"I don't know. When you have washed go tell him that dinner will be spoiled if he doesn't hurry."
Charley growled something, made a creditable effort at revealing his face, and departed to find his father. After a short but fruitless search, he returned and reported his failure. "Wonder where he went?" he demanded.
Margaret felt a chill of apprehension. Fears of this kind were not strangers to her, for she had felt many of them in the last two years. "Perhaps Lazy wandered home without him," she suggested. "It wouldn't be the first time. You would better saddle Pinto, and go see. Take Lazy with you."
"Go yourself."
"If you want any dinner you'd better be starting. The sooner you return, the sooner you will eat," she declared, with vexation. "You know that I cannot leave now."
"All right!" growled Charley. He slouched to the corral, saddled Pinto, caught Lazy, and loped toward the gulch.
Margaret's impatience gave way to a nameless fear as the minutes passed without sign of the "men." Going to the door again, she looked out, caught her breath, and then ran toward the corral. Her father, supported in the saddle by her brother, was riding slowly toward the house.
"Dad's broke his leg, Peggy; a big rock come down on it," said Charley, gloomily. "Help me get him into the house."
Between them they soon had him on his bed and Margaret told her brother to ride to Gunsight for the doctor.