The sides of the foothills were clothed in small tracts of scrubby pine timber, and altogether it was not a pleasant country to travel over in winter.
When Bud and Stella left the ranch house, Stella was bubbling over with joy at the prospect of being in the hunt for the Indians, and the prospect of Bud teaching her the mysteries of the trail, particularly the war trail.
"Don't say a word," said Bud, with a wink, "an' we'll fool 'em all. Them Injuns never went nowhere except inter ther east. I throwed out a blast o' hot atmosphere erbout them goin' west. That wuz ter fool ole nosey Ben, who had his neck stretched out like a spring chicken's ter hear what was bein' said, an' git ther advantage o' my sooperior knowledge.
"Well, when I see that I thort I'd give him somethin' ter chase, so I hands out the west p'int, when I mean ter go ter ther east. When we start out we'll ride ter ther west until we come ter ther first draw, then foller it ter ther south until we come ter a break leadin' east, then foller that, an' we'll be fust onter ther red man's tracks."
"All right," laughed Stella. "That will be a good joke on Ben. He didn't like it because he couldn't go with us."
Now it will be seen that Bud's little fiction in the hearing of Ben was not the proper thing, and, as it turned out, Bud was mighty sorry for his apparently innocent fib before the end of the day, or the dawning of the next.
They did as Bud planned, and when they were well out of sight and hearing of the other boys they turned to the east, and, when well out on the prairie, turned their ponies' heads to the north.
As they cantered across the prairie, on which the snow was like dry sand and only about an inch deep, they could see bands of their cattle here and there pawing the snow off the grass, or "rustling" for their fodder, as the cowmen call it.
"I shore believe thar's somethin' wrong on this yere range," Bud remarked, after they had gone a few miles.