"They must be," remarked Tilly. "Still—well, I sha'n't ask you again what a stampede is—not to-night."
Mr. Tim laughed.
"Well, Miss Tilly, 'tain't likely I could show you one if you did. I don't always keep 'em so handy! And now I reckon we'd better hit the trail for the Six Star, and be right lively about it, too," he added, "or we'll be having Mis' Kennedy out here herself on a broncho after ye!"
Half an hour later a white-faced, teary-eyed little woman at the Six Star Ranch was trying to get her joyful arms around six girls at once.
It was the next morning, and just before Mr. Tim's predicted storm broke, that the girls found the injured man almost hidden in the tall grass near the ranch house. They had gone out for a short ride, but had kept near shelter owing to the threatening sky. Tilly saw the man first.
"Genevieve, there's a man down there," she cried softly. "He's hurt, I think."
Genevieve was off her horse at once. The man was found to be breathing, but apparently unconscious. He lay twisted in a little huddled heap, with one of his legs bent under him. He groaned faintly when Genevieve spoke to him.
Genevieve was a little white when she straightened up.
"I think we'll have to get a wagon, or something, and two of the boys," she said. "I'll ride back to the house if some of you girls will stay here."
"We'll all stay," promised Cordelia; "only be quick," she added, slipping from her pony's back, and giving the reins to Bertha. "Maybe if I could hold his poor head he'd be more comfortable."