"Oh, Mother! have you seen Rose? Did she come back alone?"
"Rose? I have not seen her since you both rode away together. Do you mean to say——" Then Mother Bunker saw that Russ was having hard work to keep back the tears and she—wise woman that she was—knew that this was no time to scold the boy.
"Where did she go? When did you lose her?" his mother cried, running down the steps.
"Back—back where they are making the moving picture," gasped Russ. "She was scared by the Indians shooting at the whites. But, of course, they were only making believe. And—and Rose rode away somewhere and—and—oh, Mother! I can't find her."
CHAPTER XX
PINKY GOES HOME
Rose had seen men digging and blasting at home in Pineville for the new sewer system; so when the moving picture man had run back toward her and Russ to warn them not to get into the field of the camera, Rose had thought a charge of dynamite was about to be exploded.
Although the man who warned them did not wave a red flag, dynamite was all Rose could think of. The appearance of the Indians on the hillside, in any case, frightened her, and she was quite ready to yield to panic. As we have seen, she twitched Pinky, the pony, around by his bridle-rein, and the spirited pony proceeded to gallop away.
Rose did not pay any attention to where Pinky was going. And Pinky did not remain on the trail by which the brother and sister had traveled from Cowboy Jack's ranch.