"Here he comes now," said Uncle Fred, as a tall, thin man, wearing a white apron and a cap came into the room with a big tray balanced on his hands. "Bill, this little girl thinks you can't cook because you're a man!"
"Oh, I only said—I only said——" and Rose blushed and hung her head.
"That's all right!" laughed Bill Johnson. "If she doesn't like my cooking I'll have her come out and show me how to make a pie or a cake!" and he laughed at Rose.
But the six little Bunkers all agreed that they never had a better meal than that first one at Uncle Fred's, even if it was cooked by a man who used to be a cowboy, as he told them later.
"It was as good as Grandma Bell's," said Russ.
"And as good as Aunt Jo's," added Rose.
"I'm glad we came!" declared Laddie, as he pulled a cookie out of his pocket. He had taken it away with him from the table.
After supper the children and grown folk walked around the ranch near the house. They saw where the cowboys slept in the "bunk house," and looked in the corral where the ponies were kept when they were not being ridden.
"Where are the little ponies we are to ride?" asked Rose of her uncle.
"I'll show them to you to-morrow," he promised. "It's too far to go over to their corral to-night."