Alice glanced curiously at the cowboy. There seemed to be a strange look on his face.
"What do you mean?" she asked, adding in a half-bantering tone: "Is it haunted?"
"Oh, Alice!" objected Ruth, shaking out her skirt so it would hang down a little longer, for the girls rode side-saddle.
"No, Miss, it ain't exactly haunted," replied Baldy. "But it ain't a safe place to go—least-ways, not all alone."
"But why?" persisted Alice.
"Because that's a sort of sacred place—at least some of the Indians from the reservation think so—and, though it's off their land, and really belongs to Mr. Norton, them redskins come over, once in a while, to hold some of their heathen rites on it."
"Oh, how interesting!" the girl cried. "I wonder if we couldn't see them? Do they do a snake dance, and things like that?"
"Well, yes, in a way," Baldy admitted. "But it ain't safe to go watch 'em. Them Indians are peculiar. They don't want strangers lookin' on, and more than once they've made trouble when outsiders tried to climb up there and watch. As I said, the Indians come from their reservation, which is several miles away, to that place for their ceremonies. And they come at odd times, so there's no tellin' when you might strike a body of 'em up on top there, pow-wowin' to beat the band, and yellin' fit to split your ears. So it's best to keep away."
"Are the Indians really dangerous?" asked Mr. DeVere.
"Well, I don't s'pose they'd actually scalp you," replied Baldy, slowly.