Bet flared up at once. "We're not so silly as to want excitement and nothing else. We want the treasure now that we have started out to find one. Nothing else will do."
The Judge laughed as he mounted his horse and rode down the trail.
But when he returned to the ranch and informed the boys what he wanted, he was met with roars of laughter.
"You want us to guard a buried treasure! That's a good one!" said
Seedy Saunders, the old cowboy who was now staying with Judge
Breckenridge. "Let Tommy do it! He has a treasure map in his shack
that he paid five dollars for. He'd love to do it!"
However, when the cowboys heard how much it meant to the girls to have the tunnel guarded against Kie Wicks, they entered into the spirit of it, and even though they laughed and joked, they carried out the Judge's instructions.
They moved all the professor's belongings over the mountain, and took another tent and cots for themselves.
"There just naturally has to be two of us," insisted Seedy. "We'd be scared stiff to sleep alone there, even with the professor."
"Which are you scared of?" laughed Tommy Sharpe. "Kie Wicks or the ghost of the Indian Chief's daughter?"
"Both," returned Seedy pretending to shake with fright. "But I'm mostly scared of that there ghost that walks."
The boys were hilarious as they unpacked their stuff at the Orphan
Annie claim.