is is Mr. Bunker,"
said Uncle Fred, introducing them. "This is Captain Robert Roy, my ranch
partner about whom I spoke to you," he went on to Mr. and Mrs. Bunker.
"He has been away, or you would have met him last night."

"I'm glad you are here to-day, to get my boy out of the trouble he got
himself into," said Mr. Bunker, as he shook hands with the former
soldier.

"I am glad, too!" exclaimed the captain. "I like children, and I don't
want to see them hurt. But, as it happened, Russ wasn't."

"He might have been, only for you," said Mrs. Bunker. "We can't thank
you enough. Russ, don't lasso anything more."

"Can't I lasso a fence post, Mother?" Russ asked.

"Well, maybe that, or something that isn't alive. But no more calves."

"All right," said Russ.

His clothes were brushed off, Captain Roy talked a little while with Mr.
and Mrs. Bunker, and then went back to his work, and Uncle Fred
remarked:

"Well, now the excitement is over, we can go back to the spring. I
presume the other children will be wondering what has happened."

So back they went to where Laddie, Rose and the others were waiting.

"Did you get him?" asked Laddie eagerly, when he saw Russ.

"No, he got me," was the answer. "I guess we won't play Wild West any
more. We'll be Indians and not cowboys. Indians don't have to lasso
buffaloes, do they, Uncle Fred."

"No, Indians have it sort of easy out here on their reservation," said
Mr. Bell with a laugh. "I guess it will be safer for you boys to be
Indians."

"That'll be fun too," agreed Russ.

"But we must have some feathers for our heads," said Laddie.

"We can get them in the chicken yard," returned Russ.

"Did the calf bite you?" asked Violet, and she looked at Russ as if to
make sure he was all there.

"No, he didn't bite, but he almost stepped on me. You ought to have seen
me flying around the field on the end of the rope. I couldn't get it
loose," and Russ explained how it had happened.

However he was well out of it, and promised never again to try such a
trick.

"I could make a riddle up about it, but I'm not going to," said Laddie.
"Anyhow it's hard to guess the answer, so I'll think up one that's
easier."

"Now this," said Uncle Fred, as they stood about the big spring, "is
what I was telling you about. You all see what a nice lot of water there
is here. Sometimes it overflows, there's so much. Then, within a few
hours, it will go dry."

"And where does the water go?"