er eyes were fast
closed. She had gone to sleep in the middle of the talk about the
riddle.

"It's time for all little folks to go to bed," said Mother Bunker.

So none of the six little Bunkers saw the surprise that night. But they
had not forgotten it when morning came again. The six little Bunkers
never forgot anything that was promised them!

While they were all at breakfast there was a great deal of noise
outside--whooping and shouting and the like--that startled the children.
But their mother would not let them leave the table to find out about it
until breakfast was over. They heard, too, the pounding of ponies'
hoofs, and then caught sight through the windows of a company of pony
riders galloping by and off across the plain.

"Cowboys!" cried Russ. "I guess we'd better go back and put on our
cowboy suits, Laddie."

The smaller boy was just as eager as Russ to get out and see the pony
riders. As soon as they could honestly say they had eaten enough, Mother
Bunker excused them all. But when they got outside upon the broad
veranda at the front of the great house, the cowboys had disappeared.

There was something else in sight, however, that astonished the children
more than the cowboys could, for they had expected to see them.
Traveling across the plain some distance from the house was a procession
that made all the little Bunkers shout aloud.

"What's those?" Rose asked at first sight. Rose almost always saw things
first.

Russ gave one glance and fairly whooped: "Indians!"

"Oh, dear me!" gasped Rose, "are they _wild_ Indians?"

"They are real Indians just the same!" exclaimed Russ, with confidence.
"They aren't just the dressed-up kind. Look at them!"

The big Indians riding at the head of the procession wore great feather
headdresses. "Feather dusters" Laddie called them. And they did look
like feather dusters from that distance.

"We'd better get our guns and bows and arrows, hadn't we, Russ?" the
little boy asked.

"The Indians are not coming this way," explained Russ. "I guess we're
safe enough."

"See! There are Indian babies, too," cried Rose. "There's one strapped
to a board on its mother's back--just like in the pictures."

"Just the same," said Vi, rather soberly for her, "I'm glad they are
going the other way."

The Indians were traveling away from the ranch house and soon were out
of sight. So before the children could ask any of the older people about
them they were gone. And "ou