hat the horse-thieves were suspicious of our presence, for their
agents had been unable to locate the ponies at any stable in town. The
horse-race was advertised to come off on the afternoon of the
following day, half a mile below the steamboat-landing, and Texas Dick
and Juan Brincos had entered horses for the stakes.

Mr. Gray thought the appearance of the ponies in the race would depend
entirely upon what course we pursued. If we attended the race the
ponies would not be there; if we stayed away he had no doubt they
would run.

Believing the trader's convictions to be correct, I instructed the
escort not to go south of the town during the day of the races, and
told Frank and Henry to amuse themselves about the streets or in the
vicinity of Mr. Gray's residence. I then started with our host to
procure a building for a military storehouse.

For the rest of the day the boys showed little disposition to wander
about; they spent most of their time lounging on their beds with a
book, or asleep.

XV

THE PONIES ARE FOUND

The following day the boy sergeants rose from their beds fully
refreshed, and after breakfast began to explore the town. They made
some purchases in the stores, and found much amusement in watching a
bevy of Mojave Indian girls buying pigments to be used in adorning
their necks, arms, and faces. Following the bronze maidens to the
shore of a lagoon that backed up to the town from the river, they
seated themselves beneath a cottonwood and witnessed the designing of
tracings in many colors, made with endless and musical chatterings,
accompanied by an evident consciousness that they were objects of
interest to two pale-face boys.

After completing the tinting the girls would walk about for a while
and display their work to admiring friends, and then plunge into and
swim about the lagoon with the ease and grace of a lot of mermaids;
emerging with no trace left of their recent ornamentation, they would
proceed to renew it in different designs, and take another swim.

"Quite like watering-place belles with extensive wardrobes," remarked
Frank.

"And takes about as long to put on the paint as to put on a
fashionable dress," said Henry, "but not so long to remove it."

Another thing that amused the boys was a _balsa_, or raft, made by the
Mojaves, of the cane-grass which grew in the river-bottoms to the
height of fifteen feet. A large bundle bound at the ends with grass
ropes would sustain tw