It was at just this moment that Ruth felt something—­something hard and painful—­pressing between her shoulder-blades.  She shot a glance over her shoulder to see the ugly face of Dakota Joe Fenbrook peering out at her between the walls of a narrow crack in the face of the cliff.  The thing he pressed against her was a long stick, and, with a grin of menace, he drove that stick more firmly against Ruth’s body!

“Ready?  Camera!  Go!” shouted Mr. Hooley, and the scene was on.

Ruth, with a stifled cry, realized that she was being pushed to the edge of the steep path.  There was a drop of twenty feet and more, and where she stood there was no net to break the fall!

If Fenbrook pushed her over the brink of the path Ruth knew very well that the outcome would be even too realistic for a moving picture.

CHAPTER XXIV

WONOTA’S SURPRISE

Ruth Fielding might have cried out.  But at that moment the attention of everyone was so given to the taking of the important scene that perhaps nobody would have understood her cry—­what it meant.

Behind her Dakota Joe stretched forward, pushing the stick into the small of her back and urging her closer to the brink.  The spot on which she stood was so narrow that it was impossible for her to escape without turning her body, and the bad man knew very well that the pressure of the stick kept her from doing that very thing!

The cameras were being cranked steadily, and Mr. Hooley shouted his orders as needed.  Fortunately for the success of the scene, Onehorse did not need the admonitions of Ruth to “keep in the picture.”  The point came where he made his leap for the shoulders of the white man, and it was timed exactly.  The two came to the brink of the rock in perfect accord with the appearance of Wonota on the ground below.

The Indian girl came, gun in hand, as though just from the chase.  As she ran into the field of the camera Hooley shouted his advice and she obeyed his words to the letter.  Until——­

She raised her eyes, quite as she was told.  But she looked beyond Grand and Onehorse struggling on the rock.  It was to another figure she looked—­that of Ruth being forced over the verge of the narrow path.

The girl of the Red Mill was half crouched, striving to push back against the thrust of the stick in Dakota Joe’s hands.  The upper part of Fenbrook’s body was plainly visible from Wonota’s station at the foot of the cliff, and his wicked face could be mistaken for no other.

“Now!  The gun!” shouted Mr. Hooley.  “Wonota!  Come alive!”

The Indian girl obeyed—­as far as springing into action went.  The gun she held went to her shoulder, but its muzzle did not point at the actors above her.  Instead, the threatening weapon pointed directly at the head of the villain who was forcing Ruth off her insecure footing on the narrow path.