“I want some of it too—­ no, not to eat,” corrected the fat boy.  “I’ll feed it to my aunt’s cat when I get back; then he won’t be running away from home every night.”

“Better unload the rest of the equipment, boys,” advised the Professor.  “If we must remain here all night we might as well make the best of it.”

Without their ponies, the lads spent rather a restless afternoon.  They had not fully realized before how much a part of them their horses had become until they were suddenly deprived of them.

In the meantime, the bronchos slept on undisturbed.

“I’ve got another idea,” shouted Stacy.

“Keep it to yourself,” growled Ned.  “Your ideas, like your jokes, graduated a long time ago.”

“Is there sleepy grass in the Catskill Mountains!” persisted Stacy.

“We don’t know, and we don’t—­”

“I know there is, and that’s what put Rip Van Winkle to sleep for twenty years,” shouted the fat boy in high glee.  “See, I know more than—­”

“Yes; you’re the original boy wonder.  We’ll take that for granted,” nodded Ned Rector.

Tad, however, was not inclined to look upon their enforced delay with anything like amusement.  To him it had its serious side.  He had not forgotten that they had been fleeing from the Indians.  When he got an opportunity to do so, without his companions overhearing, he approached the Professor.

“I think it would be a good plan for us to have a guard over our camp to-night.”

“On account of?”

“Yes.”

“Very well; I think myself that it would be a prudent move.  Have Juan sit up, then.”

“No, he’s a sleepy bead.  Suppose we boys take turns?”

“Very well; arrange it to suit yourselves.  I presume we ought to do something of the sort every night.  It might have saved us some trouble on our Ozark journey had we been that prudent.  Arrange it to suit you.  I’ll take my turn

“No; we can do it, Professor.  You go to bed as usual.  We’ll draw lots to see who takes the different watches.  With the four of us we’ll have to take only two hours apiece.  That won’t be bad at all.”

The other boys, after the plan had been explained to them, entered into it enthusiastically.  Walter was to take the first trick, Ned the next, Chunky the third and Tad the fourth.

And they were to take their guns out with them.  The Professor agreed to this, now that they had become more familiar with firearms.  As a matter of fact, all the boys had developed into excellent marksmen, though Tad was recognized as the best shot of the party.

Professor Zepplin, during the afternoon, gave each of them a lesson in revolver shooting, using for the purpose, his heavy army revolver.  They did pretty well with this weapon, but, of course, were not nearly as expert with it as with the rifle.

Evening came and the stock was still sleeping soundly.  There was nothing the boys could do but let them sleep, though the fact of all the ponies and burros lying about as if dead began to make the Pony Riders nervous.  Night came, and with it semi-darkness, the moon being overcast with a veil of fleecy white clouds, which cast a grayish film over the landscape.  The lads joked each other about having the “creeps,” but none would admit the charge.