Walter, with rifle slung over his right shoulder, went out on the first watch with instructions to go at least two hundred yards from camp and keep walking around the camp in a circle.  This would protect them from surprises on all sides.  Ned decided not to retire until he had taken his guard trick, in view of the fact that he was to go on at eleven o’clock.  But Stacy, proposing to get all the sleep he was entitled to, turned in early.  The rest did not disturb him.  The boys were unusually quiet that evening, perhaps feeling that the responsibility of the safety of the camp rested wholly upon their youthful shoulders.

Ned came in at one o’clock, after having taken his turn, unslung his rifle, drew the cartridges then put them back in the magazine again.

“I might need them before morning,” he told himself.

Chunky being sound asleep, Ned grabbed him by a foot giving him a violent pull.

“Wat’cher want?  Get out!” growled the fat boy sleepily.

“Get up and take your watch!” commanded Ned.

“Who’s afraid of Indians?” mumbled Stacy.

This time Ned took the lad by the collar, jerked him to his feet and shook him until Stacy yelled “Ouch!” so loudly as to awaken the entire camp.

It took some time, however, to get Stacy himself awake sufficiently to make him understand that he had a duty to perform.  Finally, however, he shouldered his rifle, after surreptitiously helping himself to a sandwich from the cook tent.  Then be marched off, munching the bread and meat.

“See here,” snapped Ned, running after him.  “You’re not measuring off your distance.  Come back and pace it off.”

“How many?”

“Two hundred yards.  Stretch your fat legs as far as they’ll go, then you’ll have a yard, more or less.”

Stacy started all over again, forgot the count, came back, then tried it again.  Even at that he was not sure whether he had gone one hundred yards or five.

He was awake enough, now, to observe his surroundings.  The cool breezes of the night were tossing the leaves of the cottonwoods near the water course to the west of them, while here and there in the foliage might be heard the exultant notes of a mocking bird.

Stacy shivered.

“Guess it’s going to freeze to-night,” he decided, beginning his steady tramp about the camp of the Pony Rider Boys.

Muttering to himself, as was his habit when alone, Stacy kept on until finding himself opposite the ponies, he decided to go over and look at them.  All were asleep.  Not one had awakened since going down under the powerful influence of the “sleepy grass.”

“I’d like to eat some of that stuff myself, right now,” Chunky decided out loud.  “I’d have a good excuse for going to sleep then.  Now I can’t without getting jumped on by the fellows.  Wonder what time it is—­ only half-past one.  Must be something the matter with my watch.  I know I’ve been out more’n two hours.”