"He meant to stampede the whole bunch of ponies, looked like to me," Frank Allen remarked. "I wish we knew just what his scheme was, hanging around here and taking such big risks." "I'm still thinking he wanted to have a try for that paper," affirmed Lanky doggedly, "and when he found he hadn't a ghost of a chance to lay his paws on the same, why, he got mad, and reckoned he'd have the laugh on our outfit by stampeding the range ponies." The two boys made their way to the house, followed by Charlie Gin Sing. Here they found Mr. and Mrs. Wallace, as well as Minnie Cuthbert and Paul Bird, up and partly dressed, they having been aroused by the unusual clamor, and more than curious to understand what it all meant. "No sleep for me with all this stuff going on," announced Lanky, as he sat before the resurrected fire in the big living room. "I mean to stay right here till the cows come home--I mean the cowboys--and have a close-up look at that skunk, if they overtake him." None of the others evinced any desire to seek their beds; so half an hour afterwards when they heard the riders talking and laughing over by the corral both Lanky and Frank went out to learn what the result of the chase was. "Shucks, he got clean away!" Lanky ejaculated, after hearing what some of the men had to say. "But, anyway," announced the effeminate-looking puncher with the high voice, who had come West to build up his health and who rejoiced in the name of Sally Keating, "the joke is on that coyote, because he had the bad luck to pick out the worst pony in the whole outfit, with more mean traits than you can shake a stick at." "You don't mean that white-eyed terror we call Whitey Knocker, do you Sally?" shrilled Lanky, in great joy. Upon the other's wagging his head in the affirmative, he continued with a bit of spite in his voice: "Then he's in for a peck of trouble! I only hope that bronc will break his own neck in the bargain when he goes down in a crash with his rider." Lanky knew from experience what a pack of tricks Knocker had for all occasions. There were several sore spots on the boy's person that he could lay to his determination to beat the pony with that wicked white eye at his own game, his father having finally been compelled to forbid any repetition of the dangerous task. By degrees the excitement died out, and there was an exodus of tired riders and others to their own quarters. With the morning the boys went over the ground to revive their recollection of every incident connected with the previous night's thievery. They even followed the tracks of Whitey Knocker for some little distance, which could be done through a certain queer formation of the pony's off hind hoof. "No use going any further, Lanky," said Frank finally. "The trail keeps on getting fainter right along, as the soil changes." "Then, all we've learned," suggested his chagrined chum, "is that when he flew the coop he headed about as straight as the bee flies for Double Z Ranch."