"Too dark to get a picture, and I had a little bit of film left on a reel. I might have got a dandy rescue scene; but now it's all up. Too bad!" "Never mind, you got some good ones," Ruth comforted him. "Yes, but that would have completed the picture--'Captured By the Indians.' However, it can't be helped. Maybe after all this excitement is over we can get the Indians to pose for us. I'll tell Mr. Pertell about it." The rescuing cowboys had drawn rein in front of the lined-up Indians, near the huts of the captives. There was a goodly squad of cow punchers, and they seemed delighted to have been of some service to the picture players. Some of them were reloading their big revolvers, for they, like Baldy, in the excess of their spirits, had fired off every chamber. But no one had been hurt, for they merely shot in the air. "Well, you got here, boys, I see," remarked Baldy. "That's what we did!" cried Necktie Harry, who was flecking some dust off the end of his gaudy scarf. "We saw your smoke talk about an hour ago," explained Bow. "First I was sort of puzzled over it. I thought maybe it was the Indians, for I calculate it was about time for them to be at their high jinks. "Then I caught the private signal you and me made up, and I says: 'By Heck! Baldy's in trouble! Wasn't that what I said, Pete?" and he appealed to the foreman. "That's what it was, Bow. Them's the very words you used. Says you: 'Baldy's in trouble,' says you. And then we come on the run." "And we calculated we'd find the young ladies, and the rest of the outfit here, too," went on Bow. "When they didn't come back to the ranch last night we was all alarmed, and went off to the place they were goin' to make pictures. But there wasn't a sign of any trail there, and we didn't know what to think. We never dreamed you'd be on the _mesa_," he added to Mr. DeVere. "I suppose we never should have come," admitted the actor. "It was on a sudden impulse, and sorry enough we were for it, too." "Oh, but it all came out right," said Alice, trying to make herself look a little more presentable, for a night and more than a day spent as a prisoner in a little hut was not conducive to neatness of attire. "And Russ got some fine pictures of the ceremonies," added Ruth. "That's good!" cried Pete Batso. "When we started for here your manager said he reckoned his operator would have made good use of his time." "We didn't know just what shape you was in," said Buster Jones, "only Baldy's message didn't say any of you was killed, so we hoped for the best." "Yes, it might have been worse," agreed Baldy. "Well, now, let's travel. Did you have any trouble gettin' past their guard line, boys?" he asked. "Nary a trouble," replied Pete. "We just rushed through before they knew what was up."