"Yes. From a cloud, isn't it?" Bertha, too, stopped to look. "I think not. It's a bunch of cattle, I reckon. I think I make out the guards riding round them." "What is it, Mr. Tim?" Genevieve and the other girls had caught up with them now. "Cattle--over there. See?" explained Mr. Tim, briefly. At that moment the moon came out unusually clear. "I can see two men on horseback, passing each other," cried Bertha. Mr. Tim nodded. "Yes--the guard. They ride around the bunch in opposite ways, you know." "Let's go nearer! I want to see," proposed Tilly, trying to quiet the restless movements of her pony. [Illustration: "'FOLLOW ME--QUICK!' HE ORDERED"] The man shook his head. "I reckon not, Miss Tilly. A stampede ain't what I'm looking for to amuse you all to-night." "What's a stampede?" asked Tilly. "Mr. Tim, look--quick!" Genevieve's voice was urgent, a little frightened. But the man had not needed that. With a sharp word behind his teeth, he spurred his horse. "Follow me--quick!" he ordered. And with a frightened cry they obeyed. Genevieve obeyed, too--but she looked back over her shoulder. The moon was very bright now. The black shadow to the right had become a wedge-shaped, compact, seething mass, sweeping rapidly toward them. There was a rushing swish in the air, and the sound of hoarse shouts. A few moments later the maddened beasts swept across their path, well to the rear. "I'll answer your question, now, Miss Tilly," said Mr. Tim, as they reined in their horses and looked backward at the shadowy mass. "That was a stampede." "But what will they do with them?" chattered Cordelia, with white lips. "How can they ever stop them?" "Oh, they'll head them off--get them to running in a circle, probably, till they can quiet them and make them lie down again." "And will they be all right--then?" shivered Elsie. "Hm-m; yes," nodded Mr. Tim, "--till the next thing sets them going. Then they'll be again on their feet, every last one of them--heads and tails erect. Oh, they're a pretty sight then--they are!" "They must be," remarked Tilly. "Still--well, I sha'n't ask you again what a stampede is--not to-night." Mr. Tim laughed. "Well, Miss Tilly, 'tain't likely I could show you one if you did. I don't always keep 'em so handy! And now I reckon we'd better hit the trail for the Six Star, and be right lively about it, too," he added, "or we'll be having Mis' Kennedy out here herself on a broncho after ye!" Half an hour later a white-faced, teary-eyed little woman at the Six Star Ranch was trying to get her joyful arms around six girls at once. It was the next morning, and just before Mr. Tim's predicted storm broke, that the girls found the injured man almost hidden in the tall grass near the ranch house. They had gone out for a short ride, but had kept near shelter owing to the threatening sky. Tilly saw the man first. "Genevieve, there's a man down there," she cried softly. "He's hurt, I think."