"If you do," Pete warned, "somebody else will stake your claim." "Let me stay!" Cindy pleaded. "Let me stay, Dad! I won't be in the way, and maybe I can help!" Her father said uncertainly, "It's no place for a girl." "Please!" Cindy begged. "It looks," Pete grinned, "as though we're three homesteaders instead of two." CHAPTER EIGHT _Alec_ Alec never acted without first planning, and the action he took depended on whatever his plan called for. Right now, he decided, he'd have to move swiftly if he hoped to catch Cindy before she was out of sight. He bridled Pete's sorrel pony, whose name was Carrots, and leaped astride him. Then he shouted his intentions to his mother and whirled Carrots toward Oklahoma. At once, though it had taken less than a minute to reach and bridle the pony, he knew that he was too late. He'd noticed the running men and depended upon them to delay Cindy. But he had not counted on his sister's skill as a rider. Cindy was nowhere to be seen. Immediately Alec formed another plan. As soon as he did so, he put it into effect. Riding cautiously so as to hit none of the running men, he crossed the border into Oklahoma. After he'd passed most of the men, he let Carrots canter and drew farther ahead. Safely in advance of the crowd, Alec slowed his mount. It would be exciting to fly over the grasslands as fast as Carrots could run. But it would not be sensible, and it would not help find Cindy. The situation, in Alec's opinion, called for clear thinking. He knew that Pete Brent had in mind definite claims to which he was taking Mr. Simpson. But Alec hadn't the faintest idea how to find those claims. However, there was certain logic which could not fail to guide him correctly. North lay the Cherokee Strip, in which no lands were open, so surely Pete would not go north. It stood to reason that, knowing of claims he wanted to stake, Pete would have camped as near to them as possible. However, it did not necessarily follow that the claims lay due south. Pete might travel southeast or southwest. But since time was so important, he would not go very far to the east or west. Alec decided that, if he rode an estimated quarter of a mile east, then turned Carrots and rode the same distance west, and kept working south, he would be sure to find Cindy. And find her he would if it took him six months and he had to cover all of Oklahoma. He did not hurry, for the time for hurrying was past. Carrots might have a very long trip ahead of him, and it was well to save his strength. Letting the pony choose his own pace, Alec tried to see everything. He passed a wagon with a broken wheel. There were no horses or mules hitched to it and nobody around. Evidently, when the wagon broke down, whoever owned it had cut his team loose and ridden on into Oklahoma. Alec guided Carrots around a homesteader who had marked his claim with a huge white sheet. The homesteader was looking frantically for the corners.