"Pooh! That's made of wood. Can a wooden horse _run_?" cried Laddie.
"I guess that _is_ a pretty good riddle," said Russ soberly. "What is the answer, Laddie?"
"Do you all give it up?" asked the smaller boy, his eyes shining.
"You got us thrown and tied," declared Cowboy Jack solemnly. "I couldn't guess that riddle in a thousand years."
"But you wouldn't want to wait that long to know what it is," Laddie said delightedly. "Now, would you?"
"You'd better tell us now, Laddie," said Daddy Bunker smilingly. "You know a thousand years _is_ a long time to wait."
"Well," said the little fellow proudly, "what looks like a horse, and has four legs like a horse, and runs like a horse, and eats like a horse, is----"
"Yes, yes!" exclaimed the impatient Violet.
"Why," said Laddie, with vast satisfaction, "it is a _mule_."
They all cried out in surprise at this answer. But it was a good riddle.
"Only," said Russ thoughtfully, "it's lucky you didn't say anything about its tail and ears. Then we would have caught you."
The Bunker children had so much fun with the ponies Cowboy Jack had selected for their use during the next two or three days that they thought of very little else. The mystery of the Indians and soldiers did not often trouble their minds. But something else did. Mail came from the East, and with it was a letter from Captain Ben, and another from Norah.
"And," said Mother Bunker soberly, reading the letters to the children, "both say that they have found neither Rose's wrist-watch nor Laddie's stick-pin. I am afraid, Rose and Laddie, that your carelessness has cost you both your jewelry. It is too bad. But perhaps it will teach you the lesson of carefulness with your possessions."
This, however, did not make either Rose or Laddie feel any better in their minds. They had been very proud of both the lost articles and it looked now as though they would never see the watch and the pin again.
One morning, while Mother Bunker was amusing the four younger children in the house (for the twins and Margy and Mun Bun could not always go where Rose and Russ went) the two older Bunker children rode away from the big ranch house on that very wagon-trail that had led them into such a strange adventure the first day of their stay on Cowboy Jack's ranch. Rose rode on Laddie's pony, Pinky.