"If you have brought a hoodoo into this outfit, woe be it to you!" cried Ruth.

"It is not me," proclaimed her chum. "But I tell you _something_ is going to happen."

They worked so late that it was night before the company took the trail for Clearwater Station. There was no moon, and the stars were veiled by a haze that perhaps foreboded a storm.

This coming storm probably was what caused the excitement in a horse herd that they pa.s.sed when half way to the railroad line. Or it might have been because the motor-cars, of which there were four, were strange to the half-wild horses that the bunch became frightened.

"There's something doing with them critters, boys!" William, who was riding ahead, called back to the other pony riders, who were rear guard to the automobiles. "Keep yer eyes peeled!"

His advice was scarcely necessary. The thunder of horse-hoofs on the turf was not to be mistaken. Through the darkness the stampeding animals swept down upon the party.

"Git, you fellers!" yelled another rider. "And keep a-goin'! Jest split the wind for the station!"

The hors.e.m.e.n swept past the jouncing motor-cars. Some of the women in the cars screamed. Helen cried:

"What did I tell you!"

"Don't--_dare_--tell us anything more!" jerked out Jennie.

Through the murk the girls saw the heads and flaunted manes of the coming horses. Just what harm they might do to the motor-cars, which could not be driven rapidly on this rough trail, Ruth and her two chums did not know. But the threat of the wild ponies' approach was not to be ignored.

CHAPTER XVI

NEWS AND A THREAT

A stampede of mad cattle is like the charge of a blind and insane monster. River, nor ravine, nor any other obstruction can halt the mad rush of the horned beasts. They pile right into it, and only if it is too steep or too high do they split and go around.

A stampede of horses is different in that the equine brain appreciates danger more clearly than that of the sullen steer. Behind a cattle stampede is often left an aftermath of dead and crippled beasts. But horses are more canny. A wild horse seldom breaks a leg or suffers other injury. It is not often that the picked skeleton of a horse is found in the hills.

This herd belonging to the Hubbell ranch charged through the night directly across the trail along which the moving picture company was riding. Those on horseback could probably escape; but the motor-cars could not be driven very rapidly over the rough road.

The girls screamed as the cars b.u.mped and jounced. Out of the darkness appeared the up-reared heads and tossing manes of the ponies. There were possibly three hundred in the herd, and they ran _en ma.s.se,_ snorting and neighing, mad with that fear of the unknown which is always at the root of every stampede.

The automobile in which Ruth Fielding and her two friends, Helen and Jennie, were seated was the last of the string. It seemed as though it could not possibly escape the stampede of half-wild ponies, even if the other cars did.

"Get down in the car, girls!" shouted Ruth, suiting her action to her word. "Don't try to jump or stand up. Stoop!"

There was good reason for her command. The plunging horses seemed almost upon the car. Indeed one leader--a big black stallion,--snorting and blowing, jumped over the rear of the car, clearing it completely, and bounded away upon the other side of the trail.

He was ahead of the main stampede, however. All that found the motor-car in the path could not perform his feat. Some would be sure to plunge into the car where Ruth and Helen and Jennie crouched.

Suddenly there rode into view, coming from the head of the string of cars, a wild rider, plying whip and heel to maddened pinto pony.

"Wonota! Go back! You'll be killed!" shrieked Ruth. And then she added: "The picture will be ruined if you are hurt."

Even had the Indian girl heard Ruth's cry she would have given it small attention. Wonota was less fearful of the charging ponies than were the punchers and professional riders working for Mr. Hammond.

At least, she was the first to visualize the danger threatening the girls in the motor-car, and she did not wait to be told what to do. Up ahead the men were shouting and telling each other that Miss Fielding was in danger. But Wonota went at the charging horses without question.

She forced her snorting pinto directly between the motor-car and the stampede. She lashed the foremost horses across their faces with her quirt. She wheeled her mount and kept on beside the motor-car as its driver tried to speed up along the trail.

The mad herd seemed intent on keeping with the motor-train. Wonota gave the pinto his head and lent her entire attention to striking at the first horses in the stampede. Her quirt brought squeals of pain from more than one of the charging animals.

She fell in behind the car at last, and the scattering members of the stampede swept by. Back charged several of the pony riders, but too late to give any aid. The chauffeur of Ruth's car slackened his dangerous pace and yelled:

"It's all over, you fellers! We might have been trod into the ground for all of you. It takes this Injun gal to turn the trick. I take off my hat to Wonota."

"I guess we all take off our hats to her!" cried Helen, sitting up again. "She saved us--that is what she did!"

"Good girl, Wonota!" Ruth exclaimed, as the snorting pinto brought its rider up beside the motor-car again.

"It was little to do," the Indian girl responded modestly. "After all you have done for me, Miss Fielding. And I am not afraid of horses."

"Them horses was something to be afraid of--believe me!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed one of the men. "The gal's a peach of a rider at that."

Here Helen suddenly demanded to know where Jennie was.

"I do believe she's burrowed right through the bottom of this tonneau!"

"Haven't either!" came in the m.u.f.fled voice of the fleshy girl, and she began to rise up from under enveloping robes. "Take your foot off my arm, Nell. You're trampling me awfully. I thought it was one of those dreadful horses!"

"Well--I--like--that!" gasped Helen.

"I didn't," Jennie groaned, finally coming to the surface--like a porpoise, Ruth gigglingly suggested, to breathe! "I was sure one of those awful creatures was stamping on me. If I haven't suffered _this_ day! Such spots as were not already black and blue, are now properly bruised. I shall be a sight."

"Poor Heavy!" said Ruth. "You always have the hard part. But, thank goodness, we escaped in safety!"

"Do let's go to a hotel somewhere and stay a week to recuperate," begged the fleshy girl, as they rode on toward the railroad town. "One day of movie making calls for a week of rest--believe me!"

"You and Helen can remain at the car--"

"Not me!" cried Helen Cameron. "I do not wish to be in the picture again, but I want to see it made."

After they arrived at the special car, where a piping hot supper was ready for them, the girls forgot the shock of their adventure. Jennie, however, groaned whenever she moved.

"'Tis too bad that fat girl got so bunged up," observed one of the punchers to Helen Cameron. "I see she's a-sufferin'."

"Miss Stone's avoirdupois is forever making her trouble," laughed Helen, rather wickedly.

"Huh?" demanded the man. "Alfy Dupoy? Who's that? Her feller?"

"Oh, dear me, no!" gasped Helen. "_His_ name is Henri Marchand. I shall have to tell her that."

"Needn't mind," returned the man. "I can't be blamed for misunderstanding half what you Easterners say. You got me locoed right from the start."