She ignored my remark, however, and soon we were on our horses and moving along the trail toward the pass.

II

It will be unnecessary to remind those familiar with Glacier Park of the trail which hugs the mountain above timber-line, and extends toward the pass for a mile or so, in a long semicircle which curves inward.

At the end it turns to the right and mounts to an acre or so of level ground, with snow and rocks but no vegetation.  This is the Piegan Pass.  Behind it is the Garden Wall, that stupendous mass of granite rising to incredible heights.  On the other side the trail drops abruptly, by means of stepladders which I have explained.

Tish now told us of her plan.

“The unfortunate part is,” she said, “that the Ostermaiers will not see us.  I tried to arrange it so they could, but it was impossible.  We must content ourselves with the knowledge of a good deed done.”

Her plan, in brief, was this:  The sham attacking party was to turn and ride away down the far side of the pass, up which the Ostermaiers had come.  They were, according to the young man, to take the girl with them, with the idea of holding her for ransom.  She was to escape, however, while they were lunching in some secluded fastness, and, riding back to the pass, was to meet there a rescue party, which the Ostermaiers were to meet on the way down to Gunsight Chalet.

Tish’s idea was this:  We would ride up while they were lunching, pretend to think them real bandits, paying no attention to them if they fired at us, as we knew they had only blank cartridges, and, having taken them prisoners, make them walk in ignominy to the nearest camp, some miles farther.

“Then,” said Tish, “either they will confess the ruse, and the country will ring with laughter, or they will have to submit to arrest and much unpleasantness.  It will be a severe lesson.”

We reached the pass safely, and on the way down the other side we passed Mr. Oliver, the moving-picture man, with his outfit on a horse.  He touched his hat politely and moved out on a ledge to let us by.

“Mind if I take you as you go down the mountain?” he called.  “It’s a bully place for a picture.”  He stared at Aggie, who was muffled in a cape and had the dish towel round her head.  “I’d particularly like to get your Arab,” he said.  “The Far East and the Far West, you know.”

Aggie gave him a furious glance.  “Arab nothing!” she snapped.  “If you can’t tell a Christian lady from a heathen, on account of her having lost her hat, them you belong in the dirty work you’re doing.”

“Aggie, be quiet!” Tish said in an awful voice.

But wrath had made Aggie reckless. “‘Dirty work’ was what I said,” she repeated, staring at the young man.

“I beg your pardon.  I’m sure I—­”

“Don’t think,” Aggie went on, to Tish’s fury, “that we don’t know a few things.  We do.”