A NARROW ESCAPE
The long rope with which Jerry had captured many a wild cow was dropped
over the outer edge of the wide ledge. Since the distance was not more
than twenty-five feet, the lariat reached nearly to the crevice. Looking
around, Jerry found a projecting rock about which he wound the upper end
of the rope, but he did not trust it alone. He threw himself face
downward and grasped the knot that was nearest the edge in a firm clasp.
He told the girls he would not need their assistance at first, but that,
if he shouted, they were to both seize the rope near the rock and pull
with all their strength.
Dick, making light of the feat he was about to perform, tossed his
sombrero to one side, and then, with his hand on his heart, he made a
gallant bow to the girls.
Dora and Mary, standing close to the rock around which the rope was
twined, clung to each other nervously. They tried to smile encouragingly
toward the pretending acrobat, but they were too anxious to put much
brightness into the effort.
“Kick off your boots,” Jerry said in a low voice; “you’ll be able to
cling to the knots better in stocking feet.”
“Sort of an anti-climax.” Dick’s large brown eyes laughed through the
shell-rimmed glasses as he removed his boots. “There, _now_ I do the
renowned disappearing act. I’d feel more heroic if I were about to rescue
someone.”
“Dick isn’t the least bit afraid, is he, Jerry?” Mary asked in a
whispered voice as though she did not want the boy who had gone over the
ledge to be conscious of the fear that she felt.
“He’s all right,” Jerry reported a second later. “He’s going down the
rope as nimbly as a monkey.”
“Will there be room on the edge of that crevice for him to stand when he
_does_ get down?” was Mary’s next question.
There was a long moment’s silence, then Jerry turned his head and smiled
reassuringly. “He’s down! Oh, yes, there’s ten feet or more for him to
walk on. He’s got hold of the front wheel of the old coach.” The cowboy’s
voice changed to a warning shout, “I say, Dick, down there! _Don’t try_
to get aboard! The whole thing might crumble and take you to the bottom
of that pit.”
The girls could hear a faint shout from below. Dick evidently had assured
Jerry that he would be cautious.
“I wish we could come over where you are, Jerry,” Dora said. “I’d like to
watch Dick.”
“Stay where you are, please.” The order, without the last word, would
have sounded abrupt. “Er—I may need your help with the rope. Keep alert.”
“I couldn’t be alerter if I tried,” Mary said in a low voice to her
companion. “Every nerve in my whole body is so tense I’m afraid something
will snap or—”
“Great Jumping Jehoshaphat!”
Jerry’s startled ejaculation and sudden leap to his knees caused the
girls to cry in alarm, “Did Dick fall? Oh! Oh! What has happened?”
Jerry turned toward them and shook his head. “Sorry I hollered out that
way. Nothing happened that matters any.”
“But something did, and if you don’t tell us, we’ll come over there and
see for ourselves.” Dora’s tone was so determined that Jerry said, “Sure
I’ll tell you. When Dick took hold of the front wheel of the stage, he
must have jarred the seat, for, all at once, the driver’s skeleton
collapsed and toppled off and down into that deep crevice. Well, that’ll
be more comfortable for an eternal resting place, I reckon, than sitting
upright was, the way he’s been doing this forty years past.” Then he
called, “Hey, down there, _what_ did you say? I didn’t hear. Your voice
is blown off toward the Little Grand Canyon, I reckon.” Jerry sat
intently listening, one big brown hand cupped about his right ear. The
girls could hear Dick’s voice coming faintly from below. Jerry showed
signs of excited interest. The girls exchanged wondering glances but did
not speak until the cowboy turned toward them.
“Dick says there’s a small, child-size trunk under the driver’s seat.
Whizzle! I wish I were down there. Together we might be able to get it
out.” Leaping to his feet, Jerry went to the rock around which the rope
was tied. “_That_ ought to hold all right!” There was a glint of
determination in his gray eyes, but it wavered as he glanced at Mary who
stood watching him, but saying not a word. “There isn’t anything _here_
to frighten you girls, is there?” He seemed to be imploring the smaller
girl to tell him to go. “It’s this-a-way. If there is a child-size box or
trunk in the stage coach still, it was probably Little Bodil’s, and don’t
you see, Mary, how _important_ it is for us to get it. Why, I reckon a
clue would be there all right.”
Mary held out a small white hand. “Go along, Big Brother,” she said, “if
you’re sure the rock will hold the rope with your weight on it.”
“Shall we help the rock by holding onto the rope as well?” It was
practical Dora who asked that question.
“Yes!” Jerry’s expression brightened. “I wish you would.”
Dora thought, “Mr. Cowboy, I know _just_ what _you_ are thinking. You’re
afraid we _might_ go over to the edge and perhaps fall off, but that if
you tell us to hold onto the rope here by the rock, you expect we’ll stay
put, but you’re mistaken. As soon as I know you’re safely down, I’m going
to crawl over the ledge and peer down.”
While Dora was thus planning, she and Mary held to the highest knot in
the rope, and Jerry, having removed his boots, went over the edge without
the grand flourish that Dick had made.
“Oh, I can’t, _can’t_ hold it!” Mary exclaimed, and then Dora realized
that the younger girl had been trying to hold Jerry’s weight.
“Don’t!” she ejaculated. “The rock can hold him. Just keep your hands
lightly on the knot and pull _only_ if the rope starts slipping.”
It seemed but a few moments before the girls heard, as from far below, a
reassuring call, “All’s well!”
At once Dora let go her hold on the rope and dropped face downward as the
boys had done. Mary was not to be left behind. Cautiously, they wormed
their way to the edge of the cliff and peered over, being careful to keep
hidden. Only their hair and eyes were over the edge, and the boys, intent
on examining the skeleton stage coach, did not once glance up.
“Oh-oo!” Mary shuddered. “That black crevice looks as though it went down
into the mountain a mile or more.”
“Maybe it does!” Dora whispered. “Jerry said that it’s more than a mile
from here to the floor of the desert. The crack in the mountain may go
all the way down.”
“Oh, I _do_ wish the boys wouldn’t go so close to the edge of it!” Mary
whispered frantically. “Dora Bellman, if Dick or Jerry slipped into that
awful place—”
Dora’s interrupting voice was impatient. “_Please_ don’t start
_imagining_ terrible things. Those boys value their own lives as much as
we possibly can. Look! See how very cautiously they’re taking hold of the
driver’s seat and testing its strength. Blue Moons!” It was Dora’s turn
to be horrified. “Jerry is lifting Dick. My, aren’t his arms powerful?
Now Dick is resting his left hand on the top of the seat and pulling on
that box with his right.”
Mary clutched Dora’s arms, but neither spoke a word as they watched the
movements of the boys with startled, staring eyes.
“It’s coming slowly.” Dora’s voice was tense. “Hark! Didn’t you hear a
creak as though something about the stage had snapped suddenly?”
“Thanks be!” The words were a shout of relief. “The box is out, but oh,
Mary! _Not a second_ too soon! The skeleton stage coach is collapsing! It
has dropped right down out of sight.”
The two girls sat up with one accord and stared at each other, their
faces white.
Mary was the first to speak. Her tone was reproachful. “And yet _you_
were _so_ sure the boys would do nothing to endanger their lives. If that
crash had happened one minute sooner, they would both have gone down with
it. Dick couldn’t have leaped back in time, and Jerry would have lost his
balance, and you needn’t tell me I’m using my imagination, either, for
you _know_ it’s true.”
There was no denying that the boys had had a most narrow escape and Dora
willingly acknowledged that they had taken a greater risk than she had
supposed they would.
“As though finding that lost Bodil, or even getting money to help the
Dooleys, was worth endangering _their_ lives,” Mary continued with such a
show of indignation that Dora actually laughed. “Since it’s all over,
let’s forget it. I’m terribly thrilled about the box. I feel just as sure
as the boys do that there will be something in it that will be a clue, or
at least, lead to one.”
“Listen,” Mary said. “The boys are calling to us. See, the rope is
swaying.”
Lying flat again, Dora peered over and called, “What do you want?”
Jerry replied, “We’re tying the box to the rope. Can you two girls pull
it up? Don’t stand near the edge to do it.”
“Wait!” Dick called. Then he said something to Jerry that the girls
couldn’t hear. Dora saw the cowboy laugh and pound on his head. “He’s
calling himself a dumb-bell, looks like,” she whispered to Mary. Then
Jerry’s voice, “I’ll take back that order. You stand by the rock, will
you, and grab the rope if it starts to slip. Dick will climb up and help
lift the box. He’s such a light weight, he and the box together won’t be
any heavier than I am.”
The girls went back to the rock and saw that the rope held. They knelt by
it in readiness to seize it if it slipped. They could tell by the
tightening of the rope that Dick was ascending. In another moment, he
sprang over the edge, pulled up the box without asking the girls for
assistance, then dropped the rope down again. Soon they were joined by a
beaming Jerry.