A GENTLEMAN
Dorothy looked bewildered. Swiftly and with a return of the emotion she
had felt at that time of her chum’s great peril, lending eloquence to
her words, Tavia told Dorothy what had happened.
“That blessed pony knew you were lying there, helpless under his feet,”
she said, “and, like the gentleman and thoroughbred he is, he wasn’t
going to hurt a lady if he could help it. You should have seen him,
Doro, pawing the air to make sure he wasn’t touching you.
“And then when I pulled you out from under him he stood so still you
would have thought he was holding his breath for fear he would move. I
never saw an animal act like that. He was human, Doro!”
Dorothy took an uncertain step toward the little pony, hands
outstretched, and Tavia regarded her curiously.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
There was a curious catch in her voice as Dorothy answered softly:
“I am going to thank—a gentleman.”
She put an arm about the pony’s neck and with her other hand gently
stroked his soft muzzle. And as though he understood what she was trying
to say to him, the little horse nuzzled against her shoulder and
whinnied gently.
Suddenly Tavia thought of the other pony, the one that had so nearly
precipitated Dorothy to her death.
She found him standing on the ledge above them, tossing his head
nervously now and then at some particularly harsh rumble of thunder or
flash of lightning, but making no attempt to stray away.
“Lucky for us they gave us a couple of gentle, domesticated ponies,”
remarked Tavia, as she climbed the trail to bring the pony back to the
spot where Dorothy was standing, her arm still about the neck of the
little horse. “One with a wilder strain in him would have shown us his
heels long since and one of us would have been obliged to walk back.”
Returning with the captured pony slipping and sliding down the trail
behind her, Tavia looked anxiously at her chum.
“Do you think you are strong enough to sit in a saddle, Doro? Because if
you’re not——”
“Oh, I am,” protested Dorothy quickly. “I feel strong enough to do
anything except stay in this awful place, Tavia. Listen to that
thunder!”
“Quite a pretty storm!” Tavia admitted. “Now, Doro dear, if you will let
me help you into the saddle, perhaps we had better start.”
“We are going back though,” asserted Dorothy almost defiantly, and was
relieved when Tavia agreed with her.
It was obvious that with Dorothy in her present condition, they could
gain nothing by going on. The only sensible thing, under the
circumstances, was to return to the safety and comfort of the ranch.
Mrs. Hank Ledger’s kitchen seemed particularly alluring to them just
then!
Tavia helped Dorothy into the saddle—almost lifted her, in fact—and was
more than ever alarmed to see how much the accident had weakened her
chum.
Dorothy was game—game as they come—she told herself loyally. But nothing
could hide the trembling hands and the fact that it required all
Dorothy’s will power, even with Tavia’s help, to climb into the saddle.
It had been tacitly decided that Dorothy should ride Hero—for so she had
dubbed the little horse in appreciation of what he had done—on the
return journey.
But as she turned the pony’s head and looked back over the
sharply-sloping trail up which they had clambered, Dorothy’s heart
misgave her.
The descent would be infinitely more difficult than the ascent had been.
The ponies, though sure-footed and used to the rough mountain trails,
would be in constant danger of slipping on the wet rocks and moss.
Guessing her thoughts, Tavia urged her own pony close to her chum and
stood for a moment beside her, staring down the steep descent.
“Looks pretty bad, doesn’t it?” she said soberly, after a moment. “But I
guess we will have to risk it, Doro. We can’t very well stay where we
are.”
“No, we can’t stay where we are,” repeated Dorothy automatically,
adding, as she pressed her hand, palm out, against her forehead: “But I
am so dizzy, Tavia. When I look down it seems as if the earth rose up to
meet me.”
“Then don’t look down!” cried Tavia sharply, noting with an access of
alarm that Dorothy reeled in the saddle as she spoke. “Look up as much
as you can, Doro, and hold on tight to the pony’s mane if you feel
yourself slipping. Oh, I wish Garry were here!”
Perhaps she had revealed more of her alarm than she had meant to in that
exclamation.
At any rate, Dorothy looked at her queerly, and, with a huge effort of
will, jerked herself upright in the saddle.
“I’m all right, Tavia,” she said courageously. “I’ll keep hold of the
pony’s mane as you said. But, Tavia—you go first!”
Her heart full of misgivings, Tavia urged her pony forward and began the
steep and slippery descent to the road far below.
It seemed for a little while that the elements, having given them a
taste of what they could really do if put to it, had decided to take
mercy on them.
There was a lull in the storm. The rain continued to fall, but more
gently, and the thunder seemed to have spent its fury, retiring into the
distance with muttered and ever decreasing rumblings.
But just as the girls, making slow progress of it and stopping every now
and then to rest and give Dorothy a chance to rally her forces, had
begun to hope that the storm was almost over, it burst upon them again,
more furiously than ever.
Came the rain again and then the wind, bending trees backward before its
onslaught, driving the rain relentlessly into their faces, forcing them
to halt every few paces to pass a hand across their blinded eyes and
peer anxiously along the trail.
“We shall be lost if we don’t look out,” Dorothy panted, during one of
these pauses.
“Look out!” repeated Tavia, with a brief laugh. “Fine chance we have to
look out when we can’t see more than a few feet before our faces. How
are you feeling, Doro—any stronger?”
“Oh, I’m all right,” Dorothy responded. But in spite of the brave
assertion, Tavia knew that she was not all right, that she was fighting
every inch of the way to keep herself erect in the saddle. Despite her
effort to hide it, Tavia saw that she was trembling all over.
“Cold?” she asked, and again Dorothy shook her head, this time almost
impatiently.
“Let’s go on,” she cried. “We must be very near the road by this time.”
But Tavia knew that they were not near the road. In fact, it was not
very long before Tavia made a discovery that startled her. In the sudden
fright that caught at her throat she must have made some sort of an
ejaculation, for Dorothy, reining up beside her, called above the noise
of the storm:
“Did you say anything, Tavia?”
“Nothing, except that we are not on the trail,” retorted Tavia calmly.
“Dorothy, I am very much afraid that we are lost!”