CHAPTER X
RUTH SHOWS HER METTLE
Shouting after the runaway, and shrieking advice to The Fox, who still clung to the reins, was of no particular use, and Tom Cameron realized that as well as did Jane Ann. The boy from the East picked himself up and leaped upon the rear of the second buckboard as it passed him, and they tore on after the frightened ponies.
Mary Cox could not hold them. She was not a good horsewomen, in any case; and a moment after the ponies broke loose, she was just as frightened as ever she could be.
She did not drop the lines; that was because she did not think to do so. She was frozen with terror. The ponies plunged along the narrow trail, weaving the buckboard from side to side, and Mary was helpless to stop them. On the rear seat Helen and Ruth clung together in the first shock of fear; the threatening catastrophe, too, appalled them.
But only for the first few seconds was Ruth inactive. Behind the jouncing vehicle Tom was shouting to them to "pull 'em down!" Ruth wrenched herself free from her chum's grasp and leaned forward over the seat-back.
"Give the reins to me!" she cried in Mary's ear, and seized the leathers just as they slipped from the hands of The Fox.
Ruth gripped them firmly and flung herself back into her own seat. Helen seized her with one hand and saved her from being thrown out of the pitching vehicle. And so, with her chum holding her into her seat, Ruth swung all her weight and force against the ponies' bits.
At first this seemed to have not the least effect upon the frightened animals. Ruth's slight weight exercised small pressure on those iron jaws. On and on they dashed, rocking the buckboard over the rough trail—and drawing each moment nearer to that perilous elbow in the canon!
Ruth realized the menacing danger of that turn in the trail from the moment the beasts first jumped. There was no parapet at the outer edge of the shelf—just the uneven, broken verge of the rock, with the awful drop to the roaring river below.
She remembered this in a flash, as the ponies tore on. There likewise passed through her mind a vision of the chum beside her, crushed and mangled at the bottom of the canon—and again, Helen's broken body being swept away in the river! And The Fox—the girl who had so annoyed her—would likewise be killed unless she, Ruth Fielding, found some means of averting the catastrophe.
It was a fact that she did not think of her own danger. Mainly the runaway ponies held her attention. She must stop them before they reached the fatal turn!
Were the ponies giving way a little? Was it possible that her steady, desperate pulling on the curbs was having its effect? The pressure on their iron jaws must have been severe, and even a half-broken mustang pony is not entirely impervious to pain.
But the turn in the road was so near!
Snorting and plunging, the animals would—in another moment—reach the elbow. Either they must dash themselves headlong over the precipice, and the buckboard would follow, or, in swerving around the corner, the vehicle and its three passengers would be hurled over the brink.
And then something an inspiration—it must have been—shot athwart Ruth's brain. The thought could not have been the result of previous knowledge on her part, for the girl of the Red Mill was no horsewoman. Jane Ann Hicks might have naturally thought to try the feat; but it came to Ruth in a flash and without apparent reason.
She dropped the left hand rein, stood up to seize the right rein with a shorter grip, and then flung herself back once more. The force she brought to bear on the nigh pony by this action was too much for him. His head was pulled around, and in an instant he stumbled and came with a crash to the ground!
The pony's fall brought down his mate. The runaway was stopped just at the turn of the trail—and so suddenly that Mary Cox was all but flung headlong upon the struggling animals. Ruth and Helen did fall out of the carriage—but fortunately upon the inner side of the trail.
Even then the maddened, struggling ponies might have cast themselves—and the three girls likewise—over the brink had not help been at hand. At the turn appeared Jib Pottoway, his pony in a lather, recalled by the sound of the runaways' drumming hoofs. The Indian flung himself from the saddle and gripped the bridles of the fallen horses just in season. Bob, driving the second pair of ponies with a firm hand, brought them to a halt directly behind the wreck, and Tom and Jane Ann ran to Jib's assistance.
"What's the matter with these ponies?" demanded the Indian, sharply. "How'd they get in this shape? I thought you could drive a pair of hawses, boy?" he added, with scorn, looking at Tom.
"I got out to buckle a strap and they got away," said Tom, rather sheepishly.
"Don't you scold him, Jib!" commanded Jane Ann, vigorously, "He ain't to blame."
"Who is?"
"That girl yonder," snapped the ranchman's niece, pointing an accusing finger at Mary Cox. "I saw her start 'em on the run while Tom was on the ground."
"Never!" cried The Fox, almost in tears.
"You did," repeated Jane Ann.
"Anyway, I didn't think they'd start and run so. They're dangerous. It wasn't right for the men to give us such wild ponies. I'll speak to Mr. Hicks about it."
"You needn't fret," said Jane Ann, sternly. "I'll tell Uncle Bill all right, and I bet you don't get a chance to play such a trick again as long as you're at Silver Ranch"
Ruth, who had scrambled up with Helen, now placed a restraining hand on the arm of the angry Western girl; but Jane Ann sputtered right out:
"No! I won't keep still, Ruth Fielding. If it hadn't been for you that Mary Cox would now be at the bottom of these rocks. And she'll never thank you for saving her life, and for keeping her from killing you and Helen. She doesn't know how to spell gratitude! Bah!"
"Hush up, Jinny," commanded Jib, easily. "You've got all that off your mind now, and you ought to feel some better. The ponies don't seem to be hurt much. Some scraped, that's all. We can go on, I reckon. You ride my hawse, Mr. Cameron, and I'll sit in yere and drive. Won't trust these gals alone no more."
"I guess you could trust Ruth Fielding all right," cried the loyal Tom. "She did the trick—and showed how plucky she is in the bargain. Did you ever see anything better done than the way she threw that pony?"
Jane Ann ran to the girl of the Red Mill and flung her arms around her neck.
"You're just as brave as you can be, Ruthie!" she cried. "I don't know of anybody who is braver. If you'd been brought up right out here in the mountains you couldn't have done any better—could she, Jib?"
"Miss Fielding certainly showed good mettle," admitted the Indian, with one of his rare smiles. "And now we'll go on to the camping place. Don't let's have any more words about it, or your fun will all be spoiled. Where's Ricardo, with the camp stuff? I declare! that Greaser is five miles behind, I believe."
With which he clucked to the still nervous ponies and, Tom now in the lead, the procession started on in a much more leisurely style.