The Pony Rider Boys in Montana | Page 5

mean progress at that.
"Go it, Chunky!" shouted Walter in high glee.
The scene, dimly lighted by the smouldering camp-fire, was so ludicrous as to send the boys into shouts of laughter. All were thoroughly awake now. They had made camp at sunset on the banks of the East Fork, of what was known as Fennell's Creek, a broad, deep stream which, joining its companion fork some ten miles further down, flowed into the clear waters of the Yellowstone. Here they had cooked their supper after many attempts, made with varying degrees of success and much laughter. Later they had rolled themselves into their blankets and gone to sleep.
They had been awakened by Stacy Brown's yawns. In a moment each had taken his turn at yawning, but all took the interruption good-naturedly, save Ned Rector. By this time he had grown very much excited. No sooner would he pounce upon the spot where Stacy appeared to be, than the fat boy by a few swift rolls would propel himself well beyond the reach of his irate companion.
"It'll be the worse for you when I do get you," cried Ned.
At that moment Ned tripped over a limb, and, plunging headlong, measured his length on the ground.
The sympathy of the camp was with the rolling Chunky.
"Get a net," shouted Walter.
"No, rope him, Ned. That's the only way you ever will catch him," jeered Tad.
Both boys were dancing about their companions, shivering in their pajamas and uttering shouts of glee.
"He's a regular high roller," said Tad.
"No, not a high roller," answered Walter.
"Here, here!" admonished the Professor. "Stop this nonsense. I want to go to sleep. I don't mind you young gentlemen enjoying yourselves, but midnight is rather late for such pranks, it strikes me. Into your blankets, every one of you."
It was doubtful that the boys even heard his voice. If they did, they failed entirely to catch the meaning of his words, so absorbed were they in the mad scramble of Ned Rector and Stacy Brown.
"Roll, Chunky, roll!" urged Walter, jumping up and down in his bare feet.
"Good thing he's fat. If he weren't so round he could never do it," mocked Tad. "I'll bet he was a fast creeper when be was a baby."
The ponies, disturbed by the noise and excitement, had scrambled to their feet and were moving about restlessly in the bushes where they were tethered.
"Master Stacy, you will get up at once!" commanded the Professor sternly.
"I can't," wailed the fat boy.
"Then I'll help you," decided the Professor firmly, striding toward the spot where he had last heard the lad's voice.
"Look out for the river!" warned Tad, as the thought of what was below the boy suddenly occurred to him.
"Help, help! I'm rolling in," cried Stacy.
"There he goes, down the bank! Grab him!" shouted Walter.
"Where?" demanded Ned, not fully grasping the import of the warning.
"There, there! Don't you see him? Right in front of you. He's going to fall into the river!"
Stacy had forgotten that they were encamped on the east shore of the fork and that the broad stream was flowing rapidly along just below him. The banks at that point were high and precipitous, the water almost icy cold, being fresh from the clear mountain streams a few miles above. In spots it was deep and treacherous.
Frantically grasping at weeds and slender sprouts, as he rolled down the almost perpendicular bluff, Stacy yelled lustily for help. From the soft, sandy soil the weeds came away in his hands, without in the slightest degree checking his progress.
Tad realized the danger perhaps more fully than did the others. In the darkness the lad might slip into one of the treacherous river pockets and drown before they could reach him.
Grasping his rope which lay beside his cot. Tad sprang to the top of the bluff, swinging the loop of his lariat above his head as he ran.
He could faintly make out the figure of his companion rolling down the steep bank.
"Hold up your hand so I can drop the rope over you," shouted Tad, at the same time making a skillful cast.
His aim was true. The rawhide reached the mark. Chunky, however, feeling it slap him smartly on the cheek, brushed the rope aside in his excitement, not realizing what it was that had struck him.
"Grab it!" roared Tad, observing that he had failed to rope the lad.
With a mighty splash, Stacy Brown plunged into the stream broadside on.
"He's in! I heard him strike!" cried Walter.
With a warning cry to the others to bring lights, Tad, without an instant's hesitation, leaped over the bluff and went shooting down it in a sitting posture.
"Tad's gone in, too," shouted Walter excitedly, as their ears caught a second splash. It was more clean cut than had been Stacy's dive, and might have passed unnoticed had