The next moment the tail was taut and the jerk was almost enough to dislocate her arm. But she hung on and the shock was greater to the big steer than to Jane Ann. The yank on his tail made him lose his stride and forced him to cross his legs. The next moment Old Trouble-Maker was on his head, from which he rolled over on his side, bellowing with fright.
It was a vaquero trick that Jane Ann had seen the men perform; yet it was a mercy that she, a slight girl, was not pulled out of her saddle and killed. But Jane Ann had done the trick nicely; and in a moment she was out of her saddle, and before Ike was beside her, had tied the steer’s feet, “fore and aft,” with Jimsey’s broken rope. Then, with one foot on the heaving side of the steer, she flung off her hat and shouted to the crowd that came tearing up:
“That double-eagle’s mine! Got anything to say against it, boys?”
They cheered her to the echo, and after them came the party of Jane Ann’s friends from the East to add their congratulations. But as Ruth and the others rode up Heavy of course had to meet with an accident. Hard luck always seemed to ride the stout girl like a nightmare!
The pony on which she rode became excited because of the crowd of kicking, squealing cow ponies, and Heavy’s seat was not secure. When the pony began to cavort and plunge poor Heavy was shaken right over the pommel of her saddle. Her feet lost the stirrups and she began to scream.
“My—good—ness—me!” she stuttered. “Hold him—still! Stop! Ho—ho—ho——”
And then she slipped right over the pony’s rump and would have fallen smack upon the ground had not Tom and Bob, who had both seen her peril, leaped out of their own saddles, and caught the stout girl as she lost her hold on the reins and gave up all hope.
The boys staggered under her weight, but managed to put her upright on her feet, while her pony streaked it off across the plain, very much frightened by such a method of dismounting. It struck the whole crowd as being uproariously funny; but the good-natured and polite cowboys tried to smother their laughter.
“Don’t mind me!” exclaimed the stout girl. “Have all the fun you want to. But I don’t blame the pony for running away. I have been sitting all along his backbone, from his ears to the root of his tail, and I have certainly jounced my own backbone so loose that it rattles. I believe I’d better walk home.”
It was plain that Jennie Stone would never take a high mark in horsemanship; but they caught her pony for her and boosted her on again, and later she rode back to the ranch-house at an easy pace. But she declared that for the remainder of her stay at Silver Ranch she proposed to ride only in the automobile or in a carriage.