At last everything was ready for Frank to make the attempt to ride Firebrand. He flung aside his jacket, pulled his cap hard down on his head, and advanced toward the animal.
“You’ll have to make a jump fer ther saddle ef you ever expect to——Wa-al, dern me!”
Pecos Pete interrupted himself with the exclamation, for Frank was mounted on the broncho before he could finish speaking.
“Let go!”
Merriwell’s voice rang out clear and strong, and the cowboys broke away in all directions, one of them barely escaping being struck by the whistling heels of the animal.
Then, as if every muscle in him was of spring steel and he was run by a furnace, the broncho let himself loose. It was marvelous how he could double himself up, shoot into the air, bounce, bound, rear and kick with such rapidity. It really was impossible to follow all his movements with the eye. He squealed with fury. For thirty feet he shot ahead, and then he stopped as if turned to stone.
It did not seem possible that any living man could remain on the broncho’s back, and Frank was snapped about as if some of the movements would break him in two or jerk his head off; but he retained his seat in the saddle as if he had been fastened there and nothing could free him from it.
Firebrand stood on his forward feet and then stood on his hind feet. He jumped into the air and humped his back five or six times in rapid succession. He jumped sideways, forward, backward, in all directions, but Frank refused to be dislodged.
A murmur of admiration came from the cowboys.
“Dern my eyes!” grunted Pecos Pete, his mouth wide open.