He began pulling up the rope from where it dangled down into the abandoned shaft.
“What are you going to do?” asked Jerry.
“I’ll show you,” replied Ned, adjusting the rope around his chest, under his arms. “Now if you two will lower me into the hole I’ll fasten this cable on the professor and you can haul him up. Then you can yank me out, and it will be killing two birds with one stone.”
“More like hanging two people with one rope,” laughed Bob.
But Ned’s plan was voted a good one. Jerry and Bob lowered him carefully down the shaft, until the slacking of the rope told that he was at the bottom. In a little while they heard a shout:
“Haul away!”
It was quite a pull for the two boys, for, though the professor was a small man, he was no lightweight. Hand over hand the cable was hauled until, at last, the shining bald head of the naturalist was observed emerging from the black hole of the abandoned mine.
“Easy, easy, boys!” he cautioned, as soon as his chin was above the surface. “I’ve got two rare specimens with me, and I don’t want them harmed.”
When Jerry and Bob had pulled Professor Snodgrass up as far as possible, by means of the rope, the naturalist rested his elbows on the edge of the shaft and wiggled the rest of the way out by his own efforts. In one hand was a big lizard, struggling to escape, and in the other was a large bat, flapping its uncanny wings.
“Ah, I have you safe, my beauties!” exclaimed the collector. “You can’t get away from me now!” He placed the reptile and bat in his green specimen-box, which was on the ground a short distance away, his face beaming with pride over his achievement, though in queer contrast to his disordered appearance, for he had fallen in the mud of the mine, his clothes were all dirt, his hat was gone and he looked as ruffled as a wet hen.