Running to opposite sides of the gentle Benoni they clasped hands above his back and “trick fashion” leaped to their places upon it. Their soft blankets were all the saddle they used, and with a gay “Vamos!” they started upon their search.
“How he does go! He acts just wild, doesn’t he? And isn’t the wind getting terr’ble cold?” asked Carlota, after they had ridden northward for some distance without pausing.
Carlos glanced over his shoulder. His sister’s teeth were chattering as she spoke, and he had to press his own tightly together to keep them still. But the fear which prevented his replying had already risen in her own mind and she added, brokenly:
“Dear, it’s a—‘norther’! We’re caught in it. We—shall die. Refugio—let’s try—back—.”
She had never been exposed to such a wind-storm, but he had once experienced something of it. In terror he now recalled that bad quarter-hour which his father and he had passed before they gained a shelter. There was now no shelter possible. They had steadily ridden away from every habitation they knew, straight over the plateau toward the “north,” whither their father had vanished.
But Carlos’s latent manliness now asserted itself. Benoni had become wildly terrified, yet the boy managed to pull from beneath himself the blanket which was flapping like a whip and to order Carlota to put it around her.
“I—can’t! I—I—am—so—cold!”
He nearly lost his seat in struggling to do it for her, and then Benoni took matters into his own keeping. Swerving from the trail he had been following, he bolted due eastward, and it seemed as if he scarcely touched the ground with his speeding hoofs, that even his strong body was lifted and borne along by the blast.
Carlos strained his vision to see, through the blinding storm of leaves and snow, that point whither the animal was hurrying with all his strength. But he could discover nothing and cried, in anguish:
“Oh! my little Carlota, sister! If you were only safe at home!” Then as her stiffening arm stole round his neck he added, consolingly: “But don’t you worry, darling! I’ll take care of my father’s little daughter!”