“So will I,” cried Tad Butler stoutly.
Tad won Professor Zepplin’s consent to his plan, and after Darwood had got the papers ready and the boys had gathered provisions together, 209Tad was off, riding one pony and leading another, that he might change from one to the other, thus avoiding tiring either.
With lather standing out all over his mount, Tad pounded on, eyes and ears alight for Sandy Ketcham. He halted at noon to change horses and let each drink a little from a spring. Then on once more for seemingly countless hours.
There was a brief pause in the evening, to allow the ponies to rest and graze, then on again in the darkness. The second night a longer rest was imperative, while Tad fretted, tired as he was, to be off again.
On the third day he came across the still hot ashes of a campfire, and decided that he was not far behind Ketcham. Still twenty miles from Yakutat, one of the ponies strained a tendon. The boy was forced regretfully to abandon the animal and to go forward on the second mount.
It was about eleven o’clock in the morning of the fourth day that he caught sight of a column of black smoke through an opening between the mountains.
“It’s the ‘Corsair,’” he groaned. “She’s getting ready to sail.”
On and on he rode. He swept through the village on the panting pony and down to the dock to see the ‘Corsair’ weighing anchor.
Tad Butler set up a yell, then drove his pony 210into the bay. No small boats were in sight, so, throwing himself in the icy water, he grasped the pony’s mane and, swimming with the animal, headed for the ship.
The anchor was up, but Captain Petersen had not yet signaled for slow speed ahead. He ordered a boat lowered and Tad was hauled aboard in a semi-dazed condition. Relieved of its burden, the pony rose and swam for shore. Tad was confined to his cabin, worn out by the hard ride and the icy swim. But he learned that Ketcham was on board, and Ketcham, of course, knew of Tad’s presence.