Without the least warning, Jack stumbled and fell headlong to the earth, Little Snap at the same time being flung over his head and into the bushes several yards away!
CHAPTER XII.
THE POSTBOY'S ARREST.
Instinctively, as he found himself going, Little Snap tried to catch upon the saddle, but instead he seized upon the mail pouch, and this he carried with him on his flying trip through the air.
Partially deprived of his senses by his fall, as he regained a sitting posture on the ground, he heard sharp cries from the pathway, and the dusky figures of half a dozen men appeared about the place where Jack had tripped and fallen.
"Don't let him get clear!" he heard some one say, and then a furious rush was made toward the horse struggling to regain its feet.
Little Snap's first thought was to rush to Jack's assistance, but the fact that he still held the mail pouch in his possession caused him to quickly change his mind.
While the party were attacking the animal, frantically trying to regain its feet, in the belief the postboy was somewhere beneath its body, it was possible he might get beyond their harm.
Finding their mistake, they would not likely injure Jack, and with this hope in his heart, Snap dashed lightly away in the direction he expected the path led.
He soon proved his good judgment by coming suddenly upon the well-worn way leading to Hollow Tree.
The sounds of the struggle had not ended, though he fancied they were nearly over. In this surmise he was correct, for he had not gone much farther before he heard the same voice as had spoken before, saying: