He stepped forward and caught the horse by the bit.
“Buck!” he said, as though talking to a human being, “you and me have been through a heap together—don’t fall down on me, now!—Take the kid safe, old boy!” He caught Ches up and threw him across the saddle. “You’ll only have to tell ’em what’s happened—the Lord send nothing happens to you! Good-by, you brave little devil—we’ll win out yet. Go it, Buck!”
And while one of Jim’s friends plied pick and shovel like a mad man, the other was swaying on top of a galloping horse, gripping the pommel of the saddle with all the strength he had, and shutting his eyes when he came to the high places.
Captain Hanrahan’s party were miners of substance. They were working their way out to a new country to suit their inclinations. It had just been suggested that it was perhaps time to hit the trail again when the captain saw a figure on a horse flying athwart the mountain side—the regular road was bad enough, but Bud had short cuts of his own, and Buck followed his usual way.
“Huh!” said the captain, “that man’s drunk or crazy?”
“Holy sufferin’!” gasped the man next him, as the yellow horse slipped on a turn and sent a shower of gravel a thousand feet below. “That was a near touch,” as the horse caught himself and swept on.
“Looks to me like a case of trouble, Cap,” said a third speaker. “That ain’t no man, anyhow—it’s only a boy.”