It was well that Joy was tiny. Even then, Bet had difficulty in bringing her up. She tugged, she pulled, trying to ease the girl's body over the sharp projecting rocks.
Bet was weak and trembling when she clasped Joy in her arms, perched on that narrow shelf of rock.
And that was the way Kit found them ten minutes later, when the storm had passed and the sun shone fiercely down once more.
Joy was sobbing as if her heart would break and Bet was saying in a crooning voice: "Joy dear, you can talk about the boys as much as you want to from now on. I'll never again object to anything you do."
CHAPTER XII
DOUBLE DEALING
An anxious group was waiting for the girls to arrive in camp. Ma Patten had run over to make her daily call on Mrs. Breckenridge. Even Tang and the two Chinese hoys were watching eagerly and scowling toward the tempestuous sky. A thunder and lightning storm in the hills was not a thing to laugh at. A flash! A roar! And a large mass of rock was cleft apart as if a mighty hammer had struck it.
Tommy Sharpe and Seedy Saunders had saddled their horses and gone in search of the girls as soon as the storm threatened, but not knowing in which direction they had headed, it was like hunting for a needle in a hay stack.
They did find Professor Gillette, however, soaked to the skin, a bedraggled, shivering figure that set the boys laughing in spite of the pathetic look of the old man. They helped him up the hill to the Patten household where he could be taken care of, and once more went in search of the girls.
But it was not until the storm was over and the girls were climbing up the last trail to the ranch that Tommy spied them.