“Run for the fence, Dave,” shouted Joel, zigzagging from right to left, trying to confuse the bull, who now was getting thoroughly mad.
David gave one dreadful scream in the direction of a man, off in the road where Peletiah was now safe. But he didn’t run for the fence; on the contrary, he did just what Joel was doing, darted first to right, then to left, so that between the two boys the bull was troubled in his mind which one to toss up toward the sky.
The first thing either of them knew, somebody was saying, “I’ll take care of the bull—run for the fence!” and a tall figure was dashing in to the thick of things and swinging his hat.
By this time, the bull didn’t know where he was nor what course to pursue. And before any of them quite knew it, Joel and David were over the fence, and the tall man was bending over them where they had tumbled flat down on their faces in the grass.
“Well, little chap, I’ve paid my debt to you,” he was saying, bending over David. But David was beyond hearing anything, having fainted clear away. So the tall young man took him and carried him across the road where there was a little thread of a stream of water that ran away by itself from the brook, Joel stumbling after, picking out the grass that flew in his mouth as he tumbled off from the fence.
“Now then,” the tall young man smiled as David opened his eyes, “little chap, you’re coming round all right,” and he wrung the water out of his handkerchief, with which he had bathed the small, white face.
And David looked up into the eyes of the visitor who had come uninvited to Mr. Atkins’ store, to go afterward to Cherryville jail.
The color came flying back into David’s cheeks, and he sat straight.
“Did they hurt you there?” he cried anxiously.
“Not a bit of it,” said the young man. “I’m just out to-day. Good luck for you,” he said under his breath.