"Roy Blakeley influenced me a lot."
"Well then," said Barnard, "let's put the finishing touch on this job while both of us are here to do it. What do you say? Shall we haul up the flagpole?"
The shortest way down the hill in the direction of the new property was across a little gully over which they had laid a log. This was a convenient way of going when there was no burden to be borne. The hauling and carrying were done at a point some hundred feet from this hollow. In the woods beyond, they had cut and hewn a flagstaff and since two could easily carry it, Barnard's idea was that this should be done then, so that he might have Tom's assistance.
With Barnard, to think was to act, he was all impulse, and in two seconds he was on his feet and headed for their makeshift bridge across the gully. Tom followed him and was startled to see his friend go tumbling down into the hollow fully three feet from where the log lay. Before Tom reached the edge a scream, as of excruciating pain, arose, and he lost not a second in scrambling down into the chasm, where his companion lay upon the rocks, holding his forehead and groaning.
CHAPTER XXIII
FRIENDS
"Take your hand off your forehead," Tom said, trying gently to move it against the victim's will; "so I can tell if it's bad. Don't be scared, you're stunned that's all. It's cut, but it isn't bleeding much."
"I'm all right," Barnard said, trying to rise.