"Give it the whip," howled Walter in delight.
But Charley was too busy to heed advice. He grasped desperately at the mule's mane to save himself, but it was too short for a hand-hold, and over the mule's head he went, to land ten feet away in the soft sand with a thud that made his teeth ache.
Slowly he picked himself up, and, rubbing the sand out of his eyes, looked back. The mule was nibbling placidly at a bit of grass, and behind it the whole camp was howling with laughter.
"I really think," remarked the teamster critically, "that you could do better with a saddle on."
"Saddle," exclaimed Charley wrathfully, "have you got a saddle?"
"Got a good one over in my tent. I 'lowed you preferred to ride bare back. Some do, you know."
Charley glared at him with suspicion, but the Missourian's pale-blue eyes met his with a look of entire innocence.
"I guess I could do better with a saddle," agreed the lad dryly. "Go and get it, if you please."
Even with the saddle on, it was all he could do to retain his seat as the mule bucked up and down. But the teamster at last gave it a whack with a stick over the hind quarters and started it off on a run. For one fleeting second Charley glanced back at the grinning faces behind, then he settled down in the saddle and strove to master the vicious brute.