Page:Betty Gordon at Boarding School.djvu/210

200 I'm thankful I landed in soft snow. Where's the sled? Oh, over there!"

"Want to quit?" asked Bob, as she began to help him right the overturned sled. "We can walk over to where we left your sled, you know, Betty."

"And miss the coast?" said Betty scornfully. "Well, not much. Bob Henderson. It takes more than one upset to make me give up coasting."

She seated herself behind Bob again, and with a touch of his foot they began the descent of the second hill. The snow had melted more here, and in some spots the covering was very thin. Bob found the task of steering really difficult.

"I don't think much of this," he began to say, but at the second word the bobsled struck a huge root, the riders were pitched forward, and for one desperate moment they clung to the scrubby undergrowth that bordered what they supposed was the side of the road.

Then their hold loosened and they fell.

Slipping, sliding, tumbling, rolling, a confused sound of Bob's shouts in her ears, Betty closed her eyes and only opened them when she found that she was stationary again. She had no idea of where she was, nor of how far she had fallen.

"Bob?" she called timidly at first, and then in terror. "Bob!"

"Look behind you," said Bob's familiar voice.