Page:Ruth Fielding at Silver Ranch.djvu/102

92 away. "The time between meals isn't long enough, in her opinion, to warrant anybody's working. Come on! let's leave her to slothful dreams."

"And blisters," added Heavy. "My shoes have hurt me for two days. I wouldn't climb over these rocks for a farm—with a pig on't! Go on—and perspire—and tell yourselves you're having a good time. I've a book here to read," declared the graceless and lazy stout girl.

"But aren't the boys going?" asked Ruth.

"They've started for the tunnel down there—with Jib," said Jane Ann, with a snap. "Huh! boys aren't no good, anyway."

"Your opinion may be correct; your grammar is terrible," scoffed Mary Cox.

"Never you mind about my grammar, Miss Smarty!" rejoined the Western girl, who really couldn't forget the peril into which The Fox had run her friends so recently. "If you girls are comin' along to the top of the bridge, come on. Let the boys go down there, if they want to. The rocks are slippery, and they'll get sopping wet."

"There isn't any danger, is there?" queried Helen, thinking of her brother.

"No, of course not," replied Jane Ann. "No more danger than there is up this way," and she led the way on the path that wound up the rocky heights.