Page:Under Dewey at Manila.djvu/39

Rh "Good for you, boy! Now stop 'em!" shouted the nautical fellow on the front seat. "Stop 'em, and I'll give you a five-dollar gold piece, as sure as my name is Captain Nat Ponsberry!"

"I'll stop them if there is any stop to them!" panted Larry, for the run and the leap had somewhat winded him. "Whoa, now, my beauties, whoa!" he went on, soothingly, at the same time reaching for the reins.

"We're going into yonder gully!" suddenly shouted one of the men on the back seat. "We must jump, or we will be killed!"

"No, no, don't jump," answered his companion, a man dressed in clerical black. "The boy will stop the horses; see, he has the reins already;" and he added a half-audible prayer for their safe deliverance.

It was true that Larry had the lines, but the coat had fallen to the ground, the horses still held their bits between their teeth, and it looked as if they did not intend to give in just then. The brink of the gully swept closer and closer. Now it was a hundred feet away—now but fifty—and now twenty-five. The boy's face paled, and he gave an extra pull upon the reins of one horse, and