Dorothy Dale to the Rescue by Margaret Penrose

There came to the girls' ears the grumbling of thunder, faint at first but growing louder as it flung itself against the lofty mountains. A flash of lightning illumined the semi-dusk of the woods.

The ponies pricked up their ears nervously and danced a little, threatening to unseat their riders. But the girls spoke to them gently and soothingly and in a moment had them under control again.

"I suppose we ought to go back," said Dorothy. "You know what storms are up here. And the ponies don't like the thunder."

"So it seems," said Tavia dryly, adding, as she turned her pony so that its nose was pointing toward the trail again: "You may go back, if you like, Dorothy Dale, but I am going on. You are not afraid of a little storm, are you?"

"Only this doesn't promise to be a little one," replied Dorothy shortly. "But come on. If we keep the ponies on the trail -- "

"All may yet be well," finished Tavia. "Whew-that was a bad one! " she added, as a terrific crash of thunder flung itself against the mountainside and retreated, grumbling ominously.

The ponies attempted to stand on their hind legs again but the girls only urged them on the faster.

The storm was waxing fast and furious now. The wind tore down upon them in titanic gusts, catching at their breath, whipping twigs and branches across their faces, fairly blinding them.

Another terrific crash of thunder came, a vicious streak of lightning, and then the rain!

It did not come slowly in gentle little drops, but burst upon them in full fury, soaked them to the skin in its first onslaught, enveloped them in a solid sheet of water.

They struggled on, urging their reluctant ponies up the rocky trail-up and up, while the trail grew ever steeper, the ground more thickly strewn with rocks and tree stumps, more impassable.

It seemed to the girls that they were like flies, clinging to the walls of a precipice.

A hideous crash of thunder, more terrific than any that had preceded it, broke shatteringly above them and seemed to cause the very ground beneath their feet to tremble.

Dorothy's pony, scrambling over a huge boulder in the trail, slipped, stumbled, caught itself, and then, in fright, reared suddenly backward.

Caught unawares, Dorothy shot from her saddle like a bullet from a gun and rolled down the steep incline directly beneath the feet of Tavia's prancing pony.

The whole thing was so sudden, so horrible, that Tavia could only gasp in sickening fear.

But it was the gallant beast she rode that saved the life of her chum, helpless beneath the death-dealing hoofs.

The pony reared, balanced with his forefeet in the air for a moment while Dorothy's life hung in the balance. Then, with a terrific effort and almost human intelligence, he flung himself backward and to one side.

Even then his forefeet came to earth gently, tentatively, making sure that they touched only earth and stone. Then he stood quite still, shivering.

Dorothy lay beneath his body, her arm flung out, her face turned upward to the sky. She was as still as death and a sinister red spot grew upon her forehead-grew and widened while two tiny rivulets of blood ran down her cheek.