Their story was told in a few words, and Sam Brewster immediately surmised who the riders were. He told the girls to go on to the house and tell Mrs. Brewster to be ready with emergencies, in case either of the travelers were found. Then he turned his horse and galloped to the barns where he called several of the men to help in the rescue work. Polly and Eleanor would have preferred to go back to the shale-fields and watch the men, but they had to go where they could be of most service in the case. "Where shall we put them, mother, if father brings both back to the house?" asked Polly. "There is only one thing we can do, and that is to prepare the cots in the harness-room for them. It is in times of need, like this, that I wish we had a large house." Down on the shale-fields, Jeb had crept to the edge of the gully and peered over. Far, far below, where the stream roared over the rocks and down waterfalls like a miniature Niagara, he saw one horse doubled up in an unnatural heap. He surmised at once, that it was dead. But half-way up he spied hoofs protruding from the shale, and to this spot he tried to make his way. As he thought, the rider was still entangled with the stirrups of the horse and could not jump free when the accident had occurred. By dint of working down, clinging like lichen to the shale surface, Jeb reached the animal whose hoofs stuck pathetically upward. He carefully scraped away the shale and exposed the head of a man. He could not say whether the victim was alive or dead, and he dared not dig away more shale, just then, or the whole side would begin to move again. Having cleared the head so the man could breathe, if possible, he looked anxiously around for the second rider. Not a sign of him was seen from the place where Jeb clung. Believing that one live man was worth two dead ones, Jeb returned to the task of unearthing the one he had found. Every slab of shale was slowly removed, meanwhile Jeb watched the loose sides above him for the least intimation that it might slide again. But so careful was he, that the body was uncovered without the surrounding shale being disturbed. Jeb felt of the man's heart and found a very slight pulsation there. He was alive! But how to get his feet free from the leather on the horse, and how to carry the big heavy fellow up that treacherous side? Jeb never lost his presence of mind, nor did he ever feel unduly excited over what he thought could not be helped; had he known what a fatalist was, he would have told you that that is what _he_ was. He sat perfectly still, because the unwary movement of a single muscle might move that mountain-side down upon him, but he could _think_ and what could hinder him from doing it? As if the very discovery that he was superior in that way, to the senseless shale all about him, made him master of the situation, so he smiled and patiently waited.