“It seems so. And that accounts for his perky airs this morning. He was laughing at me, partly because he felt he could snap his finger in my face, and then because Minnie had gone riding with him. Oh! well, I’m not going to bother my head about Lef Seller and his evil fortunes. If Minnie--but the least said about that the soonest mended, I guess,” and Frank closed his lips resolutely. “Then perhaps you won’t mind going back to my affairs again, eh?” insinuated the freshman. “I declare I must ask you to forgive me again, Ralph, for being so neglectful of your interests. I only wanted to see you to say that father has heard from Uncle Jim, and that he writes he is coming up here to Columbia and will see you personally. Uncle Jim also says that----” But what the New York lawyer wrote was fated not to reach the ears of the party so deeply interested, just then at any rate. A scream smote the air, coming from some point around the nearest bend of the river road, and accompanying this the boys heard a wild voice, and the confused trample of a horse’s hoofs! CHAPTER XI A TIME FOR QUICK THINKING “What is that, Frank?” cried Ralph, in excitement. “Sounds like a horse running away!” replied the other. Ralph saw his comrade’s face turn ashy white. Then he remembered something Frank had said only a short time before. “Oh! what if it is Lef’s horse!” Frank only groaned, and shut his teeth hard together. But at the same time he started to run forward. He had only taken half a dozen paces, when something shot around the bend. “There it is, Frank!” shouted Ralph, ready to do anything in his power to assist his friend, yet hardly knowing just what to attempt first. He thought of swinging his arms above his head wildly, of waving his hat, as he had read of cowboys doing when they wished to turn runaway steers; but then the river road at this point was narrow, and if the frightened animal ever swerved, it was almost certain to topple over into the water, which was both deep and swift. “It’s them--Lef and Minnie!” The white lips of Frank formed these words as he still staggered onward, though there was little need of this. Surely the plunging horse, mad with terror, would reach him before he could take half a dozen breaths. What could he do to bring the beast to a halt? He saw Lef half standing up and sawing wildly at the lines, dragging the horse’s head from side to side with the energy of his action. But what almost froze the blood in Frank’s veins was the sight of that pitiable, shrinking figure cowering down in the seat just behind. How well he remembered that bright red dress. He had thought the girl never looked so pretty as the day she first wore that; and he mustered up courage enough to tell her so, too. And now--Frank gulped something down that threatened to choke him, and tried to set his muscles for a mad spring when the runaway horse came up with him.