half-hysterical laugh, so tightly did she cling to life.  Her mood changed.  “I—­guess—­I ought to pray!” she said, “but—­I—­God—­God knows anyhow!” her voice trailing away to a whisper as if she had grown suddenly, utterly, tired.  She stretched out her hands once more with the hat, trying to use it to buoy her up.  Under the weight of her arms it sank in the sand.  She tossed it to one side.  “It will—­stay—­on top by itself,” she choked.  “I—­I—­will leave it—­maybe they will find it—­and know—­” She felt her senses were leaving her.  Even yet she had not called for help.  It had not occurred to her that rescue was possible.  As if it were an echo to her thoughts there came the throbbing tattoo of hoofs pounding the earth.  She listened intently.  Some one was riding down the lane toward the river from the ranch!  The horse was evidently running—­running madly, desperately.  Would he cross at the upper or lower ford?  Her heart pulsed with heavy dull throbs.  The sand was crushing her chest.  A wave of weakness swept over her.  She almost fainted.  At that instant Captain Jack, carrying the Ramblin’ Kid, leaped through an opening in the willows and stopped—­his front feet plowing the firm ground at the edge of the quivering beach of sand.

“Pure luck!” the Ramblin’ Kid breathed fervently, his eye quickly measuring the distance to the nearly exhausted girl; “she’s close enough I can reach her with th’ rope!  God, if it’ll only hold!” Already the coils were in his hand.  With a single backward fling of the noose and forward toss he dropped the loop over the head of Carolyn June.

“Pull it up—­close—­under your arms!” he commanded shortly, “an’ hang on with your hands to take th’ strain off your body!”

The girt obeyed without a word.

He double half-hitched the rope to the horn of the saddle, swung Captain Jack around.  “Look out!” he called to the girl as he started away from the brink of the sand.  “Steady, Boy, be careful—­” to the broncho.  The slack gradually tightened.  The strain drew on Carolyn June’s arms till it seemed they would be pulled from the sockets.  The rope cut cruelly into her body under her shoulders.  She wanted to cry—­to scream—­to laugh.  She did neither.  She threw back her head and clung with all her strength to the rough lariat, stretched taut as a cable of steel.

The Ramblin’ Kid leaned forward in the saddle, his body half turned, eyes looking back along the straight line of the severely tested rope.  He swore softly, steadily, under his breath.  “God—­if it will only hold—­if it only don’t break!”

Slowly, surely, the little stallion leaned his weight against the tensely drawn riata and Carolyn June felt herself lifted, inch by inch, out of the sand that engulfed her.  At last she fell forward—­her body free.  Without stopping the horse the Ramblin’ Kid continued away from the river-bank and dragged the girl across the yielding surface to the solid earth and safety.  The instant she was where he could reach her he whirled Captain Jack and rode quickly back.  Carolyn June was trying to get to her feet when he sprang from the broncho and helped her to the firm ground on which he stood.  She was panting and exhausted.