“How did it happen?” asked Joe.

“Horse got scared at something—­I don’t know what—­and bolted.  I didn’t want to take him out—­he’s an old spitfire anyhow, and hasn’t been driven in a week.  But this feller was in a hurry,” and he nodded toward the unconscious man, “and I had to bring him out with Rex—­the only horse in the stable just then.

“I said I was afraid we’d have a smash-up, and we did.  The line busted near Baker’s place, and—­well, here we are.”

“Better here than—­down there,” observed Joe in a low voice.

“That’s right,” agreed Hank.  “Now let’s see what we can do for him.  Hope he isn’t much hurt, though I don’t see how he could be.”

“Who is he?” asked Blake, but the livery stable driver did not answer.  He was bending back the bent frame of the dashboard to more easily get out the swarthy man.  Joe and Blake, seeing what he was trying to do, helped him.

Soon they were able to lift out the stranger, but there was no need of carrying him, for he suddenly opened his eyes, straightened up and stood on his feet, retaining a supporting hand on Hank’s shoulder.

“Where—­where are we?” he asked, in a dazed way.  “Did we fall?”

He spoke with an accent that at once told Blake and Joe his nationality—­Spanish, either from Mexico or South America.

“We’re all right,” put in Hank.  “These young fellows saved us from going over into the gulch.  It was a narrow squeak, though.”

“Ah!” The man uttered the exclamation, with a long sigh of satisfaction and relief.  Then he put his hand to his forehead, and brought it away with a little blood on it.

“It is nothing.  It is a mere scratch and does not distress me in the least,” he went on, speaking very correct English, in his curiously accented voice.  He appeared to hesitate a little to pick out the words and expressions he wanted, and, often, in such cases, the wrong words, though correct enough in themselves, were selected.

“I am at ease—­all right, that is to say,” he went on, with a rather pale smile.  “And so these young men saved us—­saved our lives?  Is that what you mean, senor—­I should say, sir?” and he quickly corrected his slip.

“I should say they did!” exclaimed Hank with an air of satisfaction.  “Old Rex took matters into his own hands, or, rather legs, and we were just about headed for kingdom come when these fellows pulled us back from the brink.  As for Rex himself, I guess he’s gone where he won’t run away any more,” and leaning over the jagged edge of the bridge the stableman looked down on the motionless form of the horse.  Rex had, indeed, run his last.

“It is all so—­so surprising to me,” went on the stranger.  “It all occurred with such unexpected suddenness.  One moment we are driving along as quietly as you please, only perhaps a trifle accentuated, and then—­presto! we begin to go too fast, and the leather thong breaks.  Then indeed there are things doing, as you say up here.”