He slapped the horse on the hip with his hat, and gave the latter a whirl in the air with a shrill “Whoooop-eee!” which was all that remained needful to set the horse off on a series of wild, stiff-legged plunges—­the “bucking” of which Franklin had heard so much; a manoeuvre peculiar to the half-wild Western horses, and one which is at the first experience a desperately difficult one for even a skilful horseman to overcome.  It perhaps did not occur to Curly that he was inflicting any hardship upon the newcomer, and perhaps he did not really anticipate what followed on the part either of the horse or its rider.  Had Franklin not been a good rider, and accustomed to keeping his head while sitting half-broken mounts, he must have suffered almost instantaneous defeat in this sudden encounter.  The horse threw his head down far between his fore legs at the start, and then went angling and zigzagging away over the hard ground in a wild career of humpbacked antics, which jarred Franklin to the marrow of his bones.  The air became scintillant and luminously red.  His head seemed filled with loose liquid, his spine turned into a column of mere gelatine.  The thudding of the hoofs was so rapid and so punishing to his senses that for a moment he did not realize where he actually was.  Yet with the sheer instinct of horsemanship he clung to the saddle in some fashion, until finally he was fairly forced to relax the muscular strain, and so by accident fell into the secret of the seat—­loose, yielding, not tense and strung.

“Go it, go it—­whooop-e-e-e!” cried Curly, somewhere out in a dark world.  “Ee-eikee-hooo!  Set him fair, pardner!  Set him fair, now!  Let go that leather!  Ride him straight up!  That’s right!”

Franklin had small notion of Curly’s locality, but he heard his voice, half taunting and half encouraging, and calling on all his pluck as he saw some hope of a successful issue, he resolved to ride it out if it lay within him so to do.  He was well on with his resolution when he heard another voice, which he recognised clearly.

“Good boy, Ned,” cried out this voice heartily, though likewise from some locality yet vague.  “R-ride the divil to a finish, me boy!  Git up his head, Ned!  Git up his head!  The murdering haythin’ brute!  Kill him!  Ride him out!”

And ride him out Franklin did, perhaps as much by good fortune as by skill, though none but a shrewd horseman would have hoped to do this feat.  Hurt and jarred, he yet kept upright, and at last he did get the horse’s head up and saw the wild performance close as quickly as it had begun.  The pony ceased his grunting and fell into a stiff trot, with little to indicate his hidden pyrotechnic quality.  Franklin whirled him around and rode up to where Battersleigh and Curly had now joined.  He was a bit pale, but he pulled himself together well before he reached them and dismounted with a good front of unconcern.  Battersleigh grasped his hand in both his own and greeted him with a shower of welcomes and of compliments.  Curly slapped him heartily upon the shoulders.