smote him.

Miss Deringham turned to watch them, realizing that whatever the steer
risked, its pursuers were in peril of life and limb. Sometimes one
horse rose above fern and thicket, or twisted, apparently with the
sinuosity of a snake, in and out amidst the clustered trunks, while
once the girl lurched forward. Miss Deringham gasped, but part of the
fluttering skirt was rent away, and the little lithe figure swept on
again. The pair were, it was evident, closing with the steer, and the
latter apparently cut off from the valley it made for by the ravine.
This was not, however, to prove an insuperable obstacle, for as Miss
Deringham with difficulty edged her horse nearer, the beast charged
straight at the hollow, and dropped into it. Then, while she regarded
its capture as certain, it rose into view again, and floundered up the
almost vertical slope on the other side with no very obvious
difficulty. Miss Deringham, who found this riding down of a Canadian
steer almost as exciting as anything she had seen when following the
English hounds, regretted that the ravine with its fringe of
undergrowth and litter of netted branches must apparently put a stop to
the pursuit. Though the width was not great, no horse, she fancied,
would be expected to face it, and she watched the two figures flitting
amidst the trunks to see when they would pull up.

There was, however, no sign that they intended to do so, and Miss
Deringham gasped a little when Alton glanced for a moment over his
shoulder.

"Pull him!" his voice reached her hoarsely, and she held her breath as
she saw the man's hand move on the bridle and his heels pressed home.
The horse swung clear of the thicket, plunged with head down, flung it