all the time. At length Frank reached a big crotched branch shooting out from the main trunk not four feet under that which sustained the unconscious balloonist.
Frank braced his feet across the crotch. He took a great, long breath of relief and satisfaction, for he found himself now so situated that if the man should stir or slip from his insecure resting place, he could retard his fall.
Frank had, upon leaving home, placed a long coil of rope in his coat pocket. This he intended to use to tie up the bicycle in case he found it necessary to take it home to repair it. He now used this to form a criss-cross sort of a hammock directly under the two branches supporting the balloonist.
"There," said Frank finally, feeling he had the man in right shape at last. "If he drops, that contrivance will hold him like a net."
The youth rested for a few minutes, for it had been no easy task to slip the rope around the two branches and secure it stoutly. When he again stood up, he moved along his footing so that his face was on a level with the strange bed of the balloonist.
The latter lay sunk down among bending twigs like a person in a hammock. His face was bloodless, and over one temple was a great lump. That
