United States or Chile ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He was busy for a minute, kneeling in the sand with one knee, his head bent. Then he stood up, went forward to Smoky's head, and stood rubbing the horse's nose thoughtfully. "I hate to do it, old boy but I'm working to make's a home we've got to work together. And I'm not asking any more of you than I'd be willing to do myself, if I were a horse and you were a man."
"I'm taking chance enough," Bud retorted without looking up. "If I don't win this time I will the next, maybe." "That's right," Jeff agreed heartily, winking broadly at the others behind Bud's back. Bud rubbed Smoky's ankle with liniment, listened to various and sundry self-appointed advisers and, without seeming to think how the sums would total, took several other small bets on the race.
He came back, dimpling mischievously. He looked much more an angel than a fiend, for all his Angora chaps and flame-colored scarf. "Your bed and war-bag's on my bunk; you're on Smoky's; and Dixie's makin' himself to home in the corral. By all them signs and tokens, I give a reckless guess you're here t' stay a while. That right?" He prodded again at Rowdy's ribs. "It sure is, Pink.
"Now, kid, don't git chancey," Pop admonished uneasily. "Twenty-five is enough money to donate to Jeff." "That's right, kid. I like your nerve," Jeff cut in, emphasizing his approval with a slap on Bud's shoulder as he bent to lift Smoky's leg. "I've saw worse horses than this one come in ahead it wouldn't be no sport o' kings if nobody took a chance."
But when they were yet a few leaps from the wire clothes-line stretched high, from post to post, Bud leaned forward until he lay flat alongside Smoky's neck, and gave a real Indian war-whoop. Smoky lifted and lengthened his stride, came up again to Skeeter's middle, to his shoulder, to his ears and with the next leap thrust his nose past Skeeter's as they finished.
"I say he's lyin'," observed a squatter, whom Thomas Ransom had discovered ear-marking an unbranded calf. "Smoky knows that Pap done it," remarked another. This bolt went home. Smoky's face during the preceding five minutes had been worth studying.
Bud's head was up, also, his eyes went here and there, resting with a careless affection on those same landmarks which spelled home. He would have let Smoky's reins have a bit more slack and would have led his little convoy to the corrals at a gallop, had not hope begun to tremble and shrink from meeting certainty face to face. Had you asked him then, I think Bud would have owned himself a coward.
Ransom and Smoky, however, were unarmed; but the squatter who ran his hand over Smoky's pockets encountered a small cylinder, which he held up to the public gaze. It was an empty cartridge. To understand fully what this meant one must possess a certain knowledge of Western ways and sentiment.
If I take your money away from yuh, don't go and blame it onto me. Mebbe these fellers has got some cause to sidestep " "All right, the bet's on. And I won't blame you if I lose. Smoky's a good little horse. Don't think for a minute I'm giving you my hard earned coin. You'll have to throw up some dust to get it, old-timer. I forgot to say I'd like to make it a quarter dash."
For the first time in months the rein-ends stung Smoky's flanks when he was in his third jump. Just once Bud struck, and was ashamed of the blow as it fell.
Word Of The Day