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Updated: May 11, 2025
Then the corner house shut off his view. Silvermane lengthened out and stretched lower with his white mane flying and his nose pointed level for the desert. TOWARD the close of the next day Jack Hare arrived at Seeping Springs. A pile of gray ashes marked the spot where the trimmed logs had lain. Round the pool ran a black circle hard packed into the ground by many hoofs.
The horse learned rapidly the agile turns and sudden stops necessary, and as for free running he never got enough. Out on the range Silvermane always had his head up and watched; his life had been spent in watching; he saw cattle, riders, mustangs, deer, coyotes, every moving thing.
Wolf dashed on ahead, and presently a chorus of barks announced that he had been met by the other dogs. Silvermane neighed shrilly, and the horses and mustangs in the corrals trooped noisily to the lower sides and hung inquisitive heads over the top bars.
What a clear musical tinkle, like silver bells tossing on the wind! He listened. Soft murmuring flow, babble and gurgle, little hollow fall and splash! Suddenly Silvermane, lifting his head, broke the silence of the canyon with a great sigh of content. It pierced the dull fantasy of Hare's mind; it burst the gloomy spell.
It was a perilous ride down that red slope, not so much from the hissing bullets as from the washes and gullies which Silvermane sailed over in magnificent leaps. Hare thrilled with savage delight in the wonderful prowess of his desert king, in the primal instinct of joy at escaping with the woman he loved. "Outrun!" he cried, with blazing eyes.
I wish we could get down on the home side of the spring. But we can't; we've got to pass it." With many a pause to peer through openings in the pines Hare traversed a diagonal course down the slope, crossed the line of cedars, and reached the edge of the valley a mile or more above Silver Cup. Then he turned toward it, still cautiously leading Silvermane under cover of the fringe of cedars.
So that Hare, in the chasing of a cow, had but to start Silvermane, and then he could devote himself to the handling of his rope. It took him ten times longer to lasso the cow than it took Silvermane to head the animal. Dave laughed at some of Jack's exploits, encouraged him often, praised his intent if not his deed; and always after a run nodded at Silvermane in mute admiration.
In a twinkling Billy loosened his lasso over a knot, making of it a halter, and tied the end to a cedar stump. The Naabs stood back and gazed at their prize. Silvermane was badly spent; he was wet with foam, but no fleck of blood marred his mane; his superb coat showed scratches, but none cut into the flesh. After a while he rose, panting heavily, and trembling in every muscle.
That ball of fire in the sky, a glazed circle, like iron at white heat, decided for him. The sun would be hot and would evaporate such water as leakage did not claim, and so he shared alike with Wolf, and gave the rest to Silvermane. For an hour the mocking lilac mountains hung in the air and then paled in the intense light.
To Hare it was the crowning reminder of lifelessness; it fitted this world of dull gleaming stones. Silvermane went lame and slackened his trot, causing Hare to rein in and dismount. He lifted the right forefoot, the one the horse had favored, and found a stone imbedded tightly in the cloven hoof. He pried it out with his knife and mounted again.
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