"If I do the riding, yes. Now, since you're here, and don't seem as busy as you thought you were, I'll show you the difference between this livery-stable beast and a real rope-horse."
She dismounted and called to Pard, and Pard came to her, stepping warily because of the sorrel and the rope. "Just to save time, will one of you boys go and bring my riding outfit from the stable?" she asked the line at the fence, whereupon the leading man and all the villains started unanimously to perform that slight service, which shows pretty well how Jean stood in their estimation.
"Now, that's a real, typical, livery-stable saddle and bridle," she observed to Burns, pointing scornfully at the sorrel. "I was going to tell you that I'd hate to be seen in a picture riding that outfit, anyway. Now, you watch how differently Pard behaves with a rope and everything. And you watch the sorrel get what's coming to him. Shall I 'bust' him?"
"You mean throw him?" Burns, in his eagerness, began to climb the corral fence,—until he heard a rail crack under his weight. "Yes, BUST him, if you want to. John Jimpson! if you can rope and throw that sorrel—"
Jean did not reply to that half-finished sentence. She was busy saddling Pard; now she mounted and widened her loop with a sureness of the result that flashed a thrill of expectation to her audience. Twice the loop circled over her head before she flipped it out straight and true toward the frantic sorrel as he surged by. She caught him fairly by both front feet and swung Pard half away from him. Pard's muscles stiffened against the jerk of the rope, and the sorrel went down with a bump. Pard backed knowingly and braced himself like the trained rope-horse he was, and Jean looked at Robert Grant Burns and laughed.
"I didn't bust him," she disclaimed whimsically. "He done busted himself!" She touched Pard with her heel and rode up so that the rope slackened, and she could throw off the loop. "Did you see how Pard set himself?" she questioned eagerly. "I could have gotten off and gone clear away, and Pard would have kept that horse from getting on his feet. Now you see the difference, don't you? Pard never would have gone down like that."
"Oh, you'll do," chuckled Robert Grant Burns, "I'll pay you a little more and use you and your horse together. Call that settled. Come on, boys, let's get to work."