“I come down with big punch,” she said.
“Where Jean came? You're riding bareback, remember.”
“No matter. I come down jus' same.” And she added with a haughty tilt of her chin, “That's easy place for me.”
Luck eyed her steadfastly, a smile of approval on his face. “All right. I know you've got plenty of nerve, Annie. You mount and ride up that draw till you get to the ridge. Come up to where you can see camp over the brow of the hill—sabe?—and then wait till I whistle. One whistle, get ready to come down. Two whistles, you, come. Ride past camera, just the way Jean did. You know you're following the white girl and trying to catch up with her. You're a friend and you have a message for her, but she's scared and is running away—sabe? You want to come down slow first and pick your trail?”
“No.” Annie-Many-Ponies started toward the pinto pony which was her mount in this picture. “I come down hill. I make big punch for you. Pete turn camera.”
“You've got more nerve than I have, Annie,” Jean told her good-naturedly as she went by. “I'd hate to run a horse down there bareback.”
“I go where Wagalexa Conka say.” From the corner of her eye she saw the quick frown of jealousy upon the face of Ramon, and her pulse gave an extra beat of triumph.
With an easy spring she mounted the pinto pony, took the reins of her squaw bridle that was her only riding gear, folded her gay blanket snugly around her uncorseted body and touched the pinto with her moccasined heels. She was ready—ready to the least little tensed nerve that tingled with eagerness under the calm surface.
She rode slowly past luck, got her few final instructions and a warning to be careful and to take no chances of an accident—which brought that inscrutable smile to her face; for Wagalexa Conka knew, and she knew also, that in the mere act of riding down that slope faster than a walk she was taking a chance of an accident. It was that risk that lightened her heart which had been so heavy all day. The greater the risk, the more eager was she to take it. She would show Ramon that she, too, could ride.
“Oh, do be careful, Annie!” Jean called anxiously when she was riding into the mouth of the draw. “Turn to the right, when you come to that big flat rock, and don't come down where I did. It's too steep. Really,” she drawled to Rosemary and Lite, “my heart was in my mouth when I came straight down by that rock. It's a lot steeper than it looks from here.”