Bred of the Desert: A Horse and a Romance

by Charles M. Horton

Pat was the cause of the delay. Understanding neither the contraption at his heels, nor the word of command from the man, he held himself motionless and pleasantly uninterested, gazing slowly about at the landscape. Nor did he offer to move when the man cut him viciously with the whip. The lash pitted his tender flesh and hurt mightily; but even though he now understood what was required of him, he only became stubborn–bracing his legs and flattening his ears, forcefully resisting the counter efforts of the mare beside him.

And this was his nature. Long before he had demonstrated that he would not be governed by a whip. That day in the Richardses’ corral, when he was broken to saddle, cruelty alone would never have conquered him. Cruelty there had been, and much of it; but with the cruelty there had been other things–evidence of affection at the right moment, both in his mistress and in the men about him, and these, coupled with quick understanding, had made the breaking a success. And had there been evidence of kindness now, somewhere revealed early by this man, Pat might have drawn the cart as the straining mate at his side was attempting to draw it. But there was no evidence of kindness, and as a result he remained stubborn and wilful, standing braced and trembling, true in every particular to the spirit of his forebears.

Nor was Felipe less true to the spirit within himself. Infuriated, uncompromising, believing this to be merely the cussedness natural with the native horses, he abandoned all hope of instant success and gave way to brutality. Dropping the reins and reversing the whip in his hands, he began to beat the horse unmercifully, bringing the heavy butt down again and again, each mighty thwack echoing down the canyon. The result was inevitable. The horse began to kick–straight back at first, then, finding his hoofs striking the cart, he swung sideways to the tongue and kicked straight out. This last was sudden, and narrowly missed Felipe, who leaped to one side. Then, unable to reach the horse with the butt, he reversed the whip again and resumed his first torture, that of pitting the legs of the horse with the lash.

“Keeck!” he snarled, continuing to swing the whip. “Keeck! Keeck! I can keeck, too!” He swung his arm till it ached, when he stopped.

Whereupon the horse settled down. But his eyes were ablaze and he was trembling all over. Also, while undoubtedly suffering added distress from the taut and binding traces, he continued to stand at right angles to the mare–head high, nostrils quivering, mouth adrip with white slaver–until the spirit of rebellion appeared to grip him afresh. With a convulsive heave he moved again, making another quarter turn, which brought him clear of the tongue and facing the vehicle. Then he set up a nervous little prancing, whisking his tail savagely, now and again lifting his heels as if to strike. That was all. He gained no ground forward, nor did it appear as if he would ever move forward.

“You–you–” began Felipe, then subsided, evidently too wrathful for words. And he remained silent, gazing wearily toward the settlement, as though about to call assistance.

The stillness was heavy and portentous. Both horses were motionless. Felipe continued silent. Off toward the settlement all was still. Overhead, the early-morning sky pressed low, spotless and shimmering, brooding. Around and about, the flies seemed to stop buzzing. Everywhere lurked the quiet. The earth appeared bowed in humiliation, hushed in prayer as for the unfortunate one, while up and down the trail, basking in world-old light, lay dust of centuries, smug and contented in its quiescence. All nature was still, gripped in tense quiet.

The crack of a whip broke it. Felipe, suddenly bestirring himself, had sprung forward and dealt the horse a blow with the butt. Across the nose, it had sounded hollow and distant; and the horse, whipping up his head in surprised pain, now turned upon the man a look at once sorrowful and terrible, a look which spelled death and destruction. Nor did he only look. With a strange outcry, shrill and piercing, awaking the canyon in unnatural echoes, he whirled in his harness and reared, reared despite his harness, and struck out with venomous force. It was quick as a lightning flash, but, quick as it was, Felipe avoided it. And it was fortunate that he did. Terror-stricken and dropping the whip, he sped to the rear, to a point behind the cart, and there turned amazed eyes at the pirouetting horse.

What manner of horse was this, he asked himself. Could it be that this horse, black as night, was truly of the lower regions? Certainly he looked it, balancing there on his hind legs, with his reddened eyes and inflamed nostrils! And–But what was this? From the corral had come a shrill nicker, the voice of the aged mare. But that was not it! With the outcry, seemingly an answer to the black’s maddened outcry, the black dropped to all-fours again, turning quick ears and eyes in the direction of the sound! What manner of horse was this, anyway? Never before had he seen such a horse! He felt himself go limp.

There is a call in nature that sounds for life against death. It is a call put forth in innumerable different tongues around the world, and it sounds somewhere every second of the day and darkness–through jungles, across swamps, down mountains, over plains, out of valleys. It is a cry of warning, a cry to disarm foes. It is an outcry of good as against evil–the squawk of a hen to her chicks, the bleat of a sheep to her lambs, the grunt of a sow to her sucklings, the bellow of a cow to her calf, the purr of a cat to her kittens, the whine of a dog to her puppies, the drum of a partridge to her young. A cry from the heart to the heart, an appeal of flesh to its own flesh, it is the world-old mother-call.