Still his composure did not last. The novelty wore off toward noon, and he found himself morose and introspective again. Sounding the depths of his grievances, he at length took to thinking of the white corral beside the river. Not in many a day had he thought of the ranch. But he was recalling it now, not through affection, not because it was home to him, but because, brooding over his many discomforts in the open, he was suddenly remembering that his life had not always been this–that he knew actual comfort, knew what it was to have his wants gratified. And recalling these facts, he naturally recalled that which had made them possible–the little ranch in the valley. So he let his thoughts linger there. Faint and elusive at first, those other days became finally quite vivid, days of expectancy and gratification, days of sugar and quartered apples, days of affection and love-talk from his pretty little mistress. And how he missed them all! How he missed them–even the Mexican hostler and the brown saddler and the old matronly horse–his mother by adoption! But they were gone from him now, gone for all time out of his life. Yet though he believed them gone, he continued to brood on them, to live each day over again in his thoughts, till the men ahead dismounted suddenly. Then he was glad to turn his attention to other matters, things close around him. One of these was the coming of the lean man with a pair of familiar objects in his hands–this after the noonday meal.
“Well, my bucky,” he began, turning critical eyes over Pat, “I been studyin’ your case a heap, and I’ve come to think I’m old Doctor Sow himself. Your young man here is knocked out of all possible good,” he went on, as Stephen smilingly approached, “and so it occurred to me, sir, as how you ain’t sick no more’n I be. What ails you is you’re an aristocrat–something that’s been knocked around unusual–what with them rustlers and with us that’s worse than rustlers–and got yourself all mussed up and unfit! All you need is a cleanin’–that’s what ails you! You’re just nice furniture–a piece o’ Sheraton, mebbe–that’s all over sweepings, and I’m the he-maid that’s going to dust you off. Hold still, now.”
So Pat, after taking a step toward Stephen, who now was stroking him tenderly, held very still, not only under the soothing caress, but under the operation–for such was the cleaning–since he was gritty beyond belief. Also, after the operation he felt immeasurably better, and better still when Stephen led him to a tiny stream and he had relieved his thirst. But that was not all of joy. Turned loose with the other horses, he fell to grazing eagerly, actually finding it good, and once lifting a long and shrill nicker in gratitude for this change in his condition. Nor did his delight stop here. With camp broken, and his young master, instead of returning him to the lead-rope, bridling and saddling him awkwardly with one hand, he set out along the trail at a gait so brisk that it brought a startled exclamation from the young man, who promptly pulled him down. But though he was forced to keep a slow gait, yet frequently during the afternoon, conscious of his fresh coat and the sense of buoyancy it gave him, he flung up his head and nickered loud and joyfully. Also, with night once more descending, and the stars twinkling in the blue-black heavens, and the sheen of a rising moon flooding the desert, he moved about among the other horses with a vigor that was almost insolence, seizing tufts of grass wherever he saw them, heedless of others’ rights.
Around the fire sat or sprawled the men. Two of them were industriously mending, one a shirt, the other a bridle. The Professor and the man with the scrubby beard were complacently smoking, while Stephen, glad to stretch out after the day’s ride with an arm that constantly distressed him, was reclining upon a blanket, staring into the flames and conjuring up in their leaping tongues numerous soothing pictures. As he sat there the man with the beard suddenly addressed him.
“Doc,” he drawled, removing his pipe from between whiskers that glinted in the light of the fire, “now that you’ve got him, what are you thinking of doing with that horse?”
“I’ll take him back,” replied Stephen, pleasantly.
The other was silent. “Shore!” he rejoined, after a moment. “But take him back where?”
“Where he belongs.”
There was further silence. “Excuse me!” finally exclaimed the other. “I was thinking as mebbe you’d take him whence he came.”
Stephen sat erect and looked at the other. He was smoking again complacently.