“He’s greased lightning!” ejaculated Bill, from his perch on the fence.
“He’s hell, that’s what he is!” retorted Curly, from a corner of the corral.
Farrish and Pete went silently on with their work. They knew that eventually, dance and squirm as he might, the horse would be caught in one or the other of the relentless loops. And so it proved. While Sunnysides 140 was side-stepping a throw by Farrish, Pete’s rope slipped snakily over his head, and tightened around the arched neck. With an artful lunge toward the Indian, and a lowering of his head, the horse struggled to throw off the coil. But it held.
Then followed a mad performance. The horse was over all the corral at once, it seemed: rearing, plunging, leaping, tossing his head, crashing into the fence with such fury that it barely stood up under his onslaughts. Bill was knocked off the fence backward on to his head; Curly, crowded into his corner, barely avoided a vicious kick; and Haig’s temper was not improved by the narrow escape he had from being crushed against a post.
“Bill!” he yelled. “Get a rope!”
The man ran into the barn, returned with a lariat, and joined the fray. Plainly chagrined, though unhurt by his fall, Bill took long chances to even up the score; and under the very hoofs of the infuriated animal, he made a throw that brought Sunnysides sprawling on the ground, his forefeet caught in Bill’s noose. It was the work of a few seconds then for Farrish to secure the hind feet also; and the horse lay prostrate, panting and half-choked, but defiant still.
Giving him no time to recover, and no more breath than he actually required, Haig and Curly forced the bit of a bridle into the outlaw’s foaming mouth. Then the noose on his hind feet was cautiously removed, one forefoot was freed, and the horse was allowed to rise. The next proceeding appeared to be resented by Sunnysides even more than what he had already been subjected to. While Farrish and Pete held his head, Haig approached him cautiously with a saddle, and dropped it 141 on his back. There was a lightning-like motion, and the saddle was tossed a dozen feet away, while the two men at the horse’s head were jerked almost off their feet. Again and again the saddle was laid on his back, to remain there barely an instant. But at the fifth attempt, to the astonishment of all, Sunnysides stood still, as if, being an equine Napoleon, he had changed his plan of battle in the face of the enemy. Without further resistance, he permitted the saddle to be adjusted and cinched, permitted the men to lead him out of the corral into the larger one adjoining it, and permitted Haig to mount him and take the bridle reins in his hand.
“I’ll be damned!” said Curly. “You’d think––”
“Shut up!” cried Farrish. “That’s a bluff.”
“Now then!” ordered Haig, pointing to the rope that still held one forefoot.