For a time Steve twisted gently, but firmly, while the station master tugged and jerked, but still none of these things moved her.
All at once there was a transformation scene, and it came about as suddenly as a flash of lightning from out a clear sky. The participants never could give a clear and harmonious account of what happened, and all that an idle on-looker could tell was that while he was gazing he suddenly heard something strike the roof of the car; in another instant he had, after the occasional custom of nations, recognized the belligerency of Sarah Maria. When the din of battle had subsided he beheld Steve arising from the earth somewhere in the rear of the car, while the station master, on all fours, was in the act of picking himself up from a spot just in front of where Sarah had lately made her heroic stand.
Steve was in no wise perturbed or even surprised. He realized that the bovine belonged to the gentle sex, and anything was to be expected. As long as Sarah Maria and his wife spared his life, he felt that he had no just cause for complaint; both ladies were erratic, and he must simply look for whatever happened.
Unfortunately, as Steve regarded it, Sarah Maria had not taken her departure, her long rope having caught around a tree and detained her. She was well out of the car, however, and the station master washed his hands of her.
It was by this time nearing dusk, and Steve set out on his long walk toward home with many misgivings. Under happy circumstances a walk in the country along the brookside, through meadows and woods in the evening is quieting, but Steve found it the reverse of this to-night. Not that he had no still moments, in which the brain might work and memory hold sway; there were such, indeed, at first, for Sarah Maria set out with him so gently and quietly that the station master concluded she must be one of those feminines who wax irritable when their way of life is disturbed, and that once relieved of the box-car she would proceed as a domestic animal should.
Even Steve began to entertain hopes of her reformation, but these were soon dashed to the ground, and he went with them. He arose (he had by this time become an expert at arising), and again there was a truce, which he gratefully accepted, for he was ready enough to enjoy peace while it lasted.
Walking by a brook which skirted a little farm, his mind was busy with reflections. Heretofore he had looked at these places and seen them in the gross, as it were; now no detail escaped him. He saw to-night that the weeds were rampant among the peas and that in the next bed the onions were drooping, evidently having been trampled upon.
“Why is it,” he argued gently to himself, “vicious things flourish in the face of every discouragement, while it requires so much coaxing and care to keep good and useful articles above ground? One might jump up and down on a weed continuously every day for a month, and the moment his back was turned it would be up again, whereas once stepping on a young blade of corn or the first shoots of an onion is the end of it.”
Then he looked at Sarah Maria and bethought him how she never had a sick day since they owned her, while a tractable, useful cow would have died half a dozen times over in this period, of pneumonia or consumption.
“Why is it?” he asked.