"I've got him!" shrieked the blue boy.
The red pony turned mild bright eyes upon brown Awguan, and twitched red velvet ears to express surprise, and wrinkled a polite nose.
"Hello! I hadn't noticed you before. Fine day, isn't it?" said the ears.
Awguan rolled his wicked eye and snorted. The blue boy shrilled a comment of surprising particulars—a hatless boy in denim. Stanley turned his head at a clatter of hoofs; Something Dewing, on the trail from town, galloped to join them.
"That was a creditable arrest you made, Mitchell," he said, drawing rein.
"I saw it all from the top of Mule Hill. And I certainly thought our
Little Boy Blue was going to take the Big Trip. He'll make a hand!"
The gambler's eyes, unguarded and sincere for once, flashed quizzical admiration at Little Boy Blue, who, concurrently with the above speech, quavered forth his lurid personal opinions of the red pony. He was a lean, large-eyed person, apparently of some nine or ten years—which left his vocabulary unaccounted for; his face was smeared and bleeding, scratched by catclaw; his apparel much betattered by the same reason.
He now checked a flood of biographical detail concerning the red pony long enough to fling a remark their way:
"Ain't no Boy Blue—damn your soul! Name's Robteeleecarr!"
Dewing and Mitchell exchanged glances.
"What's that? What did he say?"