“Yes—just as if he’d eat him.”
“He wouldn’t eat him, but he’d worry him if he could.”
“Without salt,” said Wyatt.
“Well, have you seen Ram Dad go to him?”
“Yes; and seen him take hay out of his hand.”
“Well, what does that prove?”
“That he likes Ram Dad better than Dondy Lal.”
Dick said no more, but he was uncomfortable; and, on thinking over the matter, he felt that he should like to discharge Dondy Lal, who, with his fellow seemed to have come with the horse as a matter of course, and looked upon him as his new sahib, it being considered quite natural that an officer should have plenty of servants.
But Dick felt it would be an injustice to discharge a man upon mere suspicion; and, as he could not stoop to watch, nor question the man’s fellow-servant, matters remained in abeyance till fortune was kind to the horse one morning, when his master had risen extra early to go on to the riding-school for his lesson from Sergeant Stubbs.
It proved to be too soon, so Dick turned off in the direction of the officers’ stables to have a look at his favourite, when the loud trampling of feet and the sound of an angry voice delivering a tirade of abuse sent a thrill through the lad, and he hurried to the door, where the suspicions he had formed that the horse was brutally ill-used were at once confirmed.