"Must I order you to let me ride him?"
There was no lightness in the question; she meant business, Beck realized. And her bruskness delighted him for when he turned to give the cinch one more hitch—his only reply to her question—he was smiling merrily.
It was not much of a ride as western riding goes. Beck blindfolded the sorrel with the black silk scarf he wore about his neck, helped Jane to mount, saw that she had both stirrups, took the rope cautiously from the trembling bronco's neck and, at her nod, drew off the blind.
For a moment the great colt stood there as if bewildered. Then, with a grunt and a bound, he bowed his back, hung his head and pitched.
"Keep his head up! His head!" warned Beck, watching with intense interest. "Watch him...."
The horse went straight forward for a half dozen jumps. Erect in the saddle, sitting too far back, trusting too much to her stirrups, Jane rode.
The violence of the lunging jerked her head unmercifully but she had her balance.... Until he sunfished, with a wrenching movement that heaved her forward against the fork, dangerously near a fall.
"Grab it all!" called Beck, not remembering that his injunction to hang on was as Greek to her. "He— Look out!"
With a vicious fling of his whole body the sorrel swapped ends and as he came down, head toward the man, the girl shot into the air, turned completely over and struck full on her back.
Beck ran to her, heedless of the horse, which circled at a gallop. She lay very still with her eyes closed; a smudge of dirt was on her white cheek. He knelt beside her.