“He is a fine-looking animal, but I don’t know what you are going to do with him.”
“Don’t you? Well, jump into your saddle and I’ll show you. He was presented to me by Captain Porter, on condition that I make him beat that ugly-looking mustang of yours; and I am going to do it.”
“It isn’t my style to allow a challenge like that to pass unnoticed,” said Frank, as he mounted Roderick. “Hold on! Don’t be in such a hurry. Come back here, and give me a fair chance.”
The boys had a good deal of trouble in getting started, for Archie showed a disposition to “jockey.” His expectations had been raised to the highest pitch by the captain’s glowing description of the black’s wonderful speed, but he knew what Roderick could do, and he did not intend to allow his cousin to get the start of him by so much as an inch. In order to prevent that, he managed to keep a little in advance of Frank. But at last, after several false starts, they got off together, and the trader witnessed a race that was worth going miles to see. He entered heartily into the sport, clapping his hands, and shouting and laughing at the top of his voice; and when the rivals had passed out of sight of the rancho, he returned to his seat, his face all wrinkled up with smiles, and his fat sides shaking with suppressed mirth.
Archie had not overrated the powers of his horse. He took the lead at the start, and, what was more, increased it at every jump. For half a mile he went at an astonishing rate, carrying his rider faster than he had ever traveled before on horseback; but then the furious pace began to tell on him, and the mustang, which was good for a three-mile race at any time, gained rapidly. Archie, who had kept one eye over his shoulder all the while, noticed this, and knowing that Roderick’s long wind would bring him out winner, if the race continued much farther, pulled up his horse and stopped.
“Now see here,” exclaimed Frank, “this is not fair.”
“What isn’t?” asked his cousin, innocently.
“Why, to give up the race when I begin to gain on you. Come on; this question isn’t decided yet.”
“I think it is,” replied Archie. “I am entirely satisfied. Didn’t I keep ahead of you for half a mile?”
“Yes, but I want to explain.”