He was a pitiful object as he lay panting and shivering, plastered with mud and black slime, and almost dead from shock and chill. Collie spread his slicker over him and rode up the hill at a trot. The blunder colt raised its head a little, then dropped it and lay motionless.
When Collie and Billy Dime returned with gunnysacks and an old blanket, the sun had warmed the air. The mud on the colt's side and neck had begun to dry.
Billy Dime commented briefly. "He's a goner. He's froze clean to his heart. Why didn't you leave him where he was?"
Collie spread the gunnysacks on a level beneath a live-oak, beneath which they dragged the colt and covered him with the blanket. They gave him whiskey with water that they heated at a little fire of brush. The colt lifted its head, endeavoring spasmodically to get to its feet.
"He's wearin' hisself out. He ain't got much farther to go," said Billy Dime, mounting and turning his pony. "Come on, kid. If he's alive to-morrow mornin'—good enough."
"I think I'll stay awhile," said Collie. "Brand says he isn't worth saving, but—I kind of like the cuss. He's different."
"Correct, nurse, he is. You can telephone me if the patient shows signs of bitin' you. Keep tabs on his pulse—give him his whiskey regular, but don't by no means allow him to set up in bed and smoke. I'll call again nex' year. So long, sweetness."
"You go plump!" laughed Collie.
And Billy Dime rode over the hill singing a dolefully cheerful ditty about burying some one on the "lo-o-ne prairee." To him a horse was merely something useful, so long as it could go. When it couldn't go, he got another that could.