"What have you been doing now, Will?" asked Miss Mattie with prescience.
"Only buying a horse, Mattie," returned Red soberly. "Seems to be quite an event here."
"Is that all?"
"That's all, so help me Bob!" Red had a suspicion that there would be objections if she knew what kind of a horse it was.
Lettis, who had roomed with Red overnight, was in the secret.
The horse arrived, leading very quietly, as Mr. Upton had said. It was a buckskin, fat and hearty from long resting. Nothing could be more docile than the pensive lower lip, and the meek curve of the neck; nothing could be more contradictory than the light of its eye; a brooding, baleful fire, quietly biding its time.
"Scatter, friends!" cried Red, as he put his foot in the stirrup.
"Don't be too proud to take to timber!"
He swung over as lightly as a trapeze performer, deftly catching his other stirrup. The horse groaned and shivered.
"Don't let him get his head down! Gol-ding it! Don't you!" screamed Mr. Upton in wild excitement.
Red threw the bridle over the horn of the saddle. "Go it, you devil!" cried he. And they went. Six feet straight in the air, first pass. The crowd scattered, as requested. They hurried at that. Red gave the brute the benefit of his two hundred and a half as they touched earth, and his opponent grunted when he felt the jar of it. They rocketted and ricochetted; they were here, they were there, they were everywhere, the buckskin squealing like a pig, and fighting with every ounce of the strength that lay in his steel strung legs; the dust rose in clouds; Red's hat flew in no time; he was yelling like a maniac, and the crowd was yelling like more maniacs. Now and then a glimpse of the rider's face could be caught, transported with joy of the struggle; then the dust would roll up and hide everything. No one was more pleased at the spectacle than the blacksmith. He was capering in the middle of the road, waving a hand-hammer and shouting "Hold him down! Hold him DOWN! Why do you let him jump up like that? If I was on that horse I'd show you! Aw, there it is again—Stop him! Stop him!"