Grandpa got out of the boat and he grabbed the flag from Tom's hands. He stabbed it hard and fierce into the mud. Then he took a good look, and he began to name them all, saying a little piece of praise over each: "This one's a true Palomino. She had extry big ears, but gentle as the day, even though she'd never been rode. And this great big old tall mare was blind of one eye, but she had a colt ever' spring, reg'lar as dandylions. And this mare, she's got some pretty good age to her. She's somewhere in her twenty."
The crows came circling back, cawing at Grandpa. Angrily he whipped them away with his hat. "Likely she's had twelve, fifteen head in her day, and expectin' again." He sighed heavily. "That Black Warrior was a good stallion. He died tryin' to move his family to safety, but ..." his voice broke "... they just couldn't move."
The heart-breaking work went on. They came upon snakes floating, and rabbits and rats. And they found more stallions dead, with their mares and colts nearby. And they found lone stragglers caught and tethered fast by twining vines. As the morning dragged into noon, and noon into cold afternoon, the pile of flags in the boat dwindled.
Sometimes an hour went by before they came on anything, alive or dead. Then Tom would chatter cheerfully, trying to lighten the burden. "Not ever'thing drowns," he said. "Early this morning I found me a snapper turtle under a patch of ice. He'd gone to sleep. Y'know, Paul, they snooze all winter, like bear."
Tom waited for an answer, but none came. "Funny thing about that little snapper," he went on, "he was a baby, no bigger'n a fifty-cent piece, and he was froze sure-enough. 'Tom,' I said to myself, 'he's dead.' But something tells me to put him in my inside pocket. And walking along I guess the heat of my body warmed him up, and guess what!"
"Grandpa!" Paul screamed. "I see something alive! In the woods!"
They turned the boat quickly and went poling through the soggy mass of kinksbush and myrtle. And there, caught among broken branches was a forlorn bunch of ponies, heads hanging low, their sides scarcely moving.
