"When auntie died she gave the best she had to her favorite nephew, with the understanding, of course, that I would never enter this mare in a race, and I meant to keep her for my own use, but every time I see her it reminds me of my poor, dead aunt, and I am determined to let some good man have her, but he must use her right. It would kill me to think that auntie's favorite horse was abused."
Hank got a coughing spell and started on a run for the back end of the barn. He fell into a box stall and rolled and laughed until it seemed he would never get his breath.
"Oh, mamma!" he said, "if that dood gits that old blister he'll wish she was in heaven with Dave's auntie about the first time he goes to feed her." He doubled up again and rolled in the straw and laughed until he cried. "I like a liar, but Dave suits me too well," he cried. He peeked out of the stall just as Dave and his victim started out of the door. "Becky sure feels her ginger this morning," he said, and then fell back in the stall and rolled and laughed some more.
Dave drove down over the pavement slowly, talking "horse" as he went. When he got down on the river bank, where there was about eighty rods of good dirt road, he "cut her loose." She was used to a "brush" and liked the dirt, and the way she threw dust into that "dood's" eyes pleased Dave. "Did you ever see anything like it?" said Dave as he pulled her up. "And she only got started on that short road. She goes a mile better than a quarter." Dave turned her around and handed the lines to the young man and said, "You drive her down this time."
He fell in love with her on the way to the barn and said to
Dave, "How much do you want for her?"
"That's the trouble," said Dave, almost ready to cry. "When it comes to parting with her it almost breaks my heart; but I can't keep her around the barn, as she constantly reminds me of dear auntie. I hardly know what to say. You'll be kind to her, won't you?"
"Oh, yes, I'll be kind to her for your aunt's sake," the young man replied kindly.
As they got back to the barn Dave looked at the slick, fat team that belonged to the young man and said, "Where did you get that pair of farm horses? They'll do for plowing, but you want something that will beat anything in town, and Becky can do it."
After much talk about breeding and speed, Dave finally made him an offer to trade Becky for the team of five-year-olds and one hundred dollars. The man counted out the money without saying a word and Dave nearly fell dead, as he said afterward. "I could just as well got five hundred. What a chump I was!"
As the young man's coachman led the mare away that afternoon after delivering the five-year-olds, Dave called to him and said, "Say, watch her a little in the stable. She's cross, but if you ain't afraid of her you can handle her easy. Don't let her bluff you."