"Wait," the man said. He came quickly to her side and put his arm around her. Trembling and frightened she tried to get away. The rasping breath of the stallion, the strange light, and the huge arm around her waist made her feel faint.
"I can't," she said.
"Why not?"
"I can't do anything like that to Sarah, and to you and me."
"No," the man said. "I suppose you can't."
After she had gone Stud tried to sleep, but could not. Mice ventured out into the ring of light and nibbled at kernels of corn. The wind shoved at the door and rattled the black window panes. The animals stirred in their sleep, sighed deeply, dreamed of lush green pastures.
At half past three in the morning the stallion had another bad spell, and Stud thought he was going to die. He wished that he had a hypodermic needle so that he could puncture the gut at the spot where it had become the most distended. He felt helpless in the face of death. He pleaded with the stallion not to die.
Strange how big male things could die so easily. They were so strong and fiery and full of life one moment and dead the next. You could breed them to size, color, speed or endurance but you couldn't breed them against death. It made Stud Brailsford think of his own mortality watching the stallion hour by hour. He wished again that he could leave a dozen boys to propagate his kind.
"Don't die," he said. "Don't die, big fellow."
* * *