Appeals to his mother met with: "Don't bother me, my nerves are all unstrung;" or, "Poor child, he is so full of his pranks!"
Then Mrs. Pell spoke to his father, and that gentleman brought the youngster to the barn and whipped him with his riding whip.
After that a threat to tell his father curbed him some.
Chet was away two years before he came home at all. Two years at his time of life make great changes, and he came back a tall, slender youth, with a bit of dark down on his upper lip, and a thoughtful, studious air that was becoming.
He was through sowing wild oats, he said, and we all felt very proud and glad—all but his stepmother.
Of course, he drove Topsy out the first thing, and when I saw her, on her return, I knew that Chester Wallace still carried a cruel heart in his bosom. She said he drove as mercilessly as ever. I pitied the poor thing, for I knew that she loved her young master despite his cruel treatment. It is the way with us horses.
He was home two months or more, and Topsy looked jaded and worn when he went away.
I wonder that men do not more often notice when their horses have a fretted look. It is a sure sign that they are being hurt in some way.
Our eyes and facial expressions speak louder than words, if only people cared to consult them.
I noticed a horse, not long since, whose countenance was distorted with pain, yet his owner paid no heed, only cracked the whip and crowded him on.