Clint was right, the long winter months of freedom without seeing one human had kind of let him get back to his natural wild instinct, and the first sight of Clint had been of just a human, and it'd spooked him up till he'd have to calm down some before it'd come to him just who that human was.
The cowboy spoke to him as Smoky, wild eyed, snorted and hunted for a hole, but Clint kept a speaking, and as the pony tore around and heard the voice, something gradually came to him that seemed far away and near forgot. He stopped a couple of times to look at the cowboy, and each time his getting away was less rushing, till, as the voice kept a being heard, things got clearer and clearer in that pony's brain.
Smoky had stopped once more, and neck bowed, ears straight ahead, and eyes a sparkling, faced acrost the corral to where the cowboy, still and standing, was talking to him.
"Daggone your little hide," says Clint, "are we going to have to get acquainted all over again?—come on over here and let me run my hand over that knowledge bump of yours, and maybe I can get your think tank to functioning right again."
Smoky didn't come, but he held his ground and listened to the talk. Clint talked on and watched him till the horse lost some of his wild look and then slow and easy started walking his way. Something and away in the past seemed to hold Smoky as the cowboy slowly came nearer and nearer. His instinct was all for him a leaving the spot he was holding, but that something which stuck in his memory was the stronger and sort of kept him there.
Clint came on a few steps at the time, and then stopped, and talking the while, took his time till he was within a few feet of Smoky. A little flaw of any kind right then in that human's actions could of spoilt things easy and sent the pony a skeedaddling away from there in a hurry, but Clint knowed horses and specially Smoky too well to do anything of the kind. He knowed just what was going on between that pony's ears, and how to agree with all that mixed in there.
Finally, Clint got to where by reaching out he could near of touched Smoky. Slow and easy the cowboy raised a hand and held it to within a few inches of the pony's nose, Smoky looked at it and snorted, but pretty soon he stretched his neck and mighty careful took a sniff of the human paw. He snorted again and jerked his head away from it, but it wasn't long when he took another sniff, then another and another, and each time the snort growed less to be heard, till at last, Smoky even allowed that paw to touch his nostrils, the fingers rubbed there easy for a spell and gradually went on a rubbing along his nose along on up to between his eyes and pretty soon between his ears to that knowledge bump. Five minutes afterwards Smoky was following the grinning cowboy all around the corral.
Slow and easy Clint raised a hand and held it to within a few inches of his nose. Smoky stretched his neck, sniffed at it, and snorted.