Smoky, the cow horse

by Will James

Five years had went by since that day when Clint, riding Smoky, had joined the wagon, five summers was put in when every time Smoky was saddled and rode Clint was the cowboy that done it, not another hand had touched Smoky's hide in that time, excepting when Old Tom had tried to appropriate the horse for his own string, and since that day there hadn't been any excuse for Clint to worry about anybody taking Smoky away from him. There wasn't a cowboy in the outfit who didn't more than want the horse, and if Clint ever failed to show up when the spring works started there'd most likely been some argument as to who should get him; but he'd always been the first to ride in at the home ranch at them times and none had the chance to lay claim on the horse.

In them long summers, and as Smoky was rode off and on, the little horse had got to know Clint as well as that cowboy knowed hisself; he knowed just when Clint was a little under the weather and not feeling good,—at them times he'd go kinda easy with his bucking as the cowboy topped him off. The feel of Clint's hand was plain reading to him, and he could tell by a light touch of it whether it meant "go get 'er," "easy now," "good work," and so on. The tone of his voice was also mighty easy to understand. He could tell a lot of things by it, specially when he was being got after for doing something he shouldn't of done. His eyes was wide open at them times, his neck bowed, and he'd snort sorta low, but when Clint would tell him what a fine horse he was, Smoky was some different,—he'd just take it all in the same as he would warm sunshine in a cold fall day, and near close his eyes for the peace he was feeling at the sound of the cowboy's voice.

The way Smoky could understand the man who rode him thru and around the big herds had a lot to do in making him the cowhorse he'd turned out to be, his strong liking for the rider had made him take interest and for learning all about whatever he was rode out to do. There'd come a time when Smoky knowed the second Clint had a critter spotted to be cut out, and the pony's instinct near told him which one it was, till nary a feel of the rein was needed and the dodging critter was stepped on and headed for the "cut."

The same with roping and where Smoky could do near everything but throw the rope that caught the critter. There he shined as he did anywhere else under the saddle, he'd keep one ear back, watch out and follow the loop leave Clint's hand and sail out to settle around a steer's horns, and the slack was no more than pulled when that pony would turn and go the other way,—he knowed how to "lay" the critter, and none of the big ones ever got up, not while Smoky was at one end of the rope.

Of the many happenings that all went to show of Smoky's knowing how in handling the critter there's one Clint and the boys liked to tell of. It was only an average of the others that happened, but there was something about that one which made the telling easier as to the wonders of that horse. It was the detail that counted there.

There was a big steer in the herd with a crooked horn which had curved and threatened to grow some more and right thru his eye. Clint and Jeff spotted the steer at the same time, and while one of the boys went to the wagon to get a saw to cut the horn off with, both Clint and Jeff took their ropes down and proceeded to catch the critter.

The steer was wild, big and husky, and wise, and soon as he seen the two riders coming thru the herd headed his way, he broke out of it and tail up in the air begin to leave the flat. About then is when Smoky appeared on the scene.

That little horse et up the distance between him and that steer in no time and soon carried Clint to within reach. On account of the crooked horn Clint had to rope the steer around the neck, and that he did neat and quick. Everything went on as it should,—Smoky run on past the steer and Clint throwed the slack of his rope over that same steer's rump and in another second that critter would of been laying with toes up to the sky and ready to tie.

The unexpected happened about that time, and when the rope tightened the steer didn't lay at all. Instead there was a sound of something ripping. Clint went up in the air about three feet, turned a somerset and hit the ground, the saddle stood up on end on Smoky's back and only the flank cinch was holding it there. The stub latigo of the front cinch had been ripped right thru by the tongue of the cinch buckle like it'd been paper.

Every rider around the herd seen the thing happen, and had already figgered how it wouldn't take long for Smoky to get himself out from under the remains of that saddle. For near every horse would go to bucking and raising the dust when being pinched around the flanks that way, and Smoky had seemed so inclined to want to buck that it was thought he'd never overlook that chance.