"Nothing of the kind. It's those tight boots. Here, you ride, and let me walk." So saying, she slipped to the ground.
As was natural the horse stopped with a jerk. So did Racey.
"You get into that saddle," he directed, sternly. "We ain't got time for any foolishness."
Foolishness! And she was only trying to be thoughtful. Foolishness! She turned and climbed back into the saddle, and sat up straight, her backbone as stiff as a ramrod, and looked over his head and far away. For the moment she was so hopping mad she forgot the danger they were in. They made their way down into the heavy growth of Engelmann spruce that filled the notch, crossed the floor of the notch, and began again to climb.
An hour later they crossed the top of the second mountain and saw far below them a long saddle back split in the middle by a narrow cleft. At that distance it looked very narrow. In reality, it was forty feet wide. Racey stopped and swept with squinting eyes the place where he knew the bridge to be.
"See," he said, suddenly, pointing for Molly's benefit. "There's the Daisy trail. I can see her plain—to the left of that arrowhead bunch of trees. And the bridge is behind the trees."
"But I don't see any trail."
"Grown up in grass. That's why. It's behind the trees mostly, anyhow.
But she's there, the trail is. You can bet on it."
"I don't want to bet on it." Shortly. She was still mad at him. He had saved her life, he had succeeded in saving the family ranch, he had put her under eternal obligations, but he had called her thought for him foolishness. It was too much.
Yet all the time she was ashamed of herself. She knew that she was small and mean and narrow and deserved a spanking if any girl did. She wanted to cuff Racey, cuff him till his ears turned red and his head rang. For that is the way a woman feels when she loves a man and he has hurt her feelings. But she feels almost precisely the same way when she hates one who has. Truth it is that Love and Hate are close akin.