Page:Frederick Faust--Free Range Lanning.djvu/189

Rh and the second time the trap was sure to work. He must get away, but no ordinary horse would do for him. If he had had a fine animal under him Bill Dozier would never have run him down, and he would still be within the border of the law. A fine horse—such a horse as Sally, say!

Once he had connected her with his hope of freedom, he felt a tremendous urge to back her, and, besides, she had fitted into his mind the first moment he saw her, as a girl's face fits into the mind of an impressionable boy—there was Andrew's idea of a horse. No matter what experts may say, men are born with prejudices in horseflesh.

If he had been strong he would have attempted to break her at once, but he was not strong. He could barely support his own weight during the first couple of days after he left the bunk, and he had to use his mind. He began, then, at the point where Jud had left off.

Jud could ride Sally with a scrap of cloth beneath him; Andrew started to increase the size of that cloth. He did it very gradually. But he was with Sally every waking moment. He barely snatched time for his meals. Pop encouraged him, not with any hope that he would ever be able to ride an unridable horse, but because the chilly air of the outdoors rapidly began to whip the color back into Andrew's face and brighten his eye.

Half a dozen times a day Andrew changed the pad on Sally's back. To keep it in place he made a long strip of sacking to serve as a cinch, and before the first day was gone she was thoroughly used to it. With this great step accomplished, Andrew increased the burden each time he changed the pad. He got a big tarpaulin and folded it many times; the third day she was accepting it calmly and had ceased to turn her head and nose it.