Page:Ralph Connor - The man from Glengarry.djvu/222

  can't touch him to-day, on your own place. Let me handle him."

"No," said Aleck. "We were talking about another colt of Ranald's."

"What's that?" said Yankee, pretending not to hear. "Yes, you bet," he continued. "Ranald can handle her all right. He knows something about horses, as I guess you have found out, perhaps, by this time. Never saw anything so purty. Didn't know your team had got that move in them, Mr. McNaughton," Yankee went on to Farquhar, who had just come up.

"Indeed, they are none the worse of it," said Farquhar, rubbing his hands over the sleek sides of his horses.

"Worse!" cried Yankee. "They're worth a hundred dollars more from this day on."

"I don't know that. The hundred dollars ought to go upon the driver," said Farquhar, putting his hand kindly upon Ranald's shoulder.

But this Ranald warmly repudiated. "They are a great team," he said to Farquhar. "And they could do better than they did to-day if they were better handled."

"Indeed, it would be difficult to get that," said Farquhar, "for, in my opinion, there is not a man in the country that could handle them as well."

This was too much for Aleck, who, having by this time got his horses hitched, mounted his wagon seat and came round to the door at a gallop.

"Saved you that time, my boy," said Yankee to