He pricked his ears as they crossed the canon bottom and
breasted the ascent as bravely as his three good legs would let him.
At the top he puffed hard. Despite Pete's urging, he stood stolidly
until he had gathered enough ozone to propel him farther. "Git along,
you doggone ole cockroach!" said Pete. But Rowdy was firm. He turned
his head and gazed sadly at his rider with one mournful eye that said
plainly, "I'm doing my level best." Pete realized that the ground just
traveled was anything but level, and curbed his impatience. "I'll jest
kind o' save him for the finish," he told himself. "Then I'll hook the
spurs into him and ride in a-boilin'. Don't care what he does after
that. He can set down and rest if he wants to. Git along, old
soap-foot," he cried--"soap-foot" possibly because Rowdy occasionally
slipped. His antique legs didn't always do just what he wanted them to
do.
Topping the mesa edge, Pete saw the distant green that fringed the
Concho home-ranch, topped by a curl of smoke that drifted lazily across
the gold of the morning. Without urging, Rowdy broke into a stiff
trot, that sounded Pete's inmost depths, despite his natural good seat
in the saddle.
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