Read Ebook: Horses Nine Stories of Harness and Saddle by Ford Sewell

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Ebook has 337 lines and 23153 words, and 7 pages

But just here Chieftain heard a shrill, familiar whistle, and in a moment, with as much speed as his heavy build allowed, he was making his way across the field to where a short, stocky man with a broad grin cleaving his face, was climbing the pasture-fence. It was Tim Doyle himself.

Tim, it seems, had so bothered the stable-boss with questions about the farm, its location, distance from the city, and general management, that at last that autocrat had said: "See here, Doyle, if you want to go up there just say so and I'll send you as car hostler with the next batch. I'll give you a note to the farm superintendent. Guess he'll let you hang around for a week or so."

"I'll go up as hostler," said Tim, "but you just say in that there note that Tim Doyle pays his own way after he gets there."

In that way it was settled. For some four days Tim appeared to enjoy it greatly. Most of his time he spent sitting on the pasture-fence, smoking his pipe and watching the grazing horses. To Chieftain alone he brought great bunches of clover.

About the fifth day Tim grew restive. He had examined Chieftain's hoofs and pronounced them well healed, but the superintendent said that it would be a week before he should be ready to send another lot of horses back to the city.

"How far is it by road?" asked Tim.

"Oh, two hundred miles or so," said the superintendent.

"Why not let me take Chieftain down that way? It'd be cheaper'n shippin' him, an' do him good."

The superintendent only laughed and said he would ship Chieftain with the others, when he was ready.

That evening Tim sat on the bench before the farm-house and smoked his pipe until everyone else had gone to bed. The moon had risen, big and yellow. In a pond behind the stables it seemed as if ten thousand frogs had joined in one grand chorus. They were singing their mating song, if you know what that is. It is not altogether a cheerful or harmonious effort. Next to the soughing of a November wind it is, perhaps, the most dismally lonesome sound in nature.

For two hours Tim Doyle smoked and thought and listened. Then he knocked the ashes out of his pipe and decided that he had been long enough in the country. He would walk to the station, two miles away, and take the midnight train to the city. As he went down the farm road skirting the pasture he saw in the moonlight the sheds where the horses went at night for shelter. Moved by some sudden whim, he stopped and whistled. A moment later a big horse appeared from under the shed and came toward him, neighing gratefully. It was Chieftain.

"Well, Chieftain, me bye, I'll be lavin' ye for a spell. But I'll have yer old stall ready against yer comin' back. Good-by, laddie," and with this Tim patted Chieftain on the nose and started down the road. He had gone but a few steps when he heard Chieftain whinny. Tim stopped irresolutely, and then went on. Again came the call of the horse. There was no misunderstanding its meaning. Tim walked back to the fence.

In the morning the farm superintendent found on the door-sill a roughly pencilled note which read:

"Hav goan bak to the sitty P S chefetun warnted to goe so I tuk him. Tim Doyle."

They were ten days on the road, ten delightful days of irresponsible vagabondism. Sometimes Tim rode on Chieftain's back and sometimes he walked beside him. At night they took shelter in any stable that was handy. Tim invested in a bridle and saddle blanket. Also he bought oats and hay for Chieftain. The big Norman followed his own will, stopping to graze by the roadside whenever he wished. Together they drank from brooks and springs. Between them was perfect comradeship. Each was in holiday mood and each enjoyed the outing to the fullest. As they passed through towns they attracted no little attention, for outside of the city 2,000-pound horses are seldom seen, and there were many admirers of Chieftain's splendid proportions. Tim had many offers from shrewd horse-dealers.

"Ye would, eh? A whole hundred dollars!" Tim would answer with fine sarcasm. "Now, wouldn't that be too much, don't ye think? My, my, what a generous mon it is! G'wan, Chieftain, er Mister Car-na-gy here'll be after givin' us a lib'ry."

Chieftain, and Tim, too, for that matter, were nearer actual freedom than ever before. For years the big Norman had used his magnificent muscles only for straining at the traces. He had trod only the hard pavements. Now, he put forth his glorious strength at leisure, moving along the pleasant country roads at his own gait, and being guided only when a turning was to be made.

Fine as it all was, however, as they drew near to the city both horse and driver became eager to reach their old quarters. Tim was, for he has said so. As for Chieftain--let the stable-boss, who knows horse-nature better than most men know themselves, tell that part of the story.

"Bigger lunatics than them two, Tim Doyle and old Chieftain, I never set eyes on," he says. "I was standin' down here by the double doors watchin' some of the day-teams unhook when I looks up the street on a sudden. An' there, tail an' head up like he was a 'leven-hundred-pound Kentucky hunter 'stead of heavy-weight draught, comes that old Chieftain, a whinnyin' like a three-year-old. An' on his back, mind you, old Tim Doyle, grinnin' away 'sif he was Tod Sloan finishin' first at the Brooklyn Handicap. Tickled? I never see a horse show anything so plain in all my life. He just streaked it up that runway and into his old stall like he was a prodigal son come back from furren parts.

"Yes, Tim he's out on the truck with his old team. Tim don't have to drive nowadays, you know. Brother of his that was in the contractin' business died about three months ago an' left Tim quite a pile. Tim, he says he guesses the money won't take no hurt in the bank and that some day, when he an' Chieftain git ready to retire, maybe it'll come in handy."

BARNACLES

WHO MUTINIED FOR GOOD CAUSE

With his coming to Sculpin Point there was begun for Barnacles the most surprising period of a more or less useful career which had been filled with unusual equine activities. For Barnacles was a horse, a white horse of unguessed breed and uncertain age.

Most likely it was not, but it may have been, Barnacles's first intimate connection with an affair of the heart. Said affair was between Captain Bastabol Bean, owner and occupant of Sculpin Point, and Mrs. Stashia Buckett, the unlamenting relict of the late Hosea Buckett.

Mrs. Buckett it was who induced Captain Bastabol Bean to purchase a horse. Captain Bean, you will understand, had just won the affections of the plump Mrs. Buckett. Also he had, with a sailor's ignorance of feminine ways, presumed to settle off-hand the details of the coming nuptials.

"I'll sail over in the dory Monday afternoon," said he, "and take you back with me to Sculpin Point. You can have your dunnage sent over later by team. In the evenin' we'll have a shore chaplain come 'round an' make the splice."

"Cap'n Bean," replied the rotund Stashia, "we won't do any of them things, not one."

"Wha-a-at!" gasped the Captain.

"Have you ever been married, Cap'n Bean?"

"N-n-no, my dear."

Now for more than thirty years Bastabol Bean, as master of coasting schooners up and down the Atlantic seaboard, had given orders. He had taken none, except the formal directions of owners. He did not propose to begin taking them now, not even from such an altogether charming person as Stashia Buckett. This much he said. Then he added:

"Stashia, I give in about coming here to marry you; that seems no more than fair. But I'll come in a dory and you'll go back in a dory."

"Then you needn't come at all, Cap'n Bastabol Bean."

Argue and plead as he might, this was her ultimatum.

"But, Stashia, I 'ain't got a horse, never owned one an' never handled one, and you know it," urged the Captain.

"Then it's high time you had a horse and knew how to drive him. Besides, if I go to Sculpin Point I shall want to come to the village once in a while. I sha'n't sail and I sha'n't walk. If I can't ride like a lady I don't go to the Point."

The inevitable happened. Captain Bean promised to buy a horse next day. Hence his visit to Jed Holden and his introduction to Barnacles, as the Captain immediately named him.

As one who inspects an unfamiliar object, Captain Bean looked dazedly at Barnacles. At the same time Barnacles inspected the Captain. With head lowered to knee level, with ears cocked forward, nostrils sniffing and under-lip twitching almost as if he meant to laugh, Barnacles eyed his prospective owner. In common with most intelligent horses, he had an almost human way of expressing curiosity.

Captain Bean squirmed under the gaze of Barnacles's big, calm eyes for a moment, and then shifted his position.

"What in time does he want anyway, Jed?" demanded the Captain.

"Wants to git acquainted, that's all, Cap'n. Mighty knowin' hoss, he is. Now some hosses don't take notice of anything. They're jest naturally dumb. Then agin you'll find hosses that seem to know every blamed word you say. Them's the kind of hosses that's wuth havin."

"S'pose he knows all the ropes, Jed?"

"I should say he did, Cap'n. If there's anything that hoss ain't done in his day I don't know what 'tis. Near's I can find out he's tried every kind of work, in or out of traces, that you could think of."

"Sho!" The Captain was now looking at the old white horse in an interested manner.

"Yes, sir, that's a remarkable hoss," continued the now enthusiastic Mr. Holden. "He's been in the cavalry service, for he knows the bugle calls like a book. He's travelled with a circus--ain't no more afraid of elephants than I be. He's run on a fire engine--know that 'cause he wants to chase old Reliance every time she turns out. He's been a street-car hoss, too. You jest ring a door gong behind him twice an' see how quick he'll dig in his toes. The feller I got him off'n said he knew of his havin' been used on a milk wagon, a pedler's cart and a hack. Fact is, he's an all round worker."

"Must be some old by your tell," suggested the Captain. "Sure his timbers are all sound?"

"Dun'no' 'bout his timbers, Cap'n, but as fer wind an' limb you won't find a sounder hoss, of his age, in this county. Course, I'm not sellin' him fer a four-year-old. But for your work, joggin' from the P'int into the village an' back once or twice a week, I sh'd say he was jest the ticket; an' forty-five, harness an' all as he stands, is dirt cheap."

Again Captain Bean tried to look critically at the white horse, but once more he met that calm, curious gaze and the attempt was hardly a success. However, the Captain squinted solemnly over Barnacles's withers and remarked:

"Yes, he has got some good lines, as you say, though you wouldn't hardly call him clipper built. Not much sheer for'ard an' a leetle too much aft, eh?"

At this criticism Jed snorted mirthfully.

"Oh, I s'pose he's all right," quickly added the Captain. "Fact is, I ain't never paid much attention to horses, bein' on the water so much. You're sure he'll mind his helm, Jed?"

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