Chapter 6 Smoky The Cowhorse by Will James
"THE SQUEAK OF LEATHER"
Twenty feet of rope is laying between the cowboy's hand and the pony's head. The cowboy is standing there just watching and smiling some at the surprised look that's in the pony's face, that pony had just been stopped sudden in his bucking with an empty saddle;--it was the first time a saddle had been on his slick back and it was no wonder he tried to get out from under that thing; nothing had ever clung there before.
"Now, you just take it easy for a spell, and keep your head up" says that cowboy as he started walking towards the pony.--Legs wide apart, a wild look in his eyes, and a snorting his surprise Smoky watched him come; he didn't know whether to stand his ground and start fighting or back away as the cowboy came.--On he came, and as Smoky was seeing no sign of harm, he stood in his tracks, watched, and waited. A hand touched him on the forehead and moved on down his neck, the cowboy was a talking to him the while, and pretty soon Smoky's heart wasn't thumping so hard no more.
He was then led a little ways, and as he heard the squeak of leather and felt the weight of the saddle with each step he took, an awful hankering came to him to put his head down and try to buck it off, but the cowboy was right there in front of him and he didn't want to be stopped again and so sudden as he'd been stopped that first time.
The other side of the corral was reached and there Clint turned and rubbed Smoky on the ear. "Well, old boy, lets see how you're going to behave when I get up in the middle of you."
Smoky watched the man reach for the latigo and felt the cinch tighten up; a hump came in his back and which made the saddle set near on end,--it was the hump that carried the punch in the buck, and most likely Clint could of led the pony around some till the hump wore down and his back straightened up again, but that rider wasn't for taking the buck out of a bronc too quick. He believed a good sensible horse should buck at the first few "settings" and he wasn't the kind of rider that'd smother that natural feeling and have it come out later, when the horse is supposed to be broke gentle.
He let the hump be and never moved the pony out of his tracks;-- he knowed that just one move would be enough to start that pony to exploding, and Smoky was set and just a waiting for that signal to start. He watched the cowboy raise his chaps so the belt wouldn't hinder his leg action, watched him pull his hat brim down solid, and then he couldn't watch no more. Something had come between him and his vision, it was the cowboy's thumb which had layed over his left eyelid and pulled it down over his eye--In the next second he felt a weight added on to that of the saddle, and all of a sudden he could see again.
But what he did see left him stary eyed and paralized. For half a minute he just stood like petrified. That cowboy had disappeared from the side of him, and instead, there he was right in the middle of his back and on that hunk of leather he'd been hankering to shed off ever since it was put on there.
Instinct pointed out only one way for him to act,--it was telling him that neither the human nor the leather belonged up there in the middle of him that way, and that if he tried he could most likely get rid of 'em. There was nothing else to do that he could see, and right then he felt that he sure must do something.
His head went down, and a beller came out of him that said much as "I want you"--Up went Smoky's withers followed by the hump that made the saddle twist like on a pivot, and last came steel muscles like shot out of the earth, and which carried the whole mixed up and crooked conglameration of man and horse up in mid air and seemed like to shake there for a spell before coming down. All seemed heads and tails and made a picture of the kind that was mighty hard to see, and still harder to figger out.
Saddle strings was a popping like on a whip lash, leather was a squeaking, corrals shook as the hard hitting hoofs of the pony hit the earth, and a dust was stirred that looked like a young cloud. Smoky was scared, mad, and desperate. All the action, strength, and endurance that was in him was brought out to do its best. Not a hair on his hide was laying idle thru the performance,--every muscle tightened and loosened in a way to shake the weight on his back and make it pop.
Clint felt the muscles work even thru the saddle, and every part of that pony which his legs touched seemed as hard as steel and full of fast working bumps which came and went, twisted his saddle under him, and made him wonder if it was going to stay. It seemed like sometimes that Smoky was headed one way and his saddle another,--he wasn't always sure of the whereabouts of that pony's head; and in all his riding that's what he wanted to keep track of most, cause losing track of a horse's head at them times is something like riding blindfolded--a rider would prepare for one kind of a jolt and meet another, which would cause things to scatter considerable.
Clint was still straight up and on top when Smoky's hard jumps finally dwindled down to crow-hops and then a stop. That pony was needing wind mighty bad, and as his nostrils opened wide, was taking in the necessary air, he felt a hand a rubbing along his neck, and wild eyed, ears cocked back at the cowboy that was still there, he stood and heard him talk.
"You done a mighty fine job, little horse," says Clint, "and I'd been disappointed a lot not to've found that kind of spirit in a horse like you."
If Smoky had been raised amongst humans like a dog and been with 'em steady that way, he'd of had a hunch or felt what Clint said and meant. But Smoky was a wild horse of the flats and mountains, and even tho the sound of Clint's tone and the feel of his hand soothed him some, he would buck again and again. It was his instinct to fight the human, and he would fight till that human showed he could handle him and proved a friend.
That had to be done gradual, and Smoky had no way to know as yet that man could be a friend of his, not while the breaking was going on anyway, for thru that spell a horse is made to do things he sometimes don't want to do, and which all keeps down the confidence that would come faster if that didn't have to be done.
Smoky was doing some tall figgering as he stood there trembling and wondering if there wasn't anything that he could get by with. He'd been made to do things just as that cowboy pleased and he'd found no say in the goings on, none at all. If he could only've bucked him off that would of pleased him a lot, but the little horse didn't know that he wouldn't of won anything by that;--he didn't know he was on this earth for the purpose of the human and that if he did throw one man another would climb him till finally he'd have to give in and go thru a lot of grief the while.
Smoky felt a light slap on his neck. "Come on, young feller," says the cowboy. "Lets see you trot around the corral a while."
But Smoky bucked more than he trotted. The cowboy let him, and when his head would come up he'd keep him on the go till finally there seemed to be no buck in the horse at all.
"I reckon that'll be enough for you to-day" says Clint as he headed Smoky for the side of the corral and made him face the bars to a stop. He then reached for the pony's left ear and twisted it some, just enough to keep that pony's attention on the twist of that ear most while he got off.--
Clint touched the ground with his right foot, and keeping his left in the stirrup, at the same time keeping close to the horse's shoulder and out of the reach of his hind feet, he held that position for a few seconds. Smoky was watching him, shaking like a leaf and ready to paw the daylight out of the cowboy at the first wrong move or sudden jab of a knee.
Clint wanted him to watch. This was part of the eddication, and all that cowboy wanted to teach right then was for Smoky to stand and not to go to acting up. Slow and easy, at the same time having complete control of himself and his horse, Clint raised himself up in the saddle again. It was done in a way that only bronc busters know. Smoky never even felt the pull on the saddle as the cowboy climbed on, and if that saddle hadn't even been cinched it wouldn't of budged then, so neat it was done.
Clint climbed on and off a few times that way, Smoky stood and shivered, scared, but willing it seemed like to take his medicine. Maybe it'd come to his mind that there was no use fighting that cowboy, or else he was getting tired--anyway that was the last of it; Smoky felt the cinch loosen and then slow and easy the saddle was pulled off. About that time he whirled and faced the rider who was holding the saddle, he took a sniff at the hunk of leather and snorted like to say, "Gee! I thought that thing was on me for good."
The saddle was set to one side and the cowboy begin rubbing Smoky's back with a gunny sack, and according to the way that pony acted that felt mighty good, his upper lip stuck out and twitched with every motion of the rubbing, and when Clint finally quit, the little horse's action showed plain that he should do it some more; Clint rubbed again.
"I'm afraid," he says as he grinned and rubbed, "that I'm naturally going to spoil you. Here we just got thru with the first saddling and you're beginning to look for favors already."
Smoky's picket grounds was moved to a fresh one for that night and where the grass was tall, a plenty and green,--but somehow his appetite wasn't at its best, and when the break of day come there was very little sign (as Clint noticed) that the pony had et at all. He'd just stood in one spot, looked like, and seemed to've done tall wondering and figgering instead of feeding. He was ganted up the same as if he'd been rode all that night, and still there was no show of any appetite for the feed that was under and all around him.
As Clint worked in the corral busy with other broncs he'd look thru the bars for any show of interest in the little horse; he'd look often but most every time that pony's position was about the same, and if he did catch him with his head down he noticed how Smoky was just nibbling at the feed, and not eating much.
Smoky was taking the change, from the life he'd led to what he was now going thru, kinda hard, harder than the average wild horse ever does; and Clint layed it that the little horse had more brains than the average, more sensitive maybe, and more able to realize.
"I guess I'd better lay off of him to-day," decides the cowboy, as he noticed very little change in him even late that afternoon, "he's having a hard time trying to figger things out as it is."
It was bright and early the next morning when Clint looked out of the bunk house door and noticed Smoky out on the creek bottom. It appeared that the little horse, after figgering and figgering, had come to some sort of decision, and that done and settled had went to eating again, for that's what he was doing when Clint looked out,--Smoky was eating like he was trying to make up for the time he'd lost, and he seemed all at peace with everything in general.
The cowboy grinned, "I know what that son of a gun has decided on," he remarked. "He's going to fight, and I see where I'm sure due for a tossing from that pony to-day."
Clint done his day's work, and after riding and lining out nine head of rough and kinky broncs, went to where Smoky was picketed and led him into the corral where he'd been initiated a couple of days before. He was some kind of a different horse than what he'd been that day; his head was higher and more with just one purpose. He didn't shy and snort at every little thing like he did that first time, and Clint noticed that he never seemed to see the saddle as it was eased on his back and cinched.
"I don't like the sound of them 'rollers' that's making that noise in them nostrils of yours," he remarked; "they sound to me like you meant business."
Smoky did mean business, and even tho Clint was doing considerable kidding, he meant business too. He wasn't going to let the little horse get away with anything, for he realized that if he did it'd be harder than ever to persuade him to be good; he'd have to be treated rough, and Clint didn't want to treat him rough.
The cowboy seen the light in Smoky's eyes and understood it, he understood his every action, and they all meant fight.
"I'm glad to see so much spirit in you old boy," he says as he pulled his hat down, "but if you want to fight I'll have to fight too, and here's hoping the best one of us wins;--let's go."
Smoky only shook his head a little as Clint put his hand on his left eye and mounted, he didn't want to notice a little thing like that, which was just as much a warning from him for that cowboy to get set, set well and solid, for in this next performance things was a going to pop worse than ever.
There's a big difference between the bucking that comes with the first setting of a bronc and the bucking that comes with the settings that follows afterwards on that same bronc. The first time Smoky was rode he was just a plain scared pony, of course his intentions was all to the good towards throwing that cowboy, saddle and all, off, but he was too scared and desperate to try and figger out how that should be done. He'd learned from that first setting that plain bucking wouldn't faze that rider, he'd have to use some science, and with a cool head, study out the weak points the rider might have, and work on them weak points till a shadow on the ground tells him the cowboy is leaving.
Smoky had learned that it wouldn't get him anything to stampede hot headed into bucking like he did that first time, maybe that's what he'd been studying on the last day or so. Anyway, he was some cool horse, and when he "bowed his head" this time it was all done deliberate and easy. He lined out with a few easy jumps just to sort of feel out how that cowboy was a setting as a preliminary, and with an eye back on all the movements of the rider as he went, he layed his plans on just how to proceed and get his man.
It was just when Clint seemed to be riding his easiest when without warning Smoky "broke in two" and brought out some mighty wicked saddle-twisting, and cowboy-loosening jumps; crooked, high, and hard hitting was them jumps. It looked to the horse like his man was loosened at the sudden turning of events and had been shifted to one side a little,--and that's just what Smoky was looking for to carry on the program he'd mapped out.
It was the first encouragement that pony'd got since he first felt a rope on him, maybe he could get it over that cowboy yet. He bucked all the harder from the new energy the signs of winning brought him. No chance did he give so that the cowboy would ever get back in the saddle and straight up, and every jump from then on was used as a kind of leverage against the rider,--he bucked in a circle and every time he'd hit the ground he was his whole length back from where he'd started up.
The cowboy was well up on the fork of the saddle and still to one side. Smoky bucked on, and cool as a cucumber in a mountain stream, kept a watching and took care that he didn't buck back under him. He was holding his own, and looked for signs of the rider loosening some more, but no sign of that showed. The cowboy was still to one side and well up in the saddle, but he sure hung there, and with his left hand on the "Mecate" (hackamore rope) he kept his right up in the air and fanned on the same as ever.
As the fight kept on and no show of the cowboy ever loosening up any more was seen, Smoky begin to wonder. He'd tried different tactics and with all his figgering and variety of sidewinding he couldn't tear away from that hanging hunk of humanity. He was getting tired, his lungs begin to call for air and pretty soon he wasn't so cool no more.
All that was in him, science and everything, was brought out on a few more earth shaking jumps, and when a glance back showed Smoky the rider was still setting there, he got desperate again and begin to see red. He bellered and at the same time forgot all he'd studied on in the ways of getting his man.
The fight didn't last long after that, it was too furious and unscientific. Smoky fought the air, the earth, and everything in general,--nothing in perticular was his aim, and pretty soon he lined out in long easy crowhops and then a standstill.
Clint climbed off as Smoky stood spraddle-legged and took in the air. The little horse never seemed to notice him and in a hazy way felt the rider's hand rubbing around his ears and straightening out his mane.
"I knowed you'd give me a tossing to-day," says Clint.
And there was one thing Smoky didn't know: it was that no time during the fight did the cowboy feel he was losing his saddle; a setting to one side the way he had been was just a long-staying holt of his, something like a half nelson with the wrastler.
Poor Smoky had lost again, but in a way he'd won,--he'd won the heart of a cowboy, cause, thru that fight that cowboy's feelings was for the little horse. He'd seen, understood, and admired the show of thinking qualities and the spirit which was Smoky's.
The idea might be got, on account of Smoky being the steady loser, that his spirit would get jarred and finally break, but if anybody thinking so could of seen that horse the next day that idea would of been scattered considerable. His time on the picket rope had been spent on more thinking and figgering, and the way he went after the tall grass showed he meant to be in shape to carry thru whatever the new scheme was.
And some would of thought it queer to've seen how Smoky, the steady loser in the contest, seemed to hold no grudge or hate against the winning cowboy. As it was, that pony seemed to welcome that human a lot as he walked towards him the next morning, and the way he rubbed his head against the shoulder of that smiling rider showed that the fights in the corral had got to be some friendly. Both was mighty serious, and both meant to win in them fights, but soon as they was over and the dust cleared there was a feeling the likes of when two friends have an argument; when the argument comes to an end both the loser and winner are ready to grin, shake hands, and be friends again.
Smoky had lost out twice in trying to dodge out from under his man, but he was nowheres near convinced as yet that it couldn't be done. The third time Clint climbed him that pony bucked harder than ever and that cowboy just sat up there and let him. Clint had whipped some horses for bucking that way, but he'd whipped them because it was natural orneriness that made 'em buck. With Smoky it was different, there was no meanness in him so far,--that pony was confident that nothing could set him once he got onto the hang of knowing how to buck real well, and all he wanted was to be showed for sure that Clint could really set there and ride him thru his worst that way. After that was done he'd most likely quit.
The first couple of times Smoky was rode and after he'd quit his bucking, there hadn't been much more to it excepting that Clint wauld just run him around a bit and turn him a few times till the hump was well down on that pony's back. Smoky had got to thinking that was all would ever come of being corraled and saddled, and so, he was some surprised, when after the bucking spell was over at that third setting, to see the corral gate opened wide, the cowboy on him again, and heading him for open country.
Smoky took to the high ridges like a duck takes to water, he trotted out like a good horse, and then was put into a long lope. Covering territory felt mighty good to the little horse for a change and he wasn't caring much where the cowboy lined him out to. For a spell he'd forgot the weight on his back, his ears was straight ahead, and the hand he felt on his neck only reminded some that somebody was with him.
He was needing that change after being bested again like he'd been that third time. Clint had won once more and Smoky was a lot in favor of something, most anything, to drive off the feeling he'd got in losing. He was taking advantage of the run in that way and sashayed at a good clip. All went fine, till, of a sudden a jack rabbit scared out of his hiding place jumped up and right under Smoky's nose,--he shied straight up and to one side, and at the same time he was scared more by the wing of Clint's chap which had curled up and slapped along his shoulder. Away he went to bucking once again.
The first few jumps was mighty wicked but they didn't last; he'd already had his buck out not long before and pretty soon he straightened into a lope once again. Clint let him lope a ways then turned him and headed him back to the corrals, stopped him there, turned him a few times and started him out a ways only to turn him and bring him back again. That went on for a few minutes, and then Smoky was unsaddled and put on the picket rope once more.
The run had tired Smoky a little and give him an appetite. He didn't do so much figgering on how to get his man that night, and instead he grazed more, rested some, and even slept a little. When he was led to the corral the next day and the saddle put on he even neglected to watch the cowboy and begin to show interest in the broncs that was in another corral. His ambitions hadn't allowed him to do that before, but somehow, things had changed. --Figgering ways and means of throwing off that rider had got to be tiresome, specially when nothing but disappointment was ever got by it; and besides that saddle and man was getting so they wasn't so bad to stand up under no more.
But as neutral as Smoky showed and felt, that little son of a gun bucked again. Of course there was nothing in his bucking that was so wicked as it had been in them first three saddlings; it was more that he felt he should buck some; it made him feel better, and besides he was wanting exercise; but he raised the dust and pounded the earth in good shape even at that, and that play of his would of throwed many a man.
Another run like the one of the day before, a few turnings and teachings on the feel of the rein, and Smoky was thru for another day. He was getting used to the lay of the program Clint had set, and the new game that was brought on right along as he was rode begin to draw the pony's interest.
Then one day, the cowboy begin dragging a rope on him; he let it drag quite a ways, and even tho Smoky watched it mighty close so it wouldn't circle around his legs and throw him like most ropes always did, it didn't worry him much. Pretty soon Clint coiled the rope up and made a loop which he started whirling in the air,--the whirling was slow and easy at first and done with a small loop. Smoky looked back all interest and snorted a little; he wondered what that rope was doing up there and what Clint was up to.
But nothing happened only that the whirling kept up, the loop was gradually made bigger and then it was throwed on the ground a ways in front of him. Smoky shied and snorted and the coils shot out, straightened, and all of it pulled up again by the cowboy; but he didn't try to run away from it, he hadn't forgot the eddication he'd received from the long soft picket rope. He'd learned from it that it didn't pay to stampede when a rope was around, on account that them ropes had a way of stopping him that couldn't at all be argued with.
Loops was made, throwed out, and drug in again one right after another. They went one side one time, and another side the next, then in front and back, till Smoky begin to lose fear no matter which way the rope went or how it coiled up. It was at the point when he was beginning to lose interest in the game that Clint roped a small bush. The rope tightened on it and Smoky pulled,--he pulled more in wonder what was holding him than with the idea of what he should do, but anyway the bush came out and headed straight for Smoky as it did, he struck at it and would of left from there, but Clint held him and made him face it.
Smoky shook like a leaf as slow but sure the cowboy kept a pulling the bush towards him, he struck again and snorted as it touched his front feet, and he bucked a couple of jumps when he felt it up along his shoulder, but there was no getting away from it; the way that bush moved, it looked like something vicious to Smoky, and when Clint took the rope off of it, and held it out under the pony's nose for him to see what it was the little horse near showed signs of shame for getting scared.
Loose stumps, branches, pieces of old wagons, and everything that could be drug or moved was roped,--anything that was light enough was pulled up for Smoky to investigate, and each time he was showed that he'd been shying and fighting for no reason, till finally, nothing could be found that brought any more than a snort from him. An old coal oil can was then roped and brought up a rattling under Smoky's nose, but he even stood his ground at that.
He was learned to pull on the rope and made to drag things as heavy as a yearling critter. Then gradually Clint made him keep the rope tight and hold it that way till a couple of light jerks on it made him give slack. All that took time, and the cowboy learned him only one thing each day, sometimes very little of that one thing,--but as the days went by it all accumulated to a lot.
It done Clint's heart good to watch the way Smoky was taking to things, his little ears worked back and forth, and with his eyes he never missed a move that went on; his nostrils quivered at all that was new, and the cowboy was noticing with a glad feeling that the pony was putting a lot of trust in him. A word from that cowboy, or a touch from his hand, was getting to mean a lot when that pony was dubious or at the point of scaring at some new happening.
Clint hunted up a bunch of cattle one day and acquainted Smoky with some pointers in the handling of the critters. He'd haze the horse in the bunch, cut out some fat kinky yearling, and make him put his interest on that yearling only. All was a puzzle to Smoky at first, and he had no idea of what he should do, but Clint give him his time, and coaching him along it wasn't but a few days when the little horse understood some of what was wanted of him. In the meantime the teachings with the rope wasn't left behind; that went along with working cattle, and once in a while Clint would snare some big calf and make Smoky keep his nose along that rope while the calf circled, bucked, and bellered.
Smoky showed signs of liking all that went on. He took interest in it the same as a kid would to some new game,--he liked to chase the wild eyed cow, turn her when she didn't want to be turned, and put her where she didn't want to be put; he liked to hold the rope tight on one of the critters and feel that he was the one that was keeping 'er down. It all struck him as a kind of a game where every animal before him had to do as he and the cowboy wished.
He was all for catching on and not a nerve in him was idle as Clint would take him of evenings and ride him out for a spell, and chase, cut out, or rope at the critter. Them goings on had his mind occupied and the fact that he'd figger and think on the subject between times was proved by the way he'd go at things in a decided and knowing how way, when the day before the same thing had left him puzzled and wondering.
That little work he was getting and the all heart interest he was finding in it, had settled him to the big change from the free life he'd led with the old buckskin horse and the bunch of mares and colts,--his mammy was even forgotten, and instead there'd sprouted in him something that made him take a liking for the long lanky cowboy that came to see and play with him every day. He'd got to finding a lot of pleasure in doing just what that cowboy wanted him to do, and when that was done there was a hankering in him to do just a little bit more.
That's the way Clint wanted to keep him; just a hankering to do more would get results, and he was careful to see that the little horse didn't tire on the work. He wanted to make it play for him and keep it that way as long as he could, for he knowed that was the way to keep Smoky's heart and spirit all in one hunk and intact.