The Little Lady of the Big House / Маленькая хозяйка большого дома. Книга для чтения на английском языке

“Oh, I can manage him,” she breathed between tight teeth, as, with ears back and vicious-gleaming eyes, The Fop bared his teeth in a bite that would have been perilously near to Graham’s leg had she not reined the brute abruptly away across the neck and driven both spurs solidly into his sides. The Fop quivered, squealed, and for the moment stood still.

“It’s the old game, the white man’s game,” Dick laughed. “She’s not afraid of him, and he knows it. She out-games him, out-savages him, teaches him what savagery is in its intimate mood and tense.”

Three times, while they looked on, ready to whirl their own steeds away if he got out of hand, The Fop attempted to burst into rampage, and three times, solidly, with careful, delicate hand on the bitter bit, Paula Forrest dealt him double spurs in the ribs, till he stood, sweating, frothing, fretting, beaten, and in hand.

“It’s the way the white man has always done,” Dick moralized, while Graham suffered a fluttery, shivery sensation of admiration of the beast-conquering Little Lady. “He’s out-savaged the savage the world around,” Dick went on. “He’s out-endured him, out-filthed him, out-scalped him, out-tortured him, out-eaten him – yes, outeaten him. It’s a fair wager that the white man, in extremis, has eaten more of the genus homo, than the savage, in extremis, has eaten.”

“Good afternoon,” Paula greeted her guest, the ranch veterinary, and her husband. “I think I’ve got him now. Let’s look over the colts. Just keep an eye, Mr. Graham, on his mouth. He’s a dreadful snapper.[227] Ride free from him, and you’ll save your leg for old age.”

Now that The Fop’s demonstration was over, the colts, startled into flight by some impish spirit amongst them, galloped and frisked away over the green turf, until, curious again, they circled back, halted at gaze, and then, led by one particularly saucy chestnut filly, drew up in half a circle before the riders, with alert pricking ears.

Graham scarcely saw the colts at first. He was seeing his protean hostess in a new role. Would her protean-ness never end? he wondered, as he glanced over the magnificent, sweating, mastered creature she bestrode. Mountain Lad, despite his hugeness, was a mild-mannered pet beside this squealing, biting, striking Fop who advertised all the spirited viciousness of the most spirited vicious thoroughbred.

“Look at her,” Paula whispered to Dick, in order not to alarm the saucy chestnut filly. “Isn’t she wonderful! That’s what I’ve been working for.” Paula turned to Evan. “Always they have some fault, some miss, at the best an approximation rather than an achievement. But she’s an achievement. Look at her. She’s as near right as I shall probably ever get. Her sire is Big Chief, if you know our racing register. He sold for sixty thousand when he was a cripple. We borrowed the use of him. She was his only get of the season[228]. But look at her! She’s got his chest and lungs. I had my choices – mares eligible for the register. Her dam wasn’t eligible, but I chose her. She was an obstinate old maid, but she was the one mare for Big Chief. This is her first foal and she was eighteen years old when she bred. But I knew it was there. All I had to do was to look at Big Chief and her, and it just had to be there.”

“The dam was only half thoroughbred,” Dick explained.

“But with a lot of Morgan on the other side,” Paula added instantly, “and a streak along the back of mustang. This shall be called Nymph, even if she has no place in the books. She’ll be my first unimpeachable perfect saddle horse – I know it – the kind I like – my dream come true at last.”

“A hoss has four legs, one on each corner,” Mr. Hennessy uttered profoundly.

“And from five to seven gaits,” Graham took up lightly.

“And yet I don’t care for those many-gaited Kentuckians,” Paula said quickly, “ – except for park work. But for California, rough roads, mountain trails, and all the rest, give me the fast walk, the fox trot, the long trot that covers the ground, and the not too-long, ground-covering gallop. Of course, the close-coupled, easy canter; but I scarcely call that a gait – it’s no more than the long lope reduced to the adjustment of wind or rough ground.”

“She’s a beauty,” Dick admired, his eyes warm in contemplation of the saucy chestnut filly, who was daringly close and alertly snifing of the subdued Fop’s tremulous and nostril-dilated muzzle.

“I prefer my own horses to be near thoroughbred[229] rather than all thoroughbred,” Paula proclaimed. “The running horse has its place on the track, but it’s too specialized for mere human use.”

“Nicely coupled,” Mr. Hennessy said, indicating the Nymph. “Short enough for good running and long enough for the long trot. I’ll admit I didn’t have any faith in the combination; but you’ve got a grand animal out of it just the same.”