“You sure got your eye on me, aint you, little horse?” Clint would say, “but that’s the way I want you to be,” he’d go on, “for the more you watch the more you’ll see and the quicker you’ll learn.”
Smoky did watch and see and learn, and then one evening Clint untied the long picket rope from the log and started leading him towards the corral; the little horse was broke to lead by then and he followed easy enough. His heart was a thumping in wonder of what was due to happen as the cowboy led him thru the big pole gate. He stepped high and careful and his eyes took in everything that looked suspicious—a slicker hanging over one side of the corral made him snort and try to pull away. Clint talked to him, and kept on a leading him thru another gate into another smaller and round corral. A big snubbing post stuck up in the center of it and by that post was a big brown and shiny hunk of leather; it was Clint’s saddle.
“Well now, little horse, the performance is about to begin, you’re going to get your first smell of saddle leather.” Clint had turned as he spoke and begin rubbing on Smoky’s forehead. For once since Smoky had been caught his attention wasn’t on the cowboy. That hunk of leather was drawing all his interest; and ears pointed straight at it, eyes a shining, he snorted his suspicions and dislike for the looks of the contraption that was laying there, waiting it seemed like to jump at him and eat him alive.
“Look, snort, and paw at it all you want,” says the cowboy. “You’ll get well acquainted with it before you get thru, and I won’t rush the acquaintance either.”
Clint didn’t. He kept Smoky to within a few feet of the saddle and grinning some at the pony’s actions, kept a rubbing him back of the ears while the investigation was going on. Smoky was for getting away from there but Clint was persuading him to stick around close, and there was nothing for him to do but just that.
A move from the direction of that saddle right then would of queered things and made Smoky scatter, and Clint couldn’t of held him either for a ways, but the hunk of leather layed still, mighty still, and pretty soon it kinda lost its dangerous look to the little horse—he begin looking around for other things in that corral which wouldn’t be to his liking and not seeing anything that was worth getting spooky at, Smoky begin watching the cowboy again.
It was about then that Clint reached over and picked up the saddle slow and easy and drug it closer to Smoky. At the first move of the riggin’ the little horse snorted and backed away but Clint and the saddle kept a coming straight towards him, slow but steady. One side of the high corral finally was reached. Smoky had backed against it and couldn’t go no further. The cowboy, still hanging onto the rope that held his head, came on, saddle and all with him, and quivering with fear the little horse layed low. Feet straight out in front and head near to the ground he stayed there, and got another and different eddication with the saddle, this time it was dragging.
When Clint thought that had gone far enough and seen where Smoky had got over the worst of his fear he layed the saddle down again, and picking up an old saddle blanket he begin fanning the air with it, closer and closer to Smoky came the blanket as the fanning motion kept on, and stary-eyed the little horse watched. He struck at it and snorted a couple of times and he even tried to turn and kick, but the blanket came on till finally one corner of it grazed his side. He flinched and kicked and tried to jerk away but there was no dodging that spooky looking thing.
Not a word was heard from the cowboy as the “sacking” went on, this was a part of the eddication that was necessary and which should be put thru mighty quiet. It was all a spooky enough performance to a raw bronc without adding on any talking, and even though the goings on scared the pony near out of his hide, that blanket done the trick of showing him that no matter how bad it looked it wasn’t going to hurt him, it was one mighty good thing to teach him general confidence in the cowboy and his riggin’.
Smoky fought like a cornered wolf and tried to get away, but he had no chance—Clint had “sacked” many a bronc that’d fought as much and the cigarette between his lips noticed no change of spells between puffs. Smoky showed hate and fear of the human once again the same as when he was first caught, his instinct had warned him to expect most anything from that crethure, and he wasn’t surprised at the way things had turned;—but that didn’t help any, he just wanted to sail clear over the corral and disappear.
Thru all that fighting and goings on the sacking kept up in steady motion. Wherever the long blanket touched Smoky he flinched, and kicked at it and squealed. He was too scared to realize that
