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 though 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 the 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
