Little Britches by Ralph Moody Page A

garden seed from New England and had bought more at Fort Logan. The next day she let me stay home from school and help her plant peas and potatoes and carrots and beets. We dug trenches most of the forenoon, then Mother sent me to shovel the horse manure from behind the barn onto the wagon, so Father could haul it out for us at noon when he came in from plowing.
    Mother had me put manure in the bottom of the trenches and cover it over with an inch or two of dirt, then she laid in the cut pieces of potato and hoed dirt over them. We were right in the middle of it when I looked up and saw half a dozen cowboys riding by on the wagon road. I waved, and one of them turned his horse and came cantering across the prairie to where we were. I knew him as soon as he got near enough for me to see his face. He was the same cowboy who had given me the ride.
    He flipped out of the saddle while his horse was sliding to a stop, and took his hat off to Mother with a sort of half bow. "I see you folks are really gettin' dug in. We was scairt the big wind might have blowed you clean out of the country."
    While he was talking to Mother I was looking at his horse. It was a blue roan, the first one I had ever seen. "Yes, we're here to stay," Mother said. "My husband is going to build a storm cellar, so there won't be any danger of our being blown clean away."
    I wished Mother hadn't said "clean away." It sounded the way she did when she didn't like somebody, and I wanted her to like my cowboy friend. I walked around the roan and looked at him from the other side while Mother and my cowboy kept talking—Mother didn't talk much, but the cowboy said, "Lady, you're sure wastin' your time buryin' these here barn cleanin's under your spuds; you're due to get tops enough without it. All you got to have for this ground is water, and God help the man that ain't got it."
    The hair on the blue horse was shinier than it was on Cousin Phil's Prince. It rippled like oily water when he moved the muscles under it. To me, it was like a magnet. I had to touch it with my hand, so I stepped up close to his shoulder. Just as I reached my hand up, the cowboy called, "Hey, Pardner, watch out, you're on the off side. Come on around here."
    While I was coming around, he said to Mother, "This old cayuse is clever as a kitten if you stay on the nigh side, but he might kick the stuffin' out of him over on the off side." He had ground-tied the roan by just dropping the reins when he got off. He picked them up while he was talking and passed them around the horse's neck, then he caught me by one arm and swung me into the saddle. "How about a little ride, Puncher?" he asked.
    Mother thought he was just going to lead the horse around a little with me on it, and she didn't say anything except "Be careful," when he was showing me how to stick my feet into the loops of strap that held the stirrups. As soon as I got them in, he passed me the lines and clucked. The roan went off in a smooth, easy canter, and Mother cried, "No! No! He'll fall!"
    My friend laughed, and I could hear him say, "Aw shucks, if he falls, the ground'll catch him."
    It didn't. At first I held on to the saddle horn with one hand— the ground seemed so much farther away than it did when I was riding the donkey—but I didn't feel a bit as though I were going to fall off, so I let go and waved back to Mother and my cowboy. The only time I was frightened at all was when I went to turn him around to go back. We had gone clear out by the railroad and I was afraid he might fall down going across, so I pulled on the left rein, but he swung around to the right. For just a second I thought I was going to take a header, but I kicked out hard with my left foot and was back in balance again.
    I could see Mother was peeved when we came cantering in; her mouth was pinched up that way. For just a second I thought about seeing if I could flip off as my friend did when he came, but the ground was a long way down and I was