Traveller by Richard Adams Page B

have showed how I felt, cause after a bit this old Frisky sort o’ huffles to me, “‘Tain’t my fault, Mr. Traveller, sir.” ‘Course, I treated him friendly; Marse Robert wouldn’t ‘spect anything else. But I couldn’t help wondering what folks was going to think—me an’ this poor old Frisky keeping company together in town, where there was plenty of other horses round to see us.
    Anyways, I jest kept myself in step with Frisky best as I could, and we-all went out of town beyond the fairground. Well, it’s real fine out that way, Tom, you know; the whole outlook kind of opens up towards the mountains. And of course the little girls was delighted— jest about set ‘em up for the afternoon. Marse Robert and me rode around with ‘em a goodish while. One of them had her face all tied up in a cloth, and Marse Robert says to her, “I hope you won’t give Traveller the mumps. Whatever shall we do if Traveller gets the mumps?” ‘Fore we was done, we took ‘em home. Coming through town, I felt I jest had to put the best face on it I could, so I stepped out the same as if we was reviewing a big parade. When we got to their home, Marse Robert, he lifted ‘em both down and kissed them good-bye. “Oh, General Lee,” they said, “we’ll never forget this afternoon!” Me neither, Tom, me neither. And I still don’t know what the mumps are, ‘cepting I ain’t got ‘em.
    But I was telling you, warn’t I, ‘bout that mountain in the rain? We quit at the end of the fall, and a good job, too, ‘fore every man and beast died of the weather. I know now, ‘course, that we was s’posed to be looking for Blue men, but I never seed none all the time we was there, and in them days I shouldn’t have knowed ‘em if I had. I ‘spect they was afraid to try attacking us and we didn’t figure on attacking them, on account of it was nigh on to impossible for horse or man to move in the wet.
    Somehow I never really settled down with Joe and his brother. They was good ‘nuff masters and looked after me very well, but it warn’t like me and Jim had been—no real fun, no games. I still felt homesick. And I don’t think Joe’s brother, the major, every really ‘preciated my buck-trot. It seems to come awful hard to some riders, and he hadn’t been the one who tried me out and bought me. But there was another thing on top o’ that. I couldn’t get the recollection of the General out of my mind—the feel of his hands and knees. Whenever either of the brothers rode me, I always used to find myself thinking, I’ve knowed better’n this; I jest wish that there General would come back. The weather was bad, too, where we was—the winter’d come on, you see— and all of us horses spent a lot of time in stables. I felt all bottled up, and once’t or twice’t I found myself biting my crib again, out of sheer boredom. Some of the other horses was the same. There was one called Bandit, I remember, who got to weaving. That’s when a horse stands with his legs apart, you know, Tom, and keeps shifting his weight from side to side. ‘May do that for hours. That sort of thing’s catching, too. One horse gets to doing it and then the others take it up.
    Another thing I didn’t like was that Joe changed my name. My name was Jeff; Jim had always called me Jeff. That’s a nice, sharp-sounding name a horse can recognize, and I liked it. But Captain Joe, he took to calling me “Greenbrier.” I jest couldn’t answer to it the same way. I was still homesick for Jim and the big field at home, and when Joe called me Greenbrier, I used to think, Durn it, they’ve even taken away my name! All the same, I could have been a sight worse off. I know that now.
    Anyway, it didn’t last long. We was soon off again, and this was the