said to Mustang who was standing near, “Well, little feller, she’s gone but you’re coming right along. We’ll look after you.”
Several days passed. Mustang was kept on a long rope near the ranch house so that he could eat grass and get his exercise. And then an interesting thing happened. Old Bill, a range horse that was getting on in years, grazed around close to Mustang, and the cook at the ranch said, “Old Bill won’t leave Mustang. He stays right around him all day.”
A week of this had passed when Jim said, “Sam, turn Mustang loose with Old Bill. Old Bill never goes far and he always comes in at night for his oats. Let Mustang grow up natural like.”
This was done, and it turned out as Jim had said. Old Bill never went more than a few miles from the ranch and for some time Sam kept a close watch to see how this friendship would come out. But each day he was more convinced that all was well. Sometimes in the afternoon he would see Old Bill and Mustang standing close together like two old horses that have long been together and like each other’s company. Each night Old Bill would come in, and each night Mustang came in with him to spend the night in the stable.
And so it was that Mustang grew and lived for four and a half years on the Horseshoe Ranch. By this time all the men in a wide territory knew of Mustang. He was now a great, bright bay horse with four white stocking legs and a white mark on his chest that reached in a narrow line to his right shoulder where it ended in a rounded spot. He was as devoted to Sam McSwain as a dog might be devoted to a man. Although Jim Parkman had once said, “Sam, you’ll plumb spoil that colt,” he and all the other men had long ago changed their minds about that.
Four and a half years are but a little time in the life of a man, but a long time in the life of a horse. When a horse is four and a half years old, almost half of the best part of his life has been lived. Mustang, however, was considered still too young to undergo hard riding. Sam had him broken to the saddle and Mustang was so big and so tall and strong for his age that Sam had ridden him about, here and there, for some time. But he wanted Mustang to be at least five years old before he rode him as he would any of the older horses. At five years Mustang would be ready.
Jim and Sam now owned a controlling interest in the Horseshoe Ranch, and these two proved how kind and thoughtful they were in regard to horses when they turned every range horse loose when he got old, so that he could come and go as he pleased. Mustang, up to this spring, had grazed on the range with these old horses that had been retired. But he and Old Bill were still special friends. These two were generally seen together on the range and they seldom went more than a few miles from the ranch house during the long summer days.
Mustang had been so much petted by Sam and Jim and Charley and all the other men that there was never a doubt in their minds but that he would come home in a day or two no matter how far out on the range he chose to go. And Mustang had Sam’s brand on him so that he was safe so far as all the other ranch owners were concerned.
One evening Mustang and Old Bill came galloping into the ranch yard together. The men had all come in from the range and were out near the stables. Old Bill performed his usual action. Arrived at the place, he snorted loudly and, with head and tail high, he trotted clear around one of the corrals, came up close to Sam and, looking off toward the west, snorted as if he were scared by something. But the men all knew that Old Bill wasn’t scared. Sam knew him best of all. He came up and scratched Old Bill’s neck while he stood looking off across the plains toward the skyline, but Old Bill was not paying any attention to the place beyond him. He was only acting. He acted as if he hardly knew that Sam was scratching his neck, yet that was all he wanted. Jim came up and began to rub Old Bill on the flank, at the same time telling him he was still one of the best of horses. Jim said proudly, “Bill, you always had sense. You got as much sense as a feller!”
Mustang in the meantime was rubbing his nose on Sam’s shoulder and he began to nose around Sam’s shirt. Sam then scratched Mustang’s neck as he said, “Here you are again. You want your neck scratched, too. You and Old Bill are different from the others. You both want your oats now and you will get ’em, too, plenty!”
Presently Sam went into the stable and put oats in the feed boxes and the two horses stood side by side eating.
Very early the next morning, both being free, they started off across the plain together, and they were feeling so good that they both kicked up their heels and snorted as they galloped away. They did this before any of the men were up except the old cowboy cook, Buck Jenkins. Buck saw the two playing and running across the prairie in the first streaks of the dawn, but he thought nothing of it, as he had seen them do this many times before and they both had always come back, Mustang as a rule running in ahead of Old Bill. It never occurred to Sam or Jim or any of the men that anything might happen to Mustang during these summer months. He was now a tall, rangy young horse and it was known that he had great speed. He had shown these men that he had only to play at running to outrun any horse they had ever seen him run with on the ranch.
If he had got out in the winter they would have been alarmed, because he might have been in danger of the big gray wolves on the range, but these beasts never tackled big horses in the summer months. It was the young cows that they set upon. And anyway, up to now both Old Bill and Mustang, as already mentioned, never went far.
So it was that no one thought anything about Mustang running away that morning with Old Bill. However, when several days had gone by and one evening Old Bill came in alone, Sam was a little concerned. He thought he would soon see Mustang coming across the prairie, running like the wind for the ranch. But he didn’t come. Sam gave Old Bill his oats as usual that evening and also put some in Mustang’s feed box. A little later it was suppertime and all the men went in the house to eat—all but Sam. After Buck had called that supper was ready, Jim said, when he saw Sam was not coming, “Come on and eat, Sam. Mustang will come. He’ll be here by the time we get through supper.”
Sam said, “You go on and eat, Jim. I’ll come in before long.”
The men went in the house and Sam stood out in the yard looking out across the plains toward the west where Old Bill had come from. The time went on and Sam kept looking and hoping that any minute he would see his big bay horse with the white stocking legs thundering across the plains for home. Sam certainly wanted to see this.
After a time Sam said to himself as he looked across the prairie, “Now why don’t he come in?” And then affectionately, “Daggone his hide. I don’t see why he has done this.” Sam had reason for being a little concerned, since this was the first time that Old Bill had ever come in without Mustang.
Sam still kept on looking and hoping, but all at once the dark began to come, and no matter how hard Sam looked for his much-loved big bay horse all that could be seen was the plain stretching away to the darkening skyline, and to Sam that skyline didn’t look as it used to—it just looked awful lonesome. All that night he kept telling himself that maybe everything would be all right—that when he would wake up and go to the stable the next morning, there would be Mustang big as life, waiting to have his neck scratched. But no matter how much Sam tried to make himself think this, he couldn’t be satisfied. And although that night Jim and Bud Allen said Mustang would come in, and although all the other men went to sleep, Sam lay awake. He lay awake and listened for the sounds of a galloping horse’s hoofs on the sod, but he didn’t hear any such sounds. Once he dozed off to sleep, he didn’t know for how long, but he woke up and sat on the edge of his bunk and looked out of the small window toward the stable. It was bright moonlight out there. Sam hoped that any second he might see Mustang prancing around there, but there was no sign of him.
Sam pulled on his boots and quietly slipped out. He had tied Old Bill in the stable, and he thought that if Mustang
