his swanlike neck and snapped savagely at the shoulder of his aggressor, who kicked him again in the side and yelled, “Whoa, there, dang you!”
Dexter subsided. He saw it was no use. Whatever queer thing they meant to do to him would be done despite all his resistance. Still his alarm had caused him to hold up his head now. He was looking much more like a horse.
“There!” said Merton Gill, and as a finishing touch he lashed the coiled clothesline to the front of the saddle. “Now, here! Get me this way. This is one of the best things I do — that is, so far.” Fondly he twined his arms about the long, thin neck of Dexter, who tossed his head and knocked off the cowboy hat. “Never mind that — it’s out,” said Merton. “Can’t use it in this scene.” He laid his cheek to the cheek of his pet. “Well, old pal, they’re takin’ yuh from me, but we got to keep a stiff upper lip. You an’ me has been through some purty lively times together, but we got to face the music at last — there, Lowell, did you get that?”
The artist had made his study. He made three others of the same affecting scene at different angles. Dexter was overwhelmed with endearments. Doubtless he was puzzled — to be kicked in the ribs at one moment, the next to be fondled. But Lowell Hardy was enthusiastic. He said he would have some corking studies. He made another of Buck Benson preparing to mount good old Pinto; though, as a matter of fact, Buck, it appeared, was not even half prepared to mount.
“Go on, jump on him now,” suggested the artist. “I’ll get a few more that way.”
“Well, I don’t know,” Merton hesitated. He was 22 years old, and he had never yet been aboard a horse. Perhaps he shouldn’t try to go too far in one lesson. “You see, the old boy’s pretty tired from his week’s work. Maybe I better not mount him. Say, I’ll tell you, take me rolling a cigarette, just standing by him. I darned near forgot the cigarettes.”
From the barn he brought a sack of tobacco and some brown papers. He had no intention of smoking, but this kind of cigarette was too completely identified with Buck Benson to be left out. Lolling against the side of Dexter, he poured tobacco from the sack into one of the papers. “Get me this way,” he directed, “just pouring it out.”
He had not yet learned to roll a cigarette, but Gus Giddings, the Simsbury outlaw, had promised to teach him. Anyway, it was enough now to be looking keenly out from under his hat while he poured tobacco into the creased paper against the background of good old Pinto. An art study of this pose was completed. But Lowell Hardy craved more action, more variety.
“Go on. Get up on him,” he urged. “I want to make a study of that.”
“Well” — again Merton faltered — “the old skate’s tired out from a hard week, and I’m not feeling any too lively myself.”
“Shucks! It won’t kill him if you get on his back for a minute, will it? And you’ll want one on him to show, won’t you? Hurry up, while the light’s right.”
Yes, he would need a mounted study to show. Many times he had enacted a scene in which a director had looked over the art studies of Clifford Armytage and handed them back with the remark, “But you seem to play only society parts, Mr. Armytage. All very interesting, and I’ve no doubt we can place you very soon; but just at present we’re needing a lead for a Western, a man who can look the part and ride.”
Thereupon he handed these Buck Benson stills to the man, whose face would instantly relax into an expression of pleased surprise.
“The very thing,” he would say. And among those stills, certainly, should be one of Clifford Armytage actually on the back of his horse. He’d chance it.
“All right; just a minute.”
He clutched the bridle reins of Dexter under his drooping chin, and overcoming a feeble resistance dragged him alongside the watering trough. Dexter at first thought he was wished to drink, but a kick took that nonsense out of him. With extreme care Merton stood upon the edge of the trough and thrust a leg blindly over the saddle. With some determined clambering he was at last seated. His feet were in the stirrups. There was a strange light in his eyes. There was a strange light in Dexter’s eyes. To each of them the experience was not only without precedent but rather unpleasant.
“Ride him out in the middle here, away from that well,” directed the camera man.
“You — you better lead him out,” suggested the rider. “I can feel him tremble already. He — he might break down under me.”
Metta Judson, from the back porch, here came into the piece with lines that the author had assuredly not written for her.
“Giddap, there, you Dexter Gashwiler,” called Metta loudly and with the best intentions.
“You keep still,” commanded the rider severely, not turning his head. What a long way it seemed to the ground! He had never dreamed that horses were so lofty. “Better lead him,” he repeated to his camera man.
Lowell Hardy grasped the bridle reins, and after many vain efforts persuaded Dexter to stumble away from the well. His rider grasped the horn of his saddle.
“Look out, don’t let him buck,” he called.
But Dexter had again become motionless, except for a recurrent trembling under this monstrous infliction.
“Now, there,” began the artist. “Hold that. You’re looking off over the Western hills. Atta boy! Wait till I get a side view.”
“Move your camera,” said the rider. “Seems to me he doesn’t want to turn around.”
But again the artist turned Dexter half around. That wasn’t so bad. Merton began to feel the thrill of it. He even lounged in the saddle presently, one leg over the pommel, and seemed about to roll another cigarette while another art study was made. He continued to lounge there while the artist packed his camera. What had he been afraid of? He could sit a horse as well as the next man; probably a few little tricks about it he hadn’t learned yet, but he’d get these, too.
“I bet they’ll come out fine,” he called to the departing artist. “Leave that to me. I dare say I’ll be able to do something good with them. So long.”
“So long,” returned Merton, and was left alone on the back of a horse higher than people would think until they got on him. Indeed he was beginning to like it. If you just had a little nerve you needn’t be afraid of anything. Very carefully he clambered from the saddle. His old pal shook himself with relief and stood once more with bowed head and crossed forelegs.
His late burden observed him approvingly. There was good old Pinto after a hard day’s run over the mesa. He had borne his beloved owner far ahead of the sheriff’s posse, and was now securing a moment’s much-needed rest. Merton undid the riata and for half an hour practiced casting it at his immobile pet. Once the noose settled unerringly over the head of Dexter, who still remained immobile.
Then there was the lightning draw to be practiced. Again and again the trusty weapon of Buck Benson flashed from its holster to the damage of a slower adversary. He was getting that draw down pretty good. From the hip with straight wrist and forearm Buck was ready to shoot in no time at all. Throughout that villain-infested terrain along the border he was known for his quick draw. The most desperate of them would never molest him except they could shoot him from behind. With his back to a wall, they slunk from the encounter.
Elated from this practice and from the memory
