I heard Peery’s bass voice, protesting to somebody:
“No, let the damned fool kill himself if he wants to.”
I heaved myself wearily into the saddle again.
For a while I thought Rollo had had enough. He was a well-behaved animal under me. That was fine. I had ridden him at last.
Nonsense! He was fooling.
He put his nose in the sand. He put it in the sky. And, using his head for a base, he wagged his body as a puppy would wag its tail.
I went away from him—and stayed where I landed.
I didn’t know whether I could have got up again if I had wanted to. But I didn’t want to. I closed my eyes and rested. If I hadn’t done what I had set out to do, I was willing to fail.
Small, Dunne and Milk River carried me indoors and spread me on a bunk.
“I don’t think that horse would be much good to me,” I told them. “Maybe I’d better look at another.”
“You don’t want to get discouraged like that,” Small advised me.
“You better lay still and rest, fella,” Milk River said. “You’re liable to fall apart if you start moving around.”
I took his advice.