The Dude Wrangler | Page 9

saddle. Then he brought down his heels again,
violently, to bite at Pinkey--who kicked him.
He "weaved," he "sunfished"--with every trick known to an old outlaw
he tried to throw his rider, rearing finally to fall backward and mash to
a pulp a bed of Mr. Cone's choicest tulips. But when the horse rose
Pinkey was with him, while the spectators, choking with excitement,
forgetting themselves and each other, yelled like Apaches.
With nostrils blood-red and distended, his eyes the eyes of a wild
animal, now writhing, now crouching, now lying back on his haunches
and springing forward with a violence to snap any ordinary vertebra,
the horse pitched as if there was no limit to its ingenuity and endurance.
Pinkey's breath was coming in gasps and his colour had faded with the
terrible jar of it all. Even the uninitiated could see that Pinkey was
weakening, and the result was doubtful, when, suddenly, the horse gave
up and stampeded. He crashed through the trellis over which Mr. Cone
had carefully trained his crimson ramblers, tore through a neat border
of mignonette and sweet alyssum that edged the driveway, jumped
through "snowballs," lilacs, syringas, and rhododendrons to come to a
halt finally conquered and chastened.
The "88" brand has produced a strain famous throughout Wyoming for
its buckers, and this venerable outlaw lived up to every tradition of his
youth and breeding.
There never was worse bucking nor better riding in a Wild West Show
or out of it, and Mr. Appel declared that he had not been so stirred since
the occasion when walking in the woods at Harvey's Lake in the early
'90's he had acted upon the unsound presumption that all are kittens that
look like kittens and disputed the path with a black-and-white animal
which proved not to be.
Mrs. C. D. Budlong was shedding tears like a crocodile, without

moving a feature. Mr. Budlong put the lighted end of a cigar in his
mouth and burned his tongue to a blister, while Miss Eyester dropped
into a chair and had her sinking spell and recovered without any one
remarking it. In an abandonment that was like the delirium of madness
Mr. Cone went in and lifted Miss Gaskett's cat "Cutie" out of the plush
rocker, where she was leaving hairs on the cushion, and surreptitiously
kicked her.
Altogether it was an unforgettable occasion, and only Pinkey seemed
unthrilled by it--he dismounted in a businesslike, matter-of-fact manner
that had in it neither malice toward the horse nor elation at having
ridden him. He felt admiration, if anything, for he said as he rubbed the
horse's forehead:
"You shore made me ride, Old Timer! You got all the old curves and
some new ones. If I had a hat I'd take it off to you. I ain't had such a
churnin' sence I set 'Steamboat' fer fifteen seconds. Oh, hullo----" as
Wallie advanced with his hand out.
"I congratulate you," said Wallie, feeling himself magnanimous in view
of the way his neck was hurting.
"You needn't," replied Pinkey, good-naturedly. "He durned near 'got'
me."
"It was a very creditable ride indeed," insisted Wallie, in his most
patronizing and priggish manner. He found it very hard to be generous,
with Helene Spenceley listening.
"It seemed so, after your performance, 'Gentle Annie'!" snapped Miss
Spenceley.
Actually the woman seemed to spit like a cat at him! She had the
tongue of a serpent and a vicious temper. He hated her! Wallie removed
his hat with exaggerated politeness and decided never to have anything
more to say to Miss Spenceley.
CHAPTER V

"GENTLE ANNIE"
Wallie had told himself emphatically that he would never speak again
to Helene Spenceley. That would be an easy matter since she had
glared at him, when they had passed as she was going in for breakfast,
in a way that would have made him afraid to speak even if he had
intended to. To refrain from thinking of her was something different.
He sat on a rustic bench on The Colonial lawn watching the silly robins
and wondering why she had called him "Gentle Annie." It was clear
enough that nothing flattering was intended, but what did she mean by
it? There was no reason that he could see for her to fly at him--quite the
contrary. He had been very generous and gentlemanly, it seemed to him,
in congratulating Pinkey when it was due to them that he, Wallie, was
thrown into the petunias. His neck was still stiff from the fall and no
one had remembered to inquire about it--that was another reason for the
disgruntled mood in which the moment found him. The women were
making perfect fools of themselves over that Pinkey--they were at it
now, he could hear them cackling on the