"Smoky," he says, "you're some horse"--Clint hadn't hardly realized he'd spoke a name, he was too busy watching and admiring that pony's every move, so as it was that name came unconscious like to the cowboy and it was used and repeated from then on as natural as tho that name had been thought and decided on. He'd named many horses and had always let the name come to him either by the color, size, or shape of each horse, and sometimes by the way they acted. He'd called one tall rangy horse "Shorty" and another low built small horse "Skyhigh." Often the name didn't at all fit the horse in that way but there was some reason there, the same as there was a mighty good reason to call the mouse colored gelding "Smoky." He did look like a rounded shiny cloud of grey smoke, and as he held his ground and watched the cowboy, he acted as tho he might live up to his name and really go up in smoke,--his acquaintance with the human hadn't been very long and he wasn't as yet any too confident. Clint could tell as he watched just what was going on in that pony's think tank, he could still see fear in his eyes, but mixed in with that fear was a lot of nerve that showed fight. He knowed that pony would fight and make himself hard to handle, and he'd of been mighty disappointed not to've seen them signs in the horse. It was only natural that any of his kind should act this way and he figgered the wilder the spirit the bigger and more worth while would the winning be.--He would take his time, do a good job and turn Smoky from a wild raw bronc into a well broke and eddicated cowhorse. He took a few steps closer and Smoky backed away to the end of the rope,--he snorted when he found he couldn't back no further and pawed at the rope as the cowboy kept a coming still closer and closer. Clint took his time but came on steady and a talking the while till he finally got within a couple of feet of the horse and where he could touch him. Hanging on to the rope with the right hand he reached out with the left and touched him easy between the eyes. Smoky flinched and snorted but he stood it,--he stood it for quite a spell and felt the hand rubbing on his forehead and working up and up towards his ears. Clint had just about got to one of them ears when Smoky rubbed his nose along the cowboy's sleeve, took a sniff, and then of a sudden nipped him on the arm. That had happened to him before many a time and he'd been ready for it with the result that the pony got only a piece of shirt and no flesh. "Now, don't be so daggoned ornery," says that cowboy as he kept a rubbing the same as tho nothing had happened, "I only want to reach between them ears and touch that knowledge bump of yours."