But what he did see left him stary eyed and paralized. For half a minute he just stood like petrified, that cowboy had disappeared from the side of him, and instead, there he was right in the middle of his back and on that hunk of leather he'd been hankering to shed off ever since it was put on there. Instinct pointed out only one way for him to act,--it was telling him that neither the human nor the leather belonged up there in the middle of him that way, and that if he tried he could most likely get rid of 'em. There was nothing else to do that he could see, and right then he felt that he sure must do _something_. His head went down, and a beller came out of him that said much as "I want you"--Up went Smoky's withers followed by the hump that made the saddle twist like on a pivot, and last came steel muscles like shot out of the earth and which carried the whole mixed up and crooked conglameration of man and horse up in mid air and seemed like to shake there for a spell before coming down. All seemed heads and tails and made a picture of the kind that was mighty hard to see, and still harder to figger out. Saddle strings was a popping like on a whip lash, leather was a squeaking, corrals shook as the hard hitting hoofs of the pony hit the earth, and a dust was stirred that looked like a young cloud. Smoky was scared, mad, and desperate. All the action, strength, and endurance that was in him was brought out to do its best. Not a hair on his hide was laying idle thru the performance,--every muscle tightened and loosened in a way to shake the weight on his back and make it pop. Clint felt the muscles work even thru the saddle, and every part of that pony which his legs touched seemed as hard as steel and full of fast working bumps which came and went, twisted his saddle under him, and made him wonder if it was going to stay. It seemed like sometimes that Smoky was headed one way and his saddle another,--he wasn't always sure of the whereabouts of that pony's head; and in all his riding that's what he wanted to keep track of most, cause losing track of a horse's head at them times is something like riding blindfolded--a rider would prepare for one kind of a jolt and meet another, which would cause things to scatter considerable. Clint was still straight up and on top when Smoky's hard jumps finally dwindled down to crowhops and then a stop. That pony was needing wind mighty bad, and as his nostrils opened wide, was taking in the necessary air, he felt a hand a rubbing along his neck, and wild eyed, ears cocked back at the cowboy that was still there, he stood and heard him talk. "You done a mighty fine job little horse," says Clint, "and I'd of been disappointed a lot not to've found that kind of spirit in a horse like you." * * * * *