The Sun Maid Part 19

"Course. I remember I got so excited over the horses, and so sorry for the boys that rode and didn't win. But what of that? Other Mother has gone!"

"I tell you she's safe. Safer than you or me. Listen. Abel says _we_, too, will have to ride a race to-day! On Tempest and s...o...b..rd. Even if we win, the money will belong to him; and if we lose--he's going to sell one of our horses to pay his loss. I heard him say it."

"But they are ours!"

"He's kept them all these years, he says. He claims the right to do with them as he chooses. Bad as that is, it isn't the worst. Though Wahneenah is safe, still she will not be always. You and I will have to ride this race--to save her life, or liberty!"

"What do--you--mean?"

"I haven't time to explain. Only--will you do as I say? Exactly?"

"Of course." Kitty looked inquiringly into her foster-brother's face.

Didn't he know she loved him better than anybody and would mind him always?

"When we are on the horses if I say to you: 'Follow me!' will you?"

"Of course. Away to the sky, over yonder, if you want me."

"Even if any grown folks should try to stop you? Even if Abel or Mercy?"

"Even"--declared the little girl, sincerely.

"Now go back to the house, or anywhere you please till Abel calls you, or I do. Then come and mount. And then--then--do exactly as I tell you. Remember."

He went away, back to the group of men about the barn, and Kitty sat down in the shady place to wait. But it was not for long. Presently she heard Mercy calling her, and saw Abel, with Gaspar, leading the black gelding and pretty s...o...b..rd out of the stable toward a ring of other horses. She got up and pa.s.sed toward the cabin very slowly.

Oddly enough, she began to feel timid about riding before all those watching, strange faces; yet did not understand why. Then she thought of Wahneenah, and her returning anger made her indifferent to them.

"Abel wants you, Kit!" cried Mrs. Smith, quite ignoring the child's recent outbreak, and the girl walked quietly toward him. But it was Gaspar who helped to swing her into her saddle, where she settled herself with an ease learned long ago of the Snake-Who-Leaps. The lad, also, found time to whisper:

"Remember your promise! We are to ride this race for Wahneenah's life--though n.o.body knows that save you and me. So ride your best.

Ride as you never rode before--and on the road I lead you!"

The sons of the new settler and horse dealer were to ride against these two. There were three of these youths, all well mounted, and the course was to be a certain number of times around the great wheat field so freshly reaped. It was a rough route, indeed, but as just for one as another, and in plain sight of all the visitors. The five horses ranged in a row with their noses touching a line, held by two men, that fell as the word was given:

"One--two--three--GO!"

They went. They made the circuit of the field in fair style, with the three strangers a trifle ahead. On the completion of the second heat, the easterners pa.s.sed the starting-point alone.

"Why, Gaspar! Why, Kitty!" shouted Abel reprovingly. "How's this?"

"Maybe they don't understand what's meant," suggested somebody.

Seemingly, they did not. For neither at the third round did they appear in leading. On the contrary, they had started off at a right angle, straight across the prairie; but now so fast they rode, and so unerringly, that long before their deserted friends had ceased to stare and wonder they had pa.s.sed out of sight.

CHAPTER XIV.

ONCE MORE IN THE OLD HOME.

"We can rest a little now, Kit. We are so far away that n.o.body could catch us if they tried. They won't try, any way, I guess. They'll think we'll go back."

"Didn't the horses do finely, Gaspar! I never rode like that, I guess.

Where are we going? What did you mean about saving Wahneenah's life?

Where is she?"

"Don't ask so many questions. I've got to think. I've got to think very hard. I'm the man of our family, you know, Sun Maid. Wahneenah and you are my women."

"Oh! indeed!" said the girl, moving a little nearer her foster-brother on the gra.s.sy hillock where they had slipped from their saddles, to rest both themselves and the beasts.

"You see: we've all run away."

"Pooh! That's nothing. I've always been running away. Black Partridge said I began life that way."

"You're about ten years old, Kit. You're big enough to be getting womanly."

"Father Abel said I was. I can sew quite well. If I'm very, very good, I'm to be let st.i.tch a d.i.c.key all alone, two threads at a time, for him. Mercy said so."

"Do you like st.i.tching s.h.i.+rts for that old man?"

"No. I hate it."

"Poor little Sun Maid. You were made to be happy, and do nothing but what you like all day long. Well, I'll be a man some day, and build a cabin of my own for you and Wahneenah."

"That will be nice. Though I'll be of some use some way, even if I don't like sewing. Where shall we go when we get rested, boy?"

"To the Fort."

"The--Fort! I thought it was all burned up."

"There is a new one on the same old ground. It is our real home, you know. We will be refugees. When we meet Wahneenah, we'll go and claim protection."

"Oh! Gaspar, where is she? I want her terribly. I am afraid something will happen to her."

In his heart the lad was, also, greatly alarmed; but he felt it unwise to show this. So he answered, airily:

"Oh! she's on, a piece. I pointed her the road, and told her where to meet us. At the top of the sandhills, this side the Fort."

"The sandhills! That dreadful place. You must be getting a real 'brave,' Gaspar boy, if you don't mind going there again. I've heard you talk--"

"I don't want to talk even now, Kit. But I had to have some spot we both knew, where we could meet, and we chose that. I expect she'll be there waiting, and as soon as the horses get cooled a little, and we do, we'll go on."

"I'm hungry. I wish we had brought something to eat."

"I did. It's here in my blouse. I noticed at the dinner that you did more serving than eating. There's water yonder, too; in that clump of bushes must be a spring," and the prairie-wise lad was right.