However the old mare happened to feel, the little buckskin, since the forces of evil had as yet made no attempt to separate her from her mother, shook the fear from her heart and took all the delight there was to take in this unexpected excitement of the day. Healthy to the last cell in her body, the race had merely accelerated the circulation of her blood; and the ease with which she was able to keep up with her mother made her conscious of a great and thrilling power. Her eyes and nostrils dilated, her mane bristling and her tail unfurled, her springy legs carrying her with ease, there was an expression of boundless joy in the motion of her graceful body.
The gates of the corral stood wide open. Being so driven that they could not swerve from the path, half the group poured into one section of the corral and the other half into the other. When they turned at the opposite walls realising that there, there was no way out again, and came back toward the gates, they saw the men closing them.
Only the soul that has been trapped knows the crushing torment of four relentless walls. Round and round they went, madly and stupidly, and clouds of beaten earth rose from under their feet and choked them. Finally becoming aware of the fact that the men were not pursuing them any longer, they packed into a corner of the corral and, looking over the corral walls and between the logs, sought to learn what they were doing. They saw one man building a fire in the open, but a few paces from the corral; while the other was calmly and portentously making preparations that were only too familiar to the old mares.
The little buckskin, beside her mother, always beside her mother, clinging to that big beloved body as the soul clings to life, was wedged into the very corner and right against the logs of the wall, so that her frightened eye, in the middle of the open space between two logs, could see the rancher’s house some four rods away.
Her sides were still throbbing violently when she saw the house door open. A little girl appeared. The little filly did not know what kind of animal that was except that she guessed that it was some sort of man. She perceived with renewed trepidation that the little girl was hopping and skipping directly toward her. In her fright she pressed tight against her mother, but her mother, much more concerned with the men and apparently indifferent to the little girl, would not move an inch. When suddenly the little buckskin felt the touch of the little girl’s hand on her back, she called out frantically to her mother. But the old mare bent down her long neck, touched the little head with her soft, warm lips, murmured reassuringly and then looked away again. By that time the filly realised, uncomfortable though she was, that the little hand was not going to hurt her.