horse was coming fast--almost too fast. He laid the sleeping squirrel on
the bench, listened, then instinctively stood up and walked to the
thicket's edge.

What happened was too quick for him to comprehend; he had a vision of a
big black horse, mane and tail in the wind, tearing madly, straight at
him--a glimpse of a white face, desperate and set, a flutter of loosened
hair; then a storm of wind and sand roared in his ears; he was hurled,
jerked, and flung forward, dragged, shaken, and left half senseless,
hanging to nose and bit of a horse whose rider was picking herself out of
a bush covered with white flowers.

Half senseless still, he tightened his grip on the bit, released the
grasp on the creature's nose, and, laying his hand full on the forelock,
brought it down twice and twice across the eyes, talking to the horse in
halting, broken whispers.

When he had the trembling animal under control he looked around; the girl
stood on the grass, dusty, dirty, disheveled, bleeding from a cut on the
cheek bone; the most bewildered and astonished creature he had ever
looked upon.

"It will be all right in a few minutes," he said, motioning her to the
bench on the asphalt walk. She nodded, turned, picked up his hat, and,
seating herself, began to smooth the furred nap with her sleeve, watching
him intently all the while. That he already had the confidence of a horse
that he had never before seen was perfectly apparent. Little by little
the sweating, quivering limbs were stilled, the tense muscles in the neck
relaxed, the head sank, dusty velvet lips nibbled at his hand, his
shoulder; the heaving, sunken flanks filled and grew quiet.