Small though the sounds were, they convinced Alcatraz that his claim to
dominion would be mightily disputed. But what is worth having at all if
it is not worth fighting for? He journeyed down the hillside stepping
from grass knot to grass knot. All the time he kept his sensitive
nostrils alert for the ground-smell of water and raised his head from
moment to moment to catch the upper-air scents in case there might be
danger. At length, before prime, he came down-wind from a water-hole and
galloped gladly to it. It was a muddy place with a slope of greenish
sun-baked earth on all sides. Alcatraz stood on the verge, snuffed the
stale odor in disgust and then flirted the surface water with his upper
lip before he could make himself drink. Yet the taste was far from evil,
and there was nothing of man about it. Yonder a deer had stepped, his
tiny footprint sun-burned into the mud, and there was the sprawling,
sliding track of a steer.

Alcatraz stepped further in. The feel of the cool slush was pleasant,
working above his hoofs and over the sensitive skin of the fetlock
joint. He drank again, bravely and deep, burying his nose as a good
horse should and gulping the water. And when he came out and stamped the
mud from his feet he was transformed. He had slept and eaten and drunk
in his own home.

After that, he idled through the hills eating much, drinking often, and
making up as busily as he could in a few weeks for the long years of
semi-starvation under the regime of the Mexican. His body responded
amazingly. His coat grew sleek, his barrel rounded, his neck arched with
new muscles and the very quality of mane and tail changed; he became the
horse of which he had previously been the caricature. It was a lonely
life in many ways but the very loneliness was sweet to the stallion.
Moreover, there was much to learn, and his brain, man-trained by his