Chapter 2

"Certainly not!" said Twinkleheels.

"You kicked at Farmer Green yesterday," Spot reminded him.

"Yes! But I never touched him," Twinkleheels answered. "I only wanted to see him jump."

VIII

A GOOD SLEEPER

Twinkleheels' stall was an end one. Next to him stood the old horse Ebenezer; and beyond Ebenezer were the two bays. Twinkleheels often wished that he might have someone for his nearest neighbor that was a bit livelier than Ebenezer. When the old horse stayed in the barn he spent a great deal of his time with his eyes half shut, dozing. If Twinkleheels spoke to him, Ebenezer seldom heard him the first time. And often Ebenezer even fell asleep while Twinkleheels was talking to him.

Twinkleheels always moved smartly. Ebenezer took his time about everything. When anybody backed him between the thills of a wagon he was as slow as Timothy Turtle and no more graceful. And while people harnessed him he usually sighed heavily now and then, because he dreaded being hurried along the road.

Before Twinkleheels came to the farm to live, Johnnie Green had thought it quite a lark to drive or ride Ebenezer. Now, however, Johnnie paid little heed to the old horse. And, to tell the truth, Ebenezer was content to be let alone.

"This boy must have found it a bit poky, riding you," Twinkleheels remarked to Ebenezer one day when he noticed that the old horse was actually wide-awake.

"He found me safe," Ebenezer replied. "That's why Farmer Green let Johnnie ride me."

"It's a wonder you didn't fall asleep and tumble down and throw Johnnie," Twinkleheels said.

"I'm very sure-footed," Ebenezer told him proudly. "Of course, a person will step on a loose stone now and then. But I've never really stumbled in my whole life."

"How old are you?" Twinkleheels inquired.

"I'm twenty," Ebenezer told him.

"And you've never stumbled in all that time!" Twinkleheels cried. "How did you manage to stay on your feet like that?"

"By minding my business," Ebenezer explained with a shrewd glance at his young companion. The answer--and the look--were both lost on Twinkleheels.

"I heard Farmer Green tell Johnnie to turn me and you into the pasture to-morrow," he told Ebenezer.

"Don't you mean 'you and me'?" Ebenezer suggested mildly.

"Well, it's the same thing, isn't it?" Twinkleheels retorted.

"There's a slight difference," said Ebenezer. "I see there are some things you've never been taught. Colts were different when I was a yearling."

Twinkleheels looked almost angry.

"I hope," he snapped, "you don't take me for a yearling. Just because I'm a pony--and small--you needn't think I'm an infant. Why, I'm five years old!"

Old Ebenezer yawned. It seemed as if he was always sleepy.

"You've a good deal to learn," he said. "When I was five I thought I knew everything.... I still find that I can learn something almost every day."

Twinkleheels sniffed. "I don't believe you've picked up much that was new to-day," he said. "You've been dozing every moment, except when you ate your meals."

To his great disgust, Ebenezer gave a sort of snort. He no longer heard anything that his youthful neighbor said.

"I'll see that he learns something in the pasture to-morrow," Twinkleheels promised himself. "I'll get him to race with me--if he can stay awake long enough. And I'll show him such a burst of speed as he's never seen in all his twenty years."

IX

THE RACE

When Johnnie Green turned Twinkleheels and the old horse Ebenezer into the pasture, the first thing they did was to drop down on the grass and enjoy a good roll.

There was a vast difference in their actions. Twinkleheels was as spry as a squirrel. He rolled from one side to the other and back again, jumped up and shook himself like old dog Spot, almost before Ebenezer had picked out a nice, smooth place to roll on.

Ebenezer bent his legs beneath him in a gingerly fashion and sank with something like a sigh upon the green, grassy carpet. It was only with a great effort that he managed at last to roll all the way over; and then he couldn't roll back again. Clumsily he flung his fore feet in front of himself and by a mighty heave pulled himself off the ground.

"Slow, isn't he?" Twinkleheels remarked to the Muley Cow, who was chewing her cud and looking on.

"He doesn't get up the right way," said the Muley Cow. "When rising from the ground one should stand on his hind feet first."

"I don't agree with you," Twinkleheels told her. "Ebenezer uses the right method. But he's terribly poky about it. You can almost hear his joints creak."

The Muley Cow was somewhat offended.

"I've known Ebenezer a great many years," she snapped. "I don't care to hear a young upstart--a mere pony--make fun of him."

Twinkleheels moved away. He felt the least bit uncomfortable.

"I don't like your young friend," said the Muley Cow to the old horse Ebenezer. "He hasn't a proper respect for old people like you and me."

"Oh, he's not a bad sort," Ebenezer replied. "He has a good many things to learn. Perhaps he'll be wiser by night. I shouldn't worry about him, if I were you."

The Muley Cow told Ebenezer that he was entirely too good-natured. And they went their own ways, grazing and rambling aimlessly about the pasture.

Now and then, during the day, they chanced to meet. And always the Muley Cow asked Ebenezer if Twinkleheels had learned anything more.

"Not yet!" Ebenezer said, each time. "The day's not done till sunset."

Well, late in the afternoon Johnnie Green came slowly up the lane and stood by the pasture bars and whistled. Twinkleheels and Ebenezer happened to be together when they heard that cheerful chirp.

"I'll race you to the bars!" Twinkleheels exclaimed.

"Agreed!" cried Ebenezer. The word was no sooner out of his mouth than he started with a rush. He was three jumps ahead of Twinkleheels before that surprised pony began to run.

"I'll soon catch the old horse," Twinkleheels thought. "He can't last long. I'll pass him before we reach the brook."

Before Twinkleheels came to the brook Ebenezer had crossed it in one mighty leap. He was pounding along with a powerful stride over the firm turf of the pasture. And behind him Twinkleheels' pattering feet struggled to shorten the distance between them.

To Twinkleheels' dismay he saw that Ebenezer was steadily drawing away from him. Although Twinkleheels ran his fastest, Ebenezer reached the bars six good lengths ahead of him.

X

EBENEZER'S RECORD

The old horse Ebenezer had beaten Twinkleheels in the race to the bars. While Johnnie Green slipped their halters on them, and they munched the oats that he gave them, neither of them spoke. Johnnie mounted Ebenezer bareback; and leading Twinkleheels, he turned down the lane.

"You're not as slow as I thought you were," Twinkleheels said to Ebenezer as they drew near the barn. "And somehow I couldn't seem to get to running smoothly. I'd like to race you again. I think I could beat you next time."

"Perhaps you could," said Ebenezer. "I don't often run nowadays. But I did running enough when I was younger. I used to race at the county fair, every fall."

"Did you ever win a race at the fair?" Twinkleheels inquired.

"Yes!" Ebenezer answered. "Yes! I can remember winning a race now and then."

"He never lost a race in his whole life!" cried the Muley Cow, who was walking just ahead of them. "Ebenezer used to be known as the fastest horse in these parts. He had a record."

Twinkleheels gasped. "A record!" he exclaimed. "What's that?"

"I don't know, exactly," said the Muley Cow. "I never saw Ebenezer's. But it must have been a fine one, for Farmer Green was always talking about it."

"A horse's record," Ebenezer explained, "is the fastest time he ever makes in a race." Then he added, to Twinkleheels: "You and I will have another race the next time we're in the pasture together."

Twinkleheels gave him an odd look. Somehow Ebenezer did not seem just a poky old farm horse, as Twinkleheels had always regarded him. For the first time Twinkleheels noticed that Ebenezer had many good points. There wasn't a single bunch on his legs. And his muscles showed plainly as they rippled on his lean frame beneath a coat that was both short and fine.

"I don't believe I could beat you if we raced a hundred times," Twinkleheels blurted.

"Of course you couldn't!" the Muley Cow interrupted again.

"Oh, you might," Ebenezer said. "There'd be no harm in trying, anyhow. Racing with me would be good practice for you, even if I did win. If you're going to have a race, don't look for an easy one! Choose a hard one. That's the kind that will make you do your best."

Twinkleheels thanked him.

"It's very kind of Ebenezer to race with you," the Muley Cow bellowed. "You ought to feel honored."

"I do," said Twinkleheels. "But please don't talk so loud! I don't want everybody on the farm laughing at me because I lost a race."

The Muley Cow went into the barn grumbling.

"That pony is a young upstart," she muttered. "The idea of his telling me not to talk so loud! Ebenezer is altogether too pleasant to him."

Old Ebenezer continued to be agreeable to Twinkleheels. They often raced in the pasture, later. And though Twinkleheels never won once, he enjoyed the sport.

And he never called Ebenezer "poky" again.

XI

BRIGHT AND BROAD

Farmer Green had a yoke of oxen called Bright and Broad. They were huge, slow-moving fellows, as different from Johnnie Green's pony, Twinkleheels, as any pair could be. They never frisked about in the pasture. They never ran, nor jumped, nor kicked. They seldom even trotted. And when they did move faster than a walk they lurched into a queer, shambling swing.

The first time Twinkleheels saw them travelling at that gait he couldn't help giggling.

"They look as if their legs were going to knock down all the fence posts on the farm," he exclaimed.

Despite their clumsiness, Bright and Broad did many a day's hard work in an honest fashion for Farmer Green. Of course he never drove them to the village when he was in a hurry. But whenever there was a heavy load to pull he depended on Bright and Broad to help him. If the pair of bays couldn't haul a wagon out of a mud hole Farmer Green would call on Bright and Broad. And when they lunged forward the wagon just had to move--or something broke.

Though Twinkleheels admired their strength, he didn't care much for Bright and Broad's company. They were too sober to suit him. They were more than likely to stand and chew their cuds and look out upon the world with vacant stares and say nothing.

"I used to think Ebenezer was a slow old horse," Twinkleheels remarked to the bays on a winter's day as they stood in the barn. "I thought I could beat him easily until he showed me that I was mistaken. But I can certainly beat Bright and Broad. They're the slowest pair I ever saw."

The bays glanced at each other.

"You can't always tell by a person's looks what he can do," one of them remarked. "Let Bright and Broad choose the race course and they'd leave you behind."

"Nonsense!" Twinkleheels cried. "They couldn't beat anybody unless it's Timothy Turtle, who lives over in Black Creek."

The bays winked at each other over the low partition that separated their stalls.

"Maybe you'll find out that you're wrong," they told Twinkleheels. "Maybe you'll learn that Bright and Broad are faster than you think they are. We've known Farmer Green to take them and leave us here in the barn--when he was in a hurry to go somewhere, too."

"Ha! ha!" Twinkleheels laughed. "You're joking. You're trying to fool me."

"Oh, no!" the bays cried. "Ask Bright and Broad themselves."

So Twinkleheels spoke to Bright and Broad the very next day, when he met them in the barnyard. While he told them what the bays had said to him they chewed their cuds and listened with a dreamy look in their great, mild eyes.

Twinkleheels paused and waited for them to speak. But they said nothing. Their jaws moved steadily as they chewed; but they said never a word.

"Can't you answer when you're spoken to?" Twinkleheels cried at last.

"Yes!" they said, speaking as one--for they always did everything together. "Yes! But you haven't asked us a question."

"Is this true--what the bays told me about you?" he snapped.

"We can't deny it," they chanted.

Twinkleheels was never more surprised.

XII

NO SCHOOL TO-DAY

And that night it snowed. In the morning, when Johnnie Green crawled from his bed and looked out of the window he could scarcely see the barn. A driving white veil flickered across the farmyard. The wind howled. The blinds rattled. Even the whole house shook now and then as a mighty blast rocked it.

It was just the sort of weather to suit Johnnie Green.

"There won't be any school to-day!" he cried. And he hurried into his clothes much faster than he usually did.

Though Johnnie Green was eager to get out of doors, most of those that lived in the barn were quite content to stay there during such a storm. The old horse Ebenezer especially looked pleased.

"This will be a fine day to doze," he remarked to the pony, Twinkleheels. "Farmer Green won't make me do any work in this weather. The roads must be blocked with drifts already."

Twinkleheels moved restlessly in his stall.

"I don't want to stand here with nothing to do," he grumbled. "If I could sleep in the daytime, as you do, perhaps I wouldn't mind. And if I were like the Muley Cow maybe I could pass the hours away by chewing a cud. Bright and Broad can do that, too," said Twinkleheels.

"Oh! Farmer Green will have the oxen out as soon as the storm slackens," old Ebenezer told him. "And no doubt you'll get outside as soon as they do, for Johnnie Green will want you to play with him in the snow or I don't know anything about boys."

"Good!" Twinkleheels exclaimed. "I hope he'll take me out. It would be great fun to toss him into a snowdrift.... But I don't see what Farmer Green wants of Bright and Broad on a day like this. They'll be slower than ever if the roads are choked with snow."

The old horse Ebenezer smiled to himself as he shut his eyes for another cat nap before breakfast. He thought that Twinkleheels would learn a thing or two, a little later.

Johnnie Green was the first one to plough his way out to the barn that morning. He burst into the barn and stamped the snow off his feet. And Twinkleheels stamped, too, because he wanted something to eat.

Johnnie fed Twinkleheels and Ebenezer and the bays. He was shaking some hay; in front of the Muley Cow (who belonged to him) when his father arrived.

"The worst storm of the winter!" Farmer Green observed. "We'll have work enough after this, breaking the roads out."

"I'll help," Johnnie said. "I'll take Twinkleheels and work hard."

"I suppose," said his father, "we ought to get the road to the schoolhouse cleared first."

"Oh, no!" cried Johnnie. "Let's leave that till the last."

"If we left it for you and Twinkleheels to clear, you wouldn't get back to school before spring," Farmer Green declared.

Twinkleheels had been listening eagerly to all this.

"Now, I wonder what Farmer Green means by that," he muttered. "I hope he doesn't think I can't get through the drifts as well as anybody. I can certainly make my way through the snow better than those clumsy old oxen, Bright and Broad."

XIII

FUN AND GRUMBLES

It stopped snowing at last and the weather turned clear and crisp. The sun came out. And so did Johnnie Green, riding on Twinkleheels. He did not get far from the barn, however. Where the snow wasn't piled in drifts high above Twinkleheels' head it reached up on his fat sides. He floundered about the farmyard for a time. And, falling once, he dumped Johnnie Green neatly into a drift, head first.

The spill didn't hurt Johnnie in the least. But snow went up the inside of his sleeves, and down his neck, and into his eyes and ears and even his mouth.

He jumped up spluttering. And Twinkleheels jumped at the same time. He tried to run. But he could make little headway in the snow, and Johnnie caught his bridle rein and stopped him.

"You'd better put that pony back in the barn," Farmer Green called from the woodshed door. "After I yoke up Bright and Broad and break out the drive to the road you can ride Twinkleheels again. He might cut himself in this heavy going."

Twinkleheels sniffed as he heard what Farmer Green said.

"This is all nonsense," he grumbled to the old horse Ebenezer as Johnnie led him into his stall. "Farmer Green doesn't know what he's talking about. I'm a hundred times sprier than Bright. And I'm a hundred times sprier than Broad. That makes me two hundred times sprier than both of them. It's silly to put me in my stall and take them out. They won't be able to move. They'll get stuck fast in a drift, and goodness knows how we'll ever haul them out."

"I shouldn't worry about the oxen if I were you," Ebenezer replied. "It seems to me Bright and Broad are old enough and big enough to look out for themselves."

"That's just the trouble!" cried Twinkleheels. "They're too old and they're too big. They're terribly heavy. If they were stuck in a drift I don't believe you and the bays could pull them out--not even if I helped you."

Ebenezer sighed deeply.

"I'm going to sleep now," he told Twinkleheels.

Soon Twinkleheels could hear Farmer Green shouting "Gee!" and "Haw!"

"There!" Twinkleheels called to the two bays. "There's Farmer Green talking to Bright and Broad. I hope they're not helpless already."

The bays snickered.

"Don't laugh!" Twinkleheels begged them. "It's not funny. It would be awful for them to spend the rest of the winter in a snow bank."

"We weren't laughing at Bright and Broad," the bays explained.

Twinkleheels tried to look at them; but old Ebenezer's bony back was in the way.

"I don't know what amuses you, then," he snapped.

"Maybe you'll find out later," the bays told him.

And he did. When Johnnie Green next led him out of the barn Twinkleheels discovered that a broad path had been opened from the barn to the highway. And a little distance up the road Farmer Green and Bright and Broad were battling with the drifts.

XIV

STUCK IN A DRIFT

Outside the barn, in the snow-covered farmyard, Johnnie Green mounted Twinkleheels and rode him beyond the gate, where he could watch the fun up the road.

Yoked to a sort of plough, Bright and Broad, the oxen, tore through the piled-up snow and threw it to either side in great ridges.

"I'm going ahead to the crossroads," Johnnie Green told his father.

That plan pleased Twinkleheels. Before Farmer Green could speak he plunged out of the broken road and wallowed in snow up to his neck. He was going to show Bright and Broad that he could get to the crossroads before they did.

"Don't do that!" Farmer Green shouted to Johnnie.

He was too late. The words were scarcely out of his mouth before Twinkleheels was reaching desperately for a footing. His toes found nothing firm beneath them--nothing but yielding snow. And his frantic struggles only made him sink the deeper.

Johnnie Green slid off Twinkleheels' back and tried to help him.

He could do nothing. And he turned a somewhat frightened face to his father.

"We're stuck!" he faltered. "I can get out; but Twinkleheels can't. Do you suppose Bright and Broad could pull him out?"

"They could yank twenty of him back on the road," Farmer Green declared. "But we don't need them. I'll dig the pony out."

Seizing a shovel, Johnnie's father slowly dug his way to Twinkleheels, who had stopped struggling and was waiting glumly for help. In a few minutes more he had scrambled out of the ditch and gained the road again, through the path that Farmer Green made for him.

"Now," said Farmer Green, "don't leave the broken road. This pony's too small to handle himself in these drifts. I wouldn't try to put even a full-sized horse through them. It takes oxen in such going. They're slow; but they're strong and sure-footed, too. And they can go where horses couldn't do anything but flounder and probably cut themselves with their own feet. That's why we always use Bright and Broad to gather sap in the sugar-bush."

"I'll put Twinkleheels in the barn again," said Johnnie. "Then I'll come back on foot and help you."

So he rode Twinkleheels back and hitched him in his stall once more.

Old Ebenezer woke up as Twinkleheels pattered over the barn floor.

"What!" cried the old horse. "Back again so soon? Did you race with Bright and Broad?"

"The snow's too deep for a good race," Twinkleheels told him.

"Bright and Broad don't mind the snow much, do they?" Ebenezer asked.

"Oh, no!" Twinkleheels answered. "They're getting on slowly, up the road. They take their time, of course."

"Couldn't they beat you to the crossroads if you raced with them to-day?"

"Well--yes!" Twinkleheels admitted. And he gave Ebenezer a sharp look. "Who's been talking with you?" he demanded.

"Nobody!" said Ebenezer. "I've been dozing here all the morning."

"Not even a sparrow?" Twinkleheels asked.

"No! Nobody has said a word to me."

"That's strange," Twinkleheels mused. "I was almost sure a little bird had told you something."

XV

STEPPING HIGH

Twinkleheels was feeling quite important. Something that Farmer Green had said to Johnnie in his hearing made him hold his head higher than he usually did--and step higher, too.

"You seem very proud to-day," the old horse Ebenezer said to him. "When Johnnie Green led you back from the watering trough I noticed that you were strutting in quite a lordly fashion. You made me think of Turkey Proudfoot."

"Ah!" Twinkleheels exclaimed. "I've just heard some news. I'm going to the blacksmith's to-day to be shod. You know I've never worn any shoes. And I've always wanted some."

Old Ebenezer smiled down at Twinkleheels.

"Well, well!" he said. "I don't blame you for feeling a bit proud. I remember the day I got my first set of shoes. You see, I was young once myself."

The old horse seemed to feel like talking. Twinkleheels was glad of that, for he felt that he _must_ chatter about the new shoes he was going to have--or burst.

"Of course," said Twinkleheels, "most folks are shod before they're as old as I am. But I've spent a good deal of my time in the pasture and I don't often travel over hard roads.... How old were you when you first visited the blacksmith's shop?"

Ebenezer shut his eyes for a moment or two. And Twinkleheels feared he was going to sleep. But he was only thinking hard.

"I must have been about two months old," Ebenezer declared.

"Goodness!" cried Twinkleheels. "I didn't suppose colts of that age ever wore shoes."

"They don't," Ebenezer replied. "You didn't ask me when I had my first shoes. You asked me when I first visited a smithy. At the age of two months I jogged alongside my mother when she went to be shod. I must have been about three years old when the blacksmith nailed my first shoes to my feet."

Twinkleheels gave Ebenezer an uneasy glance.

"Does it hurt," he asked, "when they drive the nails into your hoofs?"

"Oh, no!" Ebenezer assured him. "To be sure, a careless blacksmith could prick you. But Farmer Green always takes us to the best one he can find."

"To tell the truth," Twinkleheels confessed, "I'm a bit timid about going to the smithy. I don't know what to do when I get there. I don't know which foot to hold up first."

"Don't worry about that!" said old Ebenezer. "They'll tell you everything. Just pay attention and obey orders and you won't have any trouble."

Twinkleheels thanked Ebenezer.

"It's pleasant," he said, "to have a kind, wise horse like you in the next stall. There are some matters that I shouldn't care to mention to the bays. They're almost sure to laugh at me if I ask them a question."

The old horse Ebenezer nodded his head.

"They're young and somewhat flighty," he admitted. "You know, they even ran away last summer. You'll be better off! if you don't seek their advice about things."