Alcatraz | Page 9

a fighting dog.
Arizona Charley, a tall man off a horse and walking with a limp,
moved slowly about the captive, grinning at his companions. It was
plain that he did not expect the stranger to survive the test.
A brief, deep-throated shout from the crowd.
"There's Perris!" cried Corson. "There's Red Perris, I guess!"
Marianne gasped.
It was the devil-may-care cavalier who had laughed and fought and
whistled under the window of her room. He stepped from the thick of
the circle near Rickety and responded to the voice of the crowd by
waving his hat. It would have been a trifle too grandiloquent had he not
been laughing.
"He's going through with it," said Corson, shivering and chuckling at
the same time. "He's going to try Rickety. They look like one and the
same kind to me--two reckless devils, that hoss and Red Jim Perris!"
"Is there real danger?" asked Marianne.
Corson regarded her with pity.
"Rickety can be rode, they say," he answered, "but I disremember
anybody that's done it. Look! He's a man-killer that hoss!"
Perris had stepped a little too close and the piebald thrust out at him
with reaching teeth and striking forefoot. The man leaped back, still

laughing.
"Cool, all right," said Corson judicially. "And maybe he ain't just a
blow-hard, after all. There they go!"
It happened very quickly. Perris had shaken hands with Arizona, then
turned and leaped into the saddle. The ropes were loosed. Rickety
crouched a moment to feel out the reality of his freedom, then burst
away with head close to the ground and ragged mane fluttering. There
was no leaning back in this rider. He sat arrowy-straight save that his
left shoulder worked back in convulsive jerks as he strove to get the
head of Rickety up. But the piebald had the bit. Once his chin was
tucked back against his breast his bucking chances were gone and he
kept his nose as low as possible, like the trained fighter that he was.
There were no yells now. They received Rickety as the appreciative
receive a great artist--in silence.
The straight line of his flight broke into a crazy tangle of criss-cross
pitching. Out of this maze he appeared again in a flash of straight
galloping, used the impetus for a dozen jarring bucks, then reared and
toppled backward to crush the cowpuncher against the earth.
Marianne covered her eyes, but an invisible power dragged her hand
down and made her watch. She was in time to see Perris whisk out of
the saddle before Rickety struck the dirt. His hat had been snapped
from his head. The sun and the wind were in his flaming hair. Blue
eyes and white teeth flashed as he laughed again.
"I like 'em mean," he had said, "and I keep 'em mean. A tame horse is
like a tame man, and I don't give a damn for a fellow who won't fight!"
Once that had irritated her but now, remembering, it rang in her ear to a
different tune. As Rickety spun to his feet, Perris vaulted to the saddle
and found both stirrups in mid-leap, so to speak. The gelding instantly
tested the firmness of his rider's seat by vaulting high and landing on
one stiffened foreleg. The resultant shock broke two ways, like a
curved ball, snapping down and jerking to one side. But he survived the
blow, giving gracefully to it.

It was fine riding, very fine; and the crowd hummed with appreciation.
"A handsome rascal, eh?" said Mr. Corson.
But she caught at his arm.
"Oh!" gasped Marianne. "Oh! Oh!"
Three flurries of wild pitching drew forth those horrified whispers. But
still the flaming red head of the rider was as erect, as jaunty as ever.
Then the quirt flashed above him and cut Rickety's flank; the crowd
winced and gasped. He was not only riding straight up but he was
putting the quirt to Rickety--to Rickety!
The piebald seemed to feel the sting of the insult more than the lash. He
bolted across the field to gain impetus for some new and more terrible
feat but as he ran a yell from Perris thrilled across the crowd.
"They do that, some men. Get plumb drunk with a fight!"
But Marianne did not hear Corson's remark. She watched Rickety
slacken his run as that longdrawn yell began, so wild and high that it
put a tingle in her nose. Now he was trotting, now he was walking, now
he stood perfectly still, become of a sudden, an abject, cowering figure.
The shout of the spectators was almost a groan, for Rickety had been
beaten fairly and squarely at last and it was like the passing of some old
master of the prize ring, the scarred veteran of a