The Tale of Pony Twinkleheels | Page 8

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