prairie by yourself and seen him coming?"

Emil stared. "Maybe I could hide in a badger-hole," he suggested
doubtfully.

"But suppose there wasn't any badger-hole," Lou persisted. "Would
you run?"

"No, I'd be too scared to run," Emil admitted mournfully, twisting
his fingers. "I guess I'd sit right down on the ground and say my
prayers."

The big boys laughed, and Oscar brandished his whip over the broad
backs of the horses.

"He wouldn't hurt you, Emil," said Carl persuasively. "He came
to doctor our mare when she ate green corn and swelled up most as
big as the water-tank. He petted her just like you do your cats.
I couldn't understand much he said, for he don't talk any English,
but he kept patting her and groaning as if he had the pain himself,
and saying, 'There now, sister, that's easier, that's better!'"

Lou and Oscar laughed, and Emil giggled delightedly and looked up
at his sister.

"I don't think he knows anything at all about doctoring," said
Oscar scornfully. "They say when horses have distemper he takes
the medicine himself, and then prays over the horses."

Alexandra spoke up. "That's what the Crows said, but he cured
their horses, all the same. Some days his mind is cloudy, like.
But if you can get him on a clear day, you can learn a great deal
from him. He understands animals. Didn't I see him take the horn
off the Berquist's cow when she had torn it loose and went crazy?
She was tearing all over the place, knocking herself against things.
And at last she ran out on the roof of the old dugout and her legs
went through and there she stuck, bellowing. Ivar came running
with his white bag, and the moment he got to her she was quiet and
let him saw her horn off and daub the place with tar."

Emil had been watching his sister, his face reflecting the sufferings
of the cow. "And then didn't it hurt her any more?" he asked.

Alexandra patted him. "No, not any more. And in two days they
could use her milk again."

The road to Ivar's homestead was a very poor one. He had settled
in the rough country across the county line, where no one lived but
some Russians,--half a dozen families who dwelt together in one long
house, divided off like barracks. Ivar had explained his choice
by saying that the fewer neighbors he had, the fewer temptations.
Nevertheless, when one considered that his chief business was
horse-doctoring, it seemed rather short-sighted of him to live in the
most inaccessible place