ir big troubled eyes
looking straight at me.

During my life on the frontier I have seen enough of native horses to
know that when a pair of excited mustang leaders try to get inside a
stage, it is time for one to get out, so I got out! One of those men
passengers instantly called to me, "You stay in there!" I asked, "Why?"
"Because it is perfectly safe," said a second man. I was very indignant
at being spoken to in this way and turned my back to them. The driver
got the leaders in position, and then looking around, said to me that
when the balky wheelers once started they would run up the hill "like
the devil," and I would surely be left unless I was inside the stage.

I knew that he was telling the truth, and if he had been the first man
to tell me to get in the coach I would have done so at once, but it so
happened that he was the fourth, and by that time I was beginning to
feel abused. It was bad enough to have to obey just one man, when
at home, and then to have four strange men--three of them idiots,
too--suddenly take upon themselves to order me around was not to be
endured. I had started on the trip with the expectation of taking care
of myself, and still felt competent to do so. Perhaps I was very tired,
and perhaps I was very cross. At all events I told the driver I would
not get in--that if I was left I would go back to the ranch. So I stayed
outside, taking great care, however, to stand close to the stage door.

The instant I heard the loosening of the brake I jumped up on the step,
and catching a firm hold each side of the door, was about to step in
when one of those men passengers grabbed my arm and tried to jerk me
back, so he could get in ahead of me! It was a dreadful thing for anyone
to do, for if my hands and arms had not been unusually strong from
riding hard-mouthed horses, I would undoubtedly have been thrown
underneath the big wheels and horribly crushed, for the four horses were
going at a terrific gait, and the jerky was swaying like a live thing.
As it was, anger and indignation gave me extra strength and I scrambled
inside with nothing more serious happening than a bruised head. But that
man! He pushed in back of me and, not knowing the nice little ways of
jerkies, was pitched forward to the floor with an awful thud. But after
a second or so he pulled himself up on his seat, which was opposite
mine, and there we two sat in silence and in darkness. I noticed the
next morning that there was a