ot remember when he had learned And there
was another reason--he did not want em to know he had passed that way,
if they took a notion to call him back. So he worked and he tugged and
he grew so red in the face it looked as if he were choking. But he got
the gate up and the wire loop over the stake--though he had to hunt up
an old piece of a post to stand on, and even then had to stand on his
toes to reach the loop--since he was Chip's Kid and the Little Doctor's.

He even remembered to scrape out the tell-tale prints of his small feet
in the bare earth there, and the prints of Silver's feet where he went
through. Yarns he had heard the Happy Family tell, in the bunk-house on
rainy days, had taught him these tricks. He was extremely thorough in
all that he did--being a good deal like his dad--and when he went the
grass, no one would have suspected that he had passed that way.

After a while he left that winding creek-bottom and climbed a long
ridge. Then he went down hill and pretty soon he climbed another hill
that made old Silver stop and rest before he went on to the top. The
Kid stood on the top for a few minutes and stared wistfully out over
the tumbled mass of hills, and deep hollows, and hills, and hill and
hills--till he could not see where they left off. He could not see any
of the bunch; but then, he could not see any brakes growing anywhere,
either. The bunch was down in the brakes--he had heard that often enough
to get it fixed firmly in his mind. Well, when he came to where the
brakes grew--and he would know them, all right, when he saw them!--he
would find the bunch. He thought they'd be s'prised to see him ride up!
The bunch didn't know that he could drive stock all his own self, and
that he was a real, old cowpuncher now. He was a lot bigger. He didn't
have to hunt such a big rock, or such a high bank, to get on Silver now.
He thought he must be pretty near as big as Pink, any way. They would
certainly be s'prised!

The brakes must be farther over. Maybe he would have to go over on the
other side of that biggest hill before he came to the place where they
grew. He rode unafraid down a steep, rocky slope where Silver picked his
way very, very carefully, and sometimes stopped and smelt of a ledge or
a pile of rocks, and then turned and found some other way down.

The Kid let him choose his path--Daddy Chip had taught him to leave
the reins loose and let Silver cross ditches and rough places where he
wan