FOR several days after the woman had relieved her of the racking burden of and iron and wire-net, Dora was troubled by the conflict of recurrent impulses to go back to the farm yard and the fears that just as urged her to get far out of the reach of man. Months of followed by weeks of semi-starvation had robbed her of her strength and her courage; the barn had so her that she found the cold, out doors, especially at night, very hard to endure; and her had deprived her of her companions without whom life was not worth the struggle.
One snow flurry followed another. The last spot of exposed earth disappeared. The sun did not show itself for days and every hour seemed to deepen the drifts. Never had the world seemed so and inhospitable to her.
She was so cold one windy night that she at last to go back to the farmyard where she had been so magnanimously befriended. She got up toward the end of the long night and started away, along for many miles in the dark, driven by the image of the sheltering barn; and then she stopped suddenly as the other image, that of the woman driving her away, came into her mind. She stood still, unable to decide what to do and as she stood the reddish in the south east grew brighter and less red.
She became very cold, having stood so long, and started off again more for want of exercise than through any definite decision, and as she neared the top of a wild rose bush that from a deep drift, a rabbit sprang out of its shadow and bounded away to the south. Dora stopped through fright, and followed him with her eyes as he fled. She missed him when he was swallowed up in the great ocean of whiteness and searching for him suddenly discovered a group of horses on the of a long hill, their dark bodies cut clearly against the end of the light streak in the sky.
Dora did not stop for her breakfast. Her eyes lighted up, her and her thin legs through the snows as if their old strength had come back to them. There were many hills and valleys lost to the sight in the level whiteness and, crossing them over-anxiously, she was obliged to stop a few times to rest and to her breath, before at last she reached the horses, by that time down the side of the hill.
There were about a dozen of them spread out . While yet some distance from them, she thought she recognised some of her old friends, but as she came nearer she was overwhelmed with doubt. They were pawing the snow very energetically and took little interest in her greetings. One or two heads raised up a moment, then went back to the business of finding grass which the rest would not interrupt even for that short time. This reception was a great disappointment to Dora, but there were other disappointments in store for her.
The three horses to whom she was nearest, watched her approach with suspicion. They were, all three, hard working horses, who found the pawing of snow a task. They thought she meant to eat from their find and drove her off with threats of angry whinnies and laying ears. One of them, a old , a red with two naked scars on her shoulders, jumped across the hole she had dug, ran after Dora and nipped her haunches several times, as poor Dora fled from her.
Dora stopped running about a hundred yards from there, looked back at the old nag and, seeing that she had returned to pawing, began to paw the snow where she was. When she got to the grass and had taken a mouthful, she raised her head and stared at the group, wondering what had happened to the beautiful world from which she had been by man. She could not make out why that old nag had been so intent upon hurting her. Dora did not know of those differences in which makes one creature and sympathetic after an experience of great suffering and another sour and .
Her reception was a sad disappointment to Dora, but even that companionship was better than none. So she clung to it with all her strength, content to move about on the outer edge of the group. When the had fed well and for exercise started across the snows, Dora always went with them, running with every ounce of energy in her body, striving through her old revived habit to get to the lead; but Dora soon realised that these were not the days of her . Strive as she would, she could not keep up with even the poorest plug and long before the others were ready to quit, she was obliged to drop out of the race, and unhappy, and panting for breath.
Nevertheless, she took part in every race. Every time she made the same attempt to do the impossible. The youngsters of two and three years of age fairly laughed at her, reaching her while she struggled with might and main and leaving her behind with a few easy bounds. But it is a poor effort that accomplishes no result whatever, and though she could at no time outrun the younger horses, she daily managed to leave some older horse behind her.
One day she tried her old trick. Very early in the race she happened to be in the lead, having started the race. When the younger horses saw her leading a few of the old plugs, they started after her, soon, of course, overtaking her. Dora to the side, in the hope that they would follow her, and found herself alone. They not only refused to follow her but they did not even look back to see what had happened to her. Dora was so unhappy she started off again after them, but soon stopped, realising that she could not catch up to them and that she would soon be out of breath once more. She stood still a while and watched them . Then she turned, intending to paw the snow for grass, when she saw another group of horses coming from the southeast.
Dora raised her head and looked with absorbed interest. The wind lifted her mane and fluttered it in the air. For a few moments, absorbed in the creatures that moved toward her in single file, she looked like Queen once more in all the glory of her regency. When they were a hundred yards away, Queen neighed with all her strength. At once the marching line stopped and all heads went up high in the air. Then from the rear of the line a white horse broke from the path he had been following and with a call of recognition started hastily toward her. It was White-black and, with a strength born of the very sight of him, Queen loped to meet him.
Four of the other horses recognized her, too, and the air vibrated with the music of that happy reunion. Noses touched noses and happy whinnies greeted happy whinnies. With the five of them had come a young mother, a sorrel mare with a fuzzy little colt who had been born in the spring. When the others had gone to meet Queen she remained in her tracks, hesitating to get into any kind of an assembly where through joy or anger her colt might be hurt. He stood right behind her, his fuzzy little head against her haunch, his eyes filled with wonderment.
When Dora had greeted her old friends, she went to greet the mother and her colt, running her old , on which were still the marks of her struggle with the basket, down the fuzzy little fellow’s forehead, murmuring tremulously. The proud young mother looked on almost eagerly and commented softly and good-naturedly.
But when the big group returned there was dissention at once. The ugly red mare seemed to think that there was too much fuss made over Queen, and turned upon her with open mouth. White-black, right behind the old nag, nipped her . A quarrel followed which spread to the rest of the group and finally ended in a race which divided the two groups, Dora going off with her friends. All day the two groups dug the snow a goodly distance apart and in the evening came the worst storm of the season.
The storm approached quite suddenly, though all day there had been vague signs of its coming. A northern blew up, tearing the weaker branches from the trees and sending them sliding over the surface of the snow, tearing up the looser snow and blowing it into their eyes and ears and nostrils. Queen led her group to a fairly sheltered spot in among the trees near by and together they lay down.
The warmth of their bodies, one the other, was so comforting that the slightest move on the part of any one of them brought a low, patient protest from the rest. The night came rapidly. The wind grew more and more furious, howling and overhead, and the tall ............