a good deal of persistence in
his makeup; and he went, by a roundabout way, to the stable with the
grub-sack bending him double. Still it was not so very heavy; it was
made bulky by about two dozen fresh-made doughnuts and a loaf of bread
and a jar of honey and a glass of wild-currant jelly and a pound or so
of raw, dried prunes which the Kid called nibblin's because he liked to
nibble at them, like a prairie dog at a grass root.

Getting that sack tied fast to the saddle after the saddle was on
Silver's back was no easy task for a boy who is six, even though he is
large for his age. Still, being Chip's Kid and the Little Doctor's he
did it--with the help of the oats box and Silver's patient disposition.

There were other things which the bunch always tied on their saddles; a
blanket, for instance, and a rope. The Kid made a trip to the bunk-house
and pulled a gray blanket off Ole's bed, and spent a quarter of an hour
rolling it as he had seen the boys roll blankets The oats box, with
Silver standing beside it, came in handy again. He found a discarded
rope and after much labor coiled it crudely and tied it beside the
saddle-fork.

The Kid went to the door, stood beside it and leaned away over so that
he could peek out and not be seen Voices came from the house--the voice
of the Old Man; to be exact, high-pitched and combative. The Kid looked
up the bluff, and the trail lay empty in the afternoon sun. Still, he
did not like to take that trail. Doctor Dell might come riding down
there almost any minute. The Kid did not want to meet Doctor Dell just
right then.

He went back, took Silver by the bridle reins and led him out of the
barn and around the corner where he could not be seen from the White
House. He thought he had better go down the creek, and out through the
wire gate and on down the creek that way. He was sure that the "breaks"
were somewhere beyond the end of the coulee, though he could not have
explained why he was sure of it. Perhaps the boys, in speaking of the
breaks, had unconsciously tilted heads in that direction.

The Kid went quickly down along the creek through the little pasture,
leading Silver by the reins. He was terribly afraid that his mother
might ride over the top of the hill and see him and call him back.
If she did that, he would have to go, of course. Deliberate, open
disobedience had never yet occurred to the Kid as a moral possibility.
If your mother or your Daddy Chip told you to co