Mrs. Cliff's Yacht. Frank Richard Stockton

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СКАЧАТЬ down, and the posts dug up, and new posts put in, and the flower-bed which ran along the inside of it destroyed, it would be just as well to wait until the other work began and have it all done at once; so she told Mr. Thompson he need not send a painter, for she would make the old fence do for a while.

      Mrs. Cliff sighed a little as the carpenter walked away, but there were other things to do. There was the pasture lot at the rear of her garden, and she could have a cow, and there was the little barn, and she could have a horse. The idea of the horse pleased her more than anything she had yet thought of in connection with her wealth.

      In her days of prosperity it had been her greatest pleasure to drive in her phaëton with her good brown horse, generally with Willy Croup by her side; to stop at shops or to make calls upon friends, and to make those little excursions into the surrounding country in which she and Willy both delighted. They had sometimes gone a long distance and had taken their dinner with them, and Willy was really very good in unharnessing the horse and watering him at a brook, and in giving him some oats.

      To return to these old joys was a delightful prospect, and Mrs. Cliff made inquiries about her horse, which had been sold in the town; but he was gone. He had been sold to a drover, and his whereabouts no one knew.

      So she went to Mr. Williams, the keeper of the hotel, who knew more about horses than anybody else, and consulted with him on the subject of a new steed. She told him just what she wanted: a gentle horse which she could drive herself, and one which Willy could hold when she went into a house or a shop.

      Now, it so happened that Mr. Williams had just such a horse, and when Mrs. Cliff had seen it, and when Willy had come up to look at it, and when the matter had been talked about in all the aspects in which it presented itself to Mrs. Cliff's mind, she bought the animal, and it was taken to her stable, where Andrew Marks, a neighbor, was engaged to take care of it.

      The next morning Mrs. Cliff and Willy took a drive a little way out of town, and they both agreed that this horse, which was gray, was a great deal better traveller than the old brown, and a much handsomer animal; but both of them also agreed that they did not believe that they would ever learn to love him as they had their old horse.

      Still he was very easy to drive, and he went along so pleasantly, without needing the whip in the least, that Mrs. Cliff said to herself, that for the first time since her return she really felt herself a rich woman.

      "If everything," she thought, "should come to me as this horse came to me, how delightful my life would be! When I wanted him, I found him. I did not have to trouble myself in the least about the price; I simply paid it, and ordered him sent home. Now, that sort of thing is what makes a person feel truly rich."

      When they had gone far enough, and had reached a wide place in the road, Mrs. Cliff turned and started back to Plainton. But now the horse began to be a different kind of a horse. With his face towards his home, he set out to trot as fast as he could, and when Mrs. Cliff, not liking such a rapid pace, endeavored to pull him in, she found it very hard to do, and when she began to saw his mouth, thinking that would restrain his ardor, he ambled and capered, and Mrs. Cliff was obliged to let him resume his rapid gait.

      He was certainly a very hard-mouthed horse, going home, and Mrs. Cliff's arms ached, and Willy Croup's heart quaked, long before they reached the town. When they reached Plainton, Mrs. Cliff began to be afraid that he would gallop through the streets, and she told Willy that if he did, she must not scream, but must sit quietly, and she would endeavor to steer him clear of the vehicles and people.

      But although he did not gallop, the ardent gray seemed to travel faster after he entered the town, and Mrs. Cliff, who was getting very red in the face from her steady tugging at the reins, thought it wise not to attempt to go home, but to let her horse go straight to the hotel stables where he had lived.

      When Mrs. Cliff had declared to Mr. Williams that that horse would never suit her, that she would not be willing to drive it, and would not even think of going into a house and leaving Willy Croup to hold him, he was very much surprised, and said that he had not a gentler horse in his stable, and he did not believe there was one in the town.

      "All horses," said he, "want to go home, especially at dinner-time."

      "But the old brown did not," urged Mrs. Cliff. "That is the sort of horse I want."

      "Some very old beast might please you better," said he; "but really, Mrs. Cliff, that is not the sort of horse you should have. He would die or break down in a little while, and then you would have to get another. What you should do is to have a good horse and a driver. You might get a two-seated carriage, either open or closed, and go anywhere and everywhere, and never think of the horse."

      That was not the thing she longed for; that would not bring back the happy days when she drove the brown through the verdant lanes. If she must have a driver, she might as well hire a cab and be driven about. But she told Mr. Williams to get her a suitable vehicle, and she would have Andrew Marks to drive her; and she and Willy Croup walked sadly home.

      As to the cow, she succeeded better. She bought a fairly good one, and Willy undertook to milk her and to make butter.

      "Now, what have I done so far?" said Mrs. Cliff, on the evening of the day when the cow came home. "I have a woman to cook, I have a new kitchen door, and I have a cow! I do not count the horse and the wagon, for if I do not drive, myself, I shall not feel that they are mine in the way that I want them to be."

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