Before her on the emerging plain lay a suspicious-looking stone. Without moving her head, Queen regarded it a long time. It was altogether too woolly for a stone. Her scrutiny1 brought strange sensations and her heart began to beat rapidly. A gust2 of soft morning breeze swept down from the hill and the stone moved. Queen sprang to her feet.
With its hungry face turned toward her, the coyote glided3 away. Sorrow’s night was over and Queen loped after him with a new notion of life. The faster and the more fearfully he ran, the more faith Queen acquired in her own superiority, the more consolation4 she derived5 from the hope and the will to crush him, as she had crushed the other one.
He swung off toward the northwest. She too turned northwest. He stopped to sit down on his haunches and to look back at her, to learn if possible the purpose of this uncanny mare6. But as soon as he sat down she seemed to increase her effort to reach him. When she got too near, he bounded away out of reach. When he tried to turn in a new direction, she turned and headed him off, forcing him north against his will.
Wherever he went she pursued him doggedly7. Over hills, down into valleys, around sloughs8, she went driven by emotions she had never experienced before. But while these emotions drove her, others retarded9 her and the coyote began to leave her farther and farther behind, growing smaller and smaller in the distance. Finally Queen abandoned the chase and turned with satisfaction to grazing.
Long after he had disappeared, however, Queen scrutinised the indistinct spaces in which he had sunk out of sight. She had been grazing a long while and had almost forgotten about the coyote, when she looked up once more and discovered a tiny object moving on the sky-line. There was no doubt in Queen’s mind as to what that object was. She galloped11 away at full speed and did not stop till she was out of breath. For a while she lost sight of the object, because of a deep and winding12 hollow through which she was obliged to pass, but when she reached a high place again, she beheld13 with great joy a group of horses still so far away that they did not notice her coming.
She called constantly as she ran, though she did so more to express her own excitement than with any hope of getting their attention. When at last they heard her, every head went up and every pair of ears turned forward. The big, brown colt, her old rival in the race, left the group first and started for her. As soon as she recognised him, Queen knew that she had found her old companions. Her joy was insuppressible. She rushed from one to the other and caressed14 the little colts till they fled in terror of her passion.
There was a brown, fuzzy little fellow, the foal of a big, good-natured sorrel mare. Queen caressed it emotionally. The little fellow endured it without any kind of manifestation15 for a little while, then suddenly he decided16 to take advantage of the situation. Queen gave him her milk most willingly, but his mother watched the performance with growing dissatisfaction. When he had had about all he could have she jumped at him to prevent him from going back for more and incidentally showed her jealousy17 by pretending to bite Queen. Queen sprang out of the way, manifesting clearly her disinclination to fight over it.
In spite of the big mare’s protests, Queen fed him again before nightfall. When the mother objected again, she relinquished18 temporarily and led the whole group in a merry race round the hill top. Her desire to be active, born of emotions that would not down within her, was contagious19. She could not rest and every time she started off with a toss of her head, the herd20 was at her heels.
In spite of all the weary days of journeying in the tragic21 period that had just passed out of her life, so tense was Queen’s joy at meeting her companions, so full was her life again, now that she had friends to love life with, and a colt to drink her milk, that she seemed to have lost the faculty22 of feeling weariness, and frisked about in the shower of moonlight like a gratified colt.
Not far off lay the carcass of a dead horse, from which life, tired of baffling snows all winter and toiling23 for man all summer, had departed. Over this carcass a pack of coyotes were savagely25 feasting and their hymns26 to the god of coyotedom disturbed Queen’s revelry. Several times she ran off a short distance in the direction from which the insane howling was coming. Every time she started off the herd started with her. Locating the coyotes half way down the long slope, Queen first circled around the hilltop, then suddenly turned down the slope at breakneck speed. Like an ocean wave the herd swept down the incline.
The coyotes were taken completely by surprise. Not until the herd was almost upon them did they attempt to escape, fleeing then chaotically27 in all directions. But the horses also spread out to avoid the carcass; and with momentum28 stronger than their fear, they stampeded across the paths of the fleeing pack. Most of the scavengers escaped but one was struck down. At the foot of the hill Queen turned back to the dismay of the herd. They watched her curiously29 as she trotted30, some distance ahead of them, up the incline.
She came to the miserable31 creature whose back had been broken. Unable to move his hind10 legs, he dragged them along behind as he crept away with his forelegs. But Queen did not let him get away. The herd had by this time timorously32 come after her. Stepping back a moment before the flashing teeth and the gleaming eyes she rushed at him again and struck him upon the head with a sharp, front hoof33. She struck him again and again as if moved by the terror of the thing she was doing. The herd had come up toward her but when they saw her attacking the coyote they got frightened and ran away. Queen then abandoned the lifeless form and ran to join them.
Far away on the moonlit sky-line sat the rest of the coyote pack, their nozzles turning periodically to the moon and baying madly against the betrayal of their god. Never in all their savage24 experience had they come upon such a herd of horses and never again would they expose themselves to its madness.
Without vote or discussion, without struggle or rivalry34, Queen assumed her regency. Her will became the will of the herd. Queen she became in earnest, in the highest sense of the word, ruling neither for gain nor power, ruling solely35 for love of freedom and her companions. And her ruling was the salvation36 of the herd and the consternation37 of the homesteaders whose wretched shacks38 skirted her domains39.
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1
scrutiny
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| n.详细检查，仔细观察 | |
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gust
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| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
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3
glided
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| v.滑动( glide的过去式和过去分词 )；掠过；（鸟或飞机 ） 滑翔 | |
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consolation
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| n.安慰，慰问 | |
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derived
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| vi.起源；由来；衍生；导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取 | |
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mare
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| n.母马，母驴 | |
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doggedly
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| adv.顽强地，固执地 | |
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sloughs
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| n.沼泽( slough的名词复数 )；苦难的深渊；难以改变的不良心情；斯劳(Slough)v.使蜕下或脱落( slough的第三人称单数 )；舍弃；除掉；摒弃 | |
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retarded
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| a.智力迟钝的，智力发育迟缓的 | |
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hind
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| adj.后面的，后部的 | |
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galloped
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| （使马）飞奔，奔驰( gallop的过去式和过去分词 )； 快速做[说]某事 | |
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12
winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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13
beheld
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| v.看，注视( behold的过去式和过去分词 )；瞧；看呀；（叙述中用于引出某人意外的出现）哎哟 | |
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14
caressed
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| 爱抚或抚摸…( caress的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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manifestation
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| n.表现形式；表明；现象 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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jealousy
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| n.妒忌，嫉妒，猜忌 | |
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18
relinquished
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| 交出，让给( relinquish的过去式和过去分词 )； 放弃 | |
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contagious
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| adj.传染性的，有感染力的 | |
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herd
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| n.兽群，牧群；vt.使集中，把…赶在一起 | |
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tragic
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| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
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faculty
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| n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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23
toiling
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| 长时间或辛苦地工作( toil的现在分词 )； 艰难缓慢地移动，跋涉 | |
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savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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savagely
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| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
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26
hymns
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| n.赞美诗，圣歌，颂歌( hymn的名词复数 ) | |
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chaotically
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28
momentum
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| n.动力，冲力，势头；动量 | |
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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30
trotted
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| 小跑，急走( trot的过去分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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31
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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timorously
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| adv.胆怯地，羞怯地 | |
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33
hoof
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| n.(马，牛等的)蹄 | |
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34
rivalry
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| n.竞争，竞赛，对抗 | |
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solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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36
salvation
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| n.（尤指基督）救世，超度，拯救，解困 | |
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37
consternation
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| n.大为吃惊，惊骇 | |
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38
shacks
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| n.窝棚，简陋的小屋( shack的名词复数 ) | |
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domains
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| n.范围( domain的名词复数 )；领域；版图；地产 | |
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