XIXTHE RACE
Twohours passed. And Farmer Green began to stop his work now and then and glance down the road.
“Johnnie ought to be coming along any minute now,” he said to the hired man.
“He ought to, unless that mule has taken a notion to balk,” the hired man replied.
“Oh! I don’t think he’ll do that,” said Farmer Green. “He hasn’t balked for a long time.”
But when another hour had slipped by and Johnnie and Mistah Mule were still missing, Farmer Green began to feel uneasy.So he hitched one of the bays to a buggy. And away he went, down the road, with old dog Spot racing along after him.
Spot kept carefully out of sight, beneath the buggy, until they reached the bridge. Then he dashed out and begged for a ride. He knew that he was too far from home for Farmer Green to send him back.
Farmer Green stopped the bay and told Spot to jump up. Then they hurried on again.
“There they are!” Farmer Green exclaimed as the bay began to climb the hill. “I was wrong. That mule can’t be trusted. I was foolish to think he’d ever be any good.”
“Just what I’ve said all the time!” Spot barked sharply.
Johnnie Green heard him. He turnedaround and looked down the road. Then he stood up in the wagon, waved his hat, and shouted.
And then—just because he was tired of standing there, and just because he liked to do what people didn’t expect—Mistah Mule suddenly started forward. Johnnie Green clutched at the wagon-seat to save himself from a spill.
“Whoa!” he cried. But Mistah Mule paid no heed to that order. Seizing the bit between his teeth, he broke into a smart trot.
“Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!” Johnnie yelled as he tugged at the reins.
“Ho! Ho! Ho!” Mistah Mule chuckled, as he went all the faster.
Meanwhile Farmer Green urged the bay up the hill. Just as they reached the top he brought the bay’s nose even with the rear wheels of Johnnie’s wagon.
“Stop him, Johnnie! Stop him!” he called.
“I—I—I can’t!” Johnnie answered as the wagon jolted over the stones.
Then his father tried to pass Johnnie, hoping to head off Mistah Mule.
But Mistah Mule would have none of that. He stretched his neck out and tore down the hill like a trotter at the county fair. In a few moments he had left the bay and Farmer Green far behind.
“Huh!” he grunted. “Thinks they kin pass me, does they?”