Champion Horse

by Jane Smiley

  Danny said, ‘He never forgets the “yup”, because that’s the signal to the horse that he is going to get the sugar lump.’

  Then Daphne put Barry Boy’s halter back on him and led him to one side of the in-and-out while Ralph went to the other side. When Daphne unhooked the lead rope, Ralph shouted, ‘Yup!’ and Barry Boy cantered to him – three strides to the fence, then over, then a stride in between, then over, then two strides to Ralph, then a lump of sugar.

  I said to Danny, ‘Why doesn’t he go around the jumps?’

  Danny said, ‘Because a straight line is the shortest distance between two points, or between him and his reward.’

  ‘But why make the effort to jump?’

  ‘Because for Barry Boy, it isn’t an effort, it’s a pleasure.’

  Next, they put him on the lunge line and they lunged him over the fences, first the two single verticals and then the in-and-out. They let him do it his own way and find his own pace, which was easy and graceful, as if he knew exactly how to get himself around the circle and over the fences.

  I said to Danny, ‘How many times has he done this?’

  ‘Oh, this is the fourth time, maybe.’

  And he did it willingly – he got so into the rhythm that he kept jumping the two fences in the circle until they had to ask him to stop in order to raise the fences. I said, ‘Blue needs to do this.’

  Danny said, ‘That’s what I thought. And you know what?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘If he saw a couple of other horses having fun doing it, he might think that it could be fun, too.’

  ‘Do they do this with all the horses?’

  ‘Oh, they do all sorts of things. Usually, they have three or more in the ring together. There’s one here, a filly, who just loves to jump. Two days ago, they had her in here with two of the others, and she was jumping all the fences – just turning to them and going over them, and then the three of them were cantering around the arena, and she turned and jumped right out. That’s four and a half feet. It was like she looked at the jumps and she looked at the fence, and she said to herself, ‘What’s the difference?’ And when she was out, she didn’t even run back to the barn – she just trotted along the fence and Andy let her in the gate.’

  After that, the Carmichaels put the saddle and bridle on Barry Boy, and Andy got on him, and they did the same things with Andy in the saddle that Barry Boy had done on his own. Sometimes Ralph rewarded him and sometimes he didn’t, but if he was going to, he always exclaimed, ‘Yup!’ Andy was a good rider – firm seat, but easy and light with his legs and his hands. He made his part seem like just joining in the game, too.

  They stopped. The session hadn’t gone on for more than half an hour, if that, and then Andy took Barry Boy up along the hillside for at least that long. Ralph sniffed and then said, maybe to us, ‘You want a jumper, well, you got to make jumping the fun part. When we’ve got cattle to work, we jump first and go out and do our daily business after.’ Then he said, ‘Most any horse can jump, and a fair number of them think jumping is the most fun. It’s like these racehorses. You aren’t going to make a great racehorse out of a horse who doesn’t love to run, and not all of them do. I had a friend down at Santa Anita – he had a horse with talent to burn, but he was a sulky one, and even though he won a stakes or two, my friend just never got an honest race out of him, because the horse had no vocation for it. But if jumping is always fun, then even the ones who don’t love it can enjoy it.’

  It was now getting towards evening – the sky above the mountains was heading towards blue-grey, and the air was cooling fast. Danny and I walked back to the car. Daphne came with us, carrying her tack, Ralph stayed in the pen, moving things around, and Andy rode Barry Boy up the hill on a loose rein. I couldn’t stop glancing at Daphne – she was as cheerful and as strong as any girl I had ever met. But I didn’t ask any questions. The Carmichaels were way too mysterious for that.

  Chapter 9

  It was not Sophia who called that night, it was Jane. And Mom answered the phone, because I was upstairs doing homework and listening to music. I didn’t even hear it ring. Since I hadn’t said a word to Mom about Pie in the Sky except ‘fine’, when she came upstairs and told me about it, she was all happy and excited. She sort of bounced into my room, and said, ‘Oh, that was Jane. She said that you are doing so well on Pie in the Sky that they want you to keep riding him. I don’t see how you can do that during the week, but maybe something will work out. Jane says that this is a big opportunity for you – Colonel Hawkins is so impressed by your riding, and he is not easy to impress! You should be proud, sweetie!’

  I nodded. Then I said, ‘But I don’t have time to ride our horses. And it’s getting dark earlier.’

  ‘Well, I can help. I mean, your dad and I think you should be open to opportunities, and according to Jane, riding this horse is an opportunity.’

  ‘I like him—’

  ‘I can ride Morning Glory and Nobby.’

  I looked at her and said, ‘You can ride Blue if Dad is with you. Barbie rode him a lot. He likes to take care of his rider.’

  ‘I’ve been looking at him very fondly.’

  I shrugged.

  ‘That would make time for you at least a couple of afternoons a week.’

  ‘Did she say anything about them paying me?’

  ‘Oh, goodness, Abby, no. I wouldn’t ask—’

  ‘I’m not asking. But Sophia said something about that today, and it gives me the creeps, so if they say anything about that, just tell them I’ll do it for free.’

  ‘Of course!’

  We exchanged a look that said that this part was something we would not tell Dad.

  After Mom left, I sat there gazing out of the window at the gelding pasture. It was dark, and there wasn’t much of a moon, but I could see Lincoln and Blue standing by themselves. Probably they were under the trees wondering where the pest, Jack, had got to. Dad was talking about going back to Oklahoma and buying a few horses, but he couldn’t decide whether to wait until he sold a couple of the mares, so that he could spend a little more money, or whether to go now and have a look before it got terribly cold. Mom had been serving a lot of beans lately, so I knew it was time to sell something. Oh My would be the one – she would go for good money, since she was safe and beautiful, with unusual markings. But the best time to sell a fancy horse is the early spring, when the showing and rodeo season is about to begin, and people feel good that they got through the winter, and are ready to spend a little in order to show off – and Oh My was a show-off horse if ever there was one. The ideal thing would be to take her to a round-up or a rodeo and just walk around – paint-horse lovers would be running up to Dad and asking if they could write a cheque. But that was six months away.

  And then there was Blue. I had made up my mind that he was a really good horse – it was all in his canter. It was so floating and easy that I thought that one thing would make up for everything else about him, but even though we’d had him for six months now, we didn’t know what else he had. Because he was a grown-up horse and his previous owner or owners had never asked him to do much, we had spent the time since my broken arm healed just teaching him things he should have already known – how to respond to the aids, how to move his feet, how to turn handily and go readily about his job. He had learned how to not be afraid – in that he was like Pie in the Sky. But since they had started Pie in the Sky doing his job as a young horse, the thing Pie in the Sky knew first was doing his job, and the thing he knew second was being afraid. Once he cleared away the fear, his job was easy. Blue had learned to be afraid first and to do his job second. Once he cleared away the fear, he still had to make an effort to do his job. Maybe that was the reason Peter Finneran and the whip didn’t make Blue better – the whip just added fear to fear, and covered up his job even more.

  I loved Blue. But maybe my love for him would not have a happy ending.

  Up until Jack was born, Dad had insisted on lots
of things, and one of them was that we not name the horses special names. I always hated that, because I lost track of the horses who came and went, and even the most special ones got hazy in my mind. Without names, who was the one who bucked me off, who was the one who lay down next to me in the pasture when I was sick, who was the one who liked peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, who was the one who could rear on command (not a skill Dad had known about when he bought her, or he wouldn’t have bought her), who was the one who kicked down sixty feet of fence? I didn’t know. They came and they went, though the stories stuck around, always beginning with ‘Who was the one who . . . ?’

  But when they had names, I remembered everything about them. Lester was the one Dad loved the most. Sapphire was the one who licked me all over like a foal once when I was upset, Amazon was totally responsible and bossy, Jack was the one who was just too amazing to be named like all the others, and Blue, True Blue, was the kind and faithful one, the best friend, the one who, if I trained him properly, would be able to do anything. I saw maybe for the first time that Dad’s way of not naming the horses was there for a reason. I sighed.

  The record ended, and there was a moment of the huff huff of the needle getting to the centre, then I could hear the arm lift and move back to its resting place, and then it was quiet. A horse whinnied – one of the mares, since it was coming from the other side of the house. I wondered what Jack was doing. Just then, I saw him – he came galloping and kicking out of the trees, then went to the watering trough and took a drink. After that he tossed his head, playing in the water until he was plenty wet. I smiled. What he was doing was being himself.

  *

  Ellen showed up first, and then Melinda’s lesson was a little short because she didn’t feel well, so I got to the barn early, handed Gallant Man to Rodney, and headed for the bathroom. When I came out of the bathroom, I saw Sophia and her dad, or it must have been her dad, because he was old and blond and had his arm around her shoulders. Sophia said something, and he laughed. When he laughed, he threw his head back and I got a good look at him. He looked like a movie star.

  Just then, Rodney brought out Pie in the Sky and handed the reins to Sophia, who took them. I walked towards them. Mr Rosebury turned and saw me coming. He said, ‘Oh, here you are, Abigail. I’ve been wanting to meet you.’ He held out his hand.

  I shook it and said, ‘You can call me Abby. They only call me Abigail when I’m in trouble.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Mr Rosebury. ‘That’s when they call me Henderson J. Rosebury the third, so I understand what you’re getting at.’

  Sophia handed me Pie in the Sky’s reins. She had not yet smiled at me, but she didn’t seem mad. She just seemed like Sophia. Colonel Hawkins came out of the stall and down the aisle with Onyx, and Jane appeared from her office. The colonel and I mounted our horses and headed for the big arena. Jane and Sophia walked together, and Mr Rosebury walked along beside Colonel Hawkins, talking. I could hear him pretty well.

  ‘What a pair of winners we’ve got now, right, Colonel? I am really looking forward to next year. I know we’ve done well this year – I mean, six championship ribbons is nothing to sneeze at – but why not a perfect season? These guys ought to be winning everything. They’re young, they’re sound, they’re—’

  ‘Now, Joe,’ said Colonel Hawkins. ‘How many times do I have to tell you these are horses? If you owned a baseball team, would you always be looking for the perfect game?’

  ‘Sure! Why not? If you don’t look for it, you aren’t going to find it.’ He laughed. He must have sensed me looking at him, because he turned and smiled. He seemed like a happy person. He had Sophia’s blue eyes. I smiled, because if you don’t smile when grown-ups are smiling at you, they think you’re being sassy.

  In the arena, Mr Rosebury followed Sophia to the centre and stood between her and Jane. He kept talking, but I couldn’t hear him because the colonel and I were starting to warm up Onyx and Pie in the Sky.

  It was only then that I realised that Pie in the Sky wasn’t ready to work. All the time we were walking over he’d been hesitating and dancing, and I hadn’t done a thing about it because I was paying attention to Mr Rosebury. Now, in the arena, Pie in the Sky gave a little hop and a snort, and when I asked him to back up, he just stood there, and after a couple of seconds, he started telling me with his stiff neck and back that he just might start bucking if I didn’t watch out. Rally Rally Rally was what this said to me. Pie in the Sky was a chestnut, like Rally, or, as we originally called him, Grumpy George, and just glancing down at his red-gold coat gave me, first, the sense that something was about to go wrong and, second, the memory of Jem Jarrow telling me never to be too lazy to dismount. I dismounted and led Pie in the Sky over to the corner of the arena and used his reins to work him a little in both directions, getting him to step over and bend his back.

  I had no idea if he’d done this sort of lesson with anyone other than Danny, but he was a talented and athletic horse, and he did exactly as I asked. After twice to the right and twice to the left, I asked him to step back, and he still hesitated, so I did it twice to the right again and once to the left. After that, he backed up and lowered his head, and just for good measure, I asked him to bend his neck and touch his side with his nose.

  Just then, Mr Rosebury said, ‘What are you doing with my horse, Abigail?’

  I jumped. He was right beside me, and I hadn’t seen him coming. I said, ‘I’m getting him to loosen his back.’

  ‘It’s quite odd-looking, what you’re doing.’

  ‘I’m doing it so he won’t buck me off.’

  He retreated a step, and said, ‘Never seen that before. Horse looks a little bothered.’

  I said, ‘I’d rather have him bothered with me on the ground than with me riding him. Sir.’

  I was glad they weren’t paying me, because that meant I didn’t have to do it their way. I glanced over at Sophia. She was staring at us. I said, ‘He seems looser now.’ I walked Pie in the Sky to the fence and mounted.

  He was looser, but he wasn’t really loose. Time to hope for the best.

  We trotted and cantered around, doing circles and figure of eights. I tried with each turn to lift Pie in the Sky’s shoulder and move him a little to the outside, just to bend him in both directions. Colonel Hawkins liked a preliminary hand gallop, and that was good, though Pie in the Sky did give one little buck in the corner. Bucks are good when the horse is on his own, not so good when you are riding him. On his own, he is just getting stuff out of his system. When you are on him, he might start by getting stuff out of his system and go on to thinking that he would like to toss you off his back. I was still hoping for the best.

  Onyx, of course, was completely relaxed, as always, so Colonel Hawkins finished his hand gallop by turning in a big circle and heading down over one of the smaller verticals and then looping out in the other direction to another fence, a small oxer. Now everyone looked at me, expecting me to follow him, but I didn’t think Pie in the Sky was ready, so I just came down to the trot and made a few more circles.

  Jane pointed me towards a triple in-and-out, small and easy, the fences graduated from about two-foot-six to about three foot. The heights should have been no trouble for Pie in the Sky, but he almost refused the first one, and I had to kick him to get him over the second one and the third one. And here is where I learned something about both Pie in the Sky and Blue. I learned that when Pie in the Sky tried to refuse, he was testing me to see if I was in charge, and when Blue refused, he really was just scared.

  Quite often a horse will behave himself the first time you ride him, being a good boy because he doesn’t know you. A ride or two later – Dad called it the ‘second ride rule’ but it can happen on the third ride or the fourth – he thinks he does know you, and so some horses try to push you, to see what they can get away with. I knew with all my heart that Pie in the Sky was doing this. He was not afraid – I didn’t sense in his body any ripple of nervous energy. His ears
pricked, but they didn’t arrow forwards in worry. I was sure that if I’d been able to see his face, I would have seen a grumpy look, so once we got over the last fence, I trotted to Jane and said, ‘Got a whip? I forgot to bring one.’

  She went to the gate and picked up one of the two or three that were lying under the fence. She handed it to me. I took it lash down, but I did flick it outward once, so Pie in the Sky would know that I knew that he knew I had it. We trotted a circle and picked up the canter and went back towards the fence. He slowed down about three strides out, and I flicked the whip again. He jumped, but not smoothly. So I did not go down over the other two jumps – I turned out, went back, and came again. This time, I smacked him on the haunches about six strides out, at the same time keeping steady hold of the reins. He tucked in his haunches, focused on the jumps, and went down through them perfectly. That is another thing about a horse who is testing you – most of the time, they accept being punished.

  The test was over, and the rest of the lesson was fun. The last course was eight fences, three-foot-nine, a little twisty. The first time through, Pie in the Sky was about twenty per cent disorganised, but just like the week before, he seemed to use that trip to learn the path on his own, because the second time through, he was like a machine. As before, his feet seemed attached by rubber bands to my head. Every time I turned to look at the next fence, his body curved and his feet went there. Once again, it was an uncanny feeling. Mr Rosebury came over and slapped me on the leg, the way some people slap each other on the back when they are happy, and he said, ‘Great go, Abby! Just perfect.’