Leroy Ninker Saddles Up

by Kate DiCamillo

  But he didn’t have hay. And he didn’t have oats.

  “Dag flibber it,” said Leroy Ninker.

  Outside of Unit 12, Maybelline let out a long, loud whinny that had a question mark on the end of it.

  “Okay!” Leroy shouted to the horse. “I am making you some grub! Yippie-i-oh.”

  Leroy grabbed a big pot and filled it with water. He turned the heat on high. He filled another pot with tomato sauce.

  Patty LeMarque had said nothing about whether or not Maybelline liked spaghetti, but didn’t everyone like spaghetti?

  After Leroy Ninker added the noodles to the pot, he went outside and leaned up against his horse. Her flank was very warm. She was an extremely comforting horse to lean against.

  Maybelline turned her head and looked at Leroy, and then she put her nose up in the air and sniffed.

  “That’s right,” said Leroy. “I am cooking you some grub.”

  Maybelline whinnied.

  “It’s spaghetti,” said Leroy. “I hope you like spaghetti.”

  It turned out that Maybelline did like spaghetti.

  She liked a lot of spaghetti.

  The horse ate the first pot of noodles in a single gigantic gulp. As far as Leroy could tell, she didn’t even bother to chew.

  When she was done, Maybelline lifted her head from the pot and looked at Leroy in a meaningful way. Leroy said, “Yippie-i-oh,” and he went running back into Unit 12 with the empty pot and started boiling more water. He opened another jar of tomato sauce. He made a second pot of spaghetti.

  After that, he made a third pot of spaghetti.

  By the time Maybelline was done eating, the stars were shining in the sky and the moon was looking down and there was not one noodle of spaghetti left in Unit 12.

  Leroy Ninker was very tired. He leaned against his horse and looked up at the stars. But when he closed his eyes, what he saw was Patty LeMarque. Her face was as big as the moon, and her mouth was opening and closing, and opening and closing.

  Leroy knew exactly what she was saying.

  Patty LeMarque was reciting item three.

  “Maybelline?” said Leroy.

  Maybelline turned and put her nose in Leroy’s face.

  “I have remembered item three,” said Leroy Ninker. “Item three is that you are the kind of horse who gets lonesome quick.”

  Maybelline nickered.

  “But you cannot fit inside Unit 12,” said Leroy.

  Maybelline shook her head.

  “Okay, then,” said Leroy. “I will stay here with you.”

  He took off his boots. He removed his lasso. He loosened his belt. And then he lay down at Maybelline’s feet. He put his hat over his eyes. He sighed a happy sigh.

  “I have made a lot of mistakes in my life,” said Leroy Ninker from underneath his hat. “I have done some things that I wish I had not done. I have taken some wrong turns.”

  There was a long silence. Leroy moved his hat and looked up at Maybelline. The horse looked down at him. She was listening.

  “There was a time in my life when I was a thief,” said Leroy. “I am now reformed. I hope you don’t judge me, Maybelline, because I truly am a changed man.”

  Maybelline let out a small chuff of air.

  “Oh, Maybelline,” said Leroy. “You are my horse. For me, you shine brighter than every star and every planet. You shine brighter than all the universe’s moons and suns. There are not enough yippie-i-ohs to describe you, Maybelline. I love you.”

  Leroy Ninker had never imagined that he could string so many words together at once. It was the longest speech of his life.

  He looked up at Maybelline, and she looked down at him. Leroy’s cheeks felt hot. He lowered his hat so that it covered his face. “Good night, Maybelline,” he whispered.

  Leroy closed his eyes. He thought very hard.

  Had his heart been waiting for Maybelline to come along so that it could open wide and he could speak all the beautiful words that had been hiding inside of him?

  It was an amazing concept to consider, and the cowboy fell asleep considering it.

  Leroy Ninker dreamed that he was riding Maybelline on the open plain. In the distance there were purple mountains, and high up in the sky there was a daytime moon. The moon was looking down at Leroy and Maybelline, and it was smiling at them.

  In Leroy’s dream, Maybelline was running very fast.

  Also, she had a full set of teeth.

  It’s just like a movie, thought Leroy. We are just like a horse and cowboy in a movie.

  The wind rushed across his face. It smelled like cinnamon and clover and spaghetti sauce.

  The wind is promising me wonderful things, thought Leroy.

  And then he thought, Patty LeMarque is right. I am very good at speaking poeticals.

  Maybelline’s hooves pounded on the earth.

  Maybelline’s hooves were extremely loud. Leroy had never heard such loud hooves, even in the movies. Maybelline’s hooves were as loud as thunder.

  The cinnamon-and-clover-and-spaghetti-sauce-scented wind blew harder and faster. It tickled Leroy’s nostrils. And then it slapped him on the cheeks. The wind, obviously, was trying to tell Leroy something important.

  And then, in his dream, Leroy heard Patty LeMarque’s voice. “Wake up, Hank!” she shouted. “Protect your horse!”

  Leroy Ninker woke up.

  Thunder crashed. A bolt of lightning lit up the world.

  “Dab blibber it,” said Leroy. “It’s fixing to rain.” He stood. He hitched up his pants and pushed his hat down on his head. He looked at Maybelline. Her eyes were closed. She was still asleep.

  “Horse of my heart,” whispered Leroy, “sweetest and most delicate of all springtime blossoms, I cannot let you be rained on. I will go inside and get you an umbrella.”

  Maybelline’s eyes stayed closed.

  “I’ll be right back,” said Leroy.

  He turned and ran into Unit 12.

  While Leroy was gone, the rain began. A drop fell on Maybelline’s nose. Another drop fell on her ear. The horse woke up. She lifted her head and looked around her.

  Terrible things were happening!

  Thunder was crashing!

  Lightning was flashing!

  And worst of all — oh, worst of all — Maybelline was utterly, absolutely alone.

  She was not the kind of horse who liked to be alone.

  Maybelline let out a long, questioning whinny. The thunder crashed; the lightning flashed. Maybelline called out again.

  Where was the little man? Where was the little man with the big hat and the beautiful words? Where was the little man who brought her spaghetti?

  Maybelline called out again and again. There was no answer.

  She didn’t know what to do. And when Maybelline didn’t know what to do, what Maybelline did was run.

  Leroy Ninker came out of Unit 12 holding an umbrella up high over his head. “Here I am, my springtime blossom,” he said, “and I have brought you an umbrella.”

  But when he got to where Maybelline should be, there was no Maybelline there.

  “Maybelline?” said Leroy into the darkness and the wind and the rain. “Maybelline?”

  The wind blew harder.

  “Horse of my heart?” said Leroy Ninker.

  The rain came down hard and fast. The lightning flashed, revealing a horseless world.

  Leroy stared into the emptiness. He heard Patty LeMarque’s voice in the wind. She was saying, “Do not leave Maybelline alone for too long, or you will live to rue and regret the day.”

  A great gust of wind came along and grabbed hold of Leroy’s umbrella and ripped it right out of his hands. Leroy watched as the umbrella spun up into the darkness.

  He was a cowboy without a horse, a cowboy without an umbrella. He was a cowboy absolutely, utterly alone.

  The cowboy walked through the dark and stormy world, shouting, “Maybelline, Maybelline, Maybelline!”

  In his haste to find his hors
e, Leroy had left Unit 12 without his boots and without his lasso. He was not at all prepared to go on a horse search, and he had no idea where to begin.

  Patty LeMarque’s face appeared before him and said, “Don’t forget the compliments, Hank. And the grub.”

  “Maybelline!” Leroy shouted. “You are the queen of yippie-i-oh-ness! You are the most beautiful horse in all of creation.”

  No horse appeared.

  “Maybelline!” Leroy shouted. “There will be unending pots of spaghetti if only you come home to me!”

  No horse appeared.

  Leroy thought about Maybelline and her bony spine and her four teeth. He considered her whiskered, velvety nose. He cogitated upon her twitching, twisting ears and how she bent her head down to listen to him. Oh, she listened to him so well.

  “Maybelline,” Leroy whispered into the darkness, “you are the horse for me.”

  The rain came down harder, and the wind blew meaner. Leroy’s socks were soaked through.

  This is the worst night of my life, thought Leroy. If there is anything worse than being a cowboy without a horse, it is being a cowboy who had a horse and then lost her.

  The wind howled and whistled. And then the wind grabbed hold of Leroy’s hat and tossed it away.

  “Dag blither it, you, you, wind, you . . .” Leroy shook his fist at the wind. “What am I going to do without my hat?”

  Leroy Ninker was now hatless, bootless, lasso-less, and horseless.

  He had never felt less like a cowboy.

  “I want my horse!” Leroy Ninker shouted into the wind and rain. He sank to his knees. “Give me back my horse. Please, please. Maybelline, I promise that if I find you, I will never leave you alone again.”

  These words seemed so sad to Leroy that he started to cry. The wind blew stronger. The rain beat down. The world was very, very dark, and the cowboy was lost.

  Oh, he was lost.

  And where was the horse?

  She was lost, too. She was as lost as she had ever been in her life. She was soaked to the hooves, and she was very afraid.

  She was also tired.

  She stopped running and held herself still in the darkness. She whinnied. And then she neighed. And then she nickered. Finally, she sighed.

  The horse wanted many things. She wanted the rain to stop falling and the wind to stop howling. She wanted the little man to appear out of the darkness holding a gigantic pot of spaghetti.

  But more than anything, Maybelline wanted to hear the little man’s voice.

  The horse needed to hear some beautiful words.

  But there was no little man, and there were no beautiful words. There was just darkness and rain and wind. And since Maybelline couldn’t think what to do, she started to run again. She ran without thinking or hoping.

  In the darkness, the horse went one way.

  And the cowboy, alas, went the other.

  Leroy stood in a patch of mud. He looked down at his socks. They were very dirty. He looked up at the sky. He watched as the rain slowed to a trickle. The thunder grumbled and rumbled and then slunk away. The last raindrop fell. The world became very quiet.

  The sky was gray, but at the horizon, there was the slightest hint of pink.

  “Dawn is coming,” said Leroy Ninker. “And I do not have a hat or boots or a lasso or a horse. I don’t even have an umbrella. I have nothing at all.”

  Leroy watched the sun slowly rise; the orange ball of it glowed brighter and brighter. He shook his head sadly. He looked down at his muddy socks again.

  And then, in the pink and hopeful light of dawn, Leroy noticed something in the dirt. He bent down and traced the shape that was imprinted in the mud. His heart thumped inside of him.

  “Yippie-i-oh,” whispered Leroy Ninker to the hoofprint.

  He looked past the first hoofprint, and he saw there was a second one and then a third.

  “Maybelline!” shouted Leroy Ninker.

  He followed the hoofprints. He started to run. He may not have had a hat or a lasso or boots, but he was tracking a horse.

  His horse.

  Maybelline was out there somewhere. And a cowboy named Leroy Ninker would find her.

  The horse was, indeed, out there somewhere. To be specific, she was three streets over. The horse was on Deckawoo Drive.

  She was standing at the window of a house. She was watching a family sitting down to breakfast. Wonderful, wonderful smells were coming from inside the house, and the family looked happy sitting together around the table. Maybelline put her nose very close to the window. She watched the family. She admired the food.

  And when she could not bear it any longer, she raised her head and called out. She whinnied long and loud.

  Leroy Ninker was following the hoofprints when he heard a sound that made him stop in his tracks. Leroy held himself very still. He listened.

  He heard birdsong and the low hum of a train. He heard the whoosh of car tires on the wet pavement.

  And then he heard that beautiful, singular noise again: a whinny. A horse. His horse. Maybelline.

  Leroy ran in the direction of the whinny.

  “Maybelline!” he called out. “I am on my way!”

  He leaped over a bush. He ran around a bicycle. He climbed over a fence and into a backyard.

  And there was Maybelline! She was standing and looking in the window of a house.

  “Maybelline!” shouted Leroy.

  The horse turned and looked at him. She twisted her ears left and right. Both ears trembled hopefully. It was obvious that she was waiting for some beautiful words.

  Leroy’s throat felt tight.

  He smiled. He spread his arms wide. “Horse of my heart,” he called out, “most wondrous, most glorious of all horses, I have missed you so.”

  Maybelline nickered. She came trotting toward him.

  Leroy put his arms around her. He closed his eyes and leaned his head against her neck.

  He had done it. He had taken hold of fate with both hands and wrestled it to the ground. And he had done it without a lasso, without boots, without a hat.

  “Oh, Maybelline,” said Leroy Ninker. “I have so many words I want to say to you.”

  Leroy’s eyes were still closed when he heard a voice say, “Mister, is that your horse?”

  Leroy Ninker opened his eyes. He saw a small girl.

  “Is it?” she said. “Is that your horse?”

  “Yes,” said Leroy Ninker. “This is my horse. She was lost, and I tracked her through the mud. She was lost, and I found her.”

  “Uh-huh. What’s her name?”

  “Maybelline,” said Leroy.

  “My name is Stella,” said the girl. “Can I pet your horse?”

  “Yes,” said Leroy Ninker. “But what this horse really likes is a compliment. Do you know how to give a compliment?”

  “Of course I do,” said Stella. She put her hand on Maybelline’s nose. She looked Maybelline in the eye and said, “You are a very nice-looking horse. You are the nicest-looking horse I have ever seen. Of course, I have never seen a horse before. But I have seen a pig. There is a pig who lives on this street. I know that pigs and horses are not the same at all. Other than that they both have hooves. Even though they are different kinds of hooves. You have very nice hooves, by the way.”

  Maybelline twitched her ears this way and that. She let out a pleased-sounding chuff of air.

  “Stella!” shouted a boy. “Stella, watch out. Horses can be very dangerous. They can kick out suddenly with their hind legs and harm the unsuspecting.”

  “That’s my brother, Frank,” said Stella to Leroy. “He worries a lot.”

  Maybelline put her nose up in the air. She sniffed. She whinnied and put a question mark at the end of the whinny.

  “What you are smelling is toast,” said Stella to Maybelline. “Every morning, Mrs. Watson makes toast for her pig. Mercy is the name of the pig, and she is a pig who likes toast with a great deal of butter on it. Have you ever had toa
st with a great deal of butter on it? It’s very good.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Leroy Ninker. “Is this Deckawoo Drive?”

  “This is Deckawoo Drive,” said Stella.

  “I have been here before,” said Leroy.

  And just as Leroy Ninker finished saying these words, a woman stepped out on the front porch of the house next door. She was holding a butter knife in her hand, and a pig was standing beside her.

  “Good morning, Stella,” called the woman. “And Mr. Ninker! It is lovely to see you again.”

  “Hello, Mrs. Watson,” said Leroy Ninker. “I would like for you to meet my horse, Maybelline.”

  “Well,” said Mrs. Watson, “what a wonderful horse. She looks like a true equine wonder. You must both come inside and have some toast.”

  “But I don’t know if Maybelline will fit through the door,” said Leroy.

  “Oh, heavens,” said Mrs. Watson. “There is always a way to make things fit. Come inside, come inside.”

  “Come on,” said Stella. She took hold of Leroy’s hand.

  Leroy turned to his horse. He said, “Come with me, horse of my heart. We are going to eat some toast.”

  The cowboy started to walk.

  The horse followed along behind him.

  The cowboy and the horse went inside.

  Every evening, Leroy rode Maybelline to work. Maybelline stood beside the Bijou Drive-In Theater concession stand. She watched the movies. She ate popcorn.

  Maybelline liked all the movies. She was particularly delighted when a horse showed up in a movie. Or a cowboy.

  But Maybelline’s favorite movies were the love stories. She put her ears up in the air and listened very closely to the beautiful words that people said to each other. As they spoke, she nodded and nickered quietly.

  The horse was happy.

  She knew that late at night, on the way home from the Bijou, Leroy would speak to her. Word after beautiful word would come from the cowboy’s mouth, from his heart.