Horse Trade

by Bonnie Bryant

  “Very unusual—and very dramatic,” Mr. Baker said with a surprised look. He glanced at his watch. “We still have a few minutes left. Why don’t you show me the ending?”

  “With pleasure,” Stevie said, slipping off the fence and going over to No-Name. When she untied the reins from the fence, No-Name raised her head.

  “Ha,” she said. “I knew it.”

  “What?” Phil said, hurrying over on Teddy.

  No-Name’s head and neck were covered with hives.

  “It must be the saddle soap,” Stevie said.

  “I THINK I’M getting it,” Hollie said as she and Lisa walked their horses to the stable after riding class on Tuesday afternoon. “At first this lead stuff was pretty confusing, but now I think I’m catching on.” She paused as she sneezed several times in a row.

  “Still have that cold?” Lisa said sympathetically. Not only was Hollie’s nose stuffed, but she was hoarse and her eyes were rimmed with pink. Why Hollie’s mother had let her come to class when she had such a bad cold was something that Lisa couldn’t understand. Her own mother would have kept Lisa in the house for days. And during rehearsals for Annie, Hollie had told Lisa her mother was fussy, too. In fact, having overprotective mothers was something that the girls had talked about several times.

  “Does your mother know you’re doing this?” Lisa said.

  “What do you mean?” Hollie said. “Of course she knows I’m riding.”

  Lisa shook her head. “I mean, riding with such a bad cold,” she explained.

  “It’s almost over,” Hollie said, tossing her head. “It’s just … nothing.”

  It didn’t look like nothing to Lisa, but she decided to let the subject drop.

  “Nice riding,” Stevie called to Hollie as she and Carole approached the girls with their horses. “You’re really getting the hang of it. Pretty soon you’ll be able to try even harder moves.”

  “Danks,” Hollie said. “I can hardly date.”

  “Me neither,” Stevie said with a giggle. “It seems like every time Phil and I are about to get together, something happens.”

  “She means she can’t wait,” Lisa explained. “Hollie has a cold.”

  “You’re still sick?” Stevie asked.

  Lisa nodded. “She says it’s just a tiny cold. I think she looks pretty miserable.”

  “Are you up to joining us at TD’s?” Stevie asked Hollie.

  “I’d dove to,” Hollie said firmly. “I was supposed to deet my mother at the shopping center anyway.”

  “Great,” Stevie said. “We can talk about Phil’s and my dressage dancing. Are we lucky or what? We have Hollie for a songwriter and choreographer, and Lisa for a singer.”

  “Better her than you,” said Carole with a grin, because Stevie’s horrible tone-deaf singing was well-known in The Saddle Club.

  Stevie feigned a hurt expression.

  “Just for that I’ll hide under your window and sing lullabies tonight.”

  Carole clutched her head and said, “The curse of the screeching soprano.”

  Stevie threw a handful of hay at her, and at this moment Max walked past. “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “I’m cleaning up,” Stevie said, bending over to pick up the handful of hay. “Just making sure that everything is spick-and-span.”

  His eyes twinkled. “While you’re at it, Stevie, make sure the tack room is spick-and-span.”

  The girls groaned. This meant they could forget about the trip to TD’s. But then Max grinned and added, “By Saturday.”

  This time Stevie aimed the hay in his direction.

  By the time they got to TD’s, Stevie had worked out what she was going to order. “I’ll have one scoop of peppermint-stick ice cream and one of rum raisin, topped with butter-crunch sauce, chocolate sprinkles, and Red Hots,” she said.

  The waitress sighed, wrote it down, and then turned to Hollie. “What’ll it be?”

  Hollie got a devilish look on her face and said, “I’ll have hot dudge with a smidgen of budderscotch, dopped by a drinkle of coconud.”

  The waitress rolled her eyes and said, “She’s even worse than you. I can’t understand a word she says.”

  “She has a cold,” Lisa said. “A very slight cold.” She winked at Hollie, then translated for the waitress. “Hot fudge with a smidgen of butterscotch, topped by a sprinkle of coconut.”

  “Kill or cure,” the waitress said grimly. She took Carole’s and Lisa’s orders and then marched off.

  When she was gone, Hollie turned to Stevie and said, “I’ve been thinking how we could make ‘Almost’ even more special.”

  Stevie looked worried. “I wanted this to be an exhibition that no one ever forgets. But now I’m not sure No-Name and I will be able to participate.” When the others looked puzzled, Stevie explained. “She broke out in hives again.”

  “That’s terrible,” Lisa said.

  “Do you know what caused it?” Carole asked.

  Stevie nodded. “I think so. I followed Judy Barker’s directions, and I’ve been trying to test different possibilities. Right before No-Name broke out, I put a lot of saddle soap on her tack.”

  “That’s a common cause of horse allergies.” Carole nodded.

  Stevie sighed. “You should see No-Name with welts all over her ears and head and neck. It’s terrible.”

  “It’s not such a big deal,” said Hollie, sounding a bit impatient. “So she’s a little allergic, so what?”

  Lisa looked at Hollie with amazement. Hollie was a thoughtful person. During rehearsals for Annie she had been the first to help anyone who was in trouble. So why was she saying that No-Name’s allergy didn’t matter?

  But Hollie was still thinking about the dressage exhibition. With her eyes sparkling she said, “The dressage performance should be visually memorable. Stevie and Phil have to have totally opposite looks. Their horse dance will work twice as well if it’s easy to tell the two of them apart.”

  “Wait a second,” Lisa said. Everyone stopped to stare at her. “What happened to your cold?” she said to Hollie. “You sound so much better.”

  “It was nothing,” Hollie insisted. “I told you it would go away.”

  Lisa shrugged, then turned to watch the waitress set down their orders. She thought that Hollie’s cold was the strangest thing she’d ever seen. First Hollie was sneezing and rasping, and now she was perfectly normal. It didn’t make any sense.

  “And now for my great idea,” said Hollie. “I want you and Phil to look as contrasty as possible.”

  “Contrasty?” Stevie echoed. “What’s that?”

  “It’s a show-business term,” said Hollie airily. “It means you and Phil should look as different as possible. Which means that you’ll wear a white outfit, and Phil will wear a black one.”

  “Oh,” Stevie said, mentally running through her horse wardrobe. “I guess I could do that, except for the boots and hat, of course. And my belt. And my cuff links. I don’t have all that much white riding gear.”

  “We’ll pull something together,” Hollie said cheerfully. “Then after all the ‘almosts,’ you and Phil will come together and exchange coats—your white coat for his black coat—so you each wind up half black and half white. That will be a real showstopper.”

  “I don’t know,” Stevie said, not wanting to hurt Hollie’s feelings, but wondering how Phil would feel about all this.

  “What luck,” came a voice from the doorway. “I was on my way to the supermarket and I saw you in here, Hollie. Hi, girls.”

  Hollie leaped out of her seat. “Hi, Mom. Time to go.” Stuffing her riding jacket into her backpack, she hurried toward the door.

  “Aren’t you forgetting something?” Hollie’s mother said.

  “What?” Hollie looked back at The Saddle Club.

  “Paying,” her mother said.

  “Silly me.” Hollie pulled some money from her pocket, ran back to the table, and put it down. “See you guys,” she said, and hurrie
d off.

  “Is Hollie’s mother weird or something?” Stevie said to Lisa.

  “No,” Lisa said. “She’s nice. Maybe a little overprotective. Like some other mothers,” she added with a grin.

  Stevie wrinkled her nose. “Didn’t it seem as if Hollie was rushing her out of here?”

  “Maybe she doesn’t want her to meet us,” Lisa said. “Maybe we’re embarrassing or something.”

  “We’re wonderful,” Stevie joked, still feeling confused. There was a mystery here, and she wanted to get to the bottom of it.

  “Maybe Hollie doesn’t want us to meet her mother because she’s afraid we’ll talk to her,” said Carole thoughtfully.

  “About what?” Stevie said, looking at her friend.

  “Didn’t it seem strange that Hollie dismissed No-Name’s allergy? She didn’t seem at all worried.”

  Lisa nodded vigorously. “Hollie is one of the nicest people I know. I’ve never heard her sound so uncaring.”

  “She treated No-Name’s allergy as if it were a little cold,” Stevie added. “Like she talks about her own cold.”

  The three of them looked at each other.

  “She doesn’t have a cold, does she?” said Stevie as the pieces snapped together. “She has an allergy.”

  “To horses!” Carole exclaimed.

  The Saddle Club girls sat there, dumbfounded at the sheer obviousness of the thing. When Hollie was around Pine Hollow, she sneezed, she wheezed, she was in desperate shape. As soon as she left Pine Hollow, she was fine.

  “She doesn’t want her mother to know she’s allergic to horses,” Stevie said.

  “But we know,” Lisa said in a soft voice. “Do you think we should do something? Should we tell someone?”

  “Hollie has a good time with us,” Carole said. “I think she really enjoys hanging out with The Saddle Club and learning more about horses.”

  Lisa nodded. “I was worried about her being lonely after Annie finished.”

  Stevie remembered how lonely and wistful Lisa had looked when she realized that Annie was over. For Hollie it must be even worse, Stevie thought. Lisa could go back to The Saddle Club, but Hollie didn’t have anything like that. “What’s the big deal?” Stevie said. “She coughs, she sniffles, she sneezes from time to time. That’s nothing compared to not being able to ride.”

  Lisa thought of how her own mother always wanted to help but sometimes got in the way. Maybe they should tell Hollie’s mother that she was allergic to horses. But if they did, Hollie would wind up embarrassed and angry.

  “If Hollie wants to keep her allergy a secret, it’s a secret,” Lisa said firmly. “That’s what friends are for.”

  Carole and Stevie nodded their agreement. After all, The Saddle Club always stuck together.

  BY WEDNESDAY, NO-NAME’S hives were gone. On one hand, Stevie was glad she’d be able to ride No-Name in the dressage exhibition. But on the other hand, she was disappointed she hadn’t made more progress.

  “It’s driving me crazy,” Stevie told Phil when he called the morning of the Pony Club exhibition. “I thought for sure I had the cause of No-Name’s allergy nailed down, but when I tried saddle soap for the second time, just to make sure it was causing her allergy, nothing happened. She didn’t break out in a single hive.” She sighed.

  “We’re back to square one,” Phil agreed.

  “Oh, well,” Stevie said. “At least we’re ready for today—unless for some reason she has another outbreak.”

  “Don’t even say that,” Phil warned. “I don’t want to do ‘Almost’ alone. It would look kind of bizarre.”

  “To say the least.” Stevie giggled. “A solo duet—it’s a new dressage concept.”

  “Can you come over early?” Phil said. “We’ve got a lot to do.”

  “Sure,” Stevie told him. Her mind was back on No-Name and her mysterious allergies. “Isn’t it strange that at your place No-Name is always fine, but whenever we take her somewhere, she breaks out? Maybe she hates traveling.”

  “I don’t think so,” Phil said. “She doesn’t seem like the type. If it were Teddy, I could believe it. No-Name is like you. Nothing fazes her.”

  “I’m fazed, believe me,” Stevie said. “I’ll see you in an hour and we’ll get to the bottom of this.”

  When Phil met Stevie at the bus stop, he looked glum. “My parents are coming to the exhibition—if there is one. We’ve got to make sure No-Name doesn’t have an allergy attack today.”

  “I thought about it all the way over,” Stevie said. “No-Name always seems to break out when she goes to Cross County. But when she’s there, she doesn’t even go into the stable. She waits outside, tied to the hitching post with a lead line. What could possibly be the problem? She just stands there and munches grass.”

  “Can horses be allergic to grass?” Phil said.

  “Maybe,” Stevie said, “but if she was allergic to grass, she’d be covered with hives all the time because she’s always eating grass.”

  “It’s a bummer.” Phil shook his head.

  Stevie reached out and caught the fuzzy end of a foxtail plant from the side of the road and pulled it from the ground. She nibbled on the tender white end of the stalk. “It can’t be impossible. There’s got to be a way to figure this out.” She blinked. “Maybe there is a way.”

  “What?” Phil said.

  “I’ve got to be sure,” Stevie said. “Come on, let’s get over to Cross County.”

  The two riders had to groom their horses extra carefully for the exhibition. In dressage, it was essential for a horse and its rider to look their best. In fact, points could be lost if riders and horses looked less than perfect.

  An hour later Stevie and Phil finally hit the trail for Cross County Stables.

  Teddy was frisking along, his head held high. “He can tell something special’s going on,” Phil said. “That extra grooming always gets him going.”

  “Is he all right with crowds?” Stevie asked.

  “He hasn’t had a lot of experience with shows,” Phil admitted. “But if he gets nervous, I can always talk to him in horse latin.”

  Stevie grinned. Phil’s method of dealing with Teddy actually seemed to work.

  When they got to Cross County, bleachers had been set up outside the fence of the ring. A few younger riders who wouldn’t be participating were setting up a table with cookies and lemonade.

  Suddenly Stevie’s stomach lurched. There were so many things that could go wrong. The duet could turn out to be a big flop, and everyone could laugh. Or Teddy could be spooked and run wild. Or, as she had been thinking all morning, No-Name could break out in hives. More than anything, Stevie wanted to do well in front of Mrs. Marsten, who must think she was a nut after hearing her sing the other day. Ever since that embarrassing moment Phil and Stevie had practiced to a tape of Lisa singing “Almost.”

  Phil waited for Stevie to tether No-Name in her usual spot outside the ring. Stevie shook her head and said, “We’re going inside with you guys.”

  Once No-Name was hitched to a post where there was no grass or weeds in eating distance, Stevie went to check on that delicious patch of greenery where No-Name usually liked to munch.

  Just as she thought. There was grass in No-Name’s patch, but also several varieties of weeds. A horse will avoid poisonous weeds, like deadly nightshade, Stevie knew, but they will eat other weeds. Stevie examined a plant with curly green leaves and a pale-yellow flower. Could this be the culprit?

  Unfortunately, Stevie decided, the only way to handle the situation was by waiting—something Stevie hated doing. The only way to make totally sure that these weeds had caused No-Name’s allergy was to let her eat some. But that was something Stevie would never do without consulting Judy Barker.

  “Hi, Fox,” came a voice from behind her. Stevie looked over her shoulder and saw a Cross County rider who had been on the mock fox hunt that had been held at Pine Hollow several months ago. Somehow people never got tired of teasing he
r about being chosen to play the fox.

  “Hi,” Stevie said, standing up.

  “How’s your scent?” the boy said.

  These fox jokes would be the death of her, Stevie thought. Never, ever would she be a fox again—though, in fact, she had been a fabulous fox.

  “Never better,” she said, letting herself into the ring.

  She got up on No-Name, wondering if this day was going to be one long fox joke, when she heard, “Steeevie.”

  She looked up and saw Carole, Lisa, and Hollie. Lisa was holding the music for the duet, and Hollie had the list of dressage maneuvers they were going to perform to the strains of “Almost.”

  “Just a quick sound check,” Hollie said, going over to the barn to check the microphone, which was in a metal wall box just inside the front door. “Testing—one, two, three, four,” she said. The sound was so loud that a couple of horses jumped.

  Hollie adjusted the sound and said into the mike, “Gooooooood afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.”

  It was funny, Stevie thought. Hollie was beginning to sound like a show-business personality.

  Carole came over to Stevie and Phil and said, “The most important thing is to let the horses star. The exercises should flow out of them, as if everything were their idea.”

  “Like No-Name stood awake nights thinking about shoulder-ins,” Stevie joked. She wanted to lighten the mood. She could see that Phil was beginning to tense under all this advice.

  “Teddy’s no genius,” Phil said. “He’s just a horse.”

  Carole opened her mouth, and Stevie figured that she was about to explain that in their own way horses are geniuses, which would probably make Phil even more edgy.

  “Stevie,” came a voice from where the cars were parked. There was something about that voice, Stevie thought, and something about that car. Yes! It was her mother’s voice, and the Lake family car.

  Stevie watched her parents walk across the grass and thought that it was great that her parents were there, but it would not be so great if her brothers were there, especially Michael. If Michael saw the duet, he would be singing “Almost” and teasing Stevie about Phil forever.