Gee Whiz

by Jane Smiley

  Jane sat on the edge of her desk and sighed a little sigh, then said, “The pony vetted out fine. They’d like to ship him down to LA the day after Christmas. That’s Monday. And they don’t want to take any chances, so he’s to stay in his stall except for Rodney walking him out every day. He’s suddenly gone from being a very nice pony to being a very valuable pony, so he won’t be allowed to do anything on his own, without plenty of padding, I’m sure.” She looked at me and shook her head. “I know a woman in Maryland. She has a beautiful place with wonderful pastures and the best possible fencing, but she will not put the horses out because they are so valuable, and she’s so afraid one of them might get hurt!” Then she said, “Well, it’s not my business.” She looked right at me, and said, “That stall will be empty for five days after the pony leaves. I want you to consider something.”

  “What?”

  “I want you to consider bringing Blue over here and letting Ellen and Melinda ride him. Melinda will be back Monday.”

  I said, “I don’t think my dad could afford keeping him here.”

  Jane said, “Well, we’ll see. But you know, I haven’t seen him since the clinic. I miss him. I want to see what you’ve done with him. The stall is paid for, and I’ll give you a free lesson in the big arena. How would that be?”

  That, I thought, would be great.

  When we were finished talking, I walked over to Gallant Man’s stall to say good-bye. He was staring into the distance, chewing a mouthful of hay, and he nickered at me when I approached. Ellen and I had already given him all of our bits of carrots and lumps of sugar, so I went around behind the barn and pulled a few hanks of green grass, which he took from me very nicely. I scratched him under his mane and tickled him around his forelock, which he liked. There had been a time, not so long before, when I’d had to reach up to tickle his forelock, but that wasn’t true anymore. I said, “You are such a Gallant Man. I wish you weren’t a pony.” We had called Gallant Man just “the pony,” but Jane had named him after a very small horse who’d won the Belmont Stakes. He had also almost won the Kentucky Derby, but his jockey thought they’d crossed the finish line and stood up in his stirrups. But the horse hadn’t yet crossed the finish line—another horse came up and beat him by a nose. Jane had seen two of Gallant Man’s races when she lived in the East, and she thought our pony had some of his “sass,” as she called it. When she’d named him that, it meant nothing to me, but now it meant something. I was waiting to see what. I bent down and kissed him on the nose and said, “Good-bye, little guy.”

  Mom had so much stuff in the car that I had to carry a poinsettia in my lap all the way home, but it did put me in a Christmassy mood, especially when she told me that after Barbie was finished with her lesson, we would start making spritz cookies, which were my favorite kind, and then gingerbread men, which were Danny’s favorites.

  When Barbie got to our place, she kissed me on the cheek and wished me happy spring, because the shortest day of the year had come and gone and we had survived. She was in a good mood. As something to do during vacation, she and Alexis had asked if they could repaint their bathroom, and her mother had agreed, so as she told me while we were getting Blue out of the pasture (and she did pause to pet Gee Whiz, who nuzzled her hand), they had agreed to paint a picket fence around the whole bathroom. On each wall, above the picket fence, there would be a different scene. Barbie was to do two walls, one long and one short, and Alexis the other two. They were choosing their scenes independently, and Barbie felt that she had been inspired by the winter solstice. One of her walls, the one that faced south, would have a red, distant sun just peeping above the horizon, and lots of beautiful red, orange, pink, and yellow strips and ribbons of clouds. She hadn’t decided on the other picture, but she did not want to do the obvious (summer solstice), especially as that wall looked east. Then we talked about the party. I said I’d liked Marie. Barbie said Marie had left for her ski trip. We agreed that Marie was

  “exotic.”

  I decided to do something that I’d never done with Barbie before, which was to get on another horse (in this case, Lincoln) and ride with her while giving her her lesson. We mounted up outside the barn, and walked the horses over to the arena in a relaxed way. I didn’t correct much of what she was doing—she was pretty beyond that now. In the arena, we walked around, practicing good manners—when we were abreast, we kept going and didn’t let the horses argue. When she went ahead on Blue, I stayed three paces behind her, then passed her. When I was in the lead, I sped Lincoln up and slowed him down, and she had to watch me, and make sure that Blue kept the proper distance. We did an exercise where she passed me, then I passed her, then she passed me, all the way down the center line, at both the walk and the trot, then we trotted abreast in a circle and a figure eight, and finally, we cantered abreast, both directions. Lincoln was actually a little harder to handle than Blue, but that was because he wasn’t as supple as Blue. When we were finished, I let her do her favorite thing, which was to canter around a few times at a pretty good clip, but I did not let her do it without the hard hat, which she wanted to do so that her hair could blow around her in the breeze. Then we walked them out by taking them into the mare pasture and riding down to the creek, though not into it, because it was ten or twelve inches deep and running fairly fast. We didn’t say much, except that I occasionally told her some little thing, like “Sit back going downhill” or “Watch out for the gopher hole.” We saw Rusty across the creek, scouting the far hillside for something or other.

  It’s a fairly steep hill from the creek to the top of the mare pasture. We leaned forward, and the horses exerted themselves to make the climb, and as soon as we were in sight of the fence line, we heard a loud and demanding whinny. I said, “Did you tell Gee Whiz we were going to get him out and let him run around?”

  She said, “I think he read my mind.”

  “He seems to do that.”

  “Just the look on his face is really smart.”

  “You think that?”

  “I do. He looks like this guy at school. Ben Rufus. He’s really tall, like 6′4″, and he never says much, but he’s always watching, and when the teachers actually call on him and make him say something, he gives the right answer as if he thought about it so long ago that it isn’t at all important to him anymore—he’s way past right answers and wrong answers. He’s a little intimidating.”

  I tried to imagine someone being intimidating to a Goldman twin. It wasn’t easy. “Where’s he from?”

  “Canada. Vancouver.”

  Gee Whiz was pressing his chest against the gate enough for the gate to push against the latch, and I saw right then how he had gotten out—I must have left the latch not quite pushed far enough into its slot, and so when he pressed against the gate, it slipped out, and then the gate opened. I saw that we needed a chain and a clip. I shooed him away from the gate. He trotted in a little circle with his tail up. We untacked Blue and Lincoln, and when we put Lincoln in the pasture, he snaked his head and pinned his ears at Gee Whiz, as if to say, “You are not such a big shot!” Then he and Blue trotted out to the middle of the pasture and found nice places to roll. When Barbie and I carried the tack to the barn, Gee Whiz whinnied again, as if to say, “Why do I have to keep reminding you?”

  I took the halter that had come with him off the gate, and when I opened the gate, he practically shoved his head into it. I realized that I had never led him anywhere before, and he was a racehorse, but he walked along properly, except that his strides were so big that Barbie and I had to hurry to keep up with him. For safety’s sake, I put him first in the training pen. Then I grabbed the flag that was resting against the gatepost and followed him in. He, of course, would not know any of Jem Jarrow’s lessons, but if I shook the flag at him, he would stay to the outside, away from me. I went to the center of the pen, lifted the flag, and waved it, not to scare him, but to see what he would do. He stared at me, flicked his ears and his tail, then turned gracefully
, and started trotting around the pen to the left. At first, his stride was even but normal, and he looked like a pleasant enough horse, though of course, gigantic. But after he’d made his way around the pen twice, maybe just to check out the space, he pricked his ears, lowered his head, and opened up. His stride was smooth, efficient, and huge, as rhythmic as a machine and, it appeared, perfectly natural—when I wanted Blue to speed up his trot (which was not his best gait), I could urge him, and he would do it, but when I stopped urging, he went back to his normal self, like a spring that has a certain natural bounce. Gee Whiz’s natural bounce was much bigger. I called out, “Easy! Whoa!” and stepped toward his head, and he slowed down. He walked, paused for a moment, then realized that he was being asked to turn around. He did so. I waved the flag, and he took off again, his stride huge and mesmerizing. I just stood there with the flag at my side, and he went around until he felt like slowing to the walk. Then I saw that his walk, too, which I hadn’t really noticed, other than seeing that he was crossing the pasture or investigating something, was also big and sinuous.

  Barbie said, “He looks different from Tooter. Blue, too.”

  I said, “He’s different from any horse I’ve seen, at least that I remember.”

  “He’s really big.”

  “That’s part of it.” He stopped walking and turned to look at me. I went up to him, grabbed his halter, and walked him over to the fence. “I mean, look at his legs. They’re really long.” I stood right up beside his left foreleg and put the outside of my hand against his elbow. My thumb was at my rib cage.

  Barbie said, “It’s not just that they’re long, it’s that they’re long compared to the rest of him.” And that was true, too. She said, “Let’s take him into the arena.”

  “Okay, but we’re not going to do anything to make him run around. We’re just going to stand there and see what he does.”

  “Of course! It’s a psychological test. Who is this mysterious stranger? What does he really want?”

  “He for sure really wants something. He acts like that all the time.” I snapped on the lead rope, and we led him over to the arena. The best psychological test, I thought, was not to let go of him at the gate but to lead him to the center, where he could go any direction he wanted, and see what he chose, so we did this. I took off the halter so that he would feel completely free. For about thirty seconds, all of us stood absolutely still. Gee Whiz looked at Barbie and me, then off into the distance, then at the barn, then away from the barn. Blue and Jack would have taken off trotting, then started galloping, but Gee Whiz didn’t know this place, and so he started walking—sniffing the poles, sniffing the half-collapsed straw bales, sniffing the jump standards and the cones. Then he trotted away from us over toward the railing, and he seemed to investigate that, too. It was boring in a way, because he wasn’t doing anything exciting, but Barbie said, “What he really wants is to find out.” This seemed to be true. Even when there weren’t particular objects he was sniffing and looking at, there were perspectives—he wanted to see what his new home looked like from the arena, and how it was different from what it looked like from the pasture. Only when he was finished exploring did he start moving, first at the trot—that huge trot once again—and then, gathering and lifting himself, at the canter. He cantered, but not in a straight line—he turned and switched leads and made loops and crossed the center. It was an easy and supple canter, not rocking and delightful, like Blue’s, but useful—to him. It was Gee Whiz’s own canter, and he could do whatever he wanted while cantering. It was not about being ridden, but about doing what he wanted to do.

  And then he opened up and started to gallop.

  Now he went in a straight line, keeping to the outside of the arena. It reminded me immediately of Blue and Jack’s little race, which I’d never happened to mention to anyone, except that however enjoyable it was to watch Blue and Jack, this was different. This horse was a professional, and his gallop was powerful and directed in a way that neither of them could understand. His stride was huge and flat, and his legs were like precision instruments in the way they touched the ground, then folded, then stretched. It was also clear from his expression that he was no longer exploring, that now he was galloping for the fun of it. Barbie and I stood there watching him (and I glanced at her—her eyes were wide and her mouth was hanging open, which made me laugh). And just as though he knew what he was doing, he made a loop at the end of the arena and went back the other way. Only now did he kick up.

  I said, “They say that the gallop and the canter are actually different gaits, but I never saw that before now.”

  She said, “Can I never do that? Can I never go that fast?”

  I knew what she meant. But I wasn’t sure I never wanted to do it.

  We watched him gallop five times around the arena. For about three of them, he was full out, then he slowed somewhat, but he was still moving at a fast pace. Then he broke to the trot and trotted once around, then he came down to the walk and took several deep breaths, blew the air out of his nostrils, and shook his head. We were still standing in the center of the arena. When we stepped toward him, he came toward us. I said, “I forgot the carrot!”

  Barbie pulled her hand out of her pocket. She had two sugar lumps. I said, “Just give him one.”

  He came and took it and walked away. He went back to strolling along, checking out the arena and the views. Barbie said, “Should I walk him?”

  “I don’t think you have to lead him, but you can walk along near him and cluck if he stops walking. That should keep him going.” She did this, every so often walking up to him and giving him a pat, but not trying to catch him. As for me, I built a jumping chute.

  Yes, he had galloped himself breathless, but he was in good shape, and he caught his wind after four or five minutes. He was still alert and active, and didn’t look at all tired. Maybe two weeks before, he had run a race, so he was well conditioned.

  The jumping chute was along the railing, only one jump with a chute made of three poles to one side and three poles to the other side. The “jump” was three poles also, in a little pyramid, two poles on the ground and one pole resting on them. Altogether, the jump was maybe four or five inches high. While I was setting the poles, Gee Whiz came over and watched me for a moment, and then sniffed the poles. I stepped over them. He stepped over them. I turned around and stepped over them. He turned around and stepped over them. Barbie shouted, “Yay!”

  He didn’t mind going down the chute, even though all I had to give him was tufts of green grass. But Barbie would hold him at one end, and I would trot down over the poles, then shout, “Gee Whiz!” He would trot to me over the poles, and I would say, “Yup!” like Ralph Carmichael, and give him the grass. He ate up the grass like sugar.

  Then I made a real jump, maybe a foot. He snorted the first time and looked at it, but he did jump it, and the second time and the third time he cantered to it, bent his knees, lifted his shoulders, and went. I gave him some grass, led him back to Barbie, and said, “Okay, one more time.” She held him there while I walked to my end.

  I called, “Okay, let him go!”

  She let go.

  I called, “Gee Whiz!”

  He trotted toward me, then picked up the canter. But when he was about three strides out from the little fence, a crow flew off the railing of the arena, right at him. He threw his head, shifted his weight to the left, turned. And then he jumped the chute itself, which must have been three feet or 3’3”, in perfect form, even though he was at an angle. He landed neatly on his right lead, made a half circle around the rest of the chute, and stopped in front of me. I said, “Yup!” and gave him the grass.

  Barbie came running over. She was wide-eyed. She said, “I thought he was going to run right over you!”

  “That occurred to me, but Dad says if they’re coming at you, stand absolutely still so they know where to stop.”

  “He knew where to stop.”

  “I wasn’t actually nervous,
because he wasn’t afraid. He looked like he knew what he was doing.”

  “I love him!” said Barbie. “Whose horse is he?”

  I said, “I don’t know.”

  But I thought I knew what his next career was going to be—he had been spooked, seen the jump, and jumped it perfectly, all in about one stride. Not every horse could or would do that. We petted him, and then Barbie walked him around while I put away the poles and the standards. When her mom showed up and my mom went outside to chat, both of them asked us what we’d been doing, and I said, “Oh, just this and that.” I thought I would get around to telling about Gee Whiz’s adventure at the supper table, when everyone was eating and in a good mood. Because I really didn’t know whose horse he was.

  Chapter 8

  I WAS READY FOR THE WEEKEND TO BE ALL CHRISTMAS. AFTER Barbie left, I went upstairs to change clothes and wash up. When I came down, the cookie factory was set up. The dough was made. We buttered the pans, and then Mom’s job was to press out the little trees, the little snowflakes, the little stars, the little wreaths. My job was the sprinkles. When the sprinkles were on, we put them in the oven, and started on another set of pans—Mom had lots of pans. After not very long, the kitchen table was covered with baked cookies cooling, and Mom was getting out the cookie cutters for the gingerbread men. This dough was made also—it had been chilling all day, and once she got it out, she had to work fast to roll it and cut it. My job was to butter the pans, put red hots on the gingerbread men for eyes and a row of buttons down the front, and then take a spatula and very carefully put the little men onto the pans. While the gingerbread men were baking, we put the spritz cookies in boxes for the brothers and sisters, and then, after the gingerbread men had cooled, we set a few of them in each box as well.