“I’m glad we can be so forthcoming with each other this early in our relationship,” Lockie said.
I thought that translated to “shut the hell up and ride” but maybe that’s just what I’d say to her if our positions had been reversed.
We worked on the flat for about fifteen minutes, trotting, cantering, changing directions, then more of the same in the opposite direction, just like at a horse show. Without commenting, he simply watched us ride. I would have preferred to be out on one of the trails through the woods. It wasn’t that I disliked flat work, it was just that this was preparation for something I didn’t want to do. We had a show in two weeks and if I never rode in another equitation class, it would not be one of my life’s major regrets.
“Walk, please.”
I pulled Butch up and we walked.
“Pick up the pace. We’re not out for a morning stroll,” Lockie said.
Was he talking to me?
“Miss Margolin, would you trot your horse directly to me?”
I nudged Butch into a trot and turned to go down the center of the ring.
“Thank you. Dismount. You’re done for the day.”
“Why?”
“Your horse is lame. Take him into the barn and call the vet so we can have some pictures taken.”
Radiographs? That was serious. I threw my leg over the saddle and slid to the ground. “He doesn’t feel off to me.”
“He is,” Lockie said.
I flipped the stirrups over the saddle. “Was he lame when we started this morning?”
“No.”
“If I...”
“You didn’t.”
“Can I get some attention here?” Greer shouted across the arena.
“Call the vet, we’ll deal with it,” Lockie said and turned to Greer.
I pulled the reins over Butch’s head, and led him from the ring.
In the barn, I put him in the wash stall, removed the saddle and bridle, then put a halter on him. I ran my hand down each leg to feel for heat and picked up each hoof to see if a rock had been lodged next to his frog. There was nothing wrong that would account for Butch being off.
After hosing his body, I ran cool water on each leg, scraped him off and left him there to dry while I called the vet from the tack room. Feeling guilty and responsible, I kept telling myself that if I couldn’t tell Butch was lame, it couldn’t be serious.
At ten, Greer entered the barn, in a condition I had rarely ever seen her. She was sweating, her hair was plastered against her head and her once cute little shirt was clinging to her body. Furious didn’t begin to describe her mood.
“I can hardly move,” Greer practically spat at Lockie.
“If you want to place above your competition, you must work harder than your competition, Miss Swope,” he told her while walking toward me.
“I’m not doing that every day,” she said.
“Then you will continue to pin second. It’s your choice.”
“No one else ever made me work that hard.”
“I’m not everyone else. Your father hired me to get you to the National Horse Show and that’s my job.”
“Why can’t I just get a better horse?”
“You can. But you won’t be a better rider on a better horse.”
She shrieked at him, dropped the reins into Pavel’s hand and stormed out of the barn.
Lockie turned to me. “Did you call the vet?”
“He’ll be here before lunch.”
“Good. Is your horse comfortable in his stall?”
“Yes. I felt his legs; there was no heat. His soles didn’t seem tender. I hosed him down, let him dry off and put him away. Do I need to do anything else?”
“No, you did everything you could. If you don’t need me for anything for another half hour, I’ll be in the apartment. Is that all right?”
“Sure. If Dr. Fortier comes, I’ll call.”
“Thank you but I’ll be down before then.”
I watched Lockie go down the aisle and turn for the stairs.
Chapter Three
Just before noon, the vet truck drove into the yard and I went out to meet him.
“Hi, Talia. How are you?”
“I’m fine but Butch isn’t.”
“What’s his problem?”
“We have another new trainer.”
Dr. Fortier opened the back of the truck and dipped his head so I wouldn’t see the grin.
“You can laugh, it won’t hurt my feelings.”
“How many is that this year?”
“Four.”
“Okay. Who is it this time?”
“He’s from California. He was pretty well known a couple years ago as a junior.”
“Lockie Malone?” Dr. Fortier pulled the portable x-ray machine out and set it on the tailgate.
“That’s right. He arrived yesterday and today was our first lesson. About halfway in, he said Butch was off and to call you.”
“Has Butch been ouchy?”
“I haven’t noticed anything.”
As we went into the barn, I recounted the history of the past couple weeks. We hadn’t hit any fences, we hadn’t even trained very hard since Rui left, although I rode every day.
With Butch on some crossties, Lockie turned and walked down the aisle to meet us, not wearing sunglasses any longer but regular glasses with a little tint. I thought perhaps they were the kind that were light in the dark and darker in the sunlight.
“Dr. Fortier? Hi, I’m Lockie Malone.”
“Hi. I hear Talia’s horse is sore.”
“Something’s going on.”
“Okay, I’ll talk your word for it and we’ll check him out. Talia, remind me how old Butch is.”
“I got him when we were both eleven.”
“That was a big horse for a little girl.”
“I was never very small. I outgrew the pony stage very early on.”
“Is that why you have those two ponies now?”
“I love ponies,” I admitted.
An hour later, we were looking at the X-rays he had taken.
“You can see some bone changes here and here.” Dr. Fortier pointed. “And he’s got some arthritis. It’s normal for his age.”
“There’s nothing we can do, is there?”
“Make him comfortable,” Dr. Fortier said. “You can give him some supplements, Bute for pain. You can hack out in the woods once in a while, but his show days are over.”
“Did I do this to him?”
“Age did,” Lockie replied.
“Horses only look strong and everyone starts to wear with age. It’ll happen to you, too,” Dr. Fortier said with a smile.
I didn’t feel like smiling and went into Butch’s stall while Lockie and the vet went outside.
We had been together since before my mother died. She’d been ill for a few years and it was obvious to me that she was never going to get better. She had a transparency overtaking her where each day she faded a bit more.
My father had been managing almost everything for those years as it became progressively more difficult for her to conduct her life. He made the arrangements for the hospitals and the doctors and begged her to marry him again and again until she finally gave in so that my future wouldn’t be in question.
He moved us to the farm and to give me something to try to take my heart and mind off what was happening, Butch was found for me.
Greer hated it. Blaming my mother for destroying her own family, she didn’t want me in the house. That September a boarding school in Virginia became her new home; she was as happy as Greer ever is. Her mother is still happily living in London on the extremely generous divorce settlement my father offered.
I had Butch and quiet and ever-present apprehension.
Then the time came when even with full time nursing, my mother had to go to the hospital and she never came home.
My father returned to the city, a nanny was brought in for me, and a trainer. I lived alone for the r
est of that school year. When Greer came back from Virginia, we started in on the serious equitation and junior hunter training.
The rug had been pulled out from under me again and I buried my face in Butch’s neck and cried.
“Talia,” Lockie said from behind me. “He’s retiring, not dying.”
“He’s my best friend.”
“We’ll get you a new friend.”
“Idiot,” I said, turned and pushed past him.
***
We were seated around the dinner table. I would have preferred to be anywhere else but there was so much I couldn’t do anything about.
“If Talia needs a new horse, get her a new horse,” my father said to Lockie after the news had been relayed.
“Why should she get a new horse and I don’t get a new horse? I will never beat Nicole on Sans.”
I looked to Lockie who was at the far end of the table. His glasses now had a tint, enough that I couldn’t really see his eyes and his face didn’t show any reaction to Greer’s outburst.
“Get Greer a new horse, too. Maybe we should start buying them in sets so we’ll have spares.”
“What am I going to ride for the show?”
“Ride your horse,” I said to her.
“He’s an embarrassment. Dad!”
“I’ll have a couple horses sent on trial,” Lockie replied.
I finished my dinner.
***
Under continuing loud protests, Greer rode Sans the next day for a lesson. I could have ridden one of the other horses but didn’t want to and Lockie didn’t mention it to me.
I met Rogers for a hamburger and a movie that I didn’t understand at all but she was practically swooning over. Even though there were subtitles, I wasn’t paying any attention and she felt it was necessary to explain everything to me. Luckily, the theater was nearly empty so no one complained about her whispering.
After returning home, I took a shower and sat at my window watching Butch in the field, thinking about all the times he had gotten me out of tight spots either on a trail ride or at a horse show. That kind of relationship wasn’t replaceable just because there was money enough to buy a new friend. Greer didn’t have a clue who she was riding and she didn’t care. It was all about beating Nicole. But what would happen if she did triumph over her arch rival? What would happen if Greer won the Maclay at the National Horse Show? Then what? What happened next year? Having achieved her goal, what was left? Greer had never mentioned anything else.
As for me, I had no achievable goals.
I turned off the light and got into bed.
Chapter Four
The sound of a truck entering the stable yard woke me and I went to the window but couldn’t see the license plate or read the lettering on the side because of the angle. The sun wasn’t up yet and the mist was rising from the pastures. Lockie, Pavel and two other men opened the door to the van and lowered the ramp. Four horses were lead into the barn.
They looked excellent from my vantage point. One appeared to be about 16.2 hands high and was dark brown. There were two bays and a chestnut, maybe a mare, smaller and more delicate than the tallest one.
Greer had a nice selection awaiting her.
I pulled on some jeans and went downstairs to the kitchen where Jules was making breakfast. “Why is everything happening so early?” I asked, sitting down at the island.
She placed a glass of mango nectar in front of me. “Big day for test driving horses,” she said with a wide smile.
Jules didn’t ride and had no desire to learn. She was from California, where her father was some bigshot in Hollywood and that fact had made it almost impossible for her to be her own person she said. So Jules left home and went to study cooking in Paris. Now she was with us and seemed happy all the time. I thought Jules understood the difficulties presented by having a father who had money, influence and too many demands on his plate.
“What would you like for breakfast?”
“Pancetta,” I replied. I liked the Italian unsmoked bacon she had introduced to us.
“Some eggs?”
“Sure. Am I the only one eating?”
“Right now you are.”
“Don’t you feel like a short order cook? Whatever time of day it is, you have to start cooking.”
Jules smiled. “That’s my job. If I worked at a restaurant, I’d be doing that all day long and for two or three hundred people. My life is easy. All I have to do is cook for you, sometimes Greer, sometimes your father.”
“And now Lockie.”
“Mr. Malone. He’s an interesting one, isn’t he?” She placed a plate of breakfast pastries in front of me.
“What makes him interesting?”
Jules took the eggs and the package of bacon from the refrigerator. “For starters, he’s not flirting with Greer.”
“And she’s sure not flirting with him. She’s not real happy with him.”
Jules was enjoying the thought of it. “He’s making her work and she hasn’t been able to wrap him around her little finger yet.”
“He caved on the get-her-a-new-horse routine.”
“Your father did. Lockie knew an order when he heard it. Your father wanted to make life easy for everyone and give her want she wanted.”
“How does that make it easier?” I cut the pastry in half.
“It’s only temporary.”
“She’s running out of time to qualify. Changing horses every two weeks won’t do it for her.”
“Can’t Greer just ride the new one next weekend? I don’t understand any of this.”
I nodded. “It’s better if you know the horse and the horse knows you. You build trust, a rapport. Like with a person, you begin to know them, know what to expect from them. You can anticipate their next move, making it possible to work together as a team, not as two separate individuals.”
“I never realized it was so complicated. It’s not for me,” Jules admitted as she turned the pancetta over in the pan. “I’ll leave it to you.”
“I don’t know why I need a new horse now.”
“Don’t you want to go to the big show? Isn’t it like the Academy Awards? The crowning glory, what everyone exists for?” Jules placed the bacon on a paper towel and cracked two eggs into the pan.
“No, I can live without it quite easily.”
“What do you want to do?”
I shrugged. “When did you know you wanted to be a chef?”
Jules’ smile lit up the room. “All the women in my family are terrific cooks. They always brought me into the kitchen and let me stand on a chair so I could help. The decision wasn’t that much of a choice; it was just a continuation of my childhood.”
“Why don’t you have your own restaurant?”
“Do you want to get rid of me?”
“God, no. If you left, I’d have no one.”
“You’re going to college in a year.” Jules put the eggs on a plate, placed some berries alongside them, lay the strips of pancetta down and put the plate in front of me.
“Am I?”
Greer had been looking at colleges with riding programs. After winter break, that was all she talked about. Then we got a new trainer and she became more interested in Rui. He was all she talked about. He was such a terrific rider and trainer. He understood equestrian sports differently than Americans did. He was so...European.
I pointed out that Rui is South American which is quite a distance from Europe.
Greer had snapped back that he had spent the last five years riding in Europe and that’s what gave him a unique perspective.
“Stop shining up to your boyfriend,” I had told her.
Greer had screamed at me, flung her paddock boot in my general direction and went up to her room. Twenty minutes later, she had changed and drove off, spinning the tires of her Porsche Boxster on the way out of the yard.
If I was going to college, I had to make sure it was at least a thousand miles from wherever she went.
I fi
nished breakfast and was having a conversation with Jules about food in the French countryside when Greer entered the kitchen.
“Good morning, what would you like for breakfast?”
She made a face. “Qualifying for the Maclay.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t have that in the refrigerator. Would you like a Danish? It’s fresh.”
“It’s full of butter.”
“Laminated,” Jules replied. “Hundreds of layers of butter.”
“Disgusting.”
“I thought it was delicious,” I replied and stood up.
“Have you seen the horses yet?” Greer asked as I walked out of the house with her.”
“From my bedroom window.”
“And?”
“They’re beautiful. You should be happy.”
“I get first choice.”
“Of course you do,” I said with a laugh. “You can have all of them.”
The van that had brought the horses was gone and we would have a week to decide. It was the usual arrangement but Greer often made up her mind much more quickly, sometimes just by looking. Did the horse go with her hair color type of decision.
We entered the barn and there were two horses on crossties.
“No,” Greer said as she looking at the seal brown horse.
Lockie came out of the tack room.
“What is this?” Greer asked, pointing at the horse.
“A very fine ami-owner hunter from North Carolina.”
“I need an equitation horse.”
“You need a horse for the weekend. He has an excellent reputation.”
“Let Talia ride him, she won’t look like she was put in the dryer and shrunk on him. I’ll ride the bay.”
I was taller than Greer, something she never let me forget, and it meant I always rode the bigger horses.
“Is that okay with you, Talia?” Lockie asked.
“It doesn’t matter,” I replied as I went to get my saddle.
“Hello? Pavel? Do I have to do everything?” Greer asked impatiently and he hurried off to get her tack.
Ten minutes later, I had climbed up on the mounting block while Lockie stood at the horse’s head and held him for me.
“Let’s use the indoor arena this morning,” he said as I began to walk the horse to the outside ring.
Bittersweet Farm 1: Mounted Page 2
