Gift Horse

by Terri Farley

  By three forty-five that afternoon, Sam was beginning to wonder if Rachel had been right.

  The film crew from KVDV still hadn’t arrived. Sam hated to leave before it did, but she and the guys had to beat the storm.

  Although they pretended to be having coffee and pie in the kitchen, Sam knew all three adults were eager for them to go.

  Wrapped in a long, lined trench coat, Brynna came out on the front porch.

  “We wouldn’t be interfering if we told the reporter how to find you, would we?” Brynna pretended to sound casual, but she was the one who’d announced that weather reports said the roads might be impassable by evening.

  “That’d be great,” Sam said. “We’re going to leave in a few minutes, anyway.”

  With Tinkerbell brushed and beautiful and the ranch truck belching black smoke out its tailpipe, they crossed the River Bend Bridge and waited on the wild side of the river.

  Coming home on the bus, the storm hadn’t looked threatening. Snow had wavered like a gauzy curtain between the La Charla River and the mountains.

  Now, the mountains were invisible. Sam was glad to have Tinkerbell and the guys along. She’d been lost in a snowstorm once before and she’d hated it. Even her horse hadn’t known which direction to go.

  “Let’s hit it,” Jake said. “This weather is only gonna get worse.”

  Sam checked her watch. “Five minutes more,” she told him.

  Darrell was using the extra minutes to test the knots holding each tire to the next. He planned to ride in the second-to-the-last tire.

  “This is gonna be great,” he told Jake. “Riding in this one will give me lots of snap, and I won’t get a face full of snow from that monster’s feet.

  “They’re good and tight,” Darrell said, turning to Sam.

  Sam smiled. Darrell was taking his “sleigh” ride seriously. When she’d fretted that he might fall and get tangled in the ropes, Darrell had actually pulled out a wicked-looking pocketknife and brandished it.

  “I can cut myself loose, darlin’. Don’t worry your pretty head.”

  Sam looked down the highway once more. It was completely empty.

  “I wish you guys had worn red,” she grumbled. She fidgeted, though her red pullover fit snugly under her jacket. “Brynna says red looks good on television. Besides, this is a Valentine’s Day fundraiser, you know.”

  Both guys ignored her.

  “Why are you in such a rush? You have chains,” Darrell pointed out to Jake.

  “Yeah,” he said, “and it’s time to use ’em. I’m out of here.”

  Jake yanked open the ranch truck’s door and climbed inside.

  “Might as well,” Sam said. She gave him a head start and then sent Tinkerbell after him. Clots of snow flew from Tinkerbell’s hooves. His big body surged into the wind and Sam thought of rajahs on elephants. Perched on the draft horse’s back, she had a bird’s-eye view of everything around her.

  Still, the hay truck drew away quickly, and soon it was out of sight.

  “Dashing through the snow!” Darrell bellowed.

  His voice sounded lonely floating over the barren range, but Sam didn’t order him to stop the Christmas carol. Tinkerbell liked it, and as long as he was happy, he wouldn’t notice the hundreds of pounds of truck tires sliding along behind him.

  Sam pulled down her cowboy hat. It didn’t match the English saddle, but it helped shade her eyes from the snowflakes fighting to clump on her eyelashes. She urged Tinkerbell into a jouncing trot and reined him in a weaving motion that made Darrell crow in delight.

  “Hang on, Zanzibar,” Sam whispered. Her secret name for the Phantom was safe while the wind whipped her words away.

  The foothills were finally in sight when they caught up with Jake. He was standing beside the truck. Its hood was up. Jake’s hands were on his hips as he peered inside.

  “What happened?” Sam shouted through the wind.

  “It’s dead.”

  “Are you sure?” Sam asked. It was Dad’s truck. “It can’t be dead.”

  “Well, I’m no expert,” Jake said, “but when an engine clatters like crazy, then pops like the Fourth of July, and stops, it’s either dead, or needs to be put out of its misery.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  There was no sense in complaining. Dad had said she should know when to quit, but this was not the time.

  Together, they decided she and Darrell could continue out to the feeding site, position the tires, then she’d ride back to the truck, where Jake would have bound the hay into several large bundles and Tinkerbell could drag the hay to the tires.

  It had to be two miles between the truck and the feeding site, and the mustangs might spook and run by the time they returned, but they really had no choice.

  Tinkerbell trudged through the snow, head held so low that Sam was the first to spot the Phantom.

  He stood on a high ridge, observing the strange parade of creatures trespassing on his territory.

  “Perfect,” Sam breathed.

  The stallion was here, so his herd must be nearby. She glanced back over her shoulder and motioned for Darrell to look, but he was leaning back in a tire, eyes closed as if he were sunning on a beach.

  Suddenly, Tinkerbell was rearing. Sam threw her weight forward, but Tinkerbell didn’t feel it. Grabbing, she filled both hands with mane. At last, he lowered.

  Had he smelled the wild horses?

  No. He wasn’t acting excited. Tinkerbell was afraid. He jumped, though there was nothing to jump over. He jerked each hoof up the minute he set it down, as if the ground jolted him with electricity.

  Sam tightened her reins, but the gentle snaffle was nothing to Tinkerbell. If Jake were here—but he wasn’t. She had to use her rider’s instincts to figure out what was wrong with the horse and keep him from hurting her and Darrell.

  “Yank it!” Darrell yelled, and Sam pulled the release rope holding the tires in place.

  As she did, a wave of dizziness swept over her. Not from looking down. The white world around her blurred as if she were riding a runaway carousel. The snowy plain before her lurched. Her head reeled and she fought for balance. She tried to focus on the ridge, on something solid, but even that rocky outcropping wobbled before her eyes.

  Crack! Like a shotgun blast, the noise cut across all other sounds, then spread into a roar. On the ridge, a kaleidoscope of crystals spun, erasing the Phantom. Where had he gone? A white cloud of snow blew up and out. Could it be an avalanche? Could it have swept the Phantom off the ridge?

  “Earthquake!” Darrell shouted.

  Sam reeled. In San Francisco the word made sense, but not here. Except that an earthquake could cause an avalanche, or cause a huge horse like Tinkerbell to stagger, as he was doing now.

  Then Tinkerbell was running.

  There was no stopping him. Sam clung to his neck instead of sawing at the reins. Her tugging might put him off balance. Instead, she fought to keep her boots on the thin metal bars of the English stirrups. She battled to find some rhythm in his headlong zigzag run, but he was running scared.

  She lost her right stirrup. She couldn’t breathe as she slid halfway down the gelding’s barrel. Tinkerbell grunted with exertion, and Sam heaved herself back toward the saddle. Her grip on his mane helped, and finally she hauled herself up.

  Sam was afraid to look back, afraid she’d bounce free of the saddle altogether, but she needed to see if Darrell was safe.

  Tinkerbell vaulted over nothing. Was the ground still shaking? Was he fighting gravity, trying to stay above the earth he could no longer trust?

  Sam snatched a quick glance over her shoulder, then buried her face in Tinkerbell’s mane once more. She’d glimpsed the tires and Darrell and horses running before a tidal wave of snow. The Phantom was fleeter than any of them. He must have made it down the mountainside ahead of the avalanche.

  “Please, please,” Sam chanted. “Oh, please let him be safe.”

  She looked back one more tim
e, and the stallion was there, just three horse lengths behind her. As she watched, his powerful shoulders thrust his forelegs farther, faster. In an instant, he was running beside her.

  The stallion was huffing, breathing harder than she’d ever heard him. His nostrils were wide and red from exertion. His brown eyes rolled toward her, recognizing her, checking her, as he slowed to match Tinkerbell’s pace.

  At the stallion’s snort, Tinkerbell glanced right. His hooves stuttered and for one awful second, Sam imagined going down beneath the draft horse. Then a sigh flowed through him, and Tinkerbell fell into step with the Phantom.

  Tinkerbell still ignored the reins, but his run was steady.

  Sam risked another glance back, to see if the Phantom’s herd was following. As she did, the stallion veered away, toward the dark shapes way back there, which must be his herd. Sam couldn’t say good-bye, couldn’t wish he’d stay. Zanzibar had kept her safe in the only way he knew, ordering Tinkerbell to slow his headlong panic into a rhythmic gallop.

  When the stallion left, Tinkerbell didn’t follow. He was going to the only home he knew—River Bend.

  Ahead, Jake’s silhouette stood black against the snow. His arms windmilled, trying to stop Tinkerbell, but the big gelding saw him and ran left. Jake’s shout was a puff of sound with no words.

  They swept past Jake, the truck, more miles of snow, and galloped on.

  By the time the ranch came into sight, Tinkerbell had settled into a solid, rideable gait. It gave Sam time to realize that all the animals’ weird behavior made sense.

  The horses had sensed something, even last week. So had the chickens and the cattle. She’d read about such phenomena after a minor quake in San Francisco. Some scientific labs were using mice to predict earthquakes and claimed they were every bit as accurate as technical instruments.

  “Good boy,” Sam crooned to Tinkerbell. His ears flicked back, but he kept running. He might have been going home alone.

  Sam tried to convince herself everything would be fine. Sure, it would be embarrassing to arrive home on a runaway. But Tinkerbell was listening to her hands on the reins, now.

  It would be extra work to go back out on the range to put the hay in the holders. It would be bad for Tinkerbell’s future—not to mention humiliating—if TV cameras caught any part of this. But she was pretty sure Darrell and the mustangs were safe. The TV crew might even arrive in time to pick up Jake and Darrell. And if Jake was mad? Oh well, Jake had been angry before. He’d get over it.

  Ahead, she saw the big green volunteer fire department truck bucking along the highway. Fire? In all this snow?

  Sam’s stomach dropped. Of course, the earthquake. When the earth pitched and twisted, pipes broke. Not just water pipes, but gas. Fires could flare, ignite houses and barns. Relief weakened her as the truck racketed on by, passing the River Bend bridge.

  Maybe it was just a precaution. Maybe they were making the rounds, checking on all the far-flung neighbors. Maybe Dad was even with them.

  Maybe, but that didn’t keep her from imagining the destruction such a strong quake could cause at home. A new sense of urgency gripped her.

  She gave Tinkerbell his head and as they crossed the bridge she realized something really was terribly wrong.

  The roofline of the barn was different. And someone was screaming. Not someone, a horse. A horse was screaming endlessly.

  Tinkerbell headed right for the sound, running past a strange truck with an antenna on top, past the ten-acre pasture where the saddle horses circled the fence line, past the ranch house, toward the ruined barn.

  A random thought surfaced suddenly in her brain. The difference between a hero and everyone else, she’d read once, was that a hero ran toward danger. If that was true, Tinkerbell had been bred to be heroic.

  Before they reached the barn, Dad stepped into Tinkerbell’s path. The horse slowed and let him grab the reins near the bit.

  “Dad!” Sam shouted, but a sigh shuddered through her chest, stopping her words as she slid into his arms.

  It was good to get off Tinkerbell’s plunging back, but this was a nightmare.

  The old section of the barn had collapsed. For the first time, Sam could see its real structure. Like huge tic-tac-toe squares made by timbers, the barn walls had crashed to the right. The horses inside were trapped.

  “It’s Sweetheart,” Sam gasped. She recognized the pinto’s high-pitched neigh. “But what about Ace?” Sam stared into her father’s face. “Dad? Did Ace get out? Dad?”

  “Honey, they’re both still inside,” Dad said.

  Sam pulled away from his arms and ran toward the barn. If anything happened to Ace, her heart would break.

  Dallas grabbed her before she’d run very far. “Stay back. We’ll get them out, fast as we can.”

  Brynna and Gram came jogging from the house.

  “The power’s out, but everything’s okay inside,” Brynna shouted. “It’s only the barn and the new bunkhouse.” Brynna gestured vaguely. “The radio says to stay outside. There could be aftershocks or a second quake, an even stronger one.”

  “Thank God you’re all right.” Gram grabbed Sam and hugged her.

  Pepper and Ross had been squatting near the barn. Now they approached Dad.

  “It’s gonna go,” Ross said.

  “If we’re gonna get those horses out before they’re crushed, we’ve got to try now,” Pepper said.

  Sam kept staring at the barn. Her mind tried to make sense of the building she’d known all her life. It was half gone.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Dad said finally. “The roof’s sagging, but it hasn’t caved in. We’ll prop it up with lumber from the bunkhouse, chainsaw those two uprights,” Dad said, pointing. “Pepper, you’re following me, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah, boss,” said the young red-haired cowboy. “I’m going to get a harness.”

  “You’re gonna hitch this horse”—Dallas paused to point at Tinkerbell—“to the crosspiece and have him pull the section out? It’s risky. It could bring it all down if the props don’t hold.”

  “Got a better idea?” Dad asked.

  Sam wouldn’t let herself picture the tons of woods and hay collapsing. Almost anything would be better than a second quake.

  There was silence while Dad, Brynna, Gram, and the cowboys looked at each other. They were a team. Everyone had a voice in the awful decision.

  “Let’s do it,” Brynna said.

  “He’s got the heart for it,” Gram seconded.

  In moments, Tinkerbell was in position.

  Dallas slapped the reins on Tinkerbell’s back. He shifted from hoof to hoof, but he didn’t move forward.

  “What’s wrong with him?” the old foreman shouted.

  “He’s scared,” Sam said.

  It was the first time she’d seen him nervous. Still lathered with sweat from his run, Tinkerbell’s eyes rolled as the timbers groaned and creaked behind him.

  He gave a quick, nervous nicker and an answer came from the ruined barn. Sam recognized the nicker and her heart leaped up.

  “Ace!” Sam shouted. She looked at Gram. “It’s Ace!”

  “Shh, honey, I know. Keep still, though. If he’s hurt, we don’t want him struggling.”

  The picture Gram’s words painted was awful. Fallen timbers could do terrible damage to Ace’s delicate face and slender legs.

  “Okay, we’re gonna do this in one pull. If it works, we’ll have an opening we can lead them through in about one minute. Let’s go, Tinkerbell!” Dad grabbed the gelding’s cheekpiece and strode forward.

  In a single tug, the gelding wrenched the section free. It rattled loose. Tinkerbell had pulled so hard, the chunks of wood followed him halfway across the yard.

  Dallas dropped the reins. Dad released his hold on the bridle. As one, the men darted to the barn and peered through the opening, while Gram stopped Tinkerbell.

  It was then that Sam noticed the television camera and remembered the strange vehicle she�
��d noticed as she thundered by on the big draft horse.

  Apparently it had been focused on Tinkerbell and the struggle to decide what to do. A blond woman waved, not as if she wanted Sam’s attention, but just in recognition. It must be Lynn Cooper, but Sam couldn’t return her wave. Nothing mattered except Ace.

  Before she reached the barn, she saw Pepper duck into the opening.

  “He’s the smallest and most flexible,” Brynna said of the young cowboy. “If anyone can get over that wreckage and get the horses out, it will be him.”

  Suddenly, Sam realized her teeth were chattering. Of course the weather was cold and it was still snowing, but this frigid grip was inside her. She was so afraid.

  There was a squeal and the sound of hooves clattering on wood. Sweetheart, blanketed in dirt-smeared purple, worked free of the barn. Trembling, she looked around, trying to make sense of her home. But when Pepper gave her a gentle smack on the rump, the old mare knew what to do.

  Eyes rolled white, she trotted forward, then bucked, heels kicking at the sky before she bolted for the ten-acre pasture and her friends.

  “One more,” Dad said, clapping Pepper on the shoulder.

  “And the kitten,” Ross said.

  “Cougar?” Sam gasped. She turned to Brynna, but her stepmother’s arm was already around her shoulders.

  “He slipped out just before the quake, looking for Tinkerbell, we think. I was running after him when it struck.” Brynna glanced down and Sam saw dirt on the knees of her stepmother’s BLM uniform. “But cats do well in earthquakes. I’ve heard it time and again.”

  A sudden rumble was followed by a creak like a giant hinge. An aftershock. But only the timber slanting on the right side of the opening swayed and fell. Something metal clanged and shifted, and then Sam saw his face.

  Black forelock blown back by a gust of snowy wind, Ace emerged from the barn. The white star on his forehead shimmered in the harsh winter light. Twisting free of Pepper’s grip, he scrambled clear of the fallen timbers and bolted toward Sam.

  Sam cried out, but the sound she made had no words. Her arms circled Ace’s neck and she cried into his dirty winter coat.