Hobbyhorse

by Bonnie Bryant

  “Oh, Stevie! She’s beautiful!” Amelia clasped her hands and looked up at Belle with rapt adoration. Lisa stifled a giggle. Belle was beautiful. She was a bright bay with a shiny black mane and tail and white markings on her face and forehead that looked like an upside-down exclamation point. Still, it seemed to Lisa that Amelia was overdoing it. Belle wasn’t that beautiful.

  “And Prancer! Lisa, you didn’t tell me she was this gorgeous!” Amelia held her hands flat under Prancer’s nose, and as the mare sniffed them, her ears pricked forward with interest. Prancer always seemed to love children. “She’s almost as pretty as Star,” Amelia said. Lisa glowed with pride until she saw Stevie grinning at her. Then she realized that Amelia was complimenting Prancer just as extravagantly as she had complimented Belle—in other words, overextravagantly.

  “I can see you’re a fine judge of horses,” Carole commented dryly. She’d overheard the whole exchange. Lisa and Stevie laughed a little self-consciously.

  “I’m glad you like them,” Lisa told Amelia. “They’re both good horses.”

  Amelia looked from Prancer to Belle and back. “I just don’t know how I’ll ever pick between them,” she said. “I want to ride them both!”

  Carole recalled how Amelia had wanted to ride Starlight, too. Even though the younger girl was interested in horses, she clearly hadn’t learned a lot about them yet. She still didn’t realize that riding an advanced horse was dangerous for a beginner. Amelia certainly couldn’t ride Prancer; what’s more, she wouldn’t enjoy herself if she tried. Most likely she would end up scaring herself and confusing Prancer.

  “Well, you can’t ride Belle,” Stevie said quickly, before Carole could speak. “She’s my horse, and no one else rides her. I’m training her. Max will tell you which horse you’ll ride.”

  Amelia turned her head away. “Fine,” she said sulkily. “If Belle doesn’t know what she’s doing, I’d rather not ride her anyway. I’ll ride Prancer. That’ll be okay, won’t it, Lisa? It’s not like she’s your horse.”

  “No!” Lisa said, a little stung. “It won’t be okay! I’m riding Prancer this week, and anyway, she’s never used for beginners. She used to be a racehorse, and she’s still hotheaded sometimes.”

  Amelia stamped her foot. Carole and Stevie stared at her. Lisa thought that the foot-stamping was getting annoying. “I’m not a beginner!” Amelia said. “Star is a very difficult horse!”

  Lisa lost her patience. “Enough about Star!” she said. “You’ll ride whatever horse Max gives you, and it won’t be Prancer because I’m riding her!” It was bad enough that Lisa had to share her bedroom and her privacy and her week with Amelia. She was not sharing Prancer, not even on the trillion-to-one chance that Max would actually allow it. “And quit stamping,” she said to her cousin. “You look like a three-year-old.”

  Amelia crossed her arms and stamped her foot as hard as she could. “You’re mean!” she yelled at Lisa. “You just want to keep all the good horses to yourself!”

  Lisa didn’t know what to do, but yelling back at Amelia was only going to make the situation worse.

  Stevie fought a strong urge to laugh. Amelia’s face was crimson with anger, and she looked about as sweet as a cobra ready to strike. Stevie’s three brothers sometimes seemed like incredible brats, but they could take lessons from Amelia.

  Carole was momentarily relieved that she was an only child. She caught Lisa’s eye and shook her head slightly. Lisa nodded back. They both knew that the argument couldn’t be allowed to continue. Max would not approve.

  “What’s going on?” said a familiar, infuriatingly cool voice. “Is there a little problem here? I hope you all aren’t scaring Danny.”

  Amelia turned, her tantrum suspended.

  “Amelia,” Lisa said, “meet Veronica diAngelo. She’s in Horse Wise, and that’s her horse, Danny, in the stall on the end. Veronica, this is my cousin Amelia. She’s here for the week.”

  Veronica looked the younger girl up and down. “Well, Amelia,” she said, “it’s nice to meet you. Lisa got our introductions backward, you know. You should have been introduced to me. But I won’t hold it against her. She’s still learning her manners, isn’t she?”

  Stevie and Carole stared as if Veronica were speaking Chinese. Lisa understood and sighed. Her mother had drilled her on the art of the social introduction—the less important person was always introduced to the more important person. It was the sort of social rule that Lisa found utterly trivial—and she wasn’t sure she’d call Veronica Amelia’s social superior, anyway. Amelia was a brat, but Veronica was in a brat class by herself.

  Amelia stared at Veronica’s elegant clothes and perfectly styled hair. “You’re wearing Pritchard breeches,” she said.

  “Of course,” said Veronica. “They’re the best.”

  “I’ve got Pritchard jods on,” Amelia said confidingly.

  “Do you really?” Veronica checked the label. “You do! Fantastic. You’re a much better dresser than your cousin, aren’t you?”

  Amelia beamed. “Look, Amelia—” Lisa began, in a much calmer voice, now that she’d had time to regain her composure.

  “Horse Wise!” Max called down the aisle. “Come to order!” Stevie hurried to take Belle’s halter off.

  Veronica put her arm around Amelia’s shoulder. “Come on,” she said. “I’ll introduce you to my particular friends. I’m sure Lisa hasn’t bothered.”

  Veronica’s “particular friends” were a group of snobby girls who hung on Veronica’s every word. “The only people I’ve met are the Pony Tails,” Amelia said, as she started down the aisle with Veronica. “They seemed okay.”

  “Oh, well, you don’t need to hang around them,” Veronica assured her. “They’re not society.”

  Amelia nodded. “May had a hole in her jodhpurs.”

  THE SADDLE CLUB watched all this with disbelieving eyes. “I take back what I said before,” Stevie commented. “Lisa, she’s worse than you said!”

  “She might not be that bad,” Carole said. She slipped her arm through Lisa’s. “But if she is, you can count on our help.”

  “Yeah,” Stevie said. “We’ll hog-tie her and leave her in the loft all week. Lisa, whatever you do, get her away from Veronica. It’s scary, how well they get along.”

  As they were going into the office, Lisa pulled May to one side. “I’ve got a favor to ask you,” she said. “A big one.”

  May looked at the ground. “Uh-huh,” she said without enthusiasm.

  “I know it’s going to take some effort, but would you please try to be nice to Amelia?”

  May looked up at Lisa and shifted her weight from foot to foot. “She seems like kind of a snob,” she whispered.

  “I know she seems that way,” Lisa replied. “I think she might not be very good at making friends. You don’t have to do stuff with her. Just try to be nice to her, because she’s going to be riding with you and everything. You and Jasmine and Corey—please?” May looked doubtful. “As a special favor to The Saddle Club?” Lisa asked.

  “Okay,” May said at last. “I’ll try.”

  “Thank you!” Lisa felt relieved. Now she didn’t have to feel so guilty about not sticking up for Amelia before, and if she was lucky, Amelia would still spend some time hanging around the Pony Tails. Lisa did not want to spend every minute of the next week with her cousin. She didn’t really want to spend any minutes with her, period.

  Inside the office, the riders crowded together, most of them sitting on the floor. They were all talking and laughing while they waited for Max to come in and start the meeting. At the front of the room they’d left a space for Max to stand, next to a big chalkboard used during lectures and demonstrations. Lisa joined Carole and Stevie toward the back, near the windows. May squirmed her way to the first row of kids, where she sat between Corey and the wall. Amelia, Lisa noticed, was sitting by herself on the side of the room. Veronica was only a few feet away, talking animatedly with Betsy Cavanaugh. She seeme
d to have forgotten Amelia already.

  “Carole and I tried to sit next to her,” Stevie whispered to Lisa. “As soon as we sat down, she moved.”

  Lisa looked at Amelia’s pinched, stubborn expression and sighed. She watched May settle herself between her friends. She went up to her cousin and knelt down. “Why don’t you come sit with us?” she asked.

  Amelia shrugged. “Your friends aren’t very nice. Stevie laughed when I said I wanted to ride Prancer.”

  “I don’t think Stevie meant to laugh. Give them another chance.”

  “I don’t want to. I like sitting here by Veronica.”

  “Why don’t you go sit by the Pony Tails? They’re really nice, once you get to know them.”

  “Oh, them.” Amelia raised her voice so that the entire room could hear. “May’s parents must not know much about horses if they let her run around in awful clothes like that.”

  The entire room went suddenly silent. All of Horse Wise had heard Amelia’s ridiculous pronouncement. Lisa blushed with shame.

  “Oh boy,” Stevie said to Carole, under her breath. “I bet May slugs Amelia for that.”

  Nearly everyone liked May, but she was not known for keeping her temper. Everyone in the room seemed to be holding their breath, waiting for May to respond.

  For a moment, May looked stunned. Then she looked furious. She opened her mouth, then looked at Lisa, Carole, and Stevie, swallowed hard, and shut it. She turned slightly so that she was no longer facing Amelia and kept her eyes on the front of the room.

  “Good for her!” Carole whispered.

  Jasmine and Corey looked plenty angry, too. “You don’t know anything!” Jasmine said to Amelia, in a voice of disbelief. “May’s dad is a horse trainer!”

  “So what?” Amelia asked rudely.

  Jasmine’s eyes grew wide. May reached out, still without looking at Amelia, and tapped Jasmine on the shoulder. Reluctantly Jasmine turned around, too.

  Amelia’s face was slightly pink, but she looked more triumphant than anything else, as if she had somehow won a victory against the other girls. She smiled at Veronica, who smiled back in a condescending way. Lisa was hot with shame.

  Max came in and shut the door behind him. His pleasant greeting dispelled some of the tension that Amelia’s rudeness had generated. All the kids turned their attention to Max, and Lisa felt herself relaxing a little.

  “Before we begin, I want to introduce a visitor to all of you,” Max started out. Lisa felt herself go tense again. “Lisa’s cousin is here for the week,” Max continued. “She’ll be joining us in Horse Wise today and at camp all week. Lisa, care to introduce us?”

  If Lisa had had a choice, she would never even have admitted that Amelia was her cousin. But she didn’t have a choice. She stood up and grabbed Amelia by the arm. Amelia stood, too, with a picture-perfect smile on her face. “This is Amelia,” Lisa said, and sat back down.

  Max looked surprised at her abruptness. “Uh … Amelia, maybe you’d like to tell us something about yourself.”

  The little girl beamed. “Well, I’m really glad I get to come to your camp. I’m still learning how to ride, but I love horses and love learning everything I can about them.”

  “Unbelievable,” Lisa muttered.

  Max smiled at Amelia. “We’re very glad to have you here,” he said. “Why don’t you come up to the front, where you can see? Polly’s going to be giving us a demonstration on bits. May, do you mind scooting over?”

  May slid half an inch to the left, increasing the space between herself and the wall. Amelia cooed, “Oh, thank you, Max.” She went to May’s right, cramming herself between May and Corey. May and Corey had no choice but to give her room, but neither of them looked at her.

  Carole shook her head in amazement. “It’s like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” she said softly to Stevie and Carole. At the front of the room, Polly was laying out various bits and bridles.

  “Who’re they?” Stevie asked.

  Lisa frowned. “He, not they. It’s a story about this guy named Dr. Jekyll, who turns from a quiet gentleman into a mouth-foaming monster in two seconds flat.”

  “Just like Amelia,” Lisa groaned.

  Stevie giggled. “It’s perfect. When Amelia comes around, all the other kids are going to Hyde.”

  “I made May promise to be nice to her,” Lisa said, shaking her head. “I’m going to have to buy the Pony Tails ice cream cones by the time this week is through.”

  “Ice cream cones?” Stevie asked. “Maybe you haven’t been paying attention. Between the way Amelia is acting and the way they’re taking it, you’re already up to hot fudge sundaes.”

  Lisa groaned and agreed. “By next Saturday, they may never have to pay for their own ice cream again.”

  “EVERYBODY THANK POLLY for that excellent presentation,” Max said. The members of Horse Wise clapped enthusiastically. Carole hadn’t thought Polly’s presentation was all that good—she’d forgotten to mention rubber-mouth training bits, and she’d failed to explain completely the difference between D-ring and egg-butt snaffles—but she figured Polly had done her best, so she clapped hard anyway.

  Lisa stole another glance at Amelia. The little girl had listened with intense interest to every word Polly had said. Lisa didn’t understand her cousin at all.

  “So now it’s time to ride,” Max continued. “Now, as you know, the school horses have had to stay in their stalls a lot lately because of the cold weather. Since it was so much warmer this morning, Red and I turned most of them out in the back pasture for some exercise. We’ll have to go get them and groom them.

  “Listen up,” Max said, holding up his hand. “I want you to remember that horses sometimes behave differently when they’re together in a herd. They follow different instincts. Sometimes even calm horses can act dangerously. So, while I want you all to get the halter and lead rope of the horse you’ll be riding and go out to the pasture gate, I want only a few of you older kids in the pasture with me. We’ll put the halters on the horses and lead them out the gate. Okay?”

  Lisa nodded to herself. She’d been around herds of horses on her friend’s ranch out West, and she knew what Max said made sense. In a herd, horses tried to dominate one another. They sometimes reared or kicked at each other. Humans had to be careful not to get in the way.

  Carole raised her hand. “Max, our horses are already in. We can help you.”

  Max smiled. “Thank you. You three would be just right.”

  The riders all left the office. Stevie and Carole hesitated at the door, waiting for Lisa, who was waiting for Amelia. Amelia walked up to Max instead. Taking his hand confidingly, she asked, “Which horse should I ride today?”

  Max smiled. “I’m going to give you a horse named Patch. You’ll like him. He’s a nice guy.”

  Lisa and Carole both nodded. Patch was old, gentle, and comfortable. He was the best choice for a young beginner, particularly one Max had never seen ride. Patch would take good care of Amelia.

  Amelia pushed her lower lip out the slightest bit. “But I’d rather ride Prancer,” she said. “Can I, please? I already met her, and I could tell she really loved me. Please, Max, please?”

  Max bent down so that his face was even with Amelia’s. He spoke very kindly. “I’m sure you liked Prancer. She’s a pretty horse, and she really seems to love kids, I know. But sometimes she acts silly when she’s being ridden. I don’t think she’s a good choice for you. Patch will be much better.”

  Amelia’s beautiful eyes filled with tears. “Please?” she whispered.

  Max gave Amelia a little squeeze on the chin.

  “Oh, gross,” Lisa whispered. “Can’t he see what she’s doing? She just wants to get her own way.”

  “You can’t ride Prancer today,” Max said. “You can ride Patch.”

  “What about tomorrow? Can I ride Prancer tomorrow? Please, Max!”

  “You know,” Max said, “I don’t think you realize what a super horse Patch is. You�
��re really going to like him.”

  “Does he jump?” Amelia asked.

  Max nodded. “Yes, he does.”

  Stevie snickered, and Carole elbowed her. Lisa grinned. They knew they were all thinking the same thing. Patch would jump any fence willingly and safely, but not at all elegantly. “Jumps like an elephant would,” Stevie muttered.

  “Is he well bred?” Amelia asked.

  Lisa sighed. She wished Amelia would get over her obsession with pedigrees and social standing. A horse’s breeding was not nearly as important as its personality and talent.

  Max paused. “Er … yes. Yes, he’s very well bred.”

  Carole knew Max wasn’t really lying—so long as he interpreted “well bred” to mean mannerly and kind. Patch was descended from a plow horse and a part draft horse, neither of them pedigreed.

  “Okay,” Amelia said reluctantly. “If Patch is really good, I’ll ride him today. But I want to ride Prancer tomorrow.”

  “Come on, Amelia,” Lisa said.

  Max looked up at The Saddle Club. “Carole, why don’t you take Amelia and show her where the halters are? After all, you are my assistant instructor.”

  Carole smiled. “Sure!” She took Amelia by the hand and led her down the stable aisle. As she went, Lisa and Stevie could hear her saying, “Now, there are a lot of important things to know about halters …”

  “Phew!” Lisa said, when they were on their way out of the stable. “Just getting to spend one moment away from Amelia makes me feel better!”

  “What I’m glad about is that Carole’s going to enjoy being an assistant instructor,” Stevie said. “And it gives her something to think about besides Starlight’s foot. When I got here this morning she was in his stall, crying. She tried to pretend that she wasn’t when she saw me.”

  “She was crying?” Lisa asked. “I knew she was upset, but I guess I didn’t know she was that upset. Do you know anything about navicular disease?”

  “Not really,” Stevie said. “We’ll have to ask Carole about it.”