‘I’ll manage. You’ll know,’ Mabel said mysteriously. She had become more mysterious and weird in her old age.
***
Against her children’s protests, Mabel bought the small cottage facing the marvellous view. Between the back garden and the beechwood was a good small paddock with an open shed for her old horse. This horse’s name was Julian, after her lover who had been killed in the First World War. Her children considered it pretty bad taste of her not to have called him Sidney after her husband.
Julian was about twenty-two years old. He was a bit of an old crock, but could still pull the dog cart to the village when Mabel needed food. He was not a lovable horse. He had a small moustache on his top lip and hips like a cow, and a cautious way of setting his ears straight up with the insides turned sideways and showing the yellow of his eye. But he and Mabel understood each other, and his legs had served her faithfully long after her own had left her in the lurch.
One wet afternoon, Dora took Robin out for a long ride. It was the one thing that helped. Riding him was still the same pure, exhilarating pleasure that it had been in America, but more so now, because he was hers, and she could teach him things that would be for the two of them alone.
She rode along the old, grassed-over Roman road just below the top of the hills, in and out of the small valleys, jumping streams, cantering tirelessly on the short turf that squelched up little fountains under Robin’s hoofs. Each time she thought of turning back, she wanted to go farther. It would be a long way home, but she didn’t care.
Something let go. She lurched to one side as the stirrup leather split through at the fold. Cleaning tack was not one of the strong points of Follyfoot. The dried-out leather had been cracking through for a long time.
A bit of string and a sharp skewer would do it. When Dora passed a gate half off its hinges, she turned down the lane between beech trees and found a cottage. An old horse gave Robin an unenthusiastic greeting, and an old lady in a dark rain cape with a hood was messing about in a neglected vegetable plot.
‘Could I possibly borrow some string?’ Dora rode near to her.
The old lady looked at Robin with pleasure, and at the stirrup leather with tut-tuts. ‘Your stuff is in almost as bad shape as mine.’ When she smiled, she didn’t look so much like a witch.
She brought out some string and a sharp skewer to poke holes in the two ends of the leather, then took Dora to admire the old horse before she left. It was raining quite hard. The horse was standing in the middle of the field with his ears back and his tail tucked in. The old lady chased him into the shed and put up the bars.
‘Do you have far to go home?’ she asked Dora.
‘About ten miles. I needed a long ride. Bad things have been happening. I just had to get off on my own.’
‘I know what you mean,’ said the old lady. ‘There were bad things for me too. Julian and I had to get away by ourselves.’
‘I like it here,’ Dora said.
‘Come back.’ The old lady was shivering. She started towards the house. ‘My name is Mabel. I’ll give you some cocoa and some of the awful bread I bake. I’m not quite up to it today.’
After the girl with the beautiful horse had gone, Mabel went into the house and lit the fire and fed the dogs and cats and sat in the chair which fitted her shape like a comforting hand. One of the cats jumped on her lap. She folded her hands across its broad grey back, and enjoyed some memories.
Perhaps, she thought, I will send a message to the girls. I really don’t feel up to much today. If I am going to be ill, it would be only fair to let them know. They’d feel guilty. Shut up, Mabel, she told herself. It was to get away from useless things like guilt that you came up here.
***
Dora thought quite a bit about Mabel and her lonely cottage, and about being old and wanting to be left alone. Mabel didn’t have to worry what people thought of her, because there were no people.
Dora was still padding round, trying to keep out of the Colonel’s way or trying to please him and doing everything wrong. Spilling his coffee, losing a bill for oats, leaving a rake upturned in a dark corner, where Sir Richard Wortley trod on the prongs and got conked in the forehead by the handle.
Steve found her saddling Robin.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Oh – for a ride.’
‘When will you be back? I’m not going to start mending that roof unless you’re going to help me.’
‘I’m going a long way.’
‘Then I’ll come. Miss needs the work. We’ll do the roof when we get back.’
‘But—’ But why not? Mabel hadn’t minded Dora coming to the house. It was mostly her daughters she didn’t want.
It was a glorious ride. The sun was in and out. A week of rain had drawn out all the spicy fragrance of the bushes and low clumpy plants that grew along the hills. When the horses got into the rhythm of a long canter together, it felt as if it could go on for ever.
‘Remember the last ride you had with me?’ Steve said as they pulled up to cross a chalky rock slide.
Dora rubbed her head. ‘Almost was my last ride with anyone. Poor Rebel. I wonder what the Crowleys think about it all?’
‘Just as long as they don’t think about getting another bargain horse.’
‘They will.’
‘And you’ll end up with it at Follyfoot.’
‘Probably. I don’t know, though.’ Dora thought of the Colonel. ‘Have to be someone else’s idea next time.’
As they rode down the lane under the roofing beeches, they heard a pandemonium of barking from the little house. Dora called Mabel, and when there was no answer, she gave Robin’s reins to Steve and tried the back door. As she opened it, the dogs surged out and ran off, barking in a crazy way.
The kitchen was chaotic. Food pulled out of the cupboards, milk bottles tipped over, cat and dog mess everywhere.
Dora went out again. ‘Steve. Tie up the horses and come in.’
They went through to the front room. In the doorway, Steve instinctively put his arm out and said, ‘Don’t look.’
‘I’m not afraid.’
***
Mabel was sitting in a chair by the empty fireplace. She seemed to have been dead for several days.
Shut in the shed by the bars, Julian had been pawing futilely at the ground underneath them, but was now propped in a far corner, barely able to stand. He had obviously had no food or water for some time. He was terribly dehydrated.
They gave him a small amount of food and water to start with, locked the back door of the house, took the key and went to telephone a doctor, and for the horse box to come for Julian.
In the lane, they met a car full of women and children. There was only one house at the end of this road. It must be Mabel’s family.
They stood their horses in the middle of the lane. The driver leaned out to tell them to move aside. Dora rode closer.
‘Are you going to see Mabel?’
‘Yes. Who are you? We’re her family. Thought we’d stop by and see how she is.’
Dora could only stare, so Steve said, ‘It’s too late.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘She’s dead.’
‘Oh my God!’ The two women made fluttery movements of trying to put hands over children’s ears. The children jerked away and listened solemnly.
‘My God, how ghastly!’
‘No,’ Dora said. ‘It’s all right. She wanted to die like that, I think. No fuss. Off on her own.’
The hard-voiced daughter with the glistening scarlet mouth said in a shocked sort of tone, ‘Last week, I was woken up by a voice quite close. It said “Rachel”. I didn’t pay any attention. I thought it was my conscience. She always said, “I’ll send for you if I need you.” I thought she meant telephone or letter. I didn’t know she meant like that.’
Dora gave them the key and left them to ring the doctor, the police, the ambulance – they were arguing who it should be as Dora and Ste
ve rode on. In the village, Dora telephoned the Colonel to send the horse box.
‘Another customer, Dora?’ He sounded like his old self.
‘Yes. He’s quite old and he’s weak. He’s been starved for days, but I think we can save him.’
‘Good girl,’ the Colonel said. ‘Well done. You do seem to find just the horses that Follyfoot is here for.’
Everything was all right. Although she was still shaky from the shock of Mabel, Dora came out of the telephone box feeling as if a dark cloud had lifted. Wait – there was one nagging unease. What was it? Oh yes. She had thought she was the only person who heard voices in the night. Bit disappointing to find that a girdled woman with stiff hair and lipstick like blood heard them too.
Chapter 29
EVERY YEAR AS autumn approached, Callie organised a celebration for all the neighbourhood animals that had been born that summer.
Puppies, kittens, chickens, ducks, geese, fish in bowls, an abandoned fledgling Toby had found who had refused to leave as it grew feathers and strength, and spent a lot of time in Toby’s pocket.
Dottie and her foal Polka Dot, a prize exhibit. Folly, because it wasn’t fair to exclude him for being born two months before spring. Three leggy young Dartmoors from the pony farm. Moll’s calico cat’s fifty-ninth kitten. Toby’s mother’s new baby. A box of young Belgian rabbits. A pair of hound pups who were being ‘walked’ by Mrs Oldcastle.
Everybody got a prize, because no one was better than anyone else.
Robin was allowed to enter because he had been reborn as a British citizen. Julian was celebrated because he had been born again – snatched from the jaws of death.
There was always something to celebrate at Follyfoot.
What they were really celebrating was life.
There are more stories about the horses of Follyfoot Farm for you to enjoy.
Read on for a taster chapter from Dora at Follyfoot.
Chapter 1
WHEN DORA WENT into the stable yard after lunch, Slugger was sweeping.
‘What’s wrong, Slugger?’
Slugger Jones was a man of habit, whether indoors or outdoors, he slept after Sunday lunch, and he never swept the yard until after the evening feeds. Especially on a Sunday when visitors might come and scatter toffee papers, and hastily stamp out cigarettes when they saw Steve’s notice:
EVERYTHING AT FOLLYFOOT BURNS, INCLUDING MY TEMPER
He had originally written, ‘The Colonel’s temper,’ but had blacked that out and put ‘my’.
‘What’s wrong, she wants to know.’ Slugger swept towards Dora’s feet, and over them. ‘Man doing a bit of honest work and she wants to know what’s wrong.’
Dora looked over Willy’s half door and made a face at the mule, who dozed with head down and ears lopped out from wall to wall. She felt like riding, but there was nothing much here that wasn’t lame, stiff, blind, ancient, or pensioned off from work for the rest of its life. That was the only snag about a Home of Rest for Horses. Dora and Steve were always trying to sneak in a horse that was fit enough to ride.
Dora put a bridle on Willy and the old Army saddle that was the only one that fitted him, since his back had been permanently moulded by his days as an Army mule. When she brought him out, Slugger was leaning into the water trough to pull out the stopper.
‘Where are you going?’ His voice was a muffled echo inside the trough.
‘Into the woods. I’m still trying to teach Willy to jump logs.’
‘I wouldn’t go there. Not in the woods I wouldn’t, no.’
‘Why?’ What did he expect? Murderers? Madmen? The shadowed rides through the beechwoods were calm and safe as a cathedral.
‘Ask a silly question, you get a silly answer.’ Slugger was scrubbing a brush round the sides of the trough. ‘You might miss someone.’
‘What do you – oh, Slugger, was that what the telephone was? The Colonel?’
The Colonel, who owned Follyfoot Farm, had been in hospital for nearly two months. He was coming home at last.
Dora climbed onto the mule, slapped him down the shoulder with the reins because his armoured sides were impervious to legs, and rode out of the yard and down the road to be the first to greet the car.
At the crossroads she stopped and let Willy eat grass while she lolled in the uncomfortable saddle and drifted into her fantasy world where she was brave in adventures and always knew the right things to say.
She heard the sports car on the hill. Even with Anna driving, the gearbox still made that unmistakable racket from losing battles with the Colonel. When the car stopped and he looked out with his lopsided smile, Dora hardly knew him. His face was thin and pale, his eyes and teeth too big. His hand on the edge of the car door was bony and white. He was still biting round his nails, but they were clean. At Follyfoot nobody’s nails were ever completely clean, finger or toe.
‘Hullo, Dora.’
‘Hullo.’ She pulled up Willy’s head, not knowing what to say. Are you all right? Well, he must be, or he wouldn’t come home. Did it hurt? Operations always hurt. I’m glad you—
Willy suddenly dropped his head and pulled her forward onto his bristly mane.
The Colonel laughed his old laugh that ended in a cough. Anna moved the car forward. Dora kicked Willy into his awkward canter and followed them home on the grass at the side of the road.
Callie, the Colonel’s stepdaughter, was at the gate to open it, with his yellow mongrel dog in ecstasies, tail beating its sides. Slugger was in Wonderboy’s loosebox, pretending not to be excited. He came out with his terrible old woollen cap tipped over his faded blue eyes, and the Colonel laid an arm across his shoulders.
‘Good to be back, Slugger.’
‘How’s it gone then?’
‘No picnic.’
‘Teach you to stay away from that foul pipe.’
‘It was the old war wound. The doctors say it was nothing to do with smoking.’
‘That’s what they say. I burned that old pipe.’
Anna wanted the Colonel to rest in the house, but he had to go all round the stables first, leaning on his stick, lamer than usual, and then out to the fields where some of the horses were grazing in the sweet spring day.
Fanny, the one-eyed old farm horse, trotted up to him. The Weaver lifted his head with his cracked trumpet call, and then went back to chewing the fence rail, weaving hypnotically from foot to foot. Lancelot, the oldest horse at the farm, perhaps in the world, mumbled at the grass with his long yellow teeth and looked at the Colonel through his rickety back legs. Stroller, the brewery horse, plodded up and nosed into his jacket for sugar.
‘He remembers which pocket.’
The Colonel had gone into and out of hospital wearing the patched tweed jacket with the poacher’s pockets wide enough for a horse’s nose.
In the jump field Callie was lungeing the yearling colt, Folly.
‘Shaping up quite nicely.’ The Colonel watched with his horsy look, eyes narrowed, a piece of hay in his mouth. Horses are always chewing grass or hay, and people who live with them catch the habit.
‘What do you mean?’ Callie bent as if she were going to pick up and throw a piece of earth, to make the colt trot out, head up, long legs straight, tail sailing. ‘He’s perfect!’
The Colonel laughed. ‘Nothing changes, thank God. Where’s Steve?’
‘I think he’s out with the horse box,’ Dora said casually.
‘What for?’
‘Oh—’ She stuck a piece of hay in her mouth too. ‘To bring in a horse.’
‘I thought the stable was full.’
‘Well it is,’ Dora said. ‘But we found this horse, you see. The junk man died, and the old lady, she tried to keep it in the back garden, tied to the clothes line, and it’s all thin and mangy like a worn old carpet, and so we …’
‘And so they thought it was just what we needed to keep us busy in our spare time,’ Slugger grumbled, leaning on the gate.
The Colonel laugh
ed. ‘Nothing changes.’
MONICA DICKENS
The Colonel, owner of Follyfoot, the Home of Rest for Horses, has been ill and has to go away to convalesce. Dora and Steve are left in charge, with the strict instruction, ‘Don’t buy any horses’. But when Dora sees the rangy, cream-coloured lame horse, Amigo, she is determined to save him from spending his last days pulling a heavy log-cart – even if it means borrowing money from sly Ron Stryker. But to pay Ron back, someone from Follyfoot must win the Moonlight Pony Steeplechase …
A much longed-for new edition of this classic series that inspired a generation of horse lovers!
‘Another gem from the Follyfoot series. They’re well-written with good plots and will delight any horse lover.’
The Bookbag
www.follyfootbooks.co.uk
9781849393263 £4.99
MONICA DICKENS
Follyfoot farm is a home for rescued and unwanted horses, and the animals are cared for by the stable-hands Callie, Dora and Steve. There’s plenty of work to be done around the farm, but there’s still always time for the mysteries and adventures that happen at Follyfoot.
Visitors are welcome at the farm, but when two boys come snooping round and obviously aren’t interested in the horses, Callie is suspicious. She’s sure she recognises one of them. But where from? The mystery deepens and it’s up to the young stable-hands to get to the bottom of it.
The long-awaited reissue of the novel that inspired a generation of horse-lovers!
www.follyfootbooks.co.uk
9781849391306 £4.99
The Horses of Follyfoot Page 12
