“Yup, I’d say he’s cool as a cucumber,” Carole agreed.
“You mean, as a carrot,” Stevie joked.
The girls kidded one another until they reached the line of trailers that were temporary homes for the cast and crew. It took only a few minutes for Stevie to locate the door marked BLAKE PRATT, DIRECTOR. She handed Stewball’s reins to Carole and rapped on the door. Almost immediately the door opened and she was ushered inside. Lisa and Carole waited nervously for her to reappear. They knew that Stevie had superhuman powers of persuasion, but from what they had seen of Blake Pratt, Director, he was a force to be reckoned with.
A few minutes later, Stevie burst through the door. “It’s settled! He’s coming right out! He said he never misses a chance to see new talent. He’ll only give us five minutes now, but I said that was fine. Give me a leg up, will you?”
Patting Stevie on the back, Lisa put ten fingers together and boosted her into the saddle.
“Good luck!” Carole whispered.
The trailer door opened again, and the director stepped out. He put a hand up to shield his eyes from the bright Western sun—and burst into hysterical laughter. “Ha, ha, ha! Very funny! You want me to put that in a movie? Good joke!” He turned around and called for his wife. “Honey, you gotta come see this! Funniest-looking horse I ever saw! Everybody, get a load of this!”
Lisa and Carole stood rooted to their positions. Stevie sat motionless on Stewball. It was worse than a bad nightmare. It was totally horrifying, and it was really happening. One by one the trailers’ inhabitants poked their heads out or came outside. In a matter of minutes dozens of people were screeching with laughter and pointing at poor skewbald Stewball.
“She wanted Skye to ride that in the movie!” the director screamed, doubling over at his own joke.
“This might be embarrassing to us, but it’s downright insulting to Stewball,” Carole whispered to Lisa. The girls looked over at the horse, whose ears were twitching as he listened to the director’s braying laugh.
There was only one person aside from The Saddle Club who wasn’t laughing. Skye stepped forward from the crowd. “I wish I could ride this horse in the movie,” he said defiantly. “He’s the best cutting horse for hundreds of miles. Unfortunately, some people know a lot more about ‘lights, camera, action’ than they do about horses!”
Skye’s words fell on deaf ears. The director was already walking off, still laughing loudly.
AFTER THE MORNING’S fiasco, lunch was a glum affair. Carole tried to be optimistic: At least they could still use Stewball to help train Skye. They were going to give him a lesson that afternoon. But it was going to be touch and go trying to get him ready within a couple of days.
They all felt terrible that they’d exposed Stewball to such humiliation. He was a smart, sensitive horse, and, walking back to the barn, he had looked downcast, as if he had understood that the crowd had been making fun of him.
In an attempt to cheer them up, Mrs. Devine brought out a tub of ice cream for dessert. “Help yourselves, girls, and try to remember that it’s better to face any problem with enthushiasm,” she advised. “I have to pick Kate up in town, so we’ll see you at dinner.” She left the ice cream on the table and headed out.
The Saddle Club decided to follow Kate’s mother’s advice and perk up. They ate their fill, washed their plates, and walked back out to the stable to get Stewball ready for his lesson with Skye.
“Hey, you know what?” Carole said suddenly. “I just had an idea. Why don’t I go and work with Sir Prize while you two teach Skye. I can find out how much he knows and doesn’t know, and that way we can separate which problems are his and which are Skye’s.”
Lisa and Stevie thought Carole’s plan was excellent. Both of them knew that any horse—and particularly any horse as poorly trained as Sir Prize seemed to be—would benefit from a schooling session with Carole. They parted ways at the barn. Sir Prize was not stabled in the main barn but had private quarters in the Devines’ stallion barn, which had been cleared just for his stay.
“I hope His Royal Movie-Star Highness is in his dressing room. Otherwise, I’ll have to chase him down,” said Carole.
“Don’t you mean His Royal Horseness?” Stevie asked.
Carole made a gagging expression and went on her way.
SKYE’S LESSON WENT better than the girls had dared hope. First they had him ride Stewball around the ring, but that got boring, and Skye was eager to try some cattle work. There were a few steers corralled near the ring. Lisa suggested that Skye work on singling one out of the “herd,” the way he would have to in the movie.
“Here goes nothing!” Skye called as he entered the corral and shut the gate behind him.
Leaning over the fence, the girls gave him the thumbs-up sign.
Stevie’s predictions were right. At first Skye tried to control Stewball. When Stewball stopped to size up the cattle, Skye urged him closer to the steers. Stewball dug his hooves in.
“Come on, Stewball, don’t act up,” Skye urged, using his legs to try to move the horse forward. Stewball laid his ears back and ignored his rider. One of the steers, made restless by the interruption, moved away from the others, looking as if he might bolt to the other end of the corral. Stewball was on him in a flash. He sidestepped, he turned, he stepped forward to intimidate the steer and back to cover him. Finally he stopped and stood stock-still.
“Throw your lasso!” Lisa yelled, and Skye threw, whirling the rope above his head, then letting it fly through the air and around the steer’s neck.
“Yippee!” Skye yelled. He was so thrilled with his performance that Stevie and Lisa had to beg him to let the steer go so that he could try again. “But what if I don’t make it this time?” Skye called anxiously.
“Please, Skye!” Stevie answered. “This is Stewball you’re riding. Have a little faith!”
During the rest of the lesson, Skye learned to sit back and let Stewball do the work. Like most Stewball beginners, Skye’s instinct was to try to think for the horse, but Lisa and Stevie coached him into pretending Stewball was an easy chair.
“So all I have to do is sit here and look good?” Skye asked the girls.
“Right. And swing your rope. We haven’t managed to teach Stewball to use a lasso yet,” Stevie replied.
Skye hopped off and patted Stewball as if he’d never stop. It was the most enthusiastic the girls had ever seen him about a horse. Once they had considered making Skye an honorary Saddle Club member, but they had realized that Skye wasn’t truly horse-crazy. Nobody would have believed it, though, listening to him singing Stewball’s praises now.
When Skye had exclaimed “This horse is incredible!” for the millionth time, Lisa cut him off, saying, “You’re not so bad yourself, Skye. You’ve really done your homework for this part.”
Skye grinned sheepishly. “I guess I learned my lesson after City Cowboy,” he said.
Lisa and Stevie smiled, remembering the movie Skye had been filming when they had met him.
“Luckily,” Skye concluded, putting his arm around Lisa and giving her shoulder a friendly squeeze, “Lisa Atwood came to the rescue.”
Lisa grinned, looked up, and stopped dead in her tracks. She was face-to-face with John! For a few seconds she was speechless. She couldn’t believe it: Whenever she looked or sounded friendly with Skye, John would appear. It was so ridiculous Lisa would have laughed—except that the hurt, angry expression on John’s face stopped her. What made it worse was that, because of the morning’s disappointment, Lisa had completely forgotten to mention the missing hay to Skye.
“Did you—did you find the hay, John?” Lisa asked tentatively, extracting herself from under Skye’s arm.
“Yes, we got enough of it back to do the morning feeding, and Dad ordered another shipment,” John replied.
Lisa couldn’t tell if he was still annoyed. While she was trying to think of something to add, Skye spoke up. “I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Skye
Ransom,” he said, extending his hand.
John took it but didn’t meet Skye’s eyes. “John Brightstar,” he muttered.
“Do you work on the ranch?” Skye inquired.
John nodded but didn’t say anything.
“Do you ride, too?” Skye asked.
John smirked. “It’s pretty hard to grow up on a ranch and not learn how to ride,” he said.
Skye looked embarrassed. “Of course—I should have known you would ride.”
Even though John was being rude, Lisa felt she should be loyal to him in front of Skye. “John is an excellent rider,” she said. “He’s training his own horse, Tex.”
“Wow, that’s great,” Skye said. “I’d love to have a horse to train.”
“Would you really?” John said sarcastically.
“Yes, I think it would be fun,” Skye answered.
“It’s a lot more than fun,” John retorted. “It’s hard work. But then, you might not know the meaning of those words, since you’re a famous movie star.”
Before Skye could answer, John turned on his heel and stalked off.
“Boy, something’s eating him, huh?” Skye said.
Lisa felt her face flush. She was angry and embarrassed—angry at John for embarrassing her in front of Skye. Stevie came to the rescue. “Come on, we’d better get Stewball back for his rubdown. He’s had a long day,” she said.
Lisa nodded, recovering herself. “He sure has. But I think the afternoon did him good. If I’ve ever seen a horse look depressed, Stewball did this morning.”
Skye shook his head in disgust. “I wish I could have Blake Pratt fired, after the way he acted. Unfortunately, he’s the one who could fire me. If this part didn’t mean so much to my career, I swear I’d walk off the job.
“At least I’ve got Stewball to train me now,” Skye went on. “I’m sure I’ll be able to teach Sir Prize everything I’m learning in no time.”
Lisa and Stevie exchanged glances. Neither of them had the heart to tell Skye that it could take years to train a good cutting horse—and that the horse needed to have the right personality, which Sir Prize didn’t. Having Skye do so well on Stewball was wonderful and disappointing at the same time. It just proved what Stevie had known all along: that if Skye could ride Stewball in the movie, all his problems would be solved. Instead, they were only beginning.
Skye saved the girls from having to say anything in response. He was due at a cast meeting for a run-through of a scene. Thanking them and patting Stewball again, he left them at the entrance to the main barn.
AS LISA AND Stevie led Stewball inside, Carole joined them. She was red-faced and panting and looked ready to explode.
“What happened? Didn’t the lesson go well?” Lisa asked. It wasn’t like Carole to get so worked up.
“It hardly went at all!” Carole exclaimed. “The so-called animal trainer wouldn’t let me take her precious property out of his stall until I signed about nine release forms! And even then, he had to wear every kind of boot, bandage, and pad ever invented. Once I got on, it went from terrible to horrible! That horse doesn’t know the first thing about Western aids. He doesn’t even neck-rein properly. I got so upset comparing him to Stewball that finally I had to quit. I was getting nowhere fast.”
Stevie and Lisa felt their hearts sink. Carole’s news was grim. They had been entertaining a faint hope that maybe Sir Prize just needed a good rider to set him straight. Clearly, that was far from the case. Carole had worked with all kinds of ornery, disobedient, green, and sluggish horses, and she almost never lost her cool. Like any good rider, she understood that training required infinite patience. But this situation was evidently more than she could handle.
“There’s a solution to our problems somewhere,” Stevie said. “There always is. We’ve just got to put our heads together and think.” She knew that it was crucial for them to stay optimistic. If they gave up now, Skye would have no hope of riding in the movie, and they would have failed him, not only as technical advisers, but also as friends. “If only Stewball could talk. He’d tell us what to do,” she said wistfully.
“COULD YOU PASS the salt, Lisa? Lisa? Hello-o, Earth to Lisa.” Stevie waved her hands, and Lisa finally snapped to attention.
“Oh, sorry, I didn’t hear you. What did you want? The sugar?” Lisa asked.
Stevie smiled tolerantly. “No, the salt,” she said gently, resisting the impulse to tease her.
Lisa had been distracted all through dinner. She hadn’t taken part in any of the conversations. Now she was staring at her plate, pushing her rice and beans around with her fork. Stevie had a pretty good idea why. The confrontation between John and Skye had been ugly. John hadn’t acted like himself at all. In fact, he was the one who had made it a confrontation when it should have been a friendly introduction. Poor Lisa had been caught in the middle.
Back in the bunkhouse, Stevie questioned Lisa directly. “Is it what I think?” she asked.
Lisa nodded. “If you mean John, yes,” she replied.
“Tell Carole what happened,” Stevie suggested.
Lisa recounted the story, going back to the scene in the hayloft, where John had said that Skye wouldn’t care about the missing hay. “I can see why he’s annoyed about all the extra work and the attitude of most of the Hollywood people, but why does he have to group Skye with the rest of them?” she asked.
“I have one word,” Stevie said dramatically. “Jealousy.”
“That’s what I was going to say,” Carole said.
“I did think of that,” Lisa admitted. “Practically every time John sees me I’m saying what a great guy Skye is.”
“Exactly,” Stevie said.
“But it’s true!” Lisa protested. “Skye is a great guy. And so is John. I’m not going to pretend to John that I don’t like Skye!”
“Too bad. Then it could really get interesting,” Stevie said, a wicked glint in her eye.
Carole threw a pillow at her. “Some friend you are!”
“Just kidding,” Stevie said. Then she added impishly, “Maybe you should pretend that you do like Skye. I mean like like him, you know? To make John even more jealous! Then John would confront Skye and they could fight over you.” Stevie’s hazel eyes lit up at the thought of so much scheming.
“Don’t listen to a word she says, Lisa!” Carole said, glaring at Stevie. “Honesty is the best policy. You should tell John how you feel—that you and Skye are just friends and that John had better stop acting like such a baby about it. Then the air will be cleared and you and John can go on the way you did before.”
“I keep meaning to say something to him, but we haven’t been able to spend any time together,” Lisa explained.
“Well, there’s no time like the present,” Stevie said brightly.
“You mean now?” Lisa asked. The three of them had already brushed their teeth and changed into their pajamas.
Stevie nodded. “I’ll bet if you went out to the barn right now you could catch John finishing up out there.”
“She does have a point,” Carole agreed.
Lisa thought for a minute. Stevie was probably right. She knew that John had the habit of going out to the barn in the evenings even if he didn’t have work to do. And with the extra duties the movie had brought, there was a good chance he had gone back after his dinner to finish a few barn chores. The more she thought about the idea, the less crazy it seemed. “All right, I’ll do it! I’ll go out and talk to him right now,” she announced.
Stevie and Carole helped her into her bathrobe and barn shoes and promised to stay up until she got back. Then they packed her out the door, wishing her luck.
Lisa stepped out into the night air. It was a clear evening, and the sky was lit up with stars. Lisa always noticed the difference between the sky at the Bar None and the sky at home in Virginia. Somehow out West it seemed larger—and the stars seemed brighter. Even with the ranch buildings and the Hollywood trailers nearby, the land felt vast and empty. B
reathing the clear, sharp air, Lisa thought she understood why some people could never leave the West. John was one of them. His ancestors had lived in the Western states for centuries—before the states were even states. She knew that he loved the land as if it were a person. That might have been one of the reasons the Hollywood invasion had upset him so much. Shivering a little, Lisa hurried toward the light in the stable.
Inside, John was wearily raking the dirt aisle so that it would be neat for the morning. Lisa hated to disturb him in his work, but she knew that if she didn’t, it would be impossible to talk to him anytime soon. “John?”
John looked up and smiled—his old, warm smile—when he saw her. “What are you doing out here?” he asked.
“I came to say hi. We all sort of figured you’d still be out here,” she said.
John let out a long breath. “You got that right. I grabbed a bite at home and then came back.”
“Do you want some help?” Lisa asked.
“Sure. That would be great. There’s another rake just inside the door there.”
Lisa took the rake, and they worked without speaking for several minutes. She didn’t want to break the companionable silence, and suddenly she had cold feet about bringing up Skye. She was glad when John spoke first.
“It’s nice out here at night, isn’t it?” he said.
“Yes, it’s great,” Lisa agreed. “It’s so quiet and peaceful.”
They came to the end of the aisle and stood leaning on their rakes. “I used to sleep in the barn all the time when I was little,” John said. “I’d always find some excuse—some horse that had a cold or a foal that needed watching. Dad was pretty nice about pretending that whatever I thought up was important enough for me to be here.…” John’s voice drifted off as he lost himself in the memory.
“Well,” Lisa said, chuckling, “if you need an excuse now, I’m sure Sir Prize could use another twenty-four-hour guardian.”
Cutting Horse Page 4
