Horse Race

by Bonnie Bryant

  Her friends turned to see what Lisa was looking at and gasped. It was Garvey. He had just appeared and was leaning on the rail, talking to an exercise boy, who was riding one of the Maskee horses.

  “What’s the matter?” Josh asked. He turned and stared in Garvey’s direction, too, trying to see what the girls were looking at.

  Stevie had an idea. “That’s our boss over there in the blue shirt,” she explained. “If he catches us here talking to you instead of working, he’ll be really mad.”

  “Your boss?” Josh said. “Does that mean he owns Cookie Cutter?”

  “He trains her,” Lisa corrected.

  “Wow!” Josh exclaimed. “That’s really cool. Maybe you could introduce me to him. I’d love to meet a real live horse trainer.”

  “I have a better idea,” Stevie said. She turned and pointed to a large bay horse that had just stepped onto the racetrack. “See that horse over there? His name is … um … Pine Hollow. He’s the fastest horse in all of Kentucky. You don’t want to miss his workout.”

  “Really?” Josh’s eyes widened as he watched the horse start to trot. “Wow. Thanks for the tip.”

  Stevie smiled. “You’re welcome. Hurry, it looks like he’s starting. You might want to get your father to tape him, too.”

  Josh nodded and raced over to his parents. Stevie watched long enough to see him grab his father by the arm and point toward the bay. Then she turned to her friends.

  “Okay, let’s make a break for it,” she said. “Luckily, I don’t think Garvey’s noticed us yet.”

  As the three girls hurried back to the safety of the stable area, Lisa smiled at Stevie. “I wonder what that horse’s name really is?” she said.

  Stevie shrugged. “Who knows? But I think Pine Hollow is an awfully nice name for a racehorse, don’t you?”

  THE GIRLS STILL hadn’t found Deborah a few minutes later when they met Toby leading one of the Maskee horses back from the track. Luckily, Garvey wasn’t with him.

  “Hi there,” Toby said when he saw them. “What are you three up to?”

  “We’re looking for Deborah,” Stevie said. “Have you seen her?”

  The jockey shook his head. “Not lately. I thought she said something about visiting farms.”

  Lisa gasped. “That’s right,” she said. “She’s going to be gone until post time, remember?”

  “Is there a problem?” Toby asked, looking concerned. “Maybe I can help you out.”

  Carole shook her head quickly. “No, no problem,” she assured him. “We just wanted to—um—find out what time we’re leaving tonight. We can ask her later.”

  Toby nodded and continued on his way. Lisa watched him go. “Maybe we should tell him the truth,” she whispered to her friends.

  Carole shook her head again. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” she said. “I’d like to trust Toby. But what if he was the one Garvey was talking to on the phone last night?”

  “Good point,” Stevie said. She glanced after the jockey. “Still, he seems so nice …”

  “I know,” Carole said. “But don’t you remember, I told you Garvey said something about being loyal. Doesn’t that sound like he was telling Toby he’d better win for Maskee Farms?”

  “Maybe.” Lisa frowned. “Besides, even if he’s not involved in whatever it is, he might not believe us any more than the police would if we started accusing Garvey of being a crook.”

  “Or whatever,” Carole added with a sigh. “That’s the worst thing. We don’t even know what we’re accusing him of.”

  “That’s only part of the problem,” Lisa said grimly. “We don’t know, but Garvey thinks we do. That’s why he wants to shut us up.”

  Carole glanced at her watch and gulped nervously. “And Deborah won’t be back for hours.”

  “That settles it, then,” Stevie said. “Until Deborah gets back this afternoon, we’re just going to have to deal with Garvey ourselves.”

  THE GIRLS DECIDED to head out to the grandstand to talk, since Garvey wouldn’t be likely to find them there. But someone else found them almost as soon as they made themselves comfortable on a bench.

  “Carole!” Josh B exclaimed from behind them. “How are you?”

  Carole fought back a groan of dismay as the older boy hurried over. Today he was wearing a clean white turtleneck and a pair of pressed black pants. “Hi, Josh,” she said weakly.

  “Hi, Josh,” chorused Stevie and Lisa.

  “Hi,” Josh greeted them shortly. Then he turned all his attention back to Carole. “I’m really glad to see you again,” he told her. “We didn’t have nearly enough time to talk yesterday. I was hoping for a chance to show you around the track—you know, give you a taste of what I do here and how things work.”

  “That sounds awfully interesting,” Carole said hesitantly. She didn’t want to hurt the boy’s feelings, but the last thing she needed right now was to be dragged off on some kind of grand tour of Bluegrass Park. How could she get out of it without being rude? For once, she wished she’d paid more attention when the girls at school or Pine Hollow were chattering on about how to talk to boys.

  “But we really wouldn’t want to take up so much of your time,” Stevie continued—for her, smoothly—smiling innocently at Josh. “I’m sure your job keeps you really busy, right?”

  “Well, yes,” Josh said, glancing at Stevie as if trying to remember who she was. “It does. I have a lot of responsibility here, you know. My uncle really counts on me to keep things running.”

  “That’s great,” Lisa said. “You must be really good at what you do.”

  Josh smiled and straightened the collar of his turtleneck. “Well, I don’t like to brag,” he said. “But everyone says I’m a fast learner. I already know everything about how the front office runs, and I even know a little about the betting machines. As soon as I’m old enough, I’ll probably start working at one of the windows.”

  Carole had seen the little windows where men and women sat behind the betting machines, punching in numbers and handing out tickets to the people who were gambling on the races. But she had never paid much attention to them, and she had given even less thought to the track’s front office, whatever that was. She liked the track because horses were there. Everything else was just boring details.

  She was sure Stevie and Lisa felt exactly the same way, but at the moment both of them were nodding and smiling at Josh as if his job were more exciting than a groom’s, a jockey’s, and the United States president’s combined.

  “Wow,” Lisa said. “That’s amazing. I feel bad even taking up this much of your time when you have so much to do.”

  Stevie stood up and grabbed Carole’s arm. “Come on, Carole,” she said, dragging her to her feet. “We’d better stop bothering Josh now and let him get back to work.” She smiled at Josh again. “Maybe we’ll see you later.”

  “Um, I hope so,” Josh said, looking a little confused. “Bye, Carole.”

  The Saddle Club hurried away along the rail, leaving Josh staring after them. As soon as they were near the gap and safely out of sight, Stevie and Lisa broke into giggles. “That was fun,” Stevie declared.

  Lisa shrugged. “I don’t know,” she said with a smile. “I actually felt kind of sorry for him. He never knew what hit him.”

  Carole grinned at both of her friends. “Thanks, guys,” she said gratefully. “You really helped me out back there. I couldn’t think of a thing to say to him. If it was left to me, I’d probably be touring the snack bar or the program booth right now.”

  “You’re welcome,” Lisa answered for both of them. “But we shouldn’t count on that working more than once. We’d better stick to less Josh-infested places for our meetings.”

  Carole’s smile faded as she remembered the reason for their Saddle Club meeting. But before she could say a word, she heard a gruff voice behind them.

  “Hey, you girls!” Garvey shouted. He had just rounded a corner and seen them.

  “
Oops,” Stevie whispered. “Should we make a break for it? Those muscle-bound guys usually can’t run very fast.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Lisa hissed back. “He’s not going to do anything to us here with all these people around.”

  Carole glanced around. At least two dozen people were nearby, from the jockeys on the track to the trainers watching them ride to a janitor sweeping up the grounds. That made her feel a little safer, but not much—especially when she got a good look at Garvey’s glowering face.

  “What are you three whispering about over here?” he demanded belligerently. The janitor looked up. Garvey noticed and lowered his voice. “I hope you’re not telling secrets you shouldn’t be telling.”

  “We don’t know what you’re talking about,” Lisa spoke up bravely.

  Garvey stared at her. “Oh yeah?” he growled. “I don’t think I believe you. I know little girls tell their friends everything.”

  “You’d better watch out,” Stevie said hotly, clenching her fists at her side. “We haven’t told anybody what you’re planning yet. But if you keep threatening us, we just might change our minds.”

  Garvey whirled to face her. “Threatening you?” he said. His angry face cracked into an ironic smile. “I’m not making any threats. Your imagination must be running away with you.”

  Lisa frowned, guessing what he was driving at. It was true that nothing he had said was concrete enough to be considered a threat if the girls told anyone. And now she knew that was no accident. She knew Deborah would believe them if they said Garvey was out to get them, but would anybody else?

  “What about what you said to Carole about not blabbing to her reporter friend?” Stevie challenged him.

  “What about it?” Garvey said, still smiling. “I was joking, that’s all. You can’t arrest me for having a different sense of humor than you do.”

  Meanwhile, Carole was gaping at the big man, astonished. “What about making me ride Storm Chaser when you knew I was going to get thrown!” she exclaimed. “Is that also your idea of a joke? A lot of people might not think it was funny.”

  Garvey shrugged. “That was an unfortunate accident,” he said calmly. “Storm Chaser only throws his first rider of the day. After that he’s safe enough for a five-year-old to handle. Toby told me he’d already ridden him today when he hadn’t. Obviously.”

  It was clear that Garvey had thought this out. Lisa wondered if his excuse for putting Carole on Storm Chaser meant that Toby was in on the plot, too, as Carole suspected. Either way, Lisa knew that Garvey. was lying. But they had no way of proving it. “What do you expect us to do now?” she asked the trainer.

  Garvey shrugged again. “I don’t expect a thing,” he said. “Just for you girls to do the job you’re getting paid for and mind your own business. What could be wrong with that?”

  “Nothing,” Stevie said. “But I should warn you: Anything that has to do with horses is our business.”

  Lisa groaned inwardly at Stevie’s bold words. Garvey’s face was getting red and thunderous again. His huge fists clenched and unclenched as if he wanted to strangle them all then and there.

  But before he could respond, they all heard hoofbeats approaching the gap. It was Toby on one of the Maskee horses.

  “He felt pretty relaxed out there,” the jockey called out to Garvey, obviously not noticing the tension between him and the girls. “But he had a little trouble with his lead changes. He’s not used to this wide of a curve, I guess.”

  “Don’t tell me what my horses are used to,” Garvey bellowed, whirling to face him. “I’m the trainer, not you. Got it? Now get that horse back to the barn and bring out the last one. We don’t have all day.”

  Toby frowned, but he didn’t speak in response to Garvey’s heated words. He just nodded and dismounted, leading the horse through the gap.

  “You three, go with him,” Garvey told the girls. “Someone needs to walk that animal and it’s sure not going to be me.” He lowered his voice a little so that Toby wouldn’t hear. “And remember what we talked about, or we’ll have to have another little discussion very soon.”

  The girls scurried to get away from Garvey and catch up with Toby. “Want me to lead him?” Stevie offered, reaching for the horse’s lead line.

  Toby nodded and let her take it. “Thanks,” he muttered, shooting a glance back at Garvey, who had turned to watch the action on the track. “I wonder what that was all about?” He reached down and pulled a long, thin whip out of the side of his boot. As they walked, he tapped his hand with it rhythmically.

  “I don’t know,” Lisa said. She wished they could tell the friendly jockey the truth, but they couldn’t—not as long as they thought he might be in cahoots with Garvey. “He must have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed or something. I’m sure you were just trying to help.”

  “Thanks,” Toby said, glancing at her gratefully. “It’s nice to hear you say that. I only wish Garvey would realize it, too.”

  Carole was thinking about what the jockey had said. “What did you mean about the lead changes?” she asked. Being riders themselves, she and her friends knew all about lead changes, when a horse switched from beginning its stride with its left front leg to its right or vice versa. But Carole hadn’t realized that racehorses needed to be able to change leads on command, and she said so.

  Toby nodded. “That’s a fair question,” he said. “It’s actually pretty logical. The lead foot takes a lot of pounding when a horse is running at full speed, so we like to make sure they change leads at least a couple of times during a race so one leg doesn’t get more tired than the other. And since racehorses run counterclockwise around the track—in this country, at least—it makes sense for them to lead with their right leg during the two straight stretches on the course and switch to a left lead going around the turns.”

  “I get it,” Stevie said. “That way their left leg sort of leads them around the curve.”

  “Right,” Toby said. “Sometimes a jockey will have a horse switch leads when he’s running down the homestretch, too. A fresh lead can give the horse an extra bit of energy when he’s tired.”

  “That’s really interesting,” Carole said. “I’m surprised I never noticed the horses were doing that in the races I’ve seen.”

  “I’m surprised, too,” Lisa said with a laugh. Seeing Toby’s puzzled look, she added, “Usually Carole notices every single thing about every single horse she sees.”

  As Carole was starting to protest, another horse approached, led by a man even shorter and wirier than Toby. He was leading a gray filly, and the girls immediately recognized Leprechaun. “Hey, Toby,” the little man called. “Are you ready to lose in the second race this afternoon?”

  Toby grinned. “Not on your life,” he replied. He quickly introduced the girls to the other jockey, whose name was Mack.

  Mack nodded a polite hello and then winked at them. “I beat Toby every time we run together,” he said. “He just hasn’t learned to admit it yet.”

  “Ha!” cried Toby, a twinkle in his eyes. “Don’t listen to him, girls. I’ve left him in the dust the last ten or twenty times we’ve met. The only reason he’s still getting mounts is that he’s so small he never has any trouble making weight.”

  Carole smiled. She knew that each horse had an assigned weight to carry in a race, which included the weight of its jockey and tack. No trainer wanted his or her horse to carry more than the assigned amount, since it would slow the horse down, and that was why jockeys were so small and thin. Looking at the tiny Mack, Carole could imagine that no weight assignment could possibly be too low for him. In fact, he probably weighed no more than she did.

  Mack grinned. “The day you beat me in a horse race, Toby, is the day I pack my bags and move straight back to Dry River,” he said. “You might as well keep your filly in the barn this afternoon and save yourself the effort. Leprechaun will be crossing the finish line before you make it to the quarter pole.”

  Toby just lau
ghed. “We’ll see,” he promised his friend. “We’ll just see about that, won’t we, girl?” He reached over and gave Leprechaun a friendly slap on the neck. The filly snorted and eyed him suspiciously.

  Mack said good-bye and continued on his way with the gray filly. Stevie turned to watch them go. “Do you think Leprechaun really might win today?” she asked Toby.

  Toby shrugged. “Anything can happen on the track, and it usually does,” he said. “But if racing luck is on our side, I think C.C. will take it in a walk.”

  As the group continued on its way, Carole had a different kind of question for the jockey. “I still don’t quite understand how this distance thing works,” she said. “Just now, Mack mentioned the quarter pole, and I know that’s one of the poles around the track that measures the distance. But where is it exactly? And why is it there?”

  “It can be a little confusing if you’re not familiar with the system,” Toby said. “The poles measure the distance around the track, but the trick to remember is that they count backward from the finish line. That means the quarter pole is a quarter of a mile—or two furlongs—before the finish if you’re going counterclockwise. The three-eighths pole is one furlong, or an eighth of a mile, before that. And so on.”

  “I see,” Carole said, and her friends nodded.

  They were almost back to the shed row by now, but Toby paused for a moment to finish his explanation. “The poles are really useful for measuring distance when you’re riding,” he said. “When you see them go by, you know how much more of a race is left. And you can help your horse use his energy the best way so that he doesn’t get overtired before the end.” He glanced toward the row of stalls in front of them. “Could you take C.C. and cool her down?” he asked the girls. “I’ve got to go find one of the grooms to help me tack up the other horse.”

  “We can do better than that,” Stevie said. “Lisa can walk C.C., and Carole and I will help you tack up.”

  “It’s a deal,” Toby said with a smile. “Let’s go.”

  THE GIRLS DIDN’T see Garvey again for the rest of the morning. They walked Cookie Cutter and then pitched in to help the grooms with some other chores. They were so busy that they didn’t have time to talk about Garvey’s threats or anything else. By noon most of the work was finished and the girls’ stomachs were grumbling.