by Stacy Gregg
The van stopped and one of the men jumped out to open the gate to the horse paddock. Issie’s mind was racing now. What were these men doing here? None of the horses that grazed at the River Paddock belonged to them. Besides, why would they come here in the middle of the night? What did they want?
On the other side of the van the door opened and a man stepped out. Then Issie saw he was holding a halter in his hand and she realised: they were here to steal a horse.
All this time, Mystic had been quiet underneath Issie, his dapple-grey coat was the perfect camouflage in this darkness amongst the willow trees by the river. There was no way the men could see them. But they might hear them. In the still of the night, Mystic gave a gentle nicker and the sound carried across the paddocks.
“What was that?” the big, bearded one barked out.
“What?” the other shouted back.
“That noise. It sounded like a horse.”
“Well, of course it did, you idiot. We’re at a horse paddock, aren’t we? It’s full of horses. Now stop mucking about, throw over those keys to the gate and then give me a hand. Remember, we’re looking for a chestnut with four white socks. She shouldn’t be hard to find—she’s the only chestnut in the herd.”
Issie felt her heart stop. A chestnut with four white socks? They could only mean Blaze. They were here to steal her horse! This was a nightmare. She had to do something. But what? She could try to get to Blaze before they did, but in the dark there was no guarantee that she would find her horse first. And even if she caught Blaze, what then? There were two of them and their van was blocking the only exit in the paddock, making escape impossible. No, she had to stop these men. And for that she would need some help.
“Come on, boy, we’ve got to go,” she spoke gently under her breath to Mystic, turning the little grey away from the paddock and back towards the Point. Winterflood Farm was ten minutes away at a fast gallop. If she could just find it in the darkness. And if she could only make it in time. She had to make it in time.
For the first minute, Issie had to force herself to keep calm and walk on. She was dying to get moving but she didn’t want the men to hear the sound of Mystic’s hooves pounding on the soft grass.
As soon as she knew she was safely out of range, Issie urged Mystic on into a canter, then a gallop. In the dark she knew it was risky. Mystic’s night vision couldn’t be much better than her own. There was always the chance that the grey pony might lose his footing or injure himself by getting a leg caught in a rabbit hole. But she had ridden this way before, just the other day on Blaze, and she knew it well enough.
Then there was the chance that at full gallop she might lose her balance, fall to the ground. Riding at this speed bareback was foolhardy at best. Issie knew that. But she also knew she had no choice.
If the wind had whipped her hair before, now it lashed it across her face with the sting of a birch branch. But she couldn’t free her hands to wipe the strands away, she was too busy hanging on, clenching with her fingers so that Mystic’s mane cut into the flesh of her hands. Her legs gripped firmly around the horse’s belly, and she could feel herself sliding on Mystic’s back as the grey pony became slick with sweat.
When she had ridden this same path on Blaze it had been daylight and she had the luxury of a saddle. Now, in the pitch black with nothing but her skill to keep her on Mystic’s back, she was riding as if her life depended on it. Now I know, Issie realised. Now I know what it’s like to really ride a spirited horse.
Despite the speed of Mystic’s gallop, the ride from the River Paddock to Avery’s house seemed to Issie like it took an entire lifetime. Then finally she heard the clatter of gravel under Mystic’s hooves and they rode into the driveway of Winterflood farm.
Mystic pulled to a halt, but before he even had a chance to stop, Issie was vaulting lightly to the ground and running on her own. Running for Avery’s front door.
She pressed the buzzer. Nothing. She pressed it again, hammering on the door too this time until her fists were sore. A light went on and then another, and then the door opened and the bleary-eyed face of Avery was staring at her full of amazement.
Ohmygod! Issie suddenly thought. What if he sees Mystic? But when she glanced back over her shoulder at the gravel courtyard the little grey was nowhere to be seen.
“Issie! It’s three in the morning, girl! What the hell are you doing here?”
A thousand explanations seemed to choke themselves up in Issie’s throat. She realised she had no time for words.
“Please, Tom, please. No time for that. Grab your coat and your car keys and let’s go. Blaze is in danger.”
CHAPTER 13
Avery drove the Range Rover at top speed back towards the River Paddock while Issie peered out into the darkness that surrounded them, keeping an eye out in case the white van was already making its getaway with the stolen horse onboard.
“We’re almost there, Issie,” Avery said, his eyes focused straight ahead, concentrating on the road in front of them. “So you’d better start explaining yourself now. What on earth is going on here?”
Issie quickly unfolded as much of the story as she could. She told Avery about the two men in the white van that had been following them, and how she arrived at the paddock tonight to find the same two men looking for Blaze and overheard their plans to steal her horse.
“When I left to find you they had grabbed a halter and a torch out of the van and they were hunting for her,” she explained. “A chestnut with four white socks they said, and Blaze is the only chestnut that grazes at the River Paddock…”
“Wait a minute. What were you doing down at the paddock in the middle of the night all by yourself?” Avery asked.
“Ummm…” Issie faltered, “I was worried about Blaze, I guess. You know, because she’s been so sick and with the event coming up. The weather had got so cold and I’d forgotten to put her cover on. I rode down to check on her on my bike and that’s when I saw them.”
Thankfully, it seemed that Avery was satisfied with this explanation.
He nodded his head thoughtfully, his mouth set in a grim line. Then he spoke.
“The question is, Issie, what are we going to do when we get there? There’s just two of us, so I don’t know how much use we’ll be against two burly chaps. Listen, you’d better hunt around in my glovebox there for my mobile. When we get to the paddock I’ll go off and see if I can find these men and make sure they haven’t hurt Blaze. Meanwhile you stay back at the car, and if you haven’t heard back from me in about five minutes, give the police a call. Tell them what’s going on as best you can and tell them to get down here straight away, that there’s a theft in progress. Can you do that?”
Issie nodded. But she was worried. “Can’t I come with you, Tom? There are two of them after all. You’re going to need my help.”
“It’s too dangerous, Issie. You did the right thing coming to get me. Now do what I tell you and stay in the car.”
They weren’t far away from the paddock when Avery turned off the headlights on the Range Rover. “If they don’t see us coming it will give us the element of surprise,” he explained to Issie.
“That is if they’re still there…” Avery squinted into the dark. “…I don’t see anything in the paddock. Maybe they’ve already got Blaze loaded on and taken off…”
Issie’s stomach churned as she peered desperately out into the gloom. There it was! The glow of the tail lights of a horse float. They hadn’t gone. They were still there!
“Tom, over there!” she whispered.
“I see it,” Avery confirmed. And with that, he switched off the Range Rover engine and let the car coast down the hill towards the paddock.
“Element of surprise again.” He smiled at Issie. “We don’t want them to hear us coming either, do we?”
The Range Rover coasted silently to the side of the road and Avery quietly unlatched his door and jumped out. “Change of plan,” he said. “Call the police now, Issie. T
here’s a chance we can catch these guys in the act. I’m going to take a snoop around and see what’s going on. Now, remember, after you call the cops, you stay here in the car. I don’t want you getting yourself into trouble.” Avery gave her a reassuring smile and closed the car door.
Under the shadows of the willow trees Issie could just make him out now, hunched low to the ground, running towards the back of the tack room.
Issie picked up Avery’s mobile and dialled the police. Her heart was racing as she heard the dialling tone on the phone. The phone rang once, rang twice, rang a third time…and then stopped.
“Hello? Hello?” Issie’s voice was wobbly with nerves. Why had the phone stopped ringing? Why wasn’t anyone answering? She lifted the mobile up so she could see its digital face more closely. There in the right-hand corner a red light was flashing steadily on and off. She knew what it meant. Dead battery.
“Not now! It can’t be!” Issie stared at the red light in disbelief. The mobile let out a low beep, a sign that the battery was about to die completely. About to die, Issie thought. But it’s not dead just yet. Maybe it still has enough power left to make one last call. Even if I don’t get through to the police maybe somehow they can trace my signal or something.
Issie didn’t know much about how mobile phones worked. All she knew was that she had to try something. She dialled the police number again and hung on as the phone rang once, rang twice.
“Hello?” said a voice at the other end of the line. “Which service do you require—police, ambulance or fire?”
“Listen,” Issie hissed, “I don’t have much time. My phone is going dead. I need the police. This is Issie Brown. I’m down at the River Paddock near Waterstone Street and we need help…”
There was a dull buzz in her ear as once again the line cut out. Issie looked at the blinking red light. It was still flashing, so there must still be some juice left in the phone. Should she try again? She dialled the number once more. This time there was a dialling tone, the sound of a phone ringing and then nothing. Even the red light had stopped flashing now. There was nothing more that she could do. The battery was well and truly dead. Had the police got her message? There was no way of knowing.
Out there in the darkness, Avery was expecting help to arrive at any moment. He didn’t know that the police might not be coming at all. She had to do something.
In the quiet night air the sound of the Range Rover door creaking open was almost deafening to her. She left the door hanging open, too afraid of the noise that shutting it might make, and crept forward from the car, staying low to the ground, sticking to the belt of trees that provided shadow cover.
Instead of climbing over the gate to get into the paddock, she slunk around behind the tack room and carefully, slowly, climbed over the wire paddock fence, using the wooden fence batons to balance herself. She landed lightly on the other side of the fence and there was a twang as a wire snapped back after being stretched by her foot during the climb.
“What was that?” she heard a voice say in the darkness, not more than ten metres away from her.
“What was what?” Another voice was talking now. “Probably just a possum. Don’t worry about that, come over here. I finally caught that damn horse. Let’s get her on to the float.”
The field was suddenly lit up as the headlights of the white van were turned on, and Issie could see the two men clearly. One of them, the one with the beard, was leading a horse. Her horse!
Into the shining white beams of the headlights now stepped Blaze. Even from this far away Issie could see the whites of her eyes showing with fear. Her ears, normally pricked forward with excitement, were flat back against her head. As the man led her up to the ramp of the horse float she jerked back violently on the lead rope, trying desperately to back away.
“Stand still, you pig!” The man yanked the rope furiously, startling Blaze even further. “Stand still or I’ll take the stick to you!”
He bent down to the side of the horse float, and when he stood up again Issie could see that he held a length of thick black rubber pipe in his hand. As he turned Blaze around to face the ramp of the float once more he lifted the rubber pipe in the air and brought it down hard and fast on the mare’s flank.
Blaze let out a frightened squeal and jumped forward, not up the ramp of the horse float as the man had hoped, but out to the side of it. As she landed, her right hind leg caught on the edge of the ramp, grazing against it, and when she turned to face the ramp again Issie could see that she was bleeding. A steady trickle of dark red ran down her white hind sock.
“Give us a hand with this beast!” the fat, bearded man yelled to his mate who was sitting in the front cab of the white van waiting to drive off.
“Can’t you sort it out yourself?” the skinny one whined as he came around the back of the horse float to help.
“Stand there!” the bearded man instructed, pointing to the side of the horse-float ramp. “That way she won’t be able to escape to one side; she’ll have no choice but to go on the float.”
He turned Blaze again. This time as he went to lead her back towards the float, the chestnut mare reared up, pulling the lead rope almost out of his grip.
“That’s it!” the man screamed with fury. “You’re going on this float right now, or you’re going to get the beating you deserve.” He circled Blaze one more time, then, driving her towards the float, he lifted up the black length of pipe and brought it crashing down on her rump.
The final blow was too much for Issie to bear. She started to run forward, opened her mouth to shout out at the two men, to scream at them and make them stop hurting her horse. But before she could get a word out a hand covered her face from behind, and she felt the crushing weight of someone on top of her tackling her to the ground.
Issie tried to scream, but no sound could come out: her voice was stifled by the hand across her face.
“Shhh, shhh. It’s OK. It’s me,” Avery growled in her ear. “Listen. I know you want to help Blaze, but this isn’t the way. Stay where you are, stay quiet and trust me. Can you do that?”
Issie nodded mutely and Avery slowly removed his hand from her mouth. Together, the pair of them stayed on their bellies, lying flat on the ground and watched as Blaze, finally tired of the fight, placed one hoof after the other on to the ramp of the horse float and walked on board.
“Got her!” the bearded one said gleefully as he lifted up the tailgate behind her and closed the ramp, bolting Blaze in.
“Let’s roll,” he said to his friend, and the two men clambered back into the cab of the white van, ready to set off with their prize.
“Avery! We can’t let them get away with this. We’ve got to stop them now!” Issie was almost in tears. The police hadn’t arrived and these men had all but got away. They had to do something. She looked across at Avery who, strangely had a sly smile on his face.
“Don’t worry” he said, “they’re not going far.”
A minute passed, then another and another and still the two men in the white van didn’t move. Then a door opened and Issie could hear the bearded man shouting, “The keys! The keys! How could you lose our keys? Well, come on, they’ve got to be here somewhere. Start looking!”
Issie looked at Avery in disbelief. “Tom, you didn’t…”
Avery grinned and produced a set of shining silver car keys from his pocket. “I nicked them out of the ignition while the thin chap was helping to load Blaze into the float,” he smirked. “They won’t be getting far without these. Now all we have to do is wait for the police to turn up and…”
“Oh, Tom,” Issie sighed, “that’s the problem. I’m not sure that…”
Issie was about to explain the mobile drama when there was a sudden blare of a siren behind them and a flash of blue and red light. Two police cars had pulled up, blocking the exit at the paddock gate.
“The police!” Issie yelled. “They did get my message. They’ve come.” Before Avery could say anything she was
up off the ground and sprinting towards the police car.
With a sense of total relief, Issie watched as the rear door of the police car opened. She was about to blurt out the whole situation, explain to the police that they had to arrest these horse thieves who were trying to take her Blaze away. But as the figure emerged from the car, she found herself lost for words.
The person that stepped out of the police car wasn’t a uniformed officer at all. It was her mother.
CHAPTER 14
It was five a.m. by the time they all arrived back at Avery’s farm house. Mrs Brown headed straight for the kitchen. “I think we could all do with a nice hot mug of tea,” she said, “and once I’ve sorted that out, Isadora, you’ve got some explaining to do.”
Issie sighed and collapsed on to Avery’s living room sofa. At first, when she had seen her mother emerge from the police car she had been relieved. But relief had quickly turned to terror when she realised that she still hadn’t told her about Blaze. Her mum was right. She did have some explaining to do.
Mrs Brown reappeared from the kitchen now, with three great steaming mugs of tea and some shortbread biscuits. “Is Tom back yet?” she asked her daughter.
“He shouldn’t be much longer,” Issie said. “He just had to give the police a few more details and then he was allowed to leave.”
It already seemed as if they had been at the River Paddock for ever that evening. Once the police had arrived and the horse thieves had been taken away Issie and Avery had been left with a young constable to answer some questions. Then they had been able to unlatch the horse float and let Blaze back out again.
The chestnut mare was naturally a little upset after her ordeal. Issie had taken her for a walk to calm her down and it was during the walk that she noticed Blaze was lame. She was favouring her right hind leg, the one that had been injured on the horse-float ramp. Issie had put an antiseptic on the cut, and wrapped the wound in a soft bandage to keep it clean. Then she had put antiseptic cream on the two deep gashes on Blaze’s rump caused by the blows with the black rubber pipe. Finally, she had mixed Blaze up a special late-night supper—a mix of oats, hard feed and pony pellets with a wedge of hay on the side—and put her in the pen near the tack room so she couldn’t do her leg any more damage overnight.
