Horse Capades

by Bonnie Bryant

  “Gotcha!” Phil cried, before bursting out laughing once again.

  Stevie wasn’t sure how to react. Normally she would have thought Phil’s prank was funny, even if she was the victim of it. But today the last thing she wanted to waste time on was practical jokes. Finally she slammed down the receiver and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Very funny,” she said grumpily. “Now can we get back to the rehearsal, please?” She brushed past her friends and stomped back out to the ring, where Red was watching the horses.

  Carole, Lisa, and Phil gave each other surprised looks. Was Stevie angry because they had pulled their practical joke before her own was ready—whatever it was? That wasn’t like her.

  “She can dish it out, but she can’t take it,” Phil muttered, staring after Stevie.

  Carole just shrugged and sighed. “Come on,” she said, heading in the direction Stevie had just gone. “We’d better get back out there.”

  “No! BOW, I SAID! BOW!” Stevie cried.

  Carole looked over her shoulder. “Put down that camera, and maybe I’ll think about it,” she said. “I feel stupid enough doing this stuff with people walking by and looking at us every five minutes.”

  It was Sunday afternoon. Stevie, Carole, and Lisa were in the back paddock rehearsing Cinderella. Or at least Stevie was trying to rehearse. Once again, Carole and Lisa seemed much more interested in talking about Prancer and goofing around than they were in practicing their parts. Worst of all, Phil hadn’t been able to make it at all.

  They were rehearsing the final scene of the movie. That was the wedding scene, where Cinderella and Prince Charming rode off into the sunset together while the jealous stepsisters are forced to bow to the royal couple. Stevie had decided that she would be lucky if she could get the horses to do the curtsying in the ball scene. In this one she had decided the stepsisters should dismount and do their own bowing. She figured that if they really got into it and touched their foreheads to the ground, it would still look pretty impressive.

  The trouble was, they were very reluctant to do it right then. As always on weekends, Pine Hollow was busy. Despite the fact that they were rehearsing in the little out-of-the-way paddock behind the stable, plenty of people had already stopped by to watch what the girls were doing. Even when there was no audience, Carole and Lisa were reluctant to perform any potentially embarrassing moves—such as bowing and scraping to an imaginary prince—while Stevie was holding the camcorder.

  “For the last time, I’m not filming this so I can play it at your next birthday party. And I’m not planning to set up a screening at your next school dance. And there’s no way I’m going to send the tape into one of those video bloopers shows on TV. I swear. Cross my heart and hope to die. Okay?” Stevie said.

  Lisa looked at Carole. “She crossed her heart. I guess she means it.”

  Carole nodded, then grinned. “So we haven’t figured out what she’s really up to yet. But we will!”

  Stevie sighed. Her friends still didn’t believe her assignment was for real. That meant they weren’t doing their best to help her, as they would for a real Saddle Club project.

  “Never mind,” Stevie said. “That’s enough bowing for now. Let’s put the horses away. Then you guys can try on your costumes.”

  “Costumes?” Carole said. “I’m not sure I like the sound of that.”

  “What do you mean?” Stevie demanded. “You can’t make a movie without costumes, right? They’re great—you’ll see. I stayed up half the night getting them just right.”

  After the girls had untacked the horses and made them comfortable in their stalls, they met again in the back paddock. This time Stevie was carrying a large duffel bag. She dropped it on the ground and began digging through the contents.

  “Let’s see … I had to get a little creative with these, since there wasn’t much time,” Stevie said. “But I found some good stuff up in the attic. I think it’ll do.” She pulled out a neon green T-shirt with the words I’m with Stupid printed on the front. “Lisa, you’re going to wear this for the opening scenes.”

  “Like heck I am,” Lisa replied, taking the shirt distastefully between thumb and forefinger. “I wouldn’t be caught dead in this.”

  “How do you think I feel?” Carole commented. “If you’re wearing it, that means I’m Stupid.”

  Stevie sat back on her heels. “Come on, you guys. You’re playing the nasty stepsisters, remember? They’re supposed to be mean and obnoxious and generally yucky. You have to look the part, right?”

  Lisa didn’t answer. Carole leaned over and tried to peer into the bag. “If she’s wearing that, what am I wearing?”

  “This,” Stevie said, pulling out another shirt with a flourish. This one was a Hawaiian shirt with a pattern of surfing dogs on it. The colors were so loud that Carole strongly suspected that whoever had bought it must have been wearing sunglasses at the time.

  “No way,” she said. “That thing will scare the horses.”

  “It scares me,” Lisa added helpfully. She had slung her T-shirt over the paddock fence and was leaning against the rails next to it.

  Stevie glared at her friends. “You’ve got to wear them,” she said. “Come on. They’ll look great with breeches and boots.”

  “What are you going to be wearing while we’re wearing these?” Carole asked. “Not that I’m agreeing to anything,” she added hastily.

  “I didn’t bring my costume today,” Stevie said. “But in the scenes where you’re wearing these outfits, I’ll be wearing my oldest jeans and a white T-shirt with a lot of dirt and smudges on it.”

  “Oh, you mean the same thing you wear every day,” Lisa said.

  Stevie rolled her eyes. “Very funny,” she said. “For your information, it’s all about symbolism. Real filmmakers are very big on that, you know.”

  Carole leaned back on her hands. “Oh, yeah? What exactly do jeans and a T-shirt symbolize?”

  “Well, the T-shirt is white, right?” Stevie said. “And you know the good guys always wear white. The beat-up jeans just symbolize how overworked I am—I mean, how overworked Cinderella is. Your shirts will show that the stepsisters are loud and obnoxious and overbearing. Get it?”

  Lisa shrugged. “I guess that makes sense, sort of. But what are we supposed to wear in the big ball scene? Hot pink prom gowns?”

  “I wish,” Stevie said. “Unfortunately I couldn’t think of a way to get my hands on any of those. And it would mean you’d have to ride sidesaddle, and that would take more practice.” She paused and dug around in the duffel bag again.

  “Oh no, I can hardly bear to look,” Lisa said with a groan, covering her eyes.

  But when she heard Carole’s shriek of laughter, Lisa couldn’t resist peeking. Stevie was holding up a pair of riding hard hats. But these were no ordinary hats. Stevie had glued rhinestones, feathers, beads, and buttons all over them, so that they sparkled in the afternoon sunlight.

  Lisa gasped. “Whose hats are those under all that junk?” she asked.

  “They’re Max’s,” Stevie admitted. “I figured he wouldn’t miss a couple for a week or so.” Max kept a large collection of hard hats in the locker room for the use of Pine Hollow’s riders. It had been easy for Stevie to swipe a couple and smuggle them out in her bag.

  “Maybe not, but he’s sure going to notice them when you put them back,” Carole pointed out.

  “Don’t worry,” Stevie said. “I’m going to take this stuff off when we’re finished. I used invisible glue. They’ll be as good as new when I return them.”

  Lisa had walked forward to get a better look at the hats. “Wow,” she said, with admiration in her voice. “Those are really hideous.”

  “Thanks,” Stevie said with a grin. “See, I was thinking about what you guys could wear to the big dance. Finally I decided the easiest thing would be to have you wear regular show-jumping clothes to show that you’re dressed up, and just let the hats symbolize your personalities.”

/>   Carole reached out to touch one particularly huge and gaudy fake emerald. “What will you be wearing while we’re wearing these?”

  “Same thing, sort of,” Stevie said. “I’ll have a band of flowers around my hat instead of this other stuff. I haven’t made that yet, though, since I want the flowers to be fresh when we film.”

  “I see,” Carole said.

  “So you’ll wear this stuff, right?” Stevie said.

  Lisa and Carole exchanged glances. Then, in one voice, they said, “No.”

  Stevie gaped. “What do you mean, no?” she said. As if it wasn’t hard enough being director, scriptwriter, special effects specialist, choreographer, and prop person, now she was having trouble as costume designer as well. “You have to wear these costumes. Otherwise there’s no movie.”

  “Look, Stevie,” Lisa said. “We’re not sure what’s going on, but you’re not going to trick us so easily this time. We know you’re up to something.”

  Carole nodded. “We just don’t know what it is.”

  Stevie decided enough was enough. She had to convince her friends, once and for all, that all she was interested in doing was finishing her school assignment. And she had to make them see that she meant it when she said she was through with practical jokes for good.

  “I’m like the boy who cried wolf,” she muttered under her breath. “Now that I’ve quit, they won’t believe it.”

  “What was that?” Carole asked.

  Stevie dropped the hats back in the bag and stood up. “I said I’m feeling kind of hungry,” she said. “How about a trip to TD’s?” That was the name of the ice cream parlor at the local shopping center. It was a favorite site for Saddle Club meetings, and that’s what Stevie had in mind right now.

  “Sounds perfect,” Lisa said, and Carole agreed.

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER the girls were seated in their favorite booth at TD’s. They had placed their orders—Lisa for a hot fudge sundae, Carole for a scoop of butter pecan, and Stevie for marshmallow and pineapple sauce on pistachio—and were sipping their glasses of water while they waited for the waitress to return.

  So far the conversation had revolved around Prancer. Now that they had started making a little progress, Lisa and Carole wondered if there was any way Lisa could still compete the following Saturday.

  Stevie wasn’t taking part in this conversation. She was playing with her spoon and trying to think of a way to convince her friends that she really needed their help, and that she wasn’t trying to trick them in any way.

  Finally she had an idea. “Hey, you guys,” she said. “Why don’t we make Prancer’s jumping trouble an official Saddle Club project? That way we’re sure to figure it out.”

  Carole looked a little surprised. So far Stevie hadn’t seemed very interested in Prancer’s problem at all. But maybe she had just realized how serious it was. “That’s a great idea, Stevie,” she agreed.

  Lisa nodded. “If we put our heads together, maybe we’ll come up with something brilliant.”

  “Good.” Stevie smiled. “Now, I have another good idea.” She paused and took a sip of water.

  “What?” Lisa asked expectantly. “Is it something to help Prancer? Or is it a way to get revenge on Veronica for what she did?”

  Stevie shook her head. “None of the above,” she said. “It’s an idea for another great Saddle Club project.”

  “What is it?” Carole asked.

  Stevie tried to think of a dramatic way to explain, but she couldn’t. Finally she decided to just come out and say it. “It’s my film project,” she said. “I really need your help if I want to get a good grade on it.”

  Carole and Lisa laughed. “We should have known,” Carole said. “You’re not going to trick us that way, Stevie Lake.”

  “Trying to get us to think the whole thing is a Saddle Club project,” Lisa said, shaking her head and smiling. “How dumb do you think we are?”

  “Why won’t you believe me?” Stevie cried, dropping her spoon and waving her hands in dismay. “The assignment is for real. I told you I’ve given up practical jokes, and it’s true.”

  Lisa moved her water glass out of range of Stevie’s wildly waving hands. “ ‘The lady doth protest too much, methinks,’ ” she quoted. When Carole gave her a puzzled look, she added, “Shakespeare. It’s from Hamlet. It means the more Stevie claims she’s given up practical jokes, the less I believe her.”

  “Oh yeah?” Stevie demanded. “I haven’t played one all week, have I?”

  “Not that we know of, no,” Carole said warily.

  Lisa nodded. “But all that proves is that the next one will be a real doozy,” she said. “We know you too well, Stevie Lake. You’ll never stop joking. Especially since we just helped Phil play such a good one on you.”

  Carole started laughing again. “Right,” she said. “Good old Rex Starr, Hollywood agent. That was great!”

  Just then the waitress arrived with their orders. Stevie started eating hers immediately, but she hardly tasted it. Carole and Lisa had already returned to their conversation about Prancer. Stevie’s plan had failed. Her friends still didn’t believe Cinderella should be a real Saddle Club project. But if she didn’t convince them, they’d believe it soon enough—when she was banned from Pine Hollow for failing her moving image class.

  STEVIE STOOD UP and stretched. Her back was aching and her hands were tired, but she had finally finished gluing multicolored sequins onto every inch of an old Pine Hollow pitchfork. She had managed to sneak it out of the stable that day after her Tuesday riding lesson without Max or Red noticing. She just hoped they didn’t notice it was missing until she was finished with it.

  “Voilà,” she told herself out loud. “The magic pitchfork.” The magic pitchfork was the enchanted object that the magical talking lucky horseshoe would conjure up to allow Cinderella to finish her stable chores in time to go to the royal dressage ball. It was an important prop, and Stevie was glad she’d finally finished it.

  Stevie left the pitchfork drying on the newspaper she’d laid out on the floor of her room and hurried over to her desk. It was almost bedtime, and she still had a lot to do. Her film was due on Monday—just six days away. And with the Pony Club competition coming up on Saturday, Stevie knew she would be lucky to finish on time, especially since she hadn’t shot a single minute of the movie yet.

  She sat down at the desk and checked the list she had made. “Magic pitchfork—check,” she said, crossing it off the list. She had already finished making several other props that evening, including the sign announcing the royal dressage ball and the cellophane-covered flashlight that would give the lucky horseshoe a magical blue glow.

  The next item on the list was to come up with some kind of veil for the wedding scene. Stevie had toyed with the idea of asking Max’s wife, Deborah, if she could borrow her veil. But then she had decided that a piece of white netting and a little lace attached to a riding hat would work just as well. The only question was when she was going to have time to make it, especially since she still had half a dozen other things on her list.

  Stevie sighed and scratched her chin, where a little bit of glue was drying. She was running out of time. If she wanted this movie to be perfect, she wasn’t going to have any time at all to practice for the hunter competition. She hadn’t ridden Belle at all for the past week except in rehearsals and today’s lessons. And when the rest of the class had been clearing each fence in perfect form—except for Prancer, who was still hesitating before every jump—Stevie had been trying to remind Belle just what jumping was all about. The mare had been too frisky to pay attention to her rider’s instructions, and Stevie knew it was probably because she hadn’t been exercised enough lately.

  All things considered, Stevie wondered if she should even bother taking part in the competition. Not only was there little or no chance she could place in the competition, but she could really use the extra time to work on her movie. Besides, she didn’t relish the idea of watching Veronica
diAngelo ride away with the blue ribbon.

  “Poor me,” she whispered, feeling very much like Cinderella herself. There was so much to do, and nobody was willing to help her. She had to do it all herself, even if it meant missing the ball—or, rather, the Pony Club competition.

  “Stevie?” Alex poked his head through her open doorway.

  Stevie looked up. She was in no mood for her brothers that night. “What do you want?”

  But instead of answering, Alex just grinned. “Say cheese,” he cried. Then, before Stevie could move, he leaped into the room and snapped a picture.

  Startled and partially blinded by the flash, Stevie let out an outraged shriek. “What do you think you’re doing?” she yelled.

  “Remember how I joined the staff of the school newspaper this term?” Alex said gleefully. “Well, I just snapped the picture that’s going on the front page of the next edition!”

  “What?” Stevie cried. She jumped up and ran to the mirror over her dresser, blinking her eyes to get rid of the spots the flash had caused. Peering at her reflection, she saw that in addition to the spot of dried glue on her chin, she was sporting a red sequin right in the middle of her forehead and a splash of poster paint on her left cheek. Her hair was a mess, and a pen was stuck behind each ear. Worst of all, she was wearing her oldest pair of pajamas, which just happened to have pictures of baby bunnies all over them.

  “Gotcha,” Alex said with a wink. He remained in the doorway clutching the camera, poised to run as soon as Stevie came at him.

  But she didn’t. Instead, she just slumped back down in the desk chair. “Go ahead and print it,” she said tonelessly. “I don’t care.”

  “Huh?” Alex looked surprised, then suspicious. He tucked the camera behind his back. “Is this some kind of trick?”

  “No,” Stevie replied. “I don’t expect you to believe me, though. Nobody else does.”

  “What do you mean?” Alex asked. He still looked suspicious.

  “I mean I’ve given up practical jokes. For good.”