Pony Stories (3 Book Bind-Up) (Red Fox Summer Reading Collections)

by K. M. Peyton

  Now Gem was fretting about making Vixen change leads when cantering the figure eight. ‘Vixen favors her right foreleg no matter which way we circle,’ moaned Gem. Faith knew, from hearing Beth holler it, that the inside foreleg was supposed to lead when the horse was cantering in a circle. The rider couldn’t look down to check but had to feel whether it was right or not.

  ‘I can never feel the lead,’ worried Gem. ‘I have to sneak a look down to see which shoulder is forward.’ She demonstrated, sliding her glance down without moving her head. ‘Could a judge notice my eyes?’ she asked.

  ‘I can hardly tell you’re looking down and I’m standing right next to your face,’ Faith reassured her.

  When Gem rode into the ring, Faith watched with Beth. ‘Wrong lead, wrong lead,’ muttered Beth when Gem turned in a figure-eight canter.

  But her sister took a yellow third-place ribbon and carried it out of the ring with a triumphant smile. ‘If I can learn to feel the leads, I can take a blue ribbon next time,’ she boasted.

  Part of Faith cheered her sister while another part mourned, ‘She’s not even an animal person. She doesn’t even like horses.’

  That evening, after the last dusty vehicle had pulled away and Beth’s last tired horse had been turned out to pasture, Faith resumed the custom she’d forgotten the last few days. She counted the weeks until she could go home. But now there was a new, disquieting feeling. It won’t be the same, she thought. Something is changing forever here this summer and nothing will ever be the same.

  7

  THE MORNING FOLLOWING the schooling show, Faith’s legs were stiff and sore from all the running around of the day before. But by lunchtime they felt supple and surprisingly strong. She went with Beth to bring in the horses for grooming and lessons. Together they climbed the long hill into the back field where the horses had wandered, grazing. Faith’s fear at being deep in a field of horses was manageable with Beth along.

  ‘I think I have more breath,’ she told Beth, bragging a little. ‘I don’t have to stop to catch it.’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Beth. ‘You can help me bring these fellows in more often.’

  Faith groaned inwardly. Why can’t I keep my big mouth shut she thought.

  But as the days slipped toward August, Faith helped bring in the horses. Flies were thick about the stable. At the woods’ edge their forest brothers, deerflies, lurked ready to feed on warm horse bodies. The big animals stood in groups in the fields, whisking insects from each other’s faces with their tails.

  Each morning Beth broke through the clusters of horses to cull the ones she wanted for a lesson. She led three or four together back to the stables. Faith could manage one at a time. She still sidestepped nervously when leading an eager Cloud or any of the other high-spirited horses.

  In the back of Faith’s mind flickered Beth’s promise to teach her how to lunge a horse. Faith ignored it. Helping bring in the horses, grooming and saddling them was adventure enough. She also ignored the tiny spark of interest that glowed inside her like a small forgotten star. Lunge a horse?

  Beth didn’t forget. One cloudy afternoon, she asked Faith to meet her in the ring with Harold. He didn’t need to be tacked up, just groomed she said.

  When Faith led the big bay down, she found Beth was standing in the center of the ring. Around her like the rim of a wheel trotted a frisky new dun horse, playfully shaking his head. Beth turned like a hub in the center, keeping taut the long line attached to his halter. With her left hand she trailed a lengthy whip in the dirt behind the trotting horse.

  ‘This is a lunge line,’ Beth called to Faith. ‘The trainer’s tool.’ She clucked to the horse and said, ‘Caan-ter.’ The dun horse moved from a trot into a slow canter. Beth kept the whip trailing behind him. The horse shook his head and sent out a playful buck. Calmly Beth brought him back down. ‘Tro-oh-t,’ she said. He slowed to a brisk trot.

  Faith stood outside holding Harold by his lead line.

  ‘You lunge a horse to exercise him,’ said Beth. Once more she clucked a canter at the dun, who tossed his head but began to canter again. He thundered in his wide circle about Beth while she turned herself slowly, following his movement.

  ‘You lunge a horse to discipline him, too,’ said Beth. ‘You try and keep him balanced – keep his rhythm even.’ Faith watched the turning figure with a mixture of awe and worry. It looked easy enough. But then, so did riding.

  ‘I want you to come in here,’ said Beth without taking her eyes from the horse moving about her. ‘Tie Harold to the hitching ring and come in here next to me.’

  Faith felt chills of panic cool her stomach. As she tied Harold up, her mind furiously planned how to dodge the circling horse to get to Beth. She sweated as she watched but, when the dun pounded past her for the third time, she dashed for the center.

  ‘You lunge a horse to observe him,’ continued Beth as if nothing unusual had happened. ‘You also lunge a frisky horse to take some of the zip out.’

  Faith found herself turning beside Beth. With barely a change in movement, Beth handed the line to Faith. ‘Just keep it up,’ said Beth.

  The transfer happened so smoothly that Faith had no time to panic. She kept turning while the dun cantered around her. He seemed not to notice the change. Beth trailed the whip.

  ‘Now – gently – ease the line toward you,’ said Beth so quietly her words barely moved the air. ‘Don’t pull or yank – just close your hand on the line, ease it in and say “trot – easy, now”.’

  Faith closed her hand, her eyes fixed on the horse. His movement was hypnotic: tha-thud, tha-thud. She chose a moment.

  ‘Trot,’ she said clearly, aiming the sound and easing the line toward her stomach.

  The dun slowed down into a trot without a break in rhythm. A sweet wave of pleasure swept through Faith.

  There was silence except for the soft thud of the trotting horse. They all turned together, the horse and Faith and Beth. Then Beth let out her breath.

  ‘That was perfect,’ she said. ‘That was quite – perfect.’

  Harold was tougher to lunge, stubborn. It was hard to get him started. ‘Be patient,’ said Beth. ‘He knows the signals so well, he’ll teach you.’

  But there was no repeat of Faith’s success with the dun that day. The whip was difficult to drag while using the other hand.

  ‘The whip just provides a frame. It’s not to use on the horse – just to give him a boundary,’ Beth told her.

  The entire process felt awkward to Faith. But gradually, in the days that followed, she learned to cluck Harold into a jerky trot around her. She also lunged Vixen and Cloud, a brown horse named Hobo and the dun. They were easy to work at a trot.

  Cantering was another matter. The surge of power, the hooves pounding about her, touched the memory of wild horses plunging toward her in the field on that first day. She circled a thundering horse about her in a wash of dust and fear. Eventually, after many hours and many a horse, she learned to ease the big animals into a canter. But she had to steel herself each time she gave the canter command.

  As her skill increased, Beth had Faith lunge high-strung horses before lessons. Sometimes Beth needed an older horse loosened up.

  Faith walked and trotted them around and around. She never felt fully in control when they cantered, so she avoided calling for it unless Beth was watching.

  ‘They can warm up fine at a trot,’ she told herself. But another part of her whispered scornfully, ‘Chicken.’

  Once in a while, the lunging exchange between Faith and the horse became dreamlike. It only happened when no one else was about. The horse moved in hypnotic circle around Faith and her commands came from her mouth like music.

  ‘It’s like we’re dancing,’ she told Brady later. ‘And I lead.’ She had taken to talking to Brady though he seldom answered her. But this time he said, ‘Wouldn’t catch me messing with them birds. No sir, I don’t tell ’em what to do an’ they don’t mess with me.’

>   Brady’s afraid too, she thought. She felt bold by comparison. Safely on the ground she could use her voice. She used her hands, too, caressing as she brushed the horses’ smooth neck and sides.

  She finally learned to put the bridle on the easy ones, working nervously beside the big, breathing bodies. Cloud took the bit with no fuss at all when her fingers pried into the sides of his slippery mouth. She remembered, in spite of herself, the feel of his eager response when she’d been astride his back.

  ‘If you’re really good, a horse sees out of your eyes – sees where you want him to go – while you use his legs to get there.’ Beth had said that, but it still didn’t make sense.

  What was it she had felt way back then on the eager black horse? Had Cloud seen through her eyes? Had his vision been clear and brave? Could that have been her on Cloud?

  Except for five straight days of record-breaking heat toward the end of July, the Michigan weather was comfortable. There was a lot of rain, which made the grass and the trees lush and thickly green – and nurtured the flies.

  Beth let Faith take care of the new litter of kittens in the barn, which included naming them. She hadn’t suggested Faith take a lesson again.

  Fine with me, thought Faith, but she did feel a twinge of jealousy and awe as her sister began to learn to jump a horse. Faith watched Gem on a small, gray horse first go over low cross poles and then over barrels.

  She grew impatient with her sister too, when Gem fell in love with the feisty little gray, whose name was Rambler. All Gem talked about was Rambler this and Rambler that. ‘He never pops a fence, that Rambler, he stands right off and goes over so smooth. And he’s so cu-u-te and gentle, you’d never imagine he could jump that way.’

  Ye gods! thought Faith. But she could no longer say spitefully to herself that Gem didn’t like horses. She just ‘lu-u-ved’ Rambler.

  Gem was also very excited over phone calls from the black-haired boy from LilJohn stables. His name was Owen. They talked for hours on the phone until Beth had to make a house rule about phone calls – twenty-minute limit or stall-cleaning penalties. This was very effective for, although Gem ‘lu-u-ved’ Rambler, she didn’t love mucking out his rich, odorous leavings from a stall. She began to set the kitchen timer when Owen called.

  But if Gem had Rambler and a new boyfriend, Faith had seven kittens. At first they were kept in the pantry off the kitchen. The kittens were as good as twin babies, Faith thought, maybe better since they were tiny and furry and easy to cuddle. One in particular, the smallest and weakest, a black one with a white mask across its face, was her favorite.

  The other kittens were strong and pushy. Blackie Whiteface, as Faith named the little one, couldn’t fight its way to its mother’s nipples through six other struggling bodies. Beth gave her a medicine dropper – ‘the nurse’s tool,’ she said, and Faith used it to feed Blackie Whiteface watery milk with a little honey in it.

  Beth gave Faith vitamins and other supplements to mix into the milk. Soon the kitten began to fill out and grow, and Faith could tell that Blackie Whiteface was a boy.

  Whenever Faith entered the pantry, Blackie Whiteface would come springing and wobbling in his dizzy little walk to climb all over her feet and claw her socks. She would pick him up and he would crawl across her shoulders and back and grab at her hair. Once he wet on her shirtfront. Faith didn’t really mind. Her animal ear was charmed by purring. And Beth seemed to be pleased.

  Even after the mother and her kittens were moved into the barn, Blackie Whiteface continued to follow Faith. The first night he was away, Faith heard him mewling at the back door. There stood little Blackie Whiteface wanting to get in. He was so happy to see Faith that he clawed halfway up the screen door until Faith opened it and dragged him off.

  Beth told her that, if she got Gem’s okay, Blackie Whiteface could sleep in their bed. ‘Just one night,’ agreed Gem. But she was very agreeable these days.

  The kitten wet in the corner of the room next morning and Faith hurried to clean it up. She spread some of her sister’s cologne over the spot, hoping to discourage Blackie Whiteface from using the same place again.

  Next night, Gem didn’t say a word when Faith crawled into bed with Blackie Whiteface on her shoulder. ‘It’s nice seeing you smile again,’ said her sister. ‘You’ve been so glum this summer.’

  Gem was having a wonderful summer. Excitement glowed in her face. She had never looked so pretty, and Faith felt only a little jealous. She had a cuddly kitten and she had noticed, as she did her hamstring walk up the stairs, that it was quite effortless. Her legs were strengthening, she was sure of it. Perhaps she would surprise her parents when she got home. She wouldn’t be able to ride a horse – but she’d have legs like a ballet dancer.

  8

  EARLY IN AUGUST, Beth began to prepare her students for another horse show. Her patience was short during the lessons and she tolerated few mistakes.

  ‘Now you know what diagonal is! Why are you ignoring it?’ Faith would hear her yell. Or to her prize student, Cora, who looked down at a fence while jumping it, ‘Where should your eyes be looking? Eyes up! Eyes up!’ Sometimes Faith would hear her from as far away as the kitchen. ‘Relax. RELAX! Say that to yourself. OUT LOUD! I want to hear you say it.’ Faith could never hear the students from the kitchen, but she knew they were riding around the ring mumbling, ‘Relax . . . relax . . . relax . . . relax.’ Washing up the breakfast dishes or watering the garden, Faith felt a little like Cinderella – doing all the unexciting chores while Beth’s students were dressing for the ball.

  ‘Easy with those reins; you’re on his MOUTH! You’re guiding a HORSE, not sawing down a tree!’

  The lessons themselves, usually an hour, sometimes went on and on, lasting nearly two hours. The students were exhausted and downcast. Gem, whose smart new boots were rubbing her sore ankles, was doubly miserable.

  This horse show was a big one at an elegant fox hunt stable near Detroit. Riders from many Midwest states, the East Coast and even Canada were coming. Beth would have to truck the horses a long distance and they would not return until after midnight. Beth said Gem was ready to compete in a jumping class as well as on the flat.

  As the show date grew closer, Faith too was caught in the fever of preparations. She cleaned and oiled tack, washed saddle pads and helped the riding students with the daily grooming of the four horses that would be used in the show.

  Faith admired clever, quick Cora, Beth’s best rider. She was nervous and funny and talked as she groomed about riding disasters – falls she’d had and bad habits of horses. Faith wondered how she could keep riding in the face of so much danger.

  At night Faith went gradually to sleep amid the restless, excited chatter of her sister. Gem was trying to hypnotize herself into the correct jumping position. ‘Hands forward, eyes forward – heels down.’ She repeated it over and over to herself. As her voice droned away, sleep came slowly and deliciously to Faith, snuggled next to Blackie Whiteface.

  They rose at four on the Saturday morning of the show. They loaded the four horses into the trailer and were on the road hauling in Beth’s old pickup by five. They watched the sun come up from the highway into Detroit and stopped for doughnuts at a truck stop filled with silent truckdrivers warming hands around mugs of coffee. Then they hit the highway once more.

  At the show grounds, they unloaded the horses and tied them to iron loops on the trailer. Cora and two other students who would ride for Beth showed up with nervous mothers. Then began the laborious grooming. Not only must the horses be shining and clean, their manes and tails had to be braided with colored yarn, their hooves polished. They all worked. Even two of the mothers helped. The other mother paced and smoked.

  A nervous Cora, grooming Cloud, began a litany of terrible falls at horse shows, ones she’d seen or read about. Faith shuddered at grisly accounts of broken necks over jumps, broken legs of horses and riders. She was delighted when Gem told Cora, ‘Stop polluting my space.’ After that
Cora worked in abused silence.

  The horses sensed the excitement in the preparations. The more elegant they began to look, the prouder they stood. Their nostrils widened and their eyes rolled back. After the horses were ready, Faith helped Gem put her hair in a French braid caught in a blue silk ribbon. Then Beth called her riders together to distribute the hunt caps. Gem grabbed quickly the new cap of dark blue velvet. She crammed it on her head. Although it was too small for her French-braided hair, she insisted it fit fine.

  Cinderella’s sister, thought Faith smugly. She walked away from the group, suddenly lonely and missing Blackie Whiteface.

  There were riders and trailers and horses all over the grounds. Faith wandered about, amazed at how many people wanted to risk their necks. The grass of the show ring was velvety and there were flowers beside all the jumps. Banners fluttered from the tall, white-painted judges’ stand perched high beside the ring. Dressing up danger, thought Faith.

  There were spectators sitting in bleachers and a well-dressed group under an awning at decorated tables. A good rider could earn points to ride in the big show at Madison Square Garden and events in Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania. Faith felt a surprising tug of sympathetic terror for her sister, riding in such an important event.

  But in the first two Equitation on the Flat classes, Gem took third-place yellow ribbons, while Faith gaped from the sidelines.

  Then she was lonelier than ever and wandered off by the food tent. She waited in line for the hot, oozing sloppy joe sandwiches everyone seemed to be eating. Ahead of her stood a tall man in a cowboy hat. The way he stood reminded Faith of her father and she felt a rush of homesickness. She peered around the man to see what he looked like.

  He had a blondish beard and smile lines at the corners of his eyes. He didn’t resemble her dad at all. He was chewing on a toothpick. He smiled down into her face.

  ‘What’s doin’, Red?’ he asked her.