Whispering Back

by Adam Goodfellow

  ‘Let’s ask Kelly if we can be the only ones to work with her for this week,’ suggested Sarah, ‘but let’s make it a surprise to show everyone at the end of it.’

  I didn’t think there would be a problem with this. In fact, Candide had started off as quite a ‘sour’ horse – she had quickly grown tired of the pen, and although she picked up a great deal when we started to hack her out, she still tended to drop off the bottom of the list of horses to be worked if we ran out of time. On the Tuesday after a three-day weekend, we asked Kelly if we could work on Candide in secret, in the afternoons after the course. Kelly agreed, intrigued. Then one of the other students who hadn’t been very active on the course suddenly decided she’d like to ride her in the afternoon. Candide came back quite hot (she was unclipped and it was a lovely, surprisingly warm, November afternoon), and we decided she would probably not be in the right sort of mood to do more work. Never mind, there was still Wednesday and Thursday. We were confident.

  The Wednesday session went well, but we made a real error of judgement. In her enthusiasm, Sarah tried to teach me how to move Candide sideways along a pole, a standard move in Western training. I was too uncoordinated to explain to the horse what we wanted, and the three of us got quite frustrated. We were sensible enough to recognise our mistake, and went back to working on the simpler things – transitions from trot to walk, and trot to halt, changing direction, and cantering. I’d ridden without a bridle before, in the way that many people do – riding a pony down to the field in just a headcollar as a child, and on one memorable occasion during a riding holiday when we jumped on some ponies in the field. (Mine had taken great exception to this arrogant intrusion, and promptly bucked me off.) I’d also hitched a lift with Sensi across the field a few times, but I had rarely cantered on her without her bridle, at least not intentionally. It was exhilarating to be deliberately cantering in the pen with nothing but a rope around the horse’s neck. I enjoyed the feeling that although she couldn’t go very far, equally I couldn’t really control her if she decided she didn’t want me to. It felt strangely liberating after all the hand-dominant instruction I’d been given as a child. We finished the session in high spirits.

  Even more exciting was the prospect of meeting Lucy Rees. Kelly had asked for a volunteer to collect her from Oxford train station, and I had jumped at the chance. I don’t consider myself much of a celebrity buff. I don’t read about the lifestyles of the rich and famous, for example, and am not particularly impressed by ostentatious displays of wealth, power or influence. I am, however, impressed by achievement, and love watching people who are masters in their field, whether that’s comedy, acting, singing, or horse training. I’d always felt surprisingly little desire to meet any of my heroes, partly through a fear that they might not live up to my expectations, and partly through a sense of unworthiness. What could I possibly have to say to these people that they would find interesting? What did we have in common? Now, five years later, I feel completely different. If John Cleese wanted to come on a course, I’m sure he’d find us all perfectly charming, amusing, interesting. Should David Bowie suddenly develop an interest in horses, I’m sure we’d be able to help.

  Now, Lucy Rees is not exactly as famous as David Bowie. Not even everyone in the horse world has heard of her. But she had been the single most important influence in my life with horses before I met Monty Roberts. As a teenager I had stumbled across a documentary on TV, in which she and another person were breaking in two mustangs. He was using traditional methods of force and violence, and she was using her own unique blend of patience and ingenuity. Initially, he seemed to be making much more progress than her – he already had the saddle on his horse before she had even managed to touch hers. But ultimately, his horse never really accepted being ridden, while Lucy just hopped on hers in a stream and went straight out across the Arizona desert. That she was a woman operating in the macho world of cowboys made this achievement all the more remarkable. I couldn’t wait to see what she was like in the flesh.

  ‘I’m sorry I’m so horribly late. Are you the poor student they’ve sent to fetch me?’

  She was tall, slim and strikingly good-looking, with wild, long blond hair. The sort of person you might call eccentric.

  ‘That’s right. I mean, no. I volunteered. I’m a big fan.’

  We headed out to my (dad’s) car, and I tried to think of something to say. I didn’t want awkward silences, but on the other hand I didn’t want to appear inane. At times like these, Adam is brilliant. He always can think of something to say, and has a whole range of manners, from condescending (he’s not very good with children) to courteous, and every shade in between. The more I tried to think of something intelligent to say, the more paralysed I became by my own thoughts.

  ‘So what exactly are you expecting me to say?’ she asked.

  I was startled. This thought so mirrored my own I thought perhaps she was reading my mind.

  ‘I mean, what do you want me to talk about? Is there anything specific? I don’t want to go over anything you’ve already heard about.’

  ‘Oh, I see. Well, Monty’s here this afternoon, and also tomorrow. It’s Thanksgiving, and there’s a cake and everything. I think the idea is that we have a fairly free-roaming discussion. Questions and answers, lively debate. Differences as well as agreements, that sort of thing.’

  ‘OK. So tell me a little about this Monty, then.’

  A hint of scepticism? Professional jealousy? I pushed the thought from my mind and enthused about Monty, Kelly, the course, the horses, what I’d been learning.

  She interjected the odd question, then said, ‘Of course, none of it’s new, you know. This sort of thing has been going on in the States for decades, centuries maybe. I’ve seen Monty work, and he’s an extraordinary horseman, but it’s not as revolutionary as you think.’

  ‘Well, it’s new to me,’ I said, perhaps a little petulantly. ‘I understand that people have known about advance and retreat since the days of the Native Americans, and the concept of the release of pressure is well understood in the States, but to almost everyone in this country, this stuff is new. People may have noticed certain things happening in the round pen or on the lunge – ears locked on and head lowering, for example – but it’s Monty who’s taken it to the next stage, who’s worked out what to do with the information, as a structured way of communicating with the horse, and he’s brought it to the attention of large numbers of people.’

  ‘Yes, that’s true,’ she conceded. ‘But I was doing this sort of thing years ago. We didn’t need some flashy American to come here and show it off.’

  I couldn’t think what to say. ‘Well,’ I started, as gently as I could, ‘the reason this has suddenly become so popular is because it’s exactly what so many people have been waiting for. For years and years people have been looking for a kinder way to deal with horses.’

  Maybe Monty finally found himself in the right place at the right time. But it hadn’t always been that way. Even just a few years previously, when the Queen, astonished by his skill, had arranged for him to tour the country to demonstrate his techniques, audience numbers were small. It was clear, too, that Kelly had been enormously instrumental in Monty’s UK success. But I could sympathise with Lucy. She was an exceptional horsewoman, who had been working with problem horses for almost as long as Monty. She had written books, appeared on TV, and lectured at colleges, but she was experiencing nothing like the recognition that Monty was receiving. I could understand her frustration, but I also wanted her to appreciate the frustration that many horse riders had been experiencing, too. If there had been a ten-week course on Lucy Rees’s horsemanship, I would have been the first to sign up. To hear that she had been doing lectures that I hadn’t even heard about was no comfort at all.

  I was dispirited by this conversation. Kelly had said that Monty was particularly keen to meet Lucy Rees, and it was a pity if she didn’t feel the same.

  In the end I needn’t have wor
ried. Once Monty and Lucy were in the same room, conversation flowed. Lucy had some controversial revelations about stallions and their behaviour in the wild. It turned out that ‘rival’ stallions would often come to quite amicable agreements about wife swapping, and that quite often two stallions appeared to share groups of mares. This fact was often missed by observers, she said, because they would see one very well-muscled stallion, and assume he was the only one. People usually saw what they were looking for, I couldn’t help thinking. If scientists, who receive a certain amount of training in objectivity, couldn’t even be open-minded enough to spot a second adult stallion in a herd, then how likely were we to ‘read’ each horse we were training? How could we ever know if any of our assumptions were correct? It’s a question that’s bothered me ever since, and it always worries me when people state, ‘Oh, I know he’s not really frightened because . . .’ I’ve become almost politician-like in my reluctance to state categorically the reason why I think a horse doesn’t want to do something. I guess Stantonbury, my old school, is partly responsible for this. If someone hadn’t done their homework, lack of motivation was considered as good a reason as ‘my cat died’. The teachers would look for a way to inspire motivation, rather than blame the student for being awkward.

  Another shocking revelation of Lucy’s was that much of the ‘documentary’ footage of stallions fighting comes about as a result of the documentary makers driving one group of horses into the territory of another. So many of those vicious encounters are simply avoided in real life, but can easily be set up for the cameras. Horse life is actually pretty dull: eighteen hours a day of steady munching, sex once or twice a year, and only the occasional bout of spectacular aggression.

  I had previously discovered that one of my horsey friends from the ‘pony paddocks’ in Milton Keynes knew Lucy Rees. In fact she had spent large chunks of her childhood in Wales with Lucy, learning to ride on nearly wild Welsh mountain ponies. Lucy didn’t have any concrete plans for that evening, so I suggested she might like to come to Milton Keynes to meet her old friend, since I was driving that way anyway. I was immensely thankful for my pretty reliable ability to remember a phone number having only rung it a few times, and I called Jane. She was (unusually) at home, and delighted at the prospect of seeing her old teacher again. We just had to nip out to the stables first, and do a little training with Candide . . .

  We’d arranged with the college staff for the key to the tack room to be left somewhere accessible. When we got there, it was nowhere to be found, and we couldn’t get the lights to work. Bridle-less, bareback, and in the dark? Maybe not. We spent some time with the nervous pony, then Lucy and I headed for Milton Keynes.

  All the awkwardness of the first drive had disappeared. As we drove through the cold, dark, windy night, rain splattering against the windshield, it was obvious that she’d really warmed to Monty, and had even asked to come back on the next day of the course.

  Before we went around to Jane’s, we stopped by to check on the horses. It was dark and windy in their field, and when they saw us they came charging over, snorting playfully, manes blowing wildly, curious about this new person.

  We collected Adam and went off to the pub for a few beers before ordering a take-away curry. One glass of wine followed another, each anecdote rolled into the next, and before we knew it, we’d reached that time of the night where six hours’ sleep suddenly becomes an unattainable luxury. I hadn’t been drinking, but I’d hit the level of tiredness that’s almost intoxicating.

  ‘I’ll pick you up at seven-thirty then?’ I asked doubtfully. ‘In the morning?’

  ‘No problem,’ Lucy assured me.

  Adam and I reflected on the strange turn our lives were taking. Who would have thought we’d spend the evening drinking with the author of my all-time favourite childhood book? Still, in the back of my mind, I was hoping she wouldn’t be ready to go to the college in the morning as Sarah, Candide and I were to give our presentation in the afternoon. The idea of exposing my riding skills – let alone my bridle-less ones – to her was not appealing to me. I’m the sort of person who, if I were an actress, would never allow friends and family to come to the opening night, or possibly not any other night either. When things go well, I always regret that friends weren’t there to witness it, but I’d rather that than be horribly embarrassed by screwing up in front of them.

  To my surprise, and slight dismay, she was ready promptly, just those few short hours later. Perhaps she hadn’t gone to bed at all. Conversation was a little more subdued on the way into college.

  In the morning, we had another meeting with Monty, as he explained more of his concepts and training techniques. There was a BBC film crew there, and I began to get a little nervous. Surely they would get their filming done in the morning and not bother to stay for the afternoon? I hoped so, but it seemed improbable.

  Sometimes I’m astonished by my profound lack of understanding of a situation. Once, at university, I suddenly realised that the Engineering student against whose stomach I was lying might be expecting something more from the situation than I was intending. (This was before Adam and I got together.) The fact that we had gone out for several meals, including a ‘study picnic’ at Grantchester meadows, and that we were lying on the same bed studying didn’t strike me as particularly significant. Cambridge has a ratio of about four men for every woman, and I was quite used to being the only woman in a roomful of eight men (more than which constituted a party as far as college authorities were concerned, therefore requiring written permission from the Porter’s Lodge). I was the only woman on my course of twelve students. It seemed inevitable, then, that a large proportion of my friends would be male. I was very fond of this person, and going through a particularly tactile phase, but that was it, as far as I was concerned. Looking back I’m astonished at my stupidity. The strange thing is, I don’t consider myself to be particularly naive in such matters. It’s as though my brain had all the relevant information, and just didn’t bother to process it.

  So it was with Candide. With a little mental clarity I might have been able to see the situation for the daunting task it was. There I was, on the strength of two actual sessions, about to show Monty Roberts, Kelly Marks, a BBC film crew, my childhood heroine Lucy Rees, and all the other students on my course, the principles of bridle-less riding. At least Mary Wanless wasn’t there.

  By the time we went out to the stables in the afternoon, I was feeling a little other-worldly. Not just that I was tired, but I felt distanced from my body, as if it was happening to someone else. As I warmed Candide up, I was aware things weren’t going too well. She was distracted, and even a little bored, and my signals to control her speed and direction weren’t getting through. I could see from Sarah’s face that she was worried.

  ‘If things look like they’re not going too well,’ she advised, ‘make sure it’s not too obvious from the outside that you’re trying to control her. If she canters off, just go with it, like it’s what you intended to do, and if you want her to stop, say “whoa” quietly enough that no one on the outside can hear, otherwise they’ll know it’s all going horribly wrong.’

  I smiled weakly. A vision of me galloping around for what would probably seem like eternity, trying to pretend all was going according to plan, floated in front of my eyes. It wasn’t a positive image. ‘Promise me that if that happens, you’ll come in,’ I pleaded. ‘You can slow her down with body language, and we can start again.’

  I couldn’t understand what was keeping them so long. Monty was meant to just be taking a quick look at the horse in the stables next door. It seemed they had been ages. Candide was really going off the boil, and as a three-year-old, her concentration span was short enough as it was. I didn’t want her to ‘peak’ before they came through to watch her. I also didn’t want to get off, in case she assumed the session was finished, and then felt cheated about being asked to work again. I could feel a tight knot of tension and impatience clenching in my stomach.<
br />
  Finally, the crew came through, set up the camera, and we could start. The students filed in and sat on bales of straw round the edge of the pen. By this time, Kelly was in on the secret, too, although she hadn’t actually seen us working. As she and Monty came in, I hoped fervently we wouldn’t let her down.

  Then I started riding, and talking, and it began to feel all right. I explained what we’d been doing, how we’d been pairing the ‘new’ signal on the rope around her neck with the ‘old’ rein aid. As I demonstrated, Candide began to pick up interest, getting more responsive as we went on.

  ‘Once you’re confident the horse can respond to the neck rope alone,’ I said, and by this time the reins were just resting knotted on her neck, ‘you can take off the bridle.’

  Monty came into the pen to remove the bridle, and as he approached us, I tried to read his expression. It was impenetrable. His face was blank, and I had to quell the foreboding feeling that he was annoyed. After all, who was I to be explaining bridle-less riding to him? Of course, I was really explaining it to the others on the course, but would he see it like that? Would he think I was just an upstart, arrogant student trying to impress him? The nervousness came flooding back.

  But Candide behaved impeccably. It was an amazing feeling to be riding along with no contact at all on the horse’s head, but being able to control her so closely with my seat bones, using the information I had only recently learned from Mary Wanless. Aside from an uncomfortable moment when we struck off on the wrong canter lead twice, it all went better than I could possibly have hoped for. There was a polite smattering of applause, Candide did a sort of bow after the last halt, and Kelly said something to Monty that I didn’t quite catch. Then I found myself leading her out of the pen, taking her back to the quiet of her stable and untacking her, feeling pleased and relieved, but not at all sure what Monty’s reaction would be. Sarah came up to me, delighted with how it had gone, and one or two other students congratulated me. It seemed childish to ask, ‘And what did Monty think?’ so I didn’t say anything and went back to the school to watch the other students being filmed doing join-ups and interviews. I was thankful it was over, and pleased that it hadn’t been a complete disaster, but I couldn’t quite shake the memory of Monty’s face, completely expressionless, as if set in stone.