by Kate Lattey
“She went over!”
Tabby laughs at me. “Sure did. She’s got a good pop in her.”
Alec pats her and trots back past us. “That slowed her down a bit! Look before you leap, pony.”
He brings her back at the jump again, and she approaches more steadily this time before jumping it neatly, having apparently realised that bright blue coats don’t eat ponies. Alec brings her back down to a walk and motions me over.
“That was good, right?” I ask as I approach him.
“Not bad,” he says, kicking his feet free of the stirrups. “Not as bad as Dolly, who wouldn’t go near a jump with that coat on it at all when we went to see her. Just about dropped a foal, she was that scared. When we tried it with Jess, she jumped it as though the coat wasn’t there. Didn’t even see it.”
He slides to the ground as I fasten my chin strap, ready for my turn.
“What’s your verdict?” Tabby calls over to him.
“She needs work. She’s real skittish, and a bit of a handful to ride. She’s smart though.” He looks at me and sees my expression. “Hey, wait ‘til she passes her vetting before you fall in love with her.”
I nod, patting the pony’s neck enthusiastically as Alec moves around to lengthen the off-side stirrup. “Down two holes,” I tell him, adjusting the one on the near-side. “And I know, don’t worry.”
He holds the off-side stirrup as I swing into the saddle. Settling myself, I rub the pony’s neck and talk to her in a quiet voice that I hope she’ll find calming. She flickers her ears back and forth, listening to my voice, then steps out eagerly at the gentle touch of my leg. I start to smile, loving her forward, swinging walk and the sight of the pricked ears ahead of me. Her head is up and her ears seem too close to my face, but I’m confident that proper schooling will fix that. I walk her for a while, doing a few changes in direction and she turns smoothly at the lightest touch of the rein. My stirrups are a little long, so I ask her to halt so I can adjust them. The pony opens her mouth against the bit and evades my aids. I sit down harder in the saddle and tug at the reins. She lifts her head higher, but stops, and I praise her and set to adjusting my stirrups. The mare shifts around under me impatiently, making the task difficult, so Alec comes over and holds her still, and when I get myself sorted and on the move again, I can see Tabby at the fence, looking a little worried.
“What do you think of her?” Carolyn asks loudly, and I don’t miss the way the pony flattens her ears at her owner’s voice. I nod at her, smiling, wanting to reassure Tabby, to tell her that I’m having the time of my life, that the pony’s excitable, nervous energy feels wonderful underneath me. I shorten the reins up a little and ask her to trot, and as with Alec she strides out keenly, ears pricked. Her trot is smooth and graceful, and she moves with a quick sure-footedness that makes me feel comfortable and relaxed on her. I ask her to steady and she responds a little unwillingly, preferring to move at speed. I know how she feels, and after trotting in both directions, I sit down in the saddle, open my fingers a little on the reins and ask her to canter. She leaps keenly into the faster pace, and it takes me several circuits of the arena to steady her to a reasonable speed. We glide across the ground, moving effortlessly across the rough turf. She’s enjoying herself, ears pricked and neck taut, ready to go on and do it for me, to get fit and go jumping, to go to shows, to gallop down the beach. Everything that I want to do feels possible on this pony. Tabby is calling instructions to me, telling me to sit up taller and deeper in the saddle, and bring her to a steadier canter. I do my best and after a few more racy strides, the pony checks herself and I feel what Tabby wanted me to. Her hindquarters come in underneath her, her stride shortens and becomes more collected, and her jaw softens, relaxing against my hold on the reins. I feel as though I could jump anything out of this canter, could fly over four foot oxers, could clear the moon without effort.
I turn her to face the jump, still with its scary jacket hanging over it, and I hear Tabby calling something but I can’t hear her properly with the wind rushing past my ears. I let the pony canter to the jump and she is confident and eager, taking me to the jump and flying over it in a big, clean leap. And I know, in this moment, that this is the pony for me. Pushing aside thoughts of real world issues like money and vet checks, I know it will work out, because this lonely, underfed pony needs me as much as I need her. I pull her up and praise her, and she twitches an ear back towards me as I tell her that together, we’ll go on to do great things.
CHAPTER TEN
Tabby has already cautioned me not to discuss price until we’ve had the pony on trial for two weeks and can evaluate her worth properly. I mentally bless Carolyn’s daughter for being stupid enough to choose boys over ponies as I load the mare onto the truck. After a little hesitation, she walks on and stands quietly in the back as we begin the drive back to Clearwater Bay. Alec falls asleep as usual, head lolling against the window, only waking when we hit bumps in the road and his skull knocks against the glass. It never disturbs him for more than a moment though, and soon he’s asleep again, mouth open, lightly snoring.
Tabby looks over at me. “Pleased with the pony?”
“Oh yes,” I tell her. There aren’t words to express just how delighted I am to know that the chestnut mare is in the back of the truck. Driving away without her would’ve broken my heart, and the thought of her even possibly belonging to anyone else is making my stomach tie itself in knots.
“Just hope she passes her vetting,” Tabby says, bringing me back down to earth with a jolt. “I’ll see if we can get James over early this week. Don’t want to put it off too long, better to find out sooner rather than later if there’s something dodgy.”
“Do you really think there’s something wrong with her?” I ask nervously.
“Nah. I wouldn’t have let you bring her home if I did. Always good to be on the safe side though, get her properly checked out.” We slow at the next set of lights and the truck creaks to a reluctant stop, brakes screeching in protest. “I’ll be glad when the boy gets his license and can drive this thing around.”
We sit in silence for a moment before the lights change. All of the cars around us zoom off as the truck heaves itself into motion again.
“So have you thought up a name for the pony yet? Can’t leave her without one for too long.”
“I know.” I lean forward and pick up the copies of her registration papers off the dashboard. I’ve never had the responsibility of naming any animal before, and I want to pick something good. Something that’s nice, but that suits her. I flick through the papers.
“Her full name is That’s Final,” I tell Tabby.
“Figures. All of Final Countdown’s progeny have ‘Final’ in their names. Final Edition, Final Flight, Final Chance. There’s another one, I forget its name. Alec’ll know.”
“Are they good jumpers?” I ask.
Tabby shrugs. “Not bad. Abby Brooks rides Final Chance and he goes beautifully for her, but so does everything she sits on. Before she got him, no-one else could get him to perform at all. Very temperamental.”
I hope my pony won’t be as difficult as all that. I consider the name. That’s Final. Not what I’d have chosen, but I can learn to live with it. I wonder what to call her for short. I don’t want anything obvious, like Goldie or Star. Something smart, something that suits her, something that nods to her Arab heritage, or her Irish blood…
I mull it over for a while, then it comes to me suddenly. “What about Finn?”
Tabby glances over at me and smiles. “I like it. It suits her.”
“Finn.” I say it again, trying the feel of it on my tongue, picturing the chestnut pony. “Okay. Finn it is.”
Sliding back against the seat, I close my eyes and lose myself in daydreams, imagining Finn and I jumping huge fences and winning loads of prizes. Anything seems possible, now that this long-awaited dream has finally come true.
We get back to the Harrisons’ just before dark. Finn whin
nies out as we drop the ramp, and Lucky replies from the house paddock. My pony turns to look at me as I go to her head and untie her while Alec swings open the divider. I pat the pony’s sweaty shoulder as she paws the ground with an impatient hoof, wanting to get out of the truck’s confined space.
I lead her forward. “Come on then Finn,” I tell her, trying out the name on her.
She steps carefully behind me and then when we’re halfway down the ramp, Lucky canters up to the fence in the house paddock and whinnies again. Finn throws her head up and responds, then leaps off the ramp, ripping the rope out of my hands. Alec moves to grab her but she dodges away from him and, calling loudly, canters off towards the house paddock, rope trailing around her legs. Alec is swearing and my hands are burning as I stumble down the ramp.
“You better catch that pony before your dad comes out here,” Tabby warns Alec as we dash after Finn. She’s running up and down the fence line with her tail in the air and nostrils flared in front of a rather impressed Lucky.
“What a flirt,” Alec comments as we approach Finn from both sides. I dig in my pockets and find a piece of carrot. Holding it out, I call to her softly.
“Here Finn. Come on girl.” My pony barely glances at me, far more excited by the prospect of a new pony to make friends with than a tiny piece of carrot. Or to make enemies of, perhaps, as she suddenly wheels around and double-barrels at Lucky, narrowly avoiding catching her legs in the wire fence. I move forward, carrot still outstretched, but Alec is quicker and has already grabbed Finn’s lead rope. She spins on the end of it, ears flattened at him, mad at him for ending her moment of freedom.
“Cabbage horse,” he tells her, passing the rope to me. I feed her the piece of carrot and she takes it distractedly, then prances along next to me back to the yards. Alec’s dad has come out of the house and is standing by the woolshed, watching us approach. I feel my stomach sinking. I’ve only really met the man once, but once was enough.
It was just over a month ago. Alec and I had come back from a ride, and he’d gone up to get the other two ponies in while I hosed the sweat off Dolly and Trixie. I had them both tied to the fence outside the yards and had just finished with Trixie, leaving her to dry in the sun. I’d turned towards water-phobic Dolly, and she’d rolled her eyes at the hose and swung her quarters away from me, snorting and eying me nervously. I’d lowered the hose to my side and walked quietly up to her, patting her neck and gently playing the water across her feet, telling her that it was nothing to be afraid of. Untying her rope in case she pulled back and hurt herself, I was rubbing her neck and praising her, and she was slowly starting to relax. We’d both jumped when a yell came from behind us.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
Liam Harrison has the same solid build as his children, with fair skin sunburned over so many years that it has turned permanently red. His angry appearance had made Dolly tense up again immediately. He’d pointed at the hose, lax in my hand and making a puddle next to Dolly’s front feet.
“We’re having a bloody water shortage,” he’d glared at me.
“She’s scared of it,” I’d explained quickly, but Liam hadn’t seemed to care.
“Well that’s her own problem, she’ll have to get used to it. You hold her and I’ll hose her off for you before you empty the whole rainwater tank onto the ground.”
Reluctantly I’d passed him the hose. Dolly had immediately snorted and shied away from it.
“Hold her!” Liam had snapped at me, and in an effort to keep Dolly still, I’d grabbed tightly onto her halter with one hand and turned her body up against the fence so that she had nowhere to go. Liam had put his thumb partway over the end of the hose and sent a strong spray onto the mare’s back, and the pony shivered and tensed, trembling slightly as she held still, her eyes wide. Liam was quick, pausing only to make me spin the pony around so he could do the other side. I swung her as quickly as I could, but it wasn’t fast enough. As soon as Dolly’s right side was near him, Liam had sent the hose spray towards her again, getting both of us soaked. Caught off-guard, I’d squealed and ducked my head, relaxing my hold on the pony’s halter. Dolly had shot forward, desperate to escape the horrible hose torture, and I’d felt the rope sliding through my hands. That time, luckily, I’d held on to my charge.
Liam finished her left side and Dolly and I had both relaxed slightly, thinking it was over and done with now, but the worst had turned out to be ahead of us.
“Hold her tight,” Liam had said and without further warning, turned the spray on Dolly’s head. The pony had reared slightly and shaken her head violently, and it’d been all I could do to keep hold of her. I’d gotten wetter as Dolly fretted and plunged around, but Liam’s aim was good and the stream of water had soaked the mare’s head. Finally he’d lowered the hose, walked calmly over to the tap and turned the hose off, draping it over the fence.
“That’s how you’ve gotta do it. Alec should’ve helped you.” And with that, he’d walked away, leaving the miserable, dripping pony still trembling by my side.
I’d told Alec what happened as soon as he got back, but he hadn’t been as outraged as I was.
“She’s a bit headshy,” he’d said. “She was beat up before we got her and she’s still pretty nervy.”
“Doesn’t your dad know that?”
“Patience isn’t his strong point,” he’d replied, avoiding my eyes as he’d tied Jess alongside the others. There had been a sense of underlying tension as he’d spoken, an anger at his father’s treatment of the pony that, for some reason, he couldn’t fully express.
Now Liam is standing with his arms folded across his chest as I lead my prancing pony towards the yards. His hazel eyes are looking her over, scrutinising her, and I feel horribly self-conscious under the intensity of his stare. How someone so hard and hostile can be the easy-going Alec’s father doesn’t make any sense to me.
“Bit weedy, isn’t she?” he says as we reach him. “Needs a decent feed.”
He strides over to her and claps her shoulder with his rough, broad hand. Finn jumps slightly, but doesn’t seem to mind him running his hands down her legs and picking up her feet. I want him to get away from my pony, to back off and leave us alone. I don’t care about his opinion anyway. But this is his farm and as I well know from the few stories Alec has told me about him, he calls the shots around here.
Liam steps back from her and concludes his appraisal. “Not badly put-together. Bundle of nerves though. You’ll have your hands full with this one.”
Abruptly, Finn rubs her head against his arm, almost knocking him over. He shoulders her off roughly.
“Get up there and have some manners,” he grumbles at her, then turns and walks back into the house.
I click my tongue to Finn and she follows me into one of the grass yards. Alec catches Lucky and puts him next door to her for company. He sticks his head over the railing and nickers invitingly to her, but Finn is more interested in the haynet that Pip has just hung on the railing and starts pulling hay out of it, munching contentedly.
She hasn’t come with any gear, so Alec finds an old cover of Trixie’s to throw on her for the night. It’s a bit wide for her, sagging around her narrow shoulders, but she doesn’t seem to mind. We mix her up a feed of chaff and a small scoop of pony nuts, since her owners haven’t been giving her hard feed, and we don’t want her to colic from a too sudden change in diet. We decide to leave the ponies in the yards overnight rather than turn Finn out into a strange field in the dark, so with a final pat I say goodnight to her, accepting Alec’s offer to drive me home.
His car is even more of a mess inside than out. There’s stuffing leaking out of the seats, hay and dog hair everywhere, and the back seat is covered with horse rugs, strands of baling twine and a coil of fencing wire.
“Flash ride,” I tell him and he grins, that dimple appearing again in his left cheek.
“Thanks. I’ve spent thousands on doing her up.”
I l
augh, then settle back against the seat. The ashtray is stuck open and full of cigarette butts. “Do you smoke?”
He shrugs. “Not much. Dad’s mental about it, he hates smokers. I think because his old man died of lung cancer. My brother and I used to hide out here and smoke. Brad always bought the cigs though, so now he’s gone overseas I don’t bother much, unless I’m having a really bad day.”
I look at the cigarette butts. They don’t look very old, and the smell of stale smoke permeates the car.
“Aren’t you underage to be buying cigarettes?” I ask.
“I’m underage to drive, too,” he points out.
“You…really?”
He nods. “Yeah. I’m not fifteen ‘til April.” He laughs at my expression. “It’s okay. It’s not like there’s any cops around here gonna pull me over. I’ve been driving around the farm since I was ten. Don’t worry, I’m a good driver.” I remind him of the first time I saw him, and he laughs. “I was kinda distracted that day. I’d just had a huge fight with the old man.”
We pull up outside my place. I can see Dad silhouetted against the light in the living room as he peers out the window. Chewy starts barking like a lunatic. “Thanks for the lift.”
“No problem. And we didn’t even crash into anything.”
“Alert the Pope, there’s been a miracle,” I reply and he laughs and waves goodbye as I slam the door shut. Dad steps out onto the porch as Alec reverses out and drives away.
“How’d it go?”
“Perfect,” I tell him, unable to contain my enthusiasm. “We brought her back on trial, and I’m sure it’s going to work out. She’s everything I ever wanted.” Overcome with emotion, I fling my arms around him in the first hug I’ve given him since I got here. “Thank you so much.”
