Champion Horse

by Jane Smiley

  Mom then said, ‘Shouldn’t he know? He never even seems to think about it. He just takes things as they come and doesn’t question them.’

  ‘What is he going to do about it?’ said Dad. ‘Is he going to go down there and tell them to stop? They’re doing him a favour.’

  ‘But someone has to take his place. Someone has to go.’

  I leaned forward and turned my head so my ear was close to the window screen. ‘I think you’re being over scrupulous. I think it’s just a gift from the Lord, and we should accept it.’

  ‘How is it a gift from the Lord?’

  ‘Well, all gifts are gifts from the Lord, but in this case, Mrs Larkin is our sister in faith, and her cousin feels this love, and has the chance to act on it. You should be grateful. I am.’

  ‘I am grateful, but I also, oh, I don’t know. I feel like this is something he, and we, will pay for in the end. It’s unfair. Justice will be served. I feel like this is a sin and we are colluding in it.’

  Now Dad was silent, because Mom had said the most important word.

  I said, ‘What are you talking about?’

  Dad said, ‘Abby, are you eavesdropping?’

  Mom said, ‘She should know. Honey, come inside, please.’

  I set my boots next to one another and opened the door. Mom and Dad were sitting at the table, a big bowl of shelled peas between them. Dad had the Bible in his hand, but it was closed. I sat in my chair.

  Dad said, ‘What did you hear?’

  Mom said, ‘You know that when Danny turned eighteen last May, he had to register for the draft, don’t you?’

  I nodded.

  ‘Do you talk much at school about the war?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Well, I guess we don’t think much about it because we don’t have a television and we focus more on the things of the Lord rather than the things of the world.’

  Dad said, ‘War is inevitable when the world is fallen. If you stop one, another will start. Redemption is the only path away from war.’

  Mom said, ‘But a few weeks ago, Mrs Larkin told me something. It is that her cousin serves on the draft board, and a couple of times when Danny’s name has come up, she has “put him at the bottom of the pile”. I don’t know what that means, exactly, but—’

  I said, ‘But it’s not fair to the others.’

  Mom nodded.

  Dad said, ‘We don’t know what motivates the cousin to do this. We don’t know what the Lord has planned. Your mom hasn’t talked to the cousin, and only one time to Mrs Larkin.’

  ‘I have not been brave,’ said Mom.

  I said, ‘What would happen to him?’

  Mom said, ‘Well, he would be called up, and go to basic training, and then, depending on a lot of things, he could end up fighting in Vietnam. The thing is, since he didn’t finish high school, I just think they would make cannon fodder out of him.’

  Dad said, ‘Maybe he should fight for his country.’

  ‘Maybe he should, but you and I both know that one reason we never talk about the war in church is that it’s a very sore subject, and if you listen to Brother Abner, or the Hollingsworths, or any three people, for that matter, you will find out that the Lord has very strong opinions about the war, and that he does not agree with himself.’

  I almost laughed.

  Mom said, ‘If he had stayed in school and then gone to college, he wouldn’t even have to worry about it. He’d have a student deferment and—’

  I said, ‘But he would be doing something that he hates.’

  ‘That he hated,’ said Mom. ‘I think maybe Leah Marx changed his mind a little. But because he was so stubborn, he doesn’t get a chance to know, does he?’

  I said, ‘He’s not going to learn anything about horses in the army.’

  ‘Those days are gone,’ said Dad.

  We all sighed at the same time.

  Dad opened the Bible, and the first words his eyes fell upon were ‘“Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser.”’

  Mom said, ‘I guess that means I should tell him.’

  Dad said, ‘Is Danny a wise man?’

  I said, ‘I think so.’

  Mom leaned towards me, put her arm around my shoulders, and gave me a kiss. But there were tears in her eyes.

  *

  Two days later, Danny came by himself to shoe Oh My and Lady. I had already finished riding, so I held the horses while he did the job. It wasn’t twilight yet, but the mountains to the west were shading the sun, so that the sky above them was almost white it was so bright. Maybe because it was near the equinox, the light was rich and the shadows of the trees so intertwined that they looked like lace. The arena was pale, and the shadow of the railing curved along it, a dark graceful line. Danny didn’t say much while he was working, but then, he was leaning over the horses, hammering and shaping. Both of the mares behaved themselves very nicely, so I was proud of them. I put Lady out, and Danny put his tools away; then, while he was sweeping up hoof parings and bits of nails, I asked him about the Carmichaels. I have to admit that I was terribly curious about the Carmichaels. They were like other horse people I knew – they wore jeans and boots and had a certain way of talking that I had been around all my life, but there was also something about them that was free and easy. I said, ‘Where do they live?’

  ‘Here for now.’

  ‘They’re just staying here? For how long?’

  ‘There’s a cottage that’s empty up by the house, so I guess Daphne sleeps in the bedroom and Ralph and Andy sleep in the living room.’

  ‘What about school?’ Now I sounded like Mom.

  ‘Daphne’s in the junior high down the road. I think she’s in sixth or seventh grade.’

  ‘What about Andy?’

  ‘He’s older than he looks. He just works with Ralph. They go around to other farms and train horses or work cattle. I guess they have a place, but it’s too far away from anywhere.’

  ‘Where’s their mom?’

  ‘She’s in Reno or somewhere like that. But she’s remarried. She’s got a couple of little kids. They don’t see her much.’

  ‘They don’t see their own mom?’

  Danny turned and looked right at me, then said, ‘No, they don’t. They’ve lived with Ralph since Daphne was six and Andy was thirteen.’

  ‘Are they divorced?’ This was a big word.

  ‘What do you think? Of course they are. But I guess they all get along. That’s what they say. The stepdad was their vet.’

  I said, ‘Don’t tell Dad.’

  Danny said, ‘Well, he’s got to learn sometime that there are all kinds of families, and all kinds of them are actually happy families. Andy says they all spend Christmas with their mom and the stepdad and the little ones every year.’

  I just shook my head.

  *

  In the house, I saw that we were having steak. Real steak – strip steaks that Mr Jordan had given us after the last roundup, and mom had kept in the freezer for a special occasion. We were also having mashed potatoes and spinach, and was that a pie on top of the refrigerator? We didn’t talk about much over dinner – actually the food was too good. It was like Dad said it was when he was a kid – Grandma chatted while she was cooking, everyone said how their day was while they were setting the table, but once they sat down, all they did was eat.

  Finally, as she cut the apple pie she had made, Mom said, ‘Danny, sweetheart, I think we need to talk about something.’ She set his piece in front of him and he picked up his fork. Dad looked out the window. I looked out the window. Rusty was looking in the window. As she sat down, Mom said, ‘What’s the last thing you heard from your draft board?’

  Danny shrugged. ‘Nothing. I mean, I registered and all of that, but I don’t know. I don’t think much about it.’

  Mom said, ‘It’s been almost five months.’

  ‘Well, it’s not like there aren’t a lot of guys around here. I figure that they just haven’t got
to me.’

  Mom said, ‘What are you going to do when they do get to you?’

  ‘Go, I guess.’ He shrugged again.

  And here was the surprising thing. Mom said, ‘You never thought about resisting?’

  Dad’s head swivelled around, and I felt mine do the same thing. But Danny wasn’t surprised. He said, ‘I’ve thought of it. But—’

  ‘But what?’ said Dad.

  ‘But first of all, I don’t know if I would pass the physical or not. Andy Carmichael got called up. I guess when he was twelve, a horse fell on top of him and broke his pelvis and his shoulder, and they thought he couldn’t carry equipment to march or something, anyway, he’s 1-Y, and I guess if they run out of guys, they will take him.’

  ‘You’ve never had any accidents like that,’ said Dad.

  ‘Anyway,’ said Danny, ‘I don’t mind.’

  ‘You don’t mind?’ said Mom.

  ‘I’ve thought maybe I’d like to see for myself.’

  Mom and Dad looked at each other, and Danny went on eating his pie. I knew there was going to be a lot of praying, and maybe even some by me, but I thought about that Bible verse Dad had found when we were talking about this, and I wondered if maybe Danny hadn’t been kind of wise after all, not to say yes or no, but to want to find out about the things he didn’t understand.

  Mom said, ‘I wish you had stayed in school.’

  Danny said, ‘Even if I had, I still would not have gone to college.’

  We all knew this was true.

  *

  After Danny left, we sat around the living room thinking all kinds of what-if sorts of thoughts. It got so bad that about nine o’clock, I said I would go out and check the horses, even though this was normally Dad’s job. I knew that when I went out, Mom and Dad would talk about things that they had not wanted to talk about in front of me. But really, Danny was eighteen; it was his business. Outside, it was cold. Maybe the first night we’d had where you had to walk fast so as not to shiver, but the light was beautiful along the hills, which were pale. Both pastures had trees in them, and the mares, at least, were lost in that darkness. I could only see a bit of Oh My’s white parts flashing as she moved from place to place. Blue was standing by his gate, rummaging in the dirt for last bits of hay, so when he saw me, he knew that I was maybe going to give him a little more. He whinnied and nickered, and I petted him a while. I even got up onto the fence and when he pushed towards me a little bit, I scratched him at the base of the neck. Morning Glory could almost scratch herself there, like a dog – she could use her back foot and scratch herself behind the ears, which I had never seen another horse do – but the base of the neck, a horse has to get someone else to do that for him.

  I didn’t tell him anything about Barry Boy and the Carmichaels – why get his hopes up (or mine)? – but I thought about them, and I replayed Barry Boy’s lesson in my mind for the umpteenth time. I still thought it had been more fun than I had ever seen a horse have in my life, except for Happy chasing cows. I thought Blue should have some of that fun.

  When I came into the house, Dad said, ‘Oh, by the way, I’ve agreed with Mr Rosebury that you will work Pie in the Sky and take him in a show in the spring. I think it’s good experience for you, and one show, for now, is not a big deal. You can ride the horse again tomorrow after you teach the girls. I have to go into town, so I’ll drive you over there and pick you up. I’d like to see the horse myself. Mr Rosebury and I can have a little chat.’

  He had that tone in his voice that sounds like you have no choice because this is really good for you. It made me think of a story in the Bible about a king who sees some writing on a wall, and then he knows that something is true. I saw the writing on the wall. I was going to be taking over Sophia’s horse whether I wanted to or not.

  Chapter 11

  On Saturday, Sophia was wearing nice pants that were stuck into some rubber boots, and she had on a scarf, a sweater, and a jacket, even though it wasn’t terribly cold. She also had a brown paper bag in her hand, and I knew there was something to eat in it, since at school, she nibbled away at grapes and apple slices and various kinds of crackers. She hadn’t fainted again. She’d explained ‘pi’ to Stella in a way that Stella could understand, and ‘hypotenuse’ and ‘equilateral triangle’, and Stella thought she was brilliant. In the meantime, Stella explained the concept of eyeshadow to Sophia. Sophia seemed less convinced than Stella, especially when Stella told her that you had to apply it at least four times a day to ‘maintain the freshness of the look’.

  At the stables, Dad walked right up to Mr Rosebury and they shook hands like they were trying to knock each other down. Mr Rosebury said, ‘Well, Mark Lovitt, you are a legend around here. I was out of town when we picked up Onyx, but I had been planning to come out to the wilderness there and see you. Sorry I didn’t! That’s a great horse you sold us, and worth every penny!’

  Dad of course agreed with this, and was grinning from ear to ear. Rodney gave me a leg-up onto Pie in the Sky, and after the two fathers stared at Onyx for a while, they came over and looked at us. I listened to them as I walked behind Colonel Hawkins to the arena.

  ‘Nicely made,’ said Dad. ‘A little narrow, but a good hindquarters on him, nice hock, good ankle.’

  ‘I like the tail set,’ said Mr Rosebury. ‘And you know what they say about jumpers – nothing like a steep angle from the croup to the tail. Call that a “jumping bump”.’

  ‘Makes sense for the jumping effort,’ said Dad. ‘Horse wants to be able to open up.’

  ‘Nice long neck, too,’ said Mr Rosebury. ‘Get a better bascule that way.’

  ‘Never heard that word before,’ said Dad.

  ‘Oh, that’s the arc over the jump. But to my way of thinking, different horses have different styles, and they make too much of this bascule. I like a horse like Onyx, here, who’s a little flat over the top, but has plenty of spring.’

  Mr Rosebury put his hand on Pie in the Sky’s hip as we walked along. Once again, Jane and Sophia were behind us, lagging a little, so I couldn’t hear what they were talking about. I watched Onyx’s shining black rump. His tail was waving from side to side as he walked, and when we went into the arena, he lifted it and, as Dad would have said, ‘made a deposit’. Truly, he was very relaxed.

  Pie in the Sky was himself. I knew more or less what to do with him now, which was to put him to work moving this way and that, softening him up and getting him to pay attention. I wondered if he would put me to the test again. I was only to ride him once a week – Rodney and Colonel Hawkins were riding him three other times, but this was the only jumping day. Colonel Hawkins and Onyx trotted away from us, and I made a big loop and went in the other direction. In the corner I did some small figure of eights. Pie in the Sky was flat, and then he was round. His trot picked up a little spring, and he tried to canter. I think he was thinking, ‘Yes, I do feel pretty good this morning.’

  Sophia and Jane went to the centre of the arena and watched us. Sophia had yet to smile, but she stared at Onyx and then at us. She looked pinched and cold.

  And sad. As I trotted past her, I saw her take another cracker out of her bag.

  Dad and Mr Rosebury kept talking the whole time that the colonel and I rode around them. They laughed, and Mr Rosebury slapped Dad on the back three different times. I couldn’t help staring a little bit. Dad had friends, but they were all in our church, and even then he was just a little stiff with them, in case someone broke a rule that he thought was important. People outside of the church were for doing business, and some he liked to do business with, such as Mr Jordan, who was always nice; Mr Tacker, who had bought a couple of horses from us; and Jake Morrison. But that was business. If they were not in our church, then they were not saved, and he didn’t want to get too close to them or he would have to save them, and that didn’t usually work (as with Uncle Luke and some of our other relatives). Mr Rosebury didn’t give him a chance, though. Every time I rode past, Mr Rosebury was s
aying what a good rider I was, or what a nice horse Onyx was, or how, in another life, he wouldn’t mind being the sort of horseman Dad was. Dad didn’t even correct him – we have one life, and one life is one chance to do right by the Lord.

  The arena we went to was the one with the outside course – you jumped over the hogback at one end, and then out into a big field. The jump at the end had been a coop, but they’d changed it, and they’d changed some of the jumps in the field, too, since the last time Onyx, as Black George, and I had tried those fences and found ourselves (a surprise to me, but not to Black George) jumping the fifteen-foot ditch. Since then, they had added two rather large brush fences and a jump that looked like a table half tilted upwards. It was solid and scary-looking, but scarier to a person than a horse, since the tilt just sort of drew the horse over it. Another scary one had a ditch in front of a vertical built like a pasture fence, and another had two banks – you cantered up a slope, jumped off the bank, jumped right up onto the next bank, which was a stride away, and then galloped down that slope. Fortunately, Colonel Hawkins and Onyx took all the jumps before I did, and I could watch them. The other thing was that they were solid but not terribly high, and for Pie in the Sky that was fine. He wouldn’t have touched the top of any fence if he could help it. It was fun galloping around in the grass – cross-country, you might say. He liked being out of the arena and even had a little more energy than he usually did, but because the jumps were new to him, he paid attention to them and not to whether I was offending him by not doing everything just the way he wanted me to. I didn’t feel that we were about to have any refusals, and the two times he bucked a little bit seemed like exuberance rather than resistance. The jump that looked the scariest – off the one bank and onto the other – was pretty natural. Pie in the Sky was not going to get stuck between those two banks.