Trudy laughed. Carole did not.
“It’s so funny!” Trudy said.
“Not from where I’m standing,” Carole said. She tried again. The same thing happened several times until, finally, the horse realized that Carole wasn’t playing the same game he was. He stood still long enough for her to pat him, but it was nowhere near long enough for her to put the halter on him.
“It’s as if we’ve never done this before,” she said in total frustration. “Somehow, he’s forgotten everything I taught him just two days ago. Poor Stevie must have had a terrible time yesterday. Did she say anything to you?”
“Not at all,” Trudy said. “She just said she had a lot of fun.”
“Well, this isn’t fun. He must not have been doing this!”
Carole held out the halter for Samson to examine. He looked at it very tentatively, curiously. She remained still, not wanting to distract the excitable colt. He stepped toward her extended hand.
“I don’t believe that girl!” Stevie huffed, storming out of the stable area. “Veronica diAngelo is just impossible. Impossible. She wouldn’t give me the time of day, much less lend me money. I must have been crazy to ask her!”
Samson bolted.
Carole sighed. Nothing was going right today. Just when there seemed to be a chance that Samson might learn something, she was interrupted. There was no point in losing her temper at Stevie, though. That was just the way she was.
“What’s the problem?” Carole asked resignedly.
“All I did was ask Veronica a simple question—”
“Nothing about Veronica is ever simple,” Carole reminded her. “So what did you ask?”
“I’ve just got to get some money,” Stevie said. “So I thought maybe she could lend me some. You wouldn’t be able to lend me a few dollars, would you?”
“Stevie, you know I’m saving up every penny for my dad’s birthday.”
Carole could have sworn that Stevie blushed. “Oh, yeah, right,” Stevie said. “Well, I’m not all that desperate, so forget I even mentioned it, will you?”
Stevie grabbed Trudy’s arm and pulled her back toward the stable.
Carole reflected on her day so far and quickly concluded that everybody was acting strangely. Lisa was into a disappearing act; if Stevie was desperate enough to try to borrow money from Veronica, she was in trouble; Samson wasn’t doing any of the things she’d worked so hard to train him to do the other day. And Trudy? Carole suspected that Trudy wasn’t any more strange that day than she usually was, but that was strange enough!
It was time to quit for the day. Carole climbed up over the fence, took off Delilah’s halter and lead rope, and returned the tack to the tack room.
Some days, nothing went right.
LISA COULDN’T HELP grinning. She opened the copy of The Willow Creek Gazette and read the words “Hoof Beat by Lisa Atwood.”
It was like a dream come true. The article had come out to just six hundred words and Mr. Teller had seemed happy about that. Most of the article just listed the classes Max offered for young riders. Mr. Teller had said she had to include that even though it didn’t really seem like news. The last part was news.
And there’s bad news at Pine Hollow this week: Stevie Lake’s wallet was stolen out of her cubby while she was working in the stable. The wallet had more than $15 cash in it.
There were apparently no other young riders at the stable at the time of the theft, but many of the riders knew that Stevie would be there at that time and that she had the cash in her wallet. Stevie was holding the money for her friend Carole Hanson, who had worked and saved the money to buy her father a birthday present. This reporter hopes that whoever took the money will come forward and return it. If it is returned right away, nothing will be said.
Lisa sighed happily. She was glad both that she had news to report and that she’d done it in such a good way. She’d told what had happened, but even more important, she’d given somebody the opportunity to correct the wrong that had been done. Maybe the thief thought she could get away with it. Or maybe, just maybe, the thief was beginning to feel bad, and with the encouragement from her article would have second thoughts about taking somebody else’s property and return it.
Carefully, Lisa folded the newspaper and put it in her backpack to take to the stable. Most people in town did read the paper, and it was probable that they would have noticed The Gazette’s newest feature, but just in case, she wanted to have it with her.
It seemed to Lisa that the fifteen-minute walk to Pine Hollow had never gone faster. The whole way there, she thought about how pleased Stevie was going to be with what she’d done—how she’d asked the thief to return the money. And she also thought about how relieved Carole would be to have the story out in the open so that she had a real shot at getting her money back. Most of all, she thought about how jealous absolutely everybody was going to be. She, Lisa Atwood, had her own column in The Gazette.
She was still floating on air when she entered the locker area. The whole place was full of her classmates. They were all talking to one another in little groups. In one corner, Polly Giacomin was showing some friends a new pair of sandals. In another, Betsy Cavanaugh was talking furiously with two other girls. Anna McWhirter was talking with Lorraine Olson. Lisa was thrilled. Almost certainly, everybody was talking about her.
The first person who spotted her was Stevie. She and Trudy had been standing near the doorway, talking intensely.
“Did you see?” Lisa asked proudly, pulling the paper out of her backpack.
She was expecting Stevie to shriek with joy. Stevie shrieked all right, but it wasn’t with joy.
“How could you do that to me!” she shrieked.
“What do you mean?”
“Writing about losing Carole’s money—she’s furious at me now! I’d already borrowed six dollars to give to her. I was going to get the rest in time, but you blew it. She may never speak to me again!”
Lisa was genuinely surprised to learn that Stevie hadn’t even told Carole about it yet. Carole was her best friend. How could Lisa have known Stevie would keep something like that from Carole?
“But you’d have to tell her eventually,” Lisa said. “I just saved you the trouble.”
“Maybe I would have had to tell her eventually,” Stevie said, “but I should have done it, not you.” She spun on her heel and returned to the bench next to her cubby.
That sounded exactly right to Lisa. Stevie should have done it. Stevie was angry at her for doing something she should have done in the first place! It was just like Stevie to lose her temper without thinking over what she was saying, Lisa thought. She’d get over it. In the meantime, she wasn’t going to let Stevie’s little temper tantrum interfere with her pleasure over her first publication.
She ignored Stevie and found an empty cubby next to where Anna McWhirter was sitting. “Did you see?” Lisa asked, brandishing The Gazette.
“I saw,” Anna said coldly. Lisa suspected she was jealous. She’d get over that in time. Jealousy would eventually turn to admiration, she was sure.
“Do you think it’ll make the thief return the wallet?” Lisa asked.
“It wasn’t me, so you can just forget about that!” Anna said. She gave her boot a final tug, stood up, and walked away.
That surprised Lisa. She hadn’t expected that kind of reaction at all. Then she remembered that Anna’s hat had been stolen, too. Lisa decided that Anna was jealous all right. She was jealous that Lisa had mentioned the theft of the wallet, but not of Anna’s hat. Well, she could do something about that in the next article she wrote, but it would be a week until that one came out.
Lisa busied herself getting ready for class, but her mind was on her next article. She didn’t notice when Veronica diAngelo came and stood next to her.
“I suppose you brought a search warrant,” Veronica said. “You can look all you want in my cubby for Stevie’s wallet. You won’t find it there.”
Veroni
ca spun around and walked away too fast for Lisa to respond—but she wouldn’t have been able to say anything anyway. Lisa was more than a little surprised by Veronica’s reaction. Veronica was always convinced that everything she did was better than anything anybody else ever did. She was the last person at the stable that Lisa would have expected to be jealous. It made Lisa feel good that Veronica was so obviously jealous of her. Maybe, like Anna, she was a little jealous of Carole, too, just because Lisa hadn’t said anything about the theft of Veronica’s riding gloves.
Lisa finished pulling on her boots, collected the tack for Pepper, the horse she usually rode in class, and was about to leave the locker area when she noticed a tight knot of girls in one corner. Betsy Cavanaugh was in the center, her face red with anger and streaked with tears. Lisa had always liked Betsy. She didn’t like to see her so upset about something.
“What’s the matter with Betsy?” she asked, walking over to the group.
“It’s none of your business,” Meg Durham spat out angrily.
“Oh, yes, it is,” Betsy said, overriding Meg. Then she turned to Lisa. “Look,” she said. “Just because I was here when Carole gave Stevie the money doesn’t mean I took it.”
“I never said you did,” Lisa told her.
“Well, you said one of us took it and there weren’t all that many of us there at the time. Two people have already asked me about it, but I’m telling you, I didn’t take it! If you want to know who did, why don’t you find out who just bought herself a new pair of sandals!”
Betsy glared at Lisa, ignoring the tears as they spilled out of her eyes and down her cheeks. Lisa was really sorry Betsy was so upset. Lisa doubted that Betsy had anything to do with the theft because she was such a nice girl. Sometimes the truth hurt, she realized. And sometimes the people who got hurt by the truth were innocent people, like Betsy.
Betsy wiped her tears with her bare hand, streaking her face even more. Lisa always carried tissues. It was one of the things her mother made her do. She pulled the little tissue pack out of her pocket and offered it to Betsy.
“No thank you,” Betsy said. “I’ve gotten enough from you already today.” She sniffed and then turned her back on Lisa. Confused, Lisa shook her head and walked away. It was time to tack up Pepper.
Pepper, it seemed, was the only one who wasn’t jealous or angry at her, she mused as she slipped his bridle over his head.
“Oh, you’re here,” Carole said, genuine surprise apparent in her voice.
Lisa looked up, startled; she hadn’t heard anyone’s footsteps. “Of course I’m here, where else did you think I would be ten minutes before class?” Lisa asked. An awful lot of people seemed to be behaving very strangely today. She had the sinking feeling Carole was going to be another one of them.
“Hiding out,” Carole said. “But you’re brave.”
Lisa finished buckling the bridle and turned her attention to Pepper’s saddle. “I heard you’re not speaking to Stevie. Why? Because she lost your money?”
“No. Because she didn’t tell me about it.”
“I told her she should have,” Lisa said, feeling vindicated.
“You told everyone she should have,” Carole said.
Then Lisa knew for sure that this was going to be another strange conversation. “Just exactly what do you mean by that?” Lisa asked defensively.
“I mean that you told the whole world about some things that were just between friends. I asked Stevie to do me a favor and she tried, but she made a mistake. Now the whole world knows about it.”
“It was news,” Lisa reminded her.
“But it wasn’t anybody else’s business!”
“Stealing is everybody else’s business,” Lisa snapped. “It happened. I didn’t write anything that didn’t happen.”
“What you wrote made it sound like one of the girls here stole Stevie’s wallet with my money in it. That’s not news. It’s a wild accusation!”
Lisa could now feel herself getting angry. Carole obviously just didn’t understand what journalism was all about. It was her job to tell the facts. As long as she stuck to the facts, she wasn’t responsible for how other people interpreted them.
“I didn’t say that any of those girls stole the wallet,” Lisa reminded Carole. “I just said that they were there at the time Stevie got the money. Personally, I don’t have any idea who stole the wallet, but I’ll tell you one thing—if my article gets the thief to return the money, you’ll be thanking me, and so will everybody else.”
Carole shook her head. “I suppose,” she said. “But it seems a high price to pay for fifteen dollars.” And then she walked off to finish tacking up her own horse.
Lisa returned her attention to Pepper. She put the saddle pad on his back, then lifted the saddle up and placed it carefully on the pad. She slid the pad and saddle into place and reached under Pepper for the girth, pulling the strap tight and fastening the first buckle.
“They just don’t understand,” Lisa said to Pepper. “Journalism is reporting facts. All I did was to report the facts. I didn’t say anything that wasn’t true. And besides that, Carole’s just angry because she’s found out that she doesn’t have any money to buy her father a present.”
Lisa gave the girth a final tug as if to emphasize her statement and the piece of leather snapped in her hand. This just wasn’t her day. Now she’d have to go to Mrs. Reg and get another girth. Sure as anything this would make her late for class.
The hallway in the stable area was filled with her classmates and their horses on their way to the outdoor ring. She made her way carefully among them, noting that absolutely nobody spoke to her. How different it was from what she’d been expecting that day! She’d thought everybody was going to be happy for her and proud of her. She was expecting congratulations and hugs. All she was getting was cold shoulders. She was relieved to get to Mrs. Reg’s office and the tack room.
“I need a new girth,” she said. “Pepper’s broke.” She gave Mrs. Reg the broken strap.
Mrs. Reg examined it carefully. “I just wanted to make sure somebody didn’t cut it,” Mrs. Reg explained.
‘Who would do something like that?” Lisa asked.
“Well, you never know in a hotbed of crime like this place …” Mrs. Reg left the thought dangling as she found a new girth and gave it to Lisa.
Lisa took the girth, thanked Mrs. Reg, and returned to Pepper’s stall. Methodically, she began to replace the old girth with the new one. She could hear the class begin in the nearby outdoor ring.
Lisa sighed. Even Mrs. Reg was annoyed with her. And that just meant that even Mrs. Reg didn’t understand the responsibility of the press. She’d read about reporters who had gone to jail to protect their own rights as journalists. This wasn’t exactly the same thing, but it did seem to Lisa that, like some of the finest journalists in the world, she was suffering. But suffering to protect the right of freedom of the press seemed to her like a small price to pay.
She finished buckling one side of the new girth and was about to start the second when she heard her name, from the outdoor ring.
“Where’s Lisa?” Max asked the class.
“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” somebody answered.
The words were like a slap in the face. And they proved to her that she was right. They didn’t understand. But they would understand. No matter how difficult it was, Lisa had to continue her work. She had to make the thief realize that she wasn’t going to let up until the wallet was returned.
This was no time for class, Lisa decided. She was late already, and besides, there was more news for the world to know—more to report. Quickly, she removed the saddle and bridle from Pepper, returned the tack to the tack room, changed back into her street shoes, and began the walk home.
All the way home, she was writing her next article in her head. Her friends would see. She’d make them see.
“THESE ARE SUCH silly clothes!” Trudy exclaimed, looking at herself in the dingy m
irror in Pine Hollow’s locker area.
Stevie laughed out loud. Trudy was dressed to go riding. She wore an old pair of her jodhpurs, low boots, and a plain blue shirt. The outfit looked very normal to Carole, especially when compared with the outfit Trudy had worn walking into the stable!
“You think those are funny clothes?” Carole asked.
Trudy stepped back so she could see all of herself at once in the mirror. She squinted as she examined the total effect. “Yup,” she said, nodding. “They’re funny all right, but I don’t mind. You guys are dressed funny, too, so I don’t stand out.”
Carole almost took Trudy seriously until she spotted the twinkle in her eye. The idea of Trudy’s being afraid to stand out in a crowd was just plain crazy. All three girls started laughing at once.
Trudy was different from anybody Carole had ever met, and she liked her a lot. She was glad Trudy was visiting Stevie, and she was particularly glad that Stevie had finally convinced Trudy to try horseback riding.
“You’re going to love this,” Carole assured Trudy while she handed her the tack she would need for Patch. The girls had gotten Max’s permission to take Trudy on a short trail ride through some neighboring fields and a wooded area. They were under strict orders not to go faster than a walk and not to show off.
Carole didn’t have to be told these things. She knew that a new rider would be safe enough, especially on a calm horse like Patch. But a calm horse could become a dangerously frisky horse if the other riders on the trail were trying stunts.
“Is my horse really big?” Trudy asked, eyeing Patch’s saddle warily.
“He’s big enough,” Carole answered evasively. “But don’t worry, you’re with us. We’ll take care of you.”
“Riding is great—just you wait,” Stevie said. “It’s the most fun thing we do. You’re going to love it.”
Hoof Beat Page 4