Even after Stevie had finished and stormed out to tack up Comanche for class, Lisa was still frozen in place, hiding in the shadows of Mrs. Reg’s office. She heard the rest of Veronica’s presentation, too. Veronica continued to read Lisa’s article, but now the words didn’t sound like hers and the message certainly wasn’t the one she wanted to convey. Instead of describing the Trudy she knew and really liked, she listened to words that seemed to insult Trudy, as if she weren’t really as good as the girls of Willow Creek. Some of it was the way Veronica read, but a lot of the problem came directly from the words Lisa had written.
“ ‘For Trudy, this visit to Willow Creek is an escape from the dingy city, where neighbors crowd upon one another …’ ”
Lisa realized with a start that that made it sound as if Trudy lived in a rat-infested slum, but that wasn’t the case at all. Lisa felt a blush of shame rise. Could she really have written those words?
“ ‘And of course, the most noteworthy aspect of Trudy Sanders is her unique wardrobe! Bright colors mix freely—even within her unusual hairdos! And when she matches her orange hair with some orange eyeshadow—look out!’ ”
Veronica and her friends laughed hysterically. Lisa didn’t know whether they were laughing harder at her or at Trudy, and she didn’t care. She’d made Trudy seem like a freak, not like the nice girl she was. How could she have done that to Trudy—and how could she have done that to herself? She felt she deserved all the mocking laughter Veronica and her pals could hand out, but it wasn’t fair for them to laugh at Trudy for what Lisa had done.
“Isn’t it wonderful?” Veronica asked her friends when she’d finished reading the column. “I’m so glad Lisa is writing this column now. At first, I wasn’t sure, but this—this”—she started laughing and waved the column in the air—“makes all the trouble of the last few weeks worthwhile. Maybe next week she’ll do a job on one of her other friends—if she has any left!”
Lisa could tell Veronica was just warming up to her subject and had lots more to say when she was interrupted by the public address system. Max announced that class would begin in five minutes. The girls hurried to collect their tack and go saddle their horses.
Lisa remained in Mrs. Reg’s office, hiding in the shadows, unable to move. Thoughts raced through her mind, the words that Veronica had read echoing again and again. Everything that had sounded so cute and funny when she’d written it had come out sounding cruel and heartless as Veronica read it. True, Veronica could make a Valentine sound like a death threat, but the words were Lisa’s. She’d written everything Veronica had read, and although she hadn’t meant to at all, she’d made Trudy sound awful. Poor Trudy.
“Lisa, is that you?” Mrs. Reg’s soft voice broke into her thoughts. “Are you crying, dear?”
Lisa brushed her cheek with her hand and was surprised to find it streaked with tears. She hadn’t realized. She knew that they were tears of anger, tears of humiliation, tears of sadness, but mostly, they were tears for Trudy. She must have hurt Trudy very much and that was exactly the opposite of what she’d meant to do.
Then she could see what Trudy had been telling her. Friends don’t treat one another the way she’d been treating her friends. They don’t take things said in private and make them public the way she’d done with Trudy; they don’t use others’ personal problems for their own personal use, the way she’d done with the loss of Stevie’s wallet. That wasn’t what friendship was about; it also wasn’t what journalism was about. She wasn’t being a journalist, she was just being a gossip.
Mrs. Reg slipped her arm across Lisa’s shoulder to comfort her. Lisa had the feeling Mrs. Reg knew exactly what had happened. Mrs. Reg always seemed to know.
“Oh,” Lisa said, turning to the older woman, “Mrs. Reg, I’ve done the most awful thing!”
Mrs. Reg hugged her and then Lisa’s tears came pouring out. On top of everything else, she didn’t feel as if she deserved Mrs. Reg’s comfort. That made her cry even harder.
“I’ve hurt so many people’s feelings,” she said. “I hurt Stevie and Carole and Anna, Betsy, and Polly—even Veronica—and now worst of all, I hurt Trudy’s. I didn’t mean to do it, but I did it. Everything I wrote was worse than the last thing I’d done. I’m just so awful!” She wanted to say more, but she was crying too hard.
Mrs. Reg reached for a tissue from the top of her desk and gave it to Lisa. Then a second and a third. She waited, quietly, until finally the last tear had dropped.
“Done?” Mrs. Reg asked.
Lisa nodded. “Definitely! I’m done writing, I’m done with my friends, I guess I’m even done riding.”
“Hold on now,” Mrs. Reg said. “Just because you’ve made a whole bunch of mistakes doesn’t mean it’s time to make a whole bunch more.” Mrs. Reg led Lisa to the tack room bench where they both sat down. “I remember a rider we had here once,” she began.
Mrs. Reg was famous for her memory of past horses and riders. It seemed to The Saddle Club that whenever there was a problem, Mrs. Reg had a story to tell. Lisa and her friends had learned long ago that her stories were usually worth listening to.
“This rider started riding here when she was about your age, but she’d already been riding for years. Max knew right away that she had talent, but she also had problems. Lots of them. See, not only had she been riding for years, but she’d been riding wrong for years. She wanted to be a championship rider and Max thought she could be among the best. That was the only place they agreed. See, she’d gotten the idea that her job, as a rider, was to control the horse. From the minute she’d get into the saddle until she got out, she held that poor animal in check, tugging on the reins, squeezing him with her legs, hitting him with the whip. He’d usually do what she wanted because he knew she was the boss.”
“Isn’t the rider supposed to be the boss?” Lisa asked.
“Yes and no,” Mrs. Reg said. “The rider certainly needs to establish who’s in charge, but once that’s clear, the object should be to work together. If the rider spends all the time controlling, then there’s no time to cooperate. It works and there’s no question that you can ride that way, but it’s no way to be a champion.”
“I bet Max didn’t like her being so mean to his horses,” Lisa said. “Did he refuse to let her ride here?”
“Oh, no,” Mrs. Reg said. “He knew she was going to be a good rider and he wanted to work with her, so he started her from the beginning. First, he had her work with all the horses on a lead rope, then a lunge line. That gave them more freedom and let her learn what they could do without her legs and whip. Also, he had her give them carrots every time they did something right for her.”
“Was that sort of an apology to the horses?” Lisa asked.
“Exactly,” Mrs. Reg said. “When she’d made friends with the horses, she actually began liking them and trusting them. So he started her in a beginner’s class and taught her from scratch.”
“Oh, she must have been so bored!” Lisa said.
“Not at all,” Mrs. Reg said. “See, you’re only bored when you’re studying things you already know. She was a beginner. Almost nothing she’d done before was going to be of any use to her. She had to work very hard.”
Mrs. Reg stood up as if to dismiss Lisa. As usual, her story was ending before her listener was ready for the end. Lisa stood up, too.
“So what happened then?”
Mrs. Reg looked at her as if she were a little surprised that Lisa didn’t already know the answer. “Why, she became a champion, of course. Now, if you see Red, tell him I need him. He’s just got to get on with the painting. Can you believe the smell? I can’t stand it. I’m sure the horses can’t either. And I also have to call the grain and feed man …” Mrs. Reg strode into her office and picked up the phone. Lisa was left alone with her thoughts.
Since Mrs. Reg’s stories were usually lessons in disguise, Lisa’s next step was to figure out just what the lesson was. Obviously, she had to learn something about jou
rnalism from the very beginning. She was a long way from being ready for a job as an investigative reporter. But first, what did the lead rope and the lunge line and the carrots have to do with journalism?
Then she understood. Just as the championship rider had to apologize to the horses she’d hurt before she could begin again, she, Lisa, had to apologize to the people she’d hurt before she could learn anything about writing. She had hurt a lot of people, she knew, but the one she’d hurt most had been Trudy. That was the place to start.
It was too late for her to join the class now, and besides, Lisa didn’t want to face any of her classmates just yet. The most important thing was to find Trudy and talk to her.
Lisa shoved her things into her cubby and headed for the outdoor ring where the class was taking place. Trudy liked to sit on the fence and observe, but Lisa could see from inside the stable that Trudy wasn’t there. She checked Samson and Delilah’s paddock. No sign of her. She looked in the feed room, Max’s office, the stalls, and the tack room. Trudy was nowhere to be found.
“Trudy?” Red said when Lisa asked. “I think she’s having a private lesson. She asked me to show her how to tack up Topside.”
“Trudy?” one of the painters said when Lisa stopped him. “The one with the colored hair? I saw her riding by herself out toward the trails.”
By herself? Trudy didn’t have anywhere near enough experience to ride by herself. What could she have been thinking of? Lisa wondered.
Then Lisa knew: Trudy was running away, the only way she could think of—on horseback.
Lisa guessed that Trudy had waited until the class was in progress before taking Topside out of the stable. Everybody would be too busy then to notice.
Lisa knew that Trudy could be in real danger out there by herself. An inexperienced rider had no business on the trails alone. Even on a gentle horse Trudy could be in real trouble. Topside wasn’t a gentle horse. He was a champion show horse—spirited and determined. Trudy Sanders was no match for him.
Lisa knew that she could ask Max for help, or Mrs. Reg or Red or any other rider. She also knew that she was the reason Trudy was gone, and she would be the reason Trudy would come back.
LISA HAD NEVER saddled her horse faster than she did that day. Pepper seemed to understand that this was no day to play games. He stood completely still and even lowered his head so she could put the bridle on. She patted him in thanks, remembering Mrs. Reg’s story.
Lisa led her horse to the stable exit out of sight of the outdoor ring and mounted him. She didn’t want her classmates or Max to see that she was going out by herself. Obviously Trudy must have done the same thing. That meant that she had at least started out on one of the trails that began at the back of the stable. Lisa began to consider the options before she realized she had forgotten something very important. She had forgotten the good-luck horseshoe.
She turned Pepper back toward the stable, walked him up to the doorway, and brushed the horseshoe with her hand. Then she was ready to begin her quest.
But which trail? Sitting tall on Pepper’s back, she surveyed the possibilities. All of the Pine Hollow students knew the trails because they’d ridden them time and time again. There were four starting at the back of the stable that Trudy might have taken. First was Lisa’s favorite, the mountain trail, which led into the woods and up the mountain. Then, the forest trail. It headed straight for the mountain and wound through the woods. The creek trail started out on a hill and followed the creek that gave Willow Creek its name. Finally, there was the field trail. It snaked through nearby fields, running into the woods parallel to the river that Willow Creek became. Beyond it was the highway. Until it got into the woods, it wasn’t a very pretty trail—certainly Lisa’s least favorite.
Lisa decided on the mountain trail and signaled Pepper to head to the left when something occurred to her. Trudy was a city girl. She liked concrete, especially the kind that could be found on the highway. If she was actually running away, she’d know that the highway could lead her home.
There were two problems with that. The first was that the river was deep, wide, and dangerous at the point where the trail reached it. The other was that it was right next to the highway where trucks honked, cars backfired, and sirens sometimes wailed. Topside was a champion, but he was also skittish. Highway noises could frighten Topside and Trudy wasn’t experienced enough to control him. Lisa realized she didn’t have a minute to spare.
She turned Pepper toward the field trail. “Come on, boy,” she said. “We’ve got a job to do!”
Pepper seemed to understand her. His ears perked up alertly. He tensed, ready for her next instruction. She nudged him in the belly and shifted her weight forward in the saddle. Pepper broke into a fast walk, and when he was warmed up, Lisa got him to trot and then canter. It was the best chance for Lisa to catch up with Trudy before she got into trouble. Unless Topside got out of control, Trudy was too inexperienced to do more than walk him.
The grass in the fields had been cut for the harvest so Lisa could see clearly around her. She kept a sharp eye for anything suspicious in the grass and was relieved when there was nothing to see.
If she’d been able to travel straight to the creek, it would have been only about a mile, about a ten-minute ride. But the hilly fields made it impossible to go straight and she had to follow the trail. It took her more than forty-five minutes to reach the final hillock. When she crested it, she found Trudy.
Her first instinct was to laugh at the sight, a hundred yards away down the hill on the edge of the river. There stood the city girl, sopping wet and hopping mad. Her usually stand-up hairdo hung limply on her neck. The pinkish dye she’d sprayed on that morning had seeped onto her yellow shirt. But the funny part of the scene was the fact that Trudy was standing almost toe-to-toe with Topside, hands on her hips, and her chin jutted out in the most determinedly stubborn look Lisa had ever seen as she concentrated on her battle of wits with the horse. Topside wasn’t budging. He returned her glare with a bored stare. As Lisa watched, Trudy made what looked like an attempt at delivering the last word and walked around to the horse’s left side, picking up the reins. She was ready to mount. She was following all the instructions Carole and Stevie had apparently given her because she was making a good start. But as soon as she lifted her left foot to put it in the stirrup, Topside took two steps to the right, leaving Trudy unbalanced with her foot in the air. She fell down.
Lisa giggled. Then she realized it wasn’t really a funny scene, certainly not to Trudy, who had experienced enough unhappiness for one day. Trudy must have attempted to cross the river and Topside had thrown her. The horse understood that the minute Trudy got back on him, she was going to try again. He didn’t want to cross the river. The easiest way for him was to not let her mount.
There was no telling how long the standoff could have gone on. Lisa noticed that the whole time, Topside’s ears were twitching alertly, aware of the noises of the highway. One honk and he’d take off. The risks were too great that he’d hurt Trudy when he did it.
Lisa gave Pepper a signal to continue. The hill was steep and he had to go slowly, step by step. The delay worried Lisa. She had the feeling that Trudy needed her help a lot more than Trudy realized.
As Lisa watched with concern, Trudy once more took the reins. This time, however, instead of moving slowly toward the championship horse, she dashed up to the horse’s left side and sprang upward, clinging to his saddle for all she was worth. Topside took off at a trot. Trudy held on, somehow managing to get into the saddle. She even got one foot into his stirrups.
“Hold on!” Lisa cried, now close enough to be heard. “You’re doing great!”
Trudy glanced at her. Her surprise was apparent, but her fear—and anger—was even more obvious.
“Leave me alone!” Trudy yelled back at her. “You’ve done enough harm already! Go away!”
In her agitation, Trudy yanked at Topside’s reins. The motion was sudden and firm and gave a clea
r message to the horse. Topside halted immediately.
Lisa sighed with relief.
A passing eighteen-wheel truck blasted its horn and Topside took off at full speed.
Trudy was jostled so badly that the one foot that was in a stirrup slipped through it. Now she had lost any chance to use her feet for balance, and Lisa knew that she was at a very definite risk of being thrown by Topside. If that happened when her foot was sticking all the way through the stirrup, she could be dragged along by the horse.
There wasn’t a second to lose! Once again, Pepper understood her urgency.
“Grab his mane, hold on!” Lisa cried, knowing that if she held the mane tight, Trudy had a chance of keeping her balance. Topside swerved to the right, Trudy lurched to the left, her left foot dangling treacherously through the stirrup.
Pepper galloped along the hillside, parallel to the runaway horse, but well above him. There was no way Pepper could gallop down the hill. It was an extremely dangerous thing for a horse to do. Lisa just had to stay as close as possible until the hill flattened out in another hundred yards.
“I can’t control him!” Trudy yelled.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be there as fast as I can. Just hold on!” Lisa yelled.
She tried to sound confident. She didn’t feel it at all. She just hoped that Trudy didn’t realize what a dangerous situation she was in. The last thing Trudy needed was to get more panicky than she was.
Lisa felt as if it were almost a dream, as if she were watching the action from very far away. She was aware of the horses, racing along the riverbank. She felt the power of the horse beneath her, she heard the thunderous clamor of hoofbeats, but the only thing she saw, really saw, was Trudy’s foot dangling through Topside’s stirrup. It drove her as she had never known she could be driven. Slowly, achingly slowly, she got Pepper to move downhill, closer to Topside, closer to the dangling foot. “Hold on,” she whispered in her horse’s ear. “Hold on. Don’t let go of the mane. Don’t fall. I’ll get there. Please be okay …”
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