The Pullein-Thompson Treasury of Horse and Pony Stories

by Christine Pullein-Thompson

  “I don’t want another pony, I want Firkin,” I replied. “I want his mealy nose and his little ways. I don’t want a better one. Anyway, he was the best pony in the whole world.”

  “Laminitis and all,” laughed Mum.

  I took to haunting his field. It was flat, and lay under a wood where birds sang cheerily. And it was here one evening I first saw Firkin come back to life. He was staring into the field, his mealy nose like a beacon in the dusk, his small hoofs shiny with rain.

  “Firkin,” I yelled. “Firkin.” But when I reached the wood he had vanished.

  I returned indoors. “I’ve just seen a ghost,” I announced. “Firkin’s ghost.”

  “Don’t be absurd, there’s no such thing as ghosts,” replied Mum, dishing up fish fingers. “You’re imagining things, and I don’t like you out in the field so late. Anything could happen.”

  “He’s returned to haunt us because we murdered him,” I cried, and burst into tears.

  I had supper in bed that night. Mum sat beside me, explaining that ghosts don’t exist, that such things are just part of the imagination. “When you wake up in the morning, everything will be different,” she said.

  But it wasn’t. I was still missing Firkin. It was a wet day, and in the evening I returned to the field and found hoofprints in the wood, leading along a narrow track. But the ghost of Firkin did not come – there was no sound but the sighing of the wind in the trees, and the scuttling of rabbits in the undergrowth, and the falling rain.

  When I returned to the house Mum said, “I don’t want you loafing about the field any more. You’ll be kidnapped. Stay in and watch television, and what about preparing for school?”

  “There were hoofprints,” I said, “small ones. How does a vet kill a pony?”

  “Don’t be morbid,” replied Mum.

  “I want to know.”

  “With a humane killer. It is all over in a moment,” said Mum, buttering toast.

  I imagined the young vet with the pimple by his nose killing Firkin. Perhaps the red-haired girl had assisted, and a truck with a winch, which called itself a horse ambulance, had taken him away to be turned into dog food.

  I hated myself for not fighting harder to save poor Firkin. I looked at his tack and thought, he’ll never wear it again, never, never, never. And all because I was too feeble to fight for him. His bit was small and worn, his browband large, because he had had a broad forehead.

  “Here, let me hide it. I’ll put it somewhere else,” cried Mum, seeing the tears rolling down my cheeks.

  “And don’t go to the field any more – okay?” And she put the tack in the cupboard under the stairs.

  “We’ll buy you a puppy, a lovely, lovely, cuddly puppy,” she said.

  “Laminitis is curable, isn’t it?” I asked.

  “No, not if it’s chronic. Here, I’ll look up the word ‘chronic’ in the dictionary,” said Mum, going through into the sitting room. “But he was just a pony; you musn’t turn him into a human – they are different.”

  “Yes, nicer. Ponies are much nicer,” I answered. “They don’t start wars, or drop bombs, or murder one another…”

  “Here it is – ‘Chronic – confirmed, permanent, bad, intense, severe, etc.’,” read Mum. “‘Established, abiding.’ It doesn’t say incurable, but it means it.”

  “We could have had a second opinion,” I argued, staring through the window into the dark outside. “If he had been human, we would have had a second opinion. You don’t put humans down, do you? And his death must have been violent, or he wouldn’t be haunting us now.”

  I slept very badly that night. I dreamed that Firkin was back in our field. I heard him whinny. He came to the gate and called to me, and it was so real that I woke up crying. It was five o’clock, and dawn was breaking. I suddenly felt that Firkin was very near, that I had to find him. I dressed in jeans and a sweater, put on Wellington boots because the grass would be wet with dew, and silently let myself out of the house without even the creak of a board.

  Outside the world was new and damp and empty. It was all mine, except for a cat padding softly along our rather suburban road, and birds perched on telegraph wires, surveying the scene.

  The road looked beautiful:the houses slept, their curtained windows like closed eyes, the cars outside still and lifeless. I slipped under the rail fence and waded through dew-wet grass. A mist lay on the woods, cobwebs more fragile than spun glass festooned the brambles. Why don’t I do this every morning? I thought, while above me the sky turned rosy pink. I had reached the woods now. I thought I heard a whinny and there were fresh hoofprints on the soft earth.

  Then I saw something moving in the distance, misty in the morning light, and my heart began to race – Firkin! I started to run, stumbling over roots, brambles, tearing my jeans, fear mixed with suspense. He will fade away in a minute, I thought, become part of the mist, because ghosts fade with the dawn. I am only just in time.

  I rounded a corner. Beech trees stood as tall and straight as guardsmen on parade, but Firkin had gone. Cocks crowed in the distance and birds sang, while tears ran down my cheeks like rain. I waited for my heart to stop beating; for reason to come back. I told myself it was useless. I told myself that Firkin was dead and that everything was in my imagination, that I was going mad. I looked at the trees, so tall and silent, and cried, “Help me, please, someone help me,” but nothing moved nor spoke, and then I saw the hoofprints again, clear and definite in the damp earth, and decided to go on. The path wound between the trees and I imagined my parents getting up, seeing my open door, looking for me. I imagined them going down to the field and calling my name. “Olivia, Olivia, where are you? It’s breakfast, Olivia. It’s school time. Hurry!”

  But I felt drawn to the hoofprints like a hound to a scent. I had to go on. I turned another comer and the sun was sparkling on the cobwebs and the dew was drying. The track led downhill and there was the smell of cow in the air; it was wide and clear, and I started to run, imagining the school bus leaving without me.

  I reached a clearing where rabbits clustered like people at a bus stop. I turned left, following the hoofprints, and heard a donkey braying, “Hee-haw, hee-haw.” Next I saw rooftops and then a farm snuggling at the end of the track, and still the hoofmarks led on. I stopped there and thought, Suppose I really have imagined the whole thing… What can I say? My boots were wet and shiny, my hair full of brambles, my sweater stuck with burrs, while I stood wavering, wondering what I could say if anyone asked me why I had come. I could see chickens scratching round a barn door, and a Jersey cow standing by a gate. Should I say I’d seen a ghost? No, that would make me well and truly mad. I would pretend I had lost a dog, a puppy called Maisie. It would be a lie, but only a white one, I reasoned, walking on slowly towards the farm.

  Everything needed painting; it was about as far as you could get from our neat suburban home, where chosen shrubs filled the garden and the lawn was mown every other day throughout the summer.

  Nettles grew in clumps about the yard. A donkey was tethered on what once had been a lawn. Then I heard someone calling, “Hurry, for heaven’s sake, or we’ll be late for school again.”

  And another voice replying, “Blast school.”

  Then something which made my blood run cold. “Have you put Firkin in?”

  “Not yet.”

  And Firkin was my pony.

  “Well, he’s waiting.”

  “He always is.”

  I walked into the yard then and looked around. A tall boy came out of a shed and asked, “Who are you?” He had blue eyes which looked straight at you, a scornful mouth, long hands. He was wearing dungarees.

  I was struck dumb.

  “We’ve got a visitor,” he yelled. “I think it’s the little girl who used to own Firkin.” And three more children appeared and stared at me.

  “So?” asked a girl with a long plait down her back, the largest of the three. “What do you want? As far as you are concerned Firkin is de
ad. You wanted it that way. You wanted your beastly holiday in Spain. You wanted him turned into dog food. You didn’t want to nurse him. Well, we’ve nursed him back to health.”

  “But the vet said – ” I began.

  “Why do you listen to vets? Especially Patrick. Everyone knows he’s useless,” the girl said.

  “We thought it was for the best,” I said, and suddenly I felt very small and feeble. “I wouldn’t have come all this way if I hadn’t cared. I loved him. I didn’t want him put down.”

  “Why did you let it happen then?” asked the girl. “Surely you can manage your parents.”

  “Shut up,” the boy said. “Can’t you see she’s crying?”

  “You can have him. I don’t mind. I just want to see him sometimes, that’s all,” I said. “I thought it was his ghost. I never thought he could be alive. I’m so happy. I just want him to be alive. If I can’t have him, it doesn’t matter. I don’t deserve him anyway.”

  “He’s over there,” said the boy, taking my arm, and there was Firkin waiting outside the barn door. “We starved him, then kept him on shavings and fed him only on straw. He was all right in a week. Of course you must have him back, he’s yours. We’ll help you look after him. You can have Matthew for company. He’s the donkey; but you must ride Firkin every day and keep him in while you are at school. All right?”

  Firkin whinnied when he saw me. He looked slim and lovely and his little hoofs were neat and newly- trimmed. “He’s such a lovely pony,” the girl said. “He deserves a good home.”

  “How did you know he was going to be – put down?” I asked, my arms round Firkin’s neck.

  “We wanted Patrick to look at the cow’s udder and he offered to fit it in with a visit to put down your little pony,” related the boy. “We couldn’t believe it.”

  “So we kidnapped Firkin, halter and all, and left a message saying ‘We’ve changed our minds. We’re keeping the pony.’ It took some nerve, didn’t it, Phil?” said the girl.

  Phil nodded. “Keep him in all day. We’ll bring him over this evening with Matthew,” he told me.

  “But I haven’t got a stable,” I answered.

  “Use the garage, turn the cars out. Don’t be dim,” Phil said. “We’ll help you. We understand laminitis, don’t we, Briony?”

  “Sure.”

  “We must get on or we’ll be late for school. You too,” said Phil. “See you about five.”

  “Why was he in the wood?” I asked.

  “There was nowhere else to put him,” said Briony, opening the barn door. “We have hardly any grass.”

  “Do you know the way back?” asked Phil.

  “I think so.”

  “Don’t get lost.”

  The wood was warm and friendly now, even the trees seemed to be singing in the breeze. I ran and everything looked greener and more beautiful because Firkin was alive after all. Mum was just up when I burst into the kitchen.

  “Good Lord!” she cried. “Where have you come from? I was just going to get you up. I thought you were in bed.”

  “I’m hungry, terribly hungry,” I cried, seizing a cereal bowl. “You were right about ghosts, they don’t exist, or only in my imagination.” And I started to laugh and couldn’t stop for ages. When I did, I said, “Guess what? Firkin is alive; he’s coming back this evening. Isn’t it wonderful?”

  “Now I know you really are mad!” exclaimed Mum.

  “Just wait and see! Wait until five o’clock. He’s coming with a donkey and he’s got to live in the garage in the daytime. He’s cured!” I cried, gobbling cornflakes. “I can ride again, every day. He must be exercised. The vet was wrong; it wasn’t chronic. Oh, I’m so happy.”

  “I’ll believe it when I see it,” cried Mum. Then she mouthed at Dad, who had just come into the kitchen, smelling of aftershave, “She thinks Firkin’s coming back. She had better see a doctor.”

  School dragged by, and by the time it was over I had decided it was all a dream. But punctually at five there was the pad of unshod hoofs on the road outside and Phil’s voice calling, “We’re here.” And the three of them were by our gate – Firkin, Matthew and Phil – and it was the happiest moment of my life, and even Mum couldn’t say it wasn’t true.

  Please Tame Him

  Diana Pullein-Thompson

  At the animal sanctuary Jason Cook and Jane Wright were known as the two Jays. They looked like brother and sister, both being fair with blue eyes, but were actually friends and neighbours. Jason loved the birds, and Jane their enemies the cats, and both adored the dogs who often arrived in a desperate state. The sanctuary was run by Pete and Debbie Brown, assisted by volunteers, and, of course, the two Jays, who petted the dogs and cats, helped with cleaning runs and cages, and went for sponsored walks in aid of the place. Naturally, they longed and longed to take all the animals home, but, since their parents had dogs, Pete thought this might be unwise.

  “They’d frighten the birds, quarrel with the cats and be jealous if you imported one of their own kind into their homes,” he said.

  But one wet day, when Jason and Jane dropped in on their way back from school, all that changed.

  “Come and see our new arrival,” said Debbie, looking harassed as she pushed a strand of dark hair out of her peat-brown eyes. “We can’t keep him.”

  She took the children to a small dark shed, opened the door a crack and pointed at a terrified blue roan pony cowering in a comer.

  “Of course, we don’t usually take ponies, as you know, but we had to break our rules for this one – I mean, look at those scars. He’s obviously been beaten. But he can hardly turn round in here and he needs daylight.”

  “Can we look after him, please?” chorused the Jays. And they knew that thought had already crossed Debbie’s mind when she said, “You’ve got outbuildings, haven’t you, Jason?”

  “Not a stable,” he replied doubtfully. “Sheds.”

  “But a garage you don’t use,” cut in Jane.

  “Full of junk and it only has broken double doors.”

  “We could leave them open and I could buy six brackets and put bars across,” Debbie said. “We would supply bedding and food.” She glanced at Jane, too. “Please tame him for us?”

  “Yes, yes, oh please, yes,” cried Jane.

  “I’ll have to check with Mum and Dad,” said Jason.

  “Fair enough,” agreed Debbie. “He’s called Smoky, by the way, and he’s not dangerous and, anyway, he has no shoes, so if he did kick it wouldn’t be fatal. But he needs oceans of loving care, and Pete and I… well you know how busy we are. I mean there’s fund-raising as well as the caring and the assessing.”

  “We’ll make friends with him. Show him we care,” declared Jane.

  “You’ve hit the nail on the head,” said Debbie. “I knew you would understand.”

  “Our holidays start tomorrow,” said Jason. “Come on, Jane, let’s find Mum and Dad.” He ran to his bike and the next moment the two Jays were cycling down the track that led to the lane that ran beside their houses.

  Of course, it wasn’t easy. Mr Cook was afraid Smoky might interfere with Jason’s work when term started again and Mr Wright wondered whether the responsibility was too great, and both mothers were afraid their children might be bitten or kicked. “Wild animals are not to be trusted,” Mrs Cook said. “And suppose he escapes and rampages all over the garden.”

  “Listen,” Jason said, “if we don’t win Smoky round he could be destroyed. This is a matter of life or death.”

  “Please,” pleaded Jane. “If we all worried about what might happen we would never move at all.”

  “She’s right,” exclaimed Mrs Wright. “And if the pony needs help…”

  “Oh, go ahead,” said Mr Cook. “That garage could do with a clear-out, anyhow.”

  “As long as they keep him off my borders,” murmured his wife.

  “We promise,” said Jason.

  The next morning the Jays moved the junk and Pete and D
ebbie brought the brackets and rails, and bales of hay and straw, and turned the garage into a sort of stable.

  “And here’s a worm dose for him, too,” Debbie said. “And some insecticide to kill his lice when you can get near enough to spray him.”

  In the afternoon a friendly cattle truck driver backed his vehicle to the Browns’ shed, from which Debbie gently shooed Smoky up the ramp. Then it took less than ten minutes to cover the mile to Jason’s small, well-kept home. The children were waiting, a Labrador, Olivio, at their side with Mrs Cook, who cried, “Oh no! My turf, my turf. Oh, not the pansies, please not the pansies,” as the truck thundered up the grass track to Smoky’s new stable.

  “The grass will soon grow again, madam, and look, the flowers are all right,” the driver said, before reversing to the entrance of the building and putting down the ramp. Debbie then crawled in through a small hatch at the side of the truck and the terrified Smoky plunged down into the stable.

  “Super,” said Debbie, fixing the rails.

  “Brilliant,” said Jane.

  “Great,” said Jason.

  “That was a piece of cake,” said the driver, lifting the ramp. “I never expected it to be quite so easy.”

  When the truck and the Browns had left, the Jays filled a net with hay and hung it in the stable on a peg which had once held a worn-out vacuum cleaner, and put a bucket of water close to the rails. Then they sat down in the straw.

  “Isn’t he lovely!” Jane said. “But we won’t try to touch him. We’ll wait for him to touch us.”

  “I read in a book once – I think it was called The Children of the New Forest,” said Jason, “that when people in the old days wanted to tame ponies they kept them short of food, so in the end they welcomed the owners, because they knew their arrival meant the end of hunger.”

  “Smoky’s not wild, though. He’s just terrified because he’s been bashed about,” Jane said, looking at the pony as he stood trembling, as far away from the children as possible.