The Prize

by Stacy Gregg

  Tara shook her head. “Not your ribs. I mean R.I.B.S – as in Rhythm, Impulsion, Balance and Speed – the four keys when we are jumping.”

  “Oh,” Georgie said, feeling a bit thick for not remembering this lesson.

  Tara turned to the rest of the class. “I’m sure that Georgie isn’t the only one here who needs to work on these things. So let me see all of you through the course now one at a time. And don’t forget to think RIBS the whole way!”

  Rhythm was at the heart of their jumping session that morning. Tara impressed upon the class the importance of keeping the horses in a steady stride.

  “Try counting your stride out loud between the jumps.” Tara told Georgie as she circled Belle ready to attempt the course for a second time.

  “One-two!” They took the first jump.

  “Stop hanging on to her face!” Tara shouted. “Keep your legs on and stay calm in the saddle. Count your strides!”

  “One-two-three-four!” And another turn to the next jump. “One-two…”

  Georgie kept counting all the way to the final fence and it wasn’t until she was over it that she realised how much better that round had felt.

  “You had the mare going forward without a fight,” Tara looked pleased. “Did you feel how much more balanced that was?”

  Georgie nodded.

  “Now that you actually have some control and balance we can focus on your turns. We’ll make that our next session tomorrow morning.”

  “Tomorrow morning?” Georgie was confused.

  “School regulations state that you need an instructor present at all times for showjumping in the indoor arena,” Tara said. “And since you seem to be dedicated enough to get out of bed at this hour I suppose I can manage to turn up too and make this an official morning tutorial. That is, if you want it?”

  “That would be brilliant,” Georgie said.

  “Excellent,” Tara said. “Tomorrow morning at seven then.”

  Every morning when Georgie woke up her first thought was Riley and how much she missed him. He still wouldn’t return her phone calls and if her life hadn’t been such a blur of activity she would have felt totally miserable about him.

  Her daily schedule was gruelling but Georgie knew it was worth it. The early morning sessions had been taken up a notch with Tara instructing. When Tara was a professional eventing rider she’d been renowned for aceing the showjumping phase, with a world-class record for always turning in a clear round on the final day.

  In their second session they worked on making sharp turns.

  “From the very first stride after you land you should be riding with the next jump in mind,” Tara told them. “In fact, even in mid-air you should already be turning your horse where you want to go.”

  In just a couple of sessions Georgie’s turns improved so much that she could now spin Belle on right angles straight after the jump if she needed to.

  By week two Tara decided that the riders were ready for flying changes and Georgie spent lesson after lesson working to ride Belle so that she landed after a jump leading with the correct leg to tackle the next fence.

  “On tight courses the ability to change legs so that you are balanced coming into a jump could be the difference between winning and losing,” Tara told her class.

  Georgie had been finessing her technical skills to the point where even Dominic Blackwell noticed the change in her riding when she worked his horses in the arena.

  As head girl Blackwell had been assigning Georgie his best horses to ride. Of course, this didn’t stop him from being vile and demanding. It was becoming clear to Georgie that Blackwell had actually been on best behaviour for those first weeks of their apprenticeship. He’d managed to suppress his worst traits then, but now they were surfacing thick and fast. He constantly contradicted himself and was arrogant to the point of being delusional. No matter how hard Georgie tried to please him he was never satisfied with her efforts. He made her clean out the loose boxes at least twice most days before he was satisfied. He would pull faces and mutter about the appalling state of the horses even though Georgie had them glossed to the level of a best-groomed trophy at any gymkhana.

  Blackwell’s habit of dismounting and quite literally throwing the reins at his grooms was so arrogant and awful it would have been funny – if only Georgie had someone to laugh about it with when the day was over. But all she had was Kennedy, who wasn’t exactly brimming over with camaraderie. Kennedy’s latest tactic seemed to be simple: do absolutely no work and drive Georgie completely barking.

  “I wouldn’t care if Dominic Blackwell had made you queen of England,” Kennedy told Georgie when she made the perfectly reasonably request for Kennedy to tack up Maximillion. “You might be head girl, but I’m not taking orders from you.”

  “We’re both in this together, Kennedy,” Georgie had tried to tell her. “Do you want to fail the final exam?”

  “If I take you down with me, it’ll be worth it,” Kennedy replied.

  It was impossible to coax Kennedy into doing any work. Georgie suspected that Dominic Blackwell knew what was happening, but what did he care? As long as the work got done he was happy.

  On a sunny Friday afternoon in the stables, Georgie was filling the hay nets when she heard the sound of footsteps behind her. She knew Dominic was still out in the arena so she assumed it must be Kennedy, skulking about. But when she turned around, she saw it wasn’t Kennedy at all. Conrad was standing there, arms folded and a wry smile on his face. Georgie had the feeling he’d been standing there like that for a while.

  “What are you doing here, Conrad?” Georgie felt distinctly uncomfortable being alone with him like this. She had managed to avoid the Burghley House head prefect since that kiss.

  “I came here to see my girl,” Conrad said smiling at her.

  “I’m not your…” Georgie began and then she realised what he meant.

  “Oh, Kennedy,” she said. “Well I don’t know where she is.”

  “Conrad!” Kennedy called out as she skipped into view all sweetness and light. “Are you here to give me a lift back to school? Oh, thank god for that. I am so sick of riding on that smelly minibus full of morons!” She looked pointedly at Georgie.

  “Come on,” she pulled him by the arm. “Let’s go.”

  But Conrad didn’t move. “Wait,” he said to Kennedy. “Shouldn’t we give Georgie a lift back as well?”

  “No!” Georgie and Kennedy both said in unison.

  “Are you sure?” Conrad gave Georgie a mischievous grin. “Come on, Georgie, I’ll let you ride up front with me if you want.”

  Kennedy pulled a face. “Are you insane, Conrad? She’s said no already. Let’s go!”

  “Kenny will be here with the minibus soon,” Georgie pointed out. “And I still have to clean out two more loose boxes.”

  Kennedy put her arm around Conrad and led him off down the corridor. They were almost out the door when he turned back to Georgie. Kennedy didn’t see Conrad’s smile as he gestured to Georgie, his hand to his face, little finger and thumb extended, smiling as he mouthed silently: “Call me!”

  Chapter Eleven

  There were three boys’ boarding houses at Blainford. Luhmuhlen and Lexington were located up beyond the fork of the driveway, but the third, Burghley House, was right beside the main school. It was a single level residence, built out of the same red brick as the school buildings and surrounded by magnolia bushes. At the front of the house there was a games room with a pool table and French doors leading out on to the lawn. Behind this room was the prefect’s study and this was where Damien Danforth found Conrad Miller on Saturday afternoon.

  “What do you want, Danforth?” Conrad snapped when the boy stuck his head around the door.

  “There’s a girl at the games room looking for you,” Danforth said.

  “Kennedy?” Conrad sighed. “What does she want now?”

  “Not Kennedy,” Damien replied. “It’s Georgie Parker.” Georgie had felt total
ly embarrassed turning up at Burghley House and asking for Conrad. She knew that just being seen here by boys like Damien would get tongues wagging. This was James Kirkwood’s boarding house – and she was desperately worried that she would run into Kennedy’s brother too. But what choice did she have? She had to talk to Conrad.

  At the mention of Georgie’s name Conrad had smoothed a hand through his hair, checking himself out in the mirror as he rose from his chair and sauntered through to the games room.

  Georgie was standing outside waiting for him. “I need to talk to you,” she said.

  “I thought you might,” Conrad said in what he hoped was a suave James-Bondish tone. “Do you want to come in?”

  “No, not here!” Georgie looked at him like he was dense. There were Burghley House second-years milling about the pool table, pretending to play as they earwigged. “Meet me in the tack room in five minutes.”

  “Oh right,” Conrad said. “Nice and private. Good idea. I’ll meet you there.”

  Five minutes later, Conrad arrived at the tack room to find Georgie waiting for him.

  “Conrad, I wanted to…” Georgie began her sentence but suddenly she broke off, choking and gagging. “Ohmygod, what is that smell? It’s like being gassed!”

  Conrad looked affronted. “It’s my aftershave,” he said. “I thought you’d like it.” He took a step closer to Georgie and she could hardly breathe. “So… you wanted to… talk?” he smiled at her.

  “Yes,” Georgie said briskly, taking a couple of steps backwards to get out of aftershave range. “It’s about yesterday – at the stables – with Kennedy.”

  “I know, I know,” Conrad said. “Not good.”

  “Exactly,” Georgie grimaced. “I’m glad we’re on the same page about this.”

  “Oh totally,” Conrad said. “I mean, it was kind of funny. But it can’t go on, right?”

  Georgie nodded.

  “I can’t keep stringing her along, Georgie,” Conrad said. “I’m going to have to tell her about us.”

  Georgie’s heart suddenly stopped. “You’re going to what?” she shook her head. “No, Conrad! That’s not what I meant.”

  Conrad frowned. “You don’t want me to tell her about us?”

  “Conrad,” Georgie said slowly. “There is no ‘us’. There is a ‘you’ – and there is a ‘me’. But you go out with Kennedy. There is no us.”

  “Oh, I get it,” Conrad said. “You’re not interested because I go out with Kennedy.”

  Georgie stared at him. This boy was as dumb as fungus. “I’m sorry, but I think that the best thing is for us to both move on. Let’s not tell anyone about us, OK?”

  “Gotcha,” Conrad said. “I totally get it Georgie.”

  “So we’re all good then?” Georgie said.

  “Totally,” Conrad said. “Trust me.”

  “Conrad problem eliminated!” Georgie collapsed down on her bed in the dorm rooms. “Now all I have to do is get Riley to return my calls and maybe I stand a chance of sorting this whole mess out!”

  “Um… that’s great, Georgie,” Alice tried to be supportive, but her voice gave her away. She sounded preoccupied and miserable.

  Georgie looked over at her best friend who was lying on her bed staring vacantly into space.

  “Are you OK, Alice?” she asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’ve been acting really strange lately,” Georgie said. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

  “It’s nothing,” Alice said unconvincingly.

  “Is it Cameron?” Georgie asked. “Has he done something?”

  Alice gave a hollow laugh. “Cameron has done nothing except continue to fail to notice me as a potential girlfriend. Not that I care.”

  “So what is it?” Georgie sat down on the edge of Alice’s bed. “Come on Alice, I’m going to find out what it is eventually so you might as well tell me.”

  Alice sighed and sat up. “It’s Allegra Hickman.”

  “I thought you were getting on pretty good with her?”

  “I am!” Alice groaned. “It’s just that… you know the other day when I was talking about rollkur… well… Allegra uses it.”

  Georgie was shocked. “You’re kidding me!”

  Alice shook her head. “I don’t know what to think. I mean, she knows far more about horses than I do and I’ve learnt so much being her apprentice. I could never have ridden a half-pass or a shoulder-in before she taught me…” Alice took a deep breath, “I know she’s the expert, but to me it still seems wrong.”

  “Why don’t you talk to her about it?” Georgie said.

  “I did!” Alice said. “You should hear her explaining it, Georgie! The way she talks about rollkur, it all makes perfect sense and I feel like this idiot who knows nothing…”

  Alice looked utterly miserable. “Georgie, she’s one of the best dressage riders in the world. I’m just a school kid. My opinion doesn’t matter – I should just shut up and learn.”

  “You’re not just a kid,” Georgie said. “You’re a good rider, Alice. You should go with your gut instinct.”

  Alice looked distraught. “What if my stupid gut is wrong? I could get fired and then I’ll fail Tara’s class and Allegra Hickman will never speak to me again.”

  “I can’t believe we were looking forward to this term,” Georgie groaned. “We must have been crazy.”

  On Monday afternoon, the minibus dropped Alice at Allegra Hickman’s yard at the usual time. Alice headed straight for the stables and was halfway through mucking out the boxes when Allegra arrived.

  “You’ve got the place looking lovely,” Allegra said brightly. “Great work!”

  “Thanks,” Alice replied.

  “Listen, I hope you don’t mind, but we’ll have to skip your lesson today,” Allegra said. “I have two new horses arriving tomorrow morning so I need you to prepare two extra boxes. I’ve got to work three horses myself so I think we’re going to run short on time.”

  “No, no…” Alice said, “that’s fine.”

  Allegra Hickman smiled, “Good. Please tack up Damsel for me and bring her out to the arena.”

  For the rest of that afternoon, Alice busied herself preparing the loose boxes and tacking up horses. The last horse that Allegra was riding that day was Esprit. Alice had saddled up the big chestnut gelding and handed him over to Allegra then she’d returned to the stables to finish off the last chores of the day, filling hay nets and water troughs.

  When she finally finished her duties, Alice headed back out to the arena for her end of the day chat with Allegra.

  But Allegra was still giving Esprit his workout. She had Esprit’s head jammed into the now horribly familiar outline of the rollkur, the horse’s magnificent neck contorted so that his head was rammed to his chest. As Allegra urged the horse to trot, Alice watched the way the horse moved, flinging out his legs in an extravagant and glamorous manner, which looked spectacular at first glance. But upon closer inspection, Alice could see the awful tension in the horse, the stiffened back, the painful set of his neck. Esprit’s ears were flat back and a thick froth covered his lips as he fought against the hands that held him so tightly against his will.

  Alice didn’t know how long Allegra had been riding Esprit like this, but she guessed it had been quite a while as the horse looked exhausted and wet with sweat. Allegra began to ride him in circles and then took him down the long side of the arena, still bending his neck tightly but now also twisting it, first to one side and then to the other as Esprit swished his tail angrily.

  And then Alice saw the horse’s tongue. In an effort to resist the bit, Esprit must have resorted to thrusting his tongue out of his mouth, but this had only made matters worse. His tongue had now become wedged. It was sticking out of his mouth, pinned beneath the hard press of the bit’s metal bar.

  Alice stared at Esprit’s tongue lolling out like a limp dishrag, covered in foam, dangling from the horse’s lips.

  It wa
s trapped. Alice watched in horror as the tongue began to turn blue from the pressure.

  Allegra didn’t seem to notice. She kept Esprit’s neck bent in the same cruel, twisted crescent of the rollkur. Alice couldn’t sit by and watch this. She had to say something.

  “Allegra!” Alice got up and waved to the dressage rider. “Allegra!”

  Allegra Hickman pulled her horse from a trot to a halt.

  “Yes, Alice? What is it?”

  “His tongue! It’s stuck under the bit. Look!”

  Allegra didn’t register what Alice said at first, but then she bent down over her horse’s neck and spied the blue tongue hanging from Esprit’s lips.

  Alice had expected Allegra to be as shocked as she was. She had at least expected the dressage trainer to let go of the pressure on the reins and dismount to attend to her distressed horse.

  But Allegra Hickman didn’t do either. Completely unfazed, as if she had done it a million times before, she stayed in the saddle and reached out a hand along the horse’s neck until she grabbed the numb, blue tongue in her fingers. Wiggling it free of the bit, she shoved the tongue back up into Esprit’s mouth. And then, with a thank you nod to Alice, she pushed the horse straight back into a trot, and continued to work him as if nothing had happened.

  At that moment, all Alice’s self-doubt disappeared. She knew that what she had seen today in the dressage arena was deeply wrong. She knew that the horses were suffering. And she knew she had to do something about it.

  “You have to tell Tara.”

  Back at Badminton House the friends had gathered in Georgie and Alice’s room. Alice had filled them in on what had happened at Allegra’s and their decision was unanimous.

  “Tara is the only person who can deal with this,” Georgie insisted. “You’ve tried talking to Allegra. She won’t listen.”

  “And if you go up against her yourself you could end up getting fired and failing the class,” Emily added.

  “Tara will know how to handle it,” Daisy agreed.

  “I don’t know,” Alice looked nervous. “Georgie, will you come with me?”