Jessica looked relieved. “Okay, Max. But I would ride Dime.”
“I know you would, I just don’t think you should have to.” Max looked up at The Saddle Club. “Could you guys take Dime in and get Peso for Jessica? That way she could catch her breath for a few more minutes.”
“Of course,” Stevie said instantly. “Carole, you take Dime in. Lisa and I will get Peso.”
“I’ll get his tack and meet you by his stall,” Lisa said, hurrying into the stable. Stevie went to Peso’s stall and started grooming him quickly. They didn’t want Jessica to have to miss too much of her lesson.
Carole didn’t need to hurry the way Stevie and Lisa did, and she was increasingly worried about Dime. What could spark such a huge behavioral change? In all the years Carole had ridden at Pine Hollow, she’d never known Dime to throw anyone deliberately, and here he’d done it three times in one week. Something had to be wrong.
Carole replaced Dime’s bridle with his halter and fastened him to the cross-ties in the stable aisle. She was certain Dime couldn’t be lame, because he’d looked perfectly sound every time he’d been galloping riderless in the last week. If his feet or legs were hurting, he would limp.
He could, however, be hurting somewhere else, and the most likely place seemed to Carole to be his back, because he kept bucking. She took his saddle off and carefully examined both it and Dime’s girth for anything that could hurt him—any worn or broken places, any sharp edges, anything at all. Everything looked normal. Next she removed his saddle pad and went over it even more carefully. It was possible for a burr or a splinter or even a sharp piece of hay to get lodged in the pad. The saddle pad looked freshly laundered, and again, she couldn’t find a thing.
Next Carole examined Dime’s back, where the saddle rested, and his girthline, where the girth fastened around his middle. She looked for sores, scratches, bumps, clods of dirt, and anything else that might cause him discomfort when he was wearing a saddle. Nothing. Dime was well groomed and his skin was smooth.
Carole put her hands on Dime’s back and pressed down. Could Dime have a pulled muscle? She couldn’t find a single spot where he flinched or seemed to feel any pain.
“Dime,” she said to him, “this would be so much easier if you could talk. What’s the problem?”
Dime cocked one ear forward. He looked a little sulky, but other than that he seemed okay. He didn’t have a runny nose or runny eyes, and he didn’t cough.
Carole went to the tack room and came back with Max’s stethoscope and horse thermometer. Even though Max always called the vet, Judy Barker, when one of the horses was sick, he kept these instruments on hand to help determine whether he should call her. Every responsible horse owner knew how to take a horse’s vital signs. They were often the best clue to the horse’s health.
Dime’s temperature was 100 degrees, perfectly normal. Carole used the stethoscope to listen to his heartbeat and count his pulse. Those were normal, too.
“Just like Mrs. Reg said,” Carole told him. “We can’t find anything wrong with you.” She counted the number of times Dime breathed in a minute, because if he was panting he could be in pain, but that, too, was normal. Finally she used the stethoscope to listen to Dime’s gut.
Bra-AAP! The loud rumble made Carole giggle. She was always amused by how loudly horses’ stomachs grumbled when heard through a stethoscope.
“You don’t have colic,” she informed the pony. When a horse colicked, its entire digestive system shut down, and its stomach and intestines made no noises. “I just don’t know what’s wrong with you. Dime, you’ve got to start behaving again.”
Carole tried a little pep talk. “You’re such a good pony. I know you can do it.” While she brushed the sweat marks off Dime’s back and the arena sand off his legs, she told him what a good pony he had always been, and how happy he had made the little boys and girls he helped teach to ride. She told him how valuable he was to Pine Hollow.
“We need nice ponies like you,” she said as she unclipped the cross-ties and led Dime into his stall. “Look here, look out the window,” she told him. “You can see the riding ring. Isn’t your new stall nice? Max gave it to you because he wants you to be happy.”
Dime turned and bared his teeth at her. Carole jerked her hand out of his way, and he sank his teeth into the sleeve of her coat. “Dime! Stop that!”
Lisa and Stevie came back up the aisle toward their horses. “Peso rolled in the pasture this morning, and it took ages for us to get him ready. We hurried as fast as we could.” Stevie went back to Belle’s stall and gave the mare a hug. “We’ll have to hurry now to get ready for our own lesson.”
Lisa saw the strange expression on Carole’s face. “What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Dime just tried to bite me,” Carole said in amazement. “He seemed okay, and I was telling him what a good pony he is, and how much Max depends on him, and when I put him back in his stall he tried to bite me.”
Lisa looked into the pony’s stall. “He hasn’t finished his grain today, either.”
Carole sighed. “I guess I’d better tell Mrs. Reg. Something has to be wrong with him.”
Stevie shook her head. “I wish we knew what it was. I don’t think he’s going to shape up until we fix whatever it is. Do you think his back hurts, Carole?”
Carole shook her head. “I checked, as well as I could.”
Lisa looked again at the grain bucket. “And he’s not colicking?”
“I don’t see how he can be,” Carole said in exasperation. “His stomach is rumbling like a freight train!”
“Well, it must be something,” Stevie said with a sigh.
Carole bit her lip anxiously. She was starting to really worry about the little pony.
LISA DIDN’T HAVE the best lesson of her entire life, but she enjoyed the chance to ride Prancer again. Much as she loved trail rides, she also loved lessons, because they gave her the chance to improve specific skills. Of course, on the trail she had plenty of opportunities to improve her general riding and horse handling, but there she rarely thought about the finer points of body control; for example, whether her heels were down as much as they could be or whether Prancer’s neck was curving gently through the turns.
Today Max had them riding over fences without their stirrups. This was something Lisa would never practice on the trail, because she found it a little nerve-racking, but she had to admit it was great for her leg position. Without stirrups, it was easy to let your leg swing loose, but over a jump you didn’t dare!
Lisa knew, too, that her confidence had been shaken by that horrible Pony Club rally. After an hour of jumping she felt proud of herself and of Prancer, and her confidence was restored. Stevie and Carole also rode well, so Lisa was sure they would both feel better, too.
“Wasn’t that great!” Carole said as they began walking their horses up and down the driveway to cool them off before they untacked them. “Starlight just flew, and riding without stirrups is so much fun!”
Lisa wouldn’t have called it fun. She laughed at her friend’s enthusiasm. Carole truly loved everything about horses.
“Stevie, Belle looked fantastic!” Carole continued. “Remember last week when she didn’t want to jump the brush box? She never even looked at it today—she just went over it!”
“Yeah.” Stevie reached up to stroke Belle’s neck, but she didn’t sound as happy as either of her friends thought she should. “It was a good lesson, but you know, I just can’t stop thinking about Mrs. Reg and her total lack of imagination regarding the dance. Balloons and streamers! Everyone does balloons and streamers!
“It’s just so mundane,” Stevie continued. “And that’s not all. Phil told me they’re hiring a DJ for his school dance. I asked Mrs. Reg if we could hire a DJ, since she insists that we can’t have a live band, and she said it was too expensive!”
“It probably is too expensive,” Lisa said. “Phil’s school probably charges an admission fee for the dance, and, anywa
y, the school would have a budget for social activities. This bam dance is just something Max and Mrs. Reg do because they’re nice. It’s just so we can all have fun.”
Lisa exchanged looks with Carole. They were thinking the same thing, that Stevie was making way too big a deal over the dance. She only saw Phil every few weeks anyway. Why was Valentine’s Day such a big deal? And if it was such a big deal, why didn’t Stevie just go to Phil’s dance?
Lisa wondered if she would understand better if she had her own boyfriend.
“How can it be too expensive when it’s so important?” Stevie demanded.
“How can what be too expensive?” a friendly voice asked.
The three girls turned. “Mr. Stowe!” said Lisa. “What a surprise!”
“The horses don’t need to rest today, do they?” he asked with the glint of a smile in his eye.
“No …,” said Carole. She wondered what job she could find to keep Mr. Stowe out of Mrs. Reg’s hair today. Red usually cleaned the stalls early in the mornings on weekdays.
“What is too expensive and so important?” Mr. Stowe asked Stevie again.
“The Valentine’s Day dance!” she exploded. “We want it to be special, and the decorations are very important.”
“I don’t think Phil is going to change his mind and come to Pine Hollow if our decorations are better than his,” Lisa said quietly. She didn’t want to upset Stevie, but she did think she was pinning too much hope on a bunch of balloons.
Stevie looked angry. “Atmosphere is extremely important. Every last detail counts. You know Mrs. Reg always says that.”
“But she wasn’t talking about a dance—” Lisa began. Carole elbowed her in the ribs, and Lisa shut her mouth. She understood what Carole meant, that anything Lisa said was only going to annoy Stevie more. Stevie wasn’t being logical, but they had never been able to make her be logical. The best they could do was be her friend.
Lisa remembered when Mrs. Reg had given a talk about atmosphere and details. She’d been talking about stable management during a Pony Club rally! She meant all the bridles had to be on hooks, and the water buckets in the stalls tied at the proper heights, and things like that. She hadn’t been talking about DJs or paper streamers.
“Mrs. Reg is in charge of the decorations for the dance, but she’s been so busy and distracted lately that she’s just not able to give them much time,” Stevie told Mr. Stowe sadly. “Of course, I want the bam to look nice because I expect that my boyfriend, Phil, will be coming. But that’s not the only reason. The reputation of Pine Hollow is at stake.”
Carole made a choking noise.
“Elizabeth wants the place to look nice, but she doesn’t want to spend a lot of money, is that it?” Mr. Stowe asked.
“That’s it exactly,” said Stevie. “I think Max must have put her on a very tight budget.” She sighed dramatically. “If this barn dance isn’t absolutely spectacular, I think my love life will be over.”
Mr. Stowe looked concerned. “We can’t let that happen,” he said.
LISA AND CAROLE looked at one another in amazement. Could they have heard Mr. Stowe right? Could he be concerned about Stevie’s love life? Carole thought Stevie was laying it on just a bit too thick. If her love life ended this Valentine’s Day, it would be because she and Phil were both so stubborn, not because the hay bam wasn’t pretty enough.
“Seriously?” Stevie asked. Even she sounded surprised.
“Seriously,” Mr. Stowe said. “I’m more than happy to be of assistance to Elizabeth.”
“Eli—oh, right.” None of The Saddle Club had gotten used to Mrs. Reg’s being called Elizabeth.
Carole ran her hand down Starlight’s chest. It no longer felt warm or sweaty. “Let’s take them inside,” she suggested. The wind had picked up, and she was starting to feel cold.
Mr. Stowe followed them down the stable aisle. “What did you all have in mind?”
“Not much,” Lisa said. “Stevie’s the mastermind.”
Stevie smiled modestly. “I’m not suggesting anything out of the ordinary,” she said. “I realize a laser light show is probably too expensive, and I guess all the best local bands are probably booked by now. But I do think we should get a DJ instead of using Max’s CDs.”
“What’s wrong with his CDs?” Mr. Stowe said. “Doesn’t he have good ones?”
Stevie shrugged. “They’re fine. It’s just a DJ is—you know—most dances have a DJ, to change the CDs and introduce the songs.”
Mr. Stowe shook his head. “For a Valentine’s Day dance you want pure romance,” he said.
“Totally,” said Stevie.
“So you don’t want some wisecracking high-school kid interrupting the music every couple of minutes,” he continued. “Where’s the atmosphere in that? What we need to do is find an automatic CD changer and cue up a bunch of music so that it just flows, one romantic love song into another.”
Stevie blinked. “That’d be perfect,” she said. She could imagine herself dancing with Phil, flowing from one song to another.
“There’s nothing wrong with balloons or streamers,” Mr. Stowe continued, “but for atmosphere you need to control the lighting.”
“Max has a few strings of regular lightbulbs,” Lisa said. “We usually use those.”
“But they’re bright, right?” he asked. Carole nodded. “So what if you get some of those little paper lanterns to cover all the bulbs,” Mr. Stowe suggested. “And if you got low-wattage bulbs in the first place, you could have a nice, soft, romantic light. And then—I’ve got the perfect idea! But it’s a surprise. I won’t even tell you girls.” He smiled. “The perfect surprise for a romantic bam dance.”
“What about a strobe light?” Stevie said. “I was really hoping for a strobe light.”
“A strobe light!” Mr. Stowe shook his head. “That’s one of those things that makes everyone look like they’re jerking when they dance, isn’t it?”
“It’s kind of fun,” Carole said. “People look like they stop and then start again.”
“But is it romantic?” Mr. Stowe asked, with a sweep of his hands.
“No,” said Carole. “I guess not.”
“The name of this game has to be romance,” he said. “It’s a romantic time of year; we have to create and nourish the proper atmosphere. No strobes. No mouthy DJs. Nothing but pure romance.”
Lisa drew in a breath. For a moment Mr. Stowe was utterly transformed. Lisa had seen actors on stage turn instantly from one character into another, but she had never seen it happen in life before. Suddenly Mr. Stowe seemed younger, more dapper, almost charming. Lisa was dazzled.
“Max!” Mrs. Reg shouted down the aisle. “Did you remember to buy that worm paste?”
Mr. Stowe jumped and suddenly looked sheepish. The dapper gentleman vanished, and in his place was old, kind, helpful Mr. Stowe.
Carole settled Starlight in his stall and gave him a good-bye pat. She, too, had seen something special in Mr. Stowe a moment ago. He had seemed like a man of vision and ideas, instead of a man learning how to ride. She turned to him with friendly pity. “I’m going to check Dime’s pulse again,” she said. “Would you like me to show you how?”
Mr. Stowe half shrugged. “That’s kind of you, but I wouldn’t want to trouble you,” he said.
“It’s no trouble,” Carole said. She went for the stethoscope.
“No, really …,” Mr. Stowe called to her retreating back. He shrugged again to Lisa and Stevie. “You girls don’t need to take so much trouble with me,” he said.
“It’s no trouble at all,” Stevie said sincerely. She was so pleased with Mr. Stowe’s ideas—paper lanterns would be much more romantic than a strobe light. Why hadn’t she realized that? And to think that Phil was excited about his school’s strobe light! He just didn’t know what true romance was. “Besides, Carole really loves to teach people about horses.”
“I can tell.” Mr. Stowe sighed.
Mrs. Reg came down the aisl
e toward them. “Hello, Howard. I see you found these girls again,” she said, a bit sharply. “What horse project have they dragged you into this time?”
Mr. Stowe swept his hat off. He seemed a little confused by the tone of Mrs. Reg’s voice. “Good afternoon, Elizabeth,” he said politely.
“He’s very interested in horses, Mrs. Reg,” Stevie said, rushing to his defense. How could Mrs. Reg be rude to him? Suddenly Stevie wanted Mr. Stowe to keep coming to Pine Hollow so that he could help them with the dance. He was saving her chance with Phil! “He’s learned a lot in the last week.”
“I see.” Mrs. Reg sounded oddly skeptical.
To Stevie’s and Lisa’s surprise, Mr. Stowe blushed. “I’ve found a lot around Pine Hollow to be interested in,” he said softly. Mrs. Reg gave him another slightly disgruntled look and walked away.
“Why, Mr. Stowe,” Carole said, coming back from the tack room with the stethoscope in her hands, “what’s wrong?”
“Mrs. Reg is in a bad mood,” Stevie said hotly.
“Don’t worry about her,” Carole said gently. “She never minds it when we hang around the stable, as long as we’re doing something useful. Now, here’s the stable stethoscope. Let’s go see Dime.”
“I guess I might as well,” Mr. Stowe said. He followed them down the aisle. Carole led the way, worried about Dime. Stevie walked after her, worried about Phil. Lisa trailed Stevie. She was worried about Mrs. Reg and why the sad look was back in her eyes.
LISA LEANED BACK against the pillows she’d thrown on the floor of her bedroom. “What a week,” she said. “I’m glad it’s Friday.”
“Me too,” agreed Carole, reaching for a handful of popcorn from the bowl sitting next to Lisa. The Saddle Club was staying at Lisa’s house the whole weekend. “I feel like we haven’t solved any of the problems we’ve had this week!”
Stable Hearts Page 5