Phantom Horse 5: Phantom Horse – Island Mystery

by Christine Pullein-Thompson

  “I ride myself,” he continued, “and I want to develop my own breed of horse – a Uaine Island horse, a cross between a Highland and a Donsky; and for your information, Donskies are Russian and the colour of Phantom.”

  I don’t know how you would describe Mr Carli’s boat. I am not an expert in such matters. It looked half ferry, half speedboat. It had a closed-in cabin, wooden seats and life-jackets, and smelled of tobacco. Mr Carli took the wheel. He wore a bracelet and his brown hands were covered with fine, dark hairs.

  “What does Uaine mean?” asked Angus, after a short silence.

  “It’s Gaelic for green. My island may not look very green to you, but it’s a lot greener than the others in this part of the world, and extremely fertile,” said Mr Carli.

  “It must be lovely to own an island: it must make you feel like a king,” mused my brother.

  We were nearly there. Every second things grew larger. Dark dots from a distance became rocks, ribbons of white became water falling down crevices in the hills. There was yellow gorse, bright pink flowers amid the rocks, seaweed, fine white sand, and birds everywhere.

  “It’s paradise,” said Angus.

  A man in a cap moored our boat. “This is Jacques. He hails from Brittany. He’s here for the summer,” explained Mr Carli.

  I held out a hand, but Jacques ignored it. He had resentful eyes under his peaked cap, half hidden by a mop of dark hair.

  “He’s a funny chap. He’ll take your cases to the house. Come up to the square. Let me show you the way,” offered Mr Carli.

  “The square?” I asked.

  “The stables, the old ones. The new ones are yet to be built,” replied Mr Carli.

  I could hear children laughing and someone blowing a whistle. The air was soft and damp, and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky.

  “We were very busy,” said Mr Carli. “But we broke up officially last week, and now there are only the odd-bods left. Two of the teachers have gone home until the autumn, and the indoor staff are a bit depleted too. But you will be all right. Angus will pass his maths exam, I promise.”

  “At last,” said Angus. “What a relief that will be.”

  The square was simply of buildings with a wall in front and iron gates – a sort of fenced-in yard.

  “I will leave you now, Jean,” said Mr Carli. “Caroline will look after you. She is my daughter and fully qualified. She will teach you everything you need to know about horses.”

  Phantom whinnied when I called to him. He was in an old-fashioned loose box with iron bars topping wooden partitions, an iron hayrack and deep wooden manger. It was bedded with peat. He put his muzzle against the bars and nickered. “Are you all right? Did you miss me?” I said, then a voice asked:

  “Does he look all right? I’m Caroline, your instructor. Pleased to meet you.” She wore a checked shirt, jodhpurs, and long riding boots. Her ginger hair was flecked with grey, her eyes a hard, clear grey. She looked what Dad would call ‘a hard cookie’. She looked old for her age where her father looked young for his. Her mouth turned down at the corners and her teeth were stained. Only her nose resembled Mr Carli’s.

  “I thought you would be Scottish,” I exclaimed, shaking her work-worn hand.

  “You know the difference, then,” her laugh sounded like the rasping of a hoof. It wasn’t real. “They are all seeking their fortunes elsewhere,” she said, and then added, “I’m looking forward to teaching you. It has been nothing but beginners for months now, and I’m not really that sort of teacher. I’m better at dressage and the finer points of riding. Any fool can keep saying, ‘Toes up, don’t lean forward, look straight ahead,’ that sort of thing. I like the advanced stuff.”

  “Fantastic,” I exclaimed. “I’ve passed my C and B tests; but the B was touch and go, and I only scraped through.”

  “I can see we are going to get on,” said Caroline. “Do you want to see the other horses? We are building up a herd and there are a couple of ponies for the little kids, but that’s about all.” She whistled as she walked – tunelessly. I wished Angus was with me as we walked in silence along a path to a field where daisies grew amid the grass. The Highland ponies whinnied when they saw us. They were strange colours – blue roans, orange and blue duns, the sort of colours which melted into the landscape. They had large kind eyes, marvellous feet and their own special smell. There was Flora, Ivan, Heather, Shadow and an old grey mare called Lassie.

  “Next year the mares will be put in foal to a Donsky stallion,” said Caroline. The two other ponies were half Shetland, black, and called Sinbad and Sailor. They felt our pockets hopefully and then, finding we had no titbits, swung their heels towards us in disgust.

  “Nasty little things,” said Caroline, “and completely spoilt. You start your lessons tomorrow at ten. If you ever want me, I’m in the third cottage on the left, the one with the crooked chimney. If you follow the path through the rhododendrons you will reach the front of the house. All right?”

  I nodded. Feeling very far from home, I waved and then ran, and a warm breeze straight from the sea blew against my face. I followed the path and came out on a lawn and there was the house, grey and severe with turrets at each end, and beyond it the prefabricated buildings with concrete paths between. I slowed to a walk and could hear children singing, and farther away the endless, timeless noise of the sea breaking against the rocks.

  Angus was standing on the steps leading up to the massive front door, waiting for me.

  “Come inside. We’ve got super rooms. Most of the other pupils are younger than us; disadvantaged children being coached to get into posh schools at huge cost – you know, the sort who wear suits, shorts and little jackets.”

  “Not the girls, surely?” I asked, laughing.

  My room was fantastic, with views on both sides and one enormous bed in the middle.

  “We are very lucky. The poor kids live in dorms on the top floor with Miss Pitcher in charge: a real old dragon with a moustache,” my brother said. “Come across the passage and look at our bathroom; it’s Victorian, with brass taps. How were the horses and what about Phantom?”

  “He’s all right. I hope I can look after him. I’m missing him already. I know it sounds crazy, but suddenly he doesn’t seem mine any more,” I said. “But what about the teachers? What are they like?”

  “They are mostly young and a bit peculiar. The potter is a real weirdo,” said Angus.

  We met almost everyone later at tea in a large room overlooking the bay. Miss Pitcher kept the younger children in order. The girls wore skirts and blouses, the boys shorts and shirts. They were quiet and well-behaved; they looked at me out of the corners of their eyes, and one of them muttered, “Is Phantom your horse? He’s lovely.” There were piles of scones, bread and butter, jam and biscuits.

  Angus and I were introduced to a German called Hans, who was broad-shouldered, with fair hair cut short; to Jon from Poland who only spoke a little English; and to Jane who was large and blushed when she spoke to us. “I’m potting, what about you?” she asked, turning pink.

  Potting? I thought frantically. Potting plants?

  “She means making pots,” said Angus. “Yes, I’m potting, Jane. Jean is riding. She’s horse-mad, she can think of nothing else; it’s a pity, but she’s had the disease for many years now and we have to accept it’s incurable.”

  “I’m sorry. Did you catch it from your horse?” asked Jane, not able to see the joke.

  “Yes, from Phantom,” I answered. “Sad, isn’t it?”

  “I won’t have the pleasure of you in my class, then,” said a young man with long hair, a beard and thick-lensed glasses hiding blue eyes. “I teach pottery. Won’t you change your mind?”

  I shook my head. “I won’t have time. I want to learn stable management too. Horses are going to be my career,” I said.

  “I am going in for domestic science,” announced Jane. “I like cooking and there’s always work for anyone who can cook.”

  �
�I am going to be an engineer, to manage engines, planes and the like,” said Hans, looking at me. “They are better than horses. Is that good English? Do I get it right?”

  Mr Carli offered me a scone. He seemed to be watching us all, summing us up, rather like a tiger deciding which person to pounce on for his dinner.

  “How did you find Phantom, Jean?” he asked. “Was he all right?”

  “Fantastic, thank you.”

  “What did you think of my Highland ponies?”

  “Very nice.”

  “Good foundation stock when I have my stallion from Russia,” he said, smiling at me.

  I looked round the room. There were modem pictures hanging on the walls, as well as two which looked like old masters. Though everything looked perfect there was still something missing. The scones were Scottish but the company wasn’t, except for me and Angus who were only half. And the house was so Scottish that it needed its own people inside it.

  “Who did all this belong to before?” I asked, waving an arm around the room.

  “Before I bought it? The old chief of the Maclnnes. He died and the death duties were enormous. I got it for a very fair price,” replied Mr Carli in tones of tremendous satisfaction.

  “So you are the laird now? Isn’t that lovely,” cried Jane, suddenly coming to life and then blushing.

  “That’s right, my dear. I am the new Laird of Uaine.”

  “And that is a good thing to be – yes?” asked Hans.

  Miss Pitcher was driving her brood out of the room; she was thin and dry, without hope on her face; a woman waiting to retire, I thought. The sort of person who wears gloves in the summer out of habit.

  After tea Angus and I wandered about the island. Phantom had been turned loose in a field with Lassie. They were already friends. He stood staring at the sea, his head high, his ears alert, his eyes shining, while the Highland stood behind him like a person in a queue. In a lower field someone had erected jumps and marked out a school.

  Angus pointed to a flat strip of land where the grass was short and runways were marked out by strips of painted concrete. “That’s the landing-strip – and what a perfect run in over the sea,” he said.

  “I hate airports. I think they eat up land and make fumes and noise. I would like us to go back to the horse age. I don’t like cars either,” I said, “so who cares?”

  “You might if you had appendicitis and needed a doctor in a hurry,” retorted Angus.

  “Look,” I said, pointing, “another empty cottage. We’ve passed at least five in the last half hour. Where have all the people gone?”

  “To make money. There are Scots doing just that all over the world,” replied Angus. “Haven’t you noticed?”

  We walked to the jetty and looked at the boats.

  There was a postbox which said NEXT POST TUESDAY and today was Friday. There was a telephone kiosk with the receiver ripped out, and a large bell which you could ring for the ferry, except that the ferry was no longer there.

  “It’s sad. It makes me want to cry,” I said.

  “It will come to life again. Think of the new breed of horse which will soon be here – the Carli breed,” replied Angus.

  “What do you think of the laird?” I asked.

  “He’s friendly, and he’s got a super secretary called Maria with long legs and beautiful eyelashes,” replied Angus. “What’s your riding instructor like?”

  “All right, so far,” I said.

  “My maths master is typical maths; just here for the summer. He’s very nervous and he stutters. He had tea sent up to his room. I can’t imagine him ever managing a class at our school, which is probably why he’s here,” said Angus.

  There were sheep everywhere, unsheared, panting in thick coats, their square bodies supported by speckled legs. They walked like grannies with their big lambs running after them, baaing like overgrown infants.

  We met a herd of wild Highland cattle too, with huge horns and long shaggy coats, their calves as woolly as teddy bears.

  We sat on a rock and stared out across the bay where great shafts of sunlight lay on the sea. Everything was blue and gold.

  “It’s miles from home, isn’t it?” I asked with a shiver.

  “Yes, and lovely. I want to go out to inspect the lobster-pots,” said Angus.

  “If there are any lobster-pots,” I answered.

  “What’s the matter? Don’t you like it here?” asked Angus.

  “Of course I like it. It’s just that a month here seems a very long time.”

  “You’ll be all right when you start riding and learning about splints and spavins; not to mention half a dozen dressage tests,” replied Angus, laughing.

  We returned to the house and almost at once Maria called us. “Telephone for you, Angus. It’s your parents. You can take it in the office.”

  I seized the receiver.

  “Are you all right?” asked Mum. “Do you like it? Is Phantom okay?”

  “Yes,” I shouted.

  “It’s marvellous,” said Angus over my shoulder. “Wild, free and wonderful.”

  “It’s so beautiful it makes you want to cry,” I shouted.

  “Wait till it rains,” laughed Mum.

  “How is the Middle East?” asked Angus, snatching the receiver.

  “Hot,” said Mum.

  Then Dad came on the telephone and asked Angus about his maths. “Work!” he said. “I expect results, and that applies to Jean, too.”

  “I’m going to,” I answered, pushing Angus away. “I start tomorrow.” Then suddenly the call was over.

  “All right?” asked Maria, looking at us, and I noticed for the first time that the room was lined with filing cabinets, and furnished with a huge desk and swivel chair.

  “Yes, thank you,” I replied.

  She followed us out, and, to my surprise, locked the door after her. “State secrets,” she explained, laughing.

  I looked at Maria and her eyes weren’t with us; they were miles away seeing something else, and her hands were so tense that the knuckles showed white through her skin. I wanted to say, “What’s the matter? Is something wrong?”

  But at that moment she said, “Okay? Fine,” and walked away smiling.

  “She’s strange, isn’t she?” I asked.

  “Oh, she’s all right,” said Angus. “I like her a lot. But then I like everything and everybody. I’m not suspicious and critical like you. I like it here.”

  “I like it too,” I said, but I wasn’t sure, not yet.

  “There wouldn’t be so many children here if it wasn’t a super place. People don’t send their children just anywhere,” continued Angus. “It’s expensive, too, and the teaching is of a very high standard. You should see the classrooms.”

  “No thank you. I prefer the stables,” I said.

  “You are so stand-offish, you really haven’t met anyone yet,” continued Angus. “There’s a very nice Scottish girl called Janet, who’s the cook – she’s got a dear little baby, and two Spanish women who do the housework and help her in the kitchen. Do you know that the pottery teacher, Mr Smith, teaches five other subjects and so does my maths master, and that Maria teaches domestic science? Why don’t you enrol for domestic science like Mum suggested?”

  “For goodness’ sake, I have enough of lessons all term, and I plan to pass my maths exam next year. If I don’t I’ll think again,” I said.

  “There’s a whole list of things hung up in the hall you can do. You haven’t even looked at it,” complained Angus.

  “I don’t want to. I want to forget school,” I said. “Next term will arrive soon enough.”

  “The Spanish women live somewhere at the back of the house; they don’t speak English. I don’t know their names yet,” continued Angus. “The other children are all younger than us, which is a pity, and they don’t do much besides endless French, Latin and maths – poor things. Listen, there’s the gong for supper. I hope it’s fish.”

  Later I climbed into my su
mptuous bed. The sun was setting above the sea, burnishing it red and gold. The waves were lapping the white sand and somewhere in the sky a bird was calling. I’m glad I’m here, I thought. It’s so beautiful, it’s like a dream; and the sound of the waves became music as I slept.

  3

  How can I describe those first few days? They were beautiful beyond description, with the sea in the bay as calm as inland water and the rocks warmed by the sun. The school ran like clockwork with gongs and bells and scurrying feet. Angus did computer studies and made clay pots. The teachers nodded at me when they passed in the passage, but I stayed outside it all, determined only to ride. Caroline had her British Horse Society’s Instructors Certificate. She had taught abroad and was a superb teacher, and I had her entirely to myself! It seemed like a gift straight from heaven, and I did not want to waste it.

  I learned to sit deep in Phantom’s saddle, to make him go as he had never gone before, with impulsion flowing from his quarters, his neck arched and proud, his jaw light and flexed. I learned to make the transitions from one pace to another as gentle and flowing as beautiful music until we seemed to glide together as one whole being, rather than rider and horse. I learned about navicular and ringbone, about tetanus and ragwort poisoning, about the theory of long reining and a great mass of stable management. I wrote it down on file paper from the office, thinking, I’ll have it for life, if I forget anything I will still have my notes. When I was not studying or riding, I sat on the rocks and stared at the beautiful, calm, Highland sea and was sorry for the people in the prefabricated classrooms being stuffed full of maths, Latin and French.

  I also thought about Caroline and wondered and pondered. She’s too good to be here, I thought. She should be managing a stable with fifty horses and a covered school. She’s like someone who has been hurt. Perhaps she is here to recover from something … maybe she was in love and going to be married and then jilted at the church gate. I simply wanted to ask her, “What brought you here?” but it must be because of her father, I thought.