“But honestly, Christopher, is it worth it?” asked Carola languidly. “I know one must wash up and make one’s bed and all that, but why bother about marks?”
“I’m the section leader,” Christopher told her, “and you’ve got to do what I say.”
“I’m so vague,” sighed James Radcliffe.
“Well, you’ll have to snap out of it,” Christopher told him sharply. “And we’ll start tonight,” he went on, turning to the rest of his section. “Your tack’s got to be perfect.”
Susan, having at last persuaded Gay, Margaret and Lynne to make their beds, set out in search of her section—the Reds. She found Sally and Joy still bedmaking and Noel looking for Penelope’s pyjamas which had disappeared.
“Hallo, you two are in my section,” she said to Sally and Joy, “and we’re the washing up lot tomorrow, worse luck. Still, everything’s tin so we can’t break much. We have to lay breakfast too, so you give your haynet to the person next to you in the lines and rush down to the barn a bit before the whistle goes.”
Joy asked, “Where’s the barn?”
“Where we had tea, of course,” Sally told her.
“Oh, here they are,” exclaimed Noel. “They were in your suitcase all the time; you just hadn’t unpacked them.”
“Sorry,” said Penelope, “I’m mad.”
Jean appeared. “Honestly, this tent’s miles too small,” she complained as she crawled in.
“What, for you four little ones?” laughed Susan.
“Honestly, do you know I’m in Christopher’s section? And that boy; do you know what he thinks? He thinks that we’re going to win the camp competition. He’ll be lucky.”
“Oh, dear,” said Noel. “Don’t say Christopher’s competitive spirit is going to get the better of him.”
“Going to? It’s swamped him already,” Jean told her.
Susan said, “I’m not spoiling my holiday for the competition. Anyway, my section’s sure to be last; how could it be anything else with me as leader?”
Nicholas Lucien went to look for Susan and sent his younger brother Jonathan to find Marion, the leader of the Black section.
Marion said, “We’re lucky; we’re on line guard—it’s much the nicest job. You don’t go down to breakfast tomorrow, you stay up here and we send one person down for our breakfasts and then we eat them up here. Will you tell Guy? He’s in our lot. I’ll tell Lynne.”
“O.K.,” said Jonathan, “we don’t go to breakfast, we stay here. I’ll tell him.”
Judith Quayle, leader of the Orange section, didn’t bother to tell her section anything because they were one of the two sections which had nothing to do next day.
Donald Edge, lying on his bed and reading his detective story, had forgotten that he was a section leader.
Noel finished her tour of inspection and decided that she and Merry now possessed the most untidy tent in the female part of the camp. She began to make her bed. Soon Susan and Marion appeared. “We’ll help you,” they offered, but there wasn’t really room so they sat on Merry Hemlock-Jones’s bed and talked.
“I like your hair now it’s permed,” Susan told her.
Noel said, “It’s not bad I suppose. I’m not used to it yet, but I felt I had to do something about it now that I’ve left school.”
Merry appeared in the camp just as Mrs. Quayle rang the bell for supper.
“Oh, what a filthy mess,” she said impatiently as she burst into the tent. “Why did I ever let the major talk me into this? I must have been crazy. Is it true that there’s only cold water to wash in, Noel?”
“Well, I suppose you could boil a kettle,” suggested Noel. “That bell means supper,” she added, and left Merry cursing under her breath and throwing her possessions on the floor.
Hordes of hungry members were converging on the barn at the sound of the bell, but Henry was driving them all back. “Go and wash,” he was shouting. “Go on. You can’t come in till you’re clean.”
Noel rushed guiltily to wash and then on her way back she met Miss Sinclair.
“One last look round and then I must be off,” Miss Sinclair told her. “You seem to have got everything shipshape now, Noel. How I shall envy you young things tonight—sleeping under the stars.”
“How I shall envy you,” said Merry, appearing in the opening of her tent, “having a nice hot bath.”
Supper was a much gayer meal than tea had been, partly because the members had got to know people in their tents and sections and partly because the staff table looked much less oppressive with only Noel and Henry sitting there. Several people had attacks of the giggles and a mug of water was upset.
“This is much better,” said Henry to Noel above a babble of rising voices. “I don’t feel half so like a headmaster.”
But when Merry Hemlock-Jones came into supper ten minutes late, she said, “What a filthy noise. Can’t you shut them up, Henry?”
Henry answered, “Easily, but I’m not going to; after all they are here to enjoy themselves.”
“And we’re not, I suppose,” said Merry crossly. “Does one really have to drink out of this enamel mug?” she asked, as Henry passed her one across from the serving table. “Not cocoa; oh, really, how too disgusting.” Towards the end of supper everyone began to look so sleepy that Henry announced that the tack would only be given a very sketchy clean and that he would tell the Camp Commandant not to be too fussy about it at the morning inspection.
“Thank goodness for that,” said Susan. “Mine’s filthy; it’s going to take me all the week to get it clean.”
“That’ll calm Christopher down, I hope,” remarked Jean. And Margaret Radcliffe said, “I should jolly well think so. What on earth’s the point of us cleaning our tack up to show standard just for the major to inspect us? I wasn’t going to bother about mine.”
“Who’s your section leader?” asked Jean.
“Oh, a whopping fat lump called Donald.”
“Shush, he’ll hear.”
“Well, it’s true.”
“Think of his feelings.”
“I can’t be bothered with people’s feelings. Anyway, he’s only got to look in the mirror to see that he’s a fat lump, so I don’t see why hearing should hurt him.”
Even a sketchy tack clean took a very long time. First of all everyone had lost his saddle soap or found someone else’s metal polish or mislaid a sponge and then when they had found their own possessions or borrowed from someone, conversation made them much slower than usual. At twenty minutes to nine, Noel, who had been looking up the official bedtimes on the notice board, began to panic. “The Juniors are supposed to be in bed,” she told Henry who was studying the programme for next day, “and they haven’t nearly finished their tack.”
“Try yelling threats at them,” suggested Henry cheerfully.
However, Noel merely shouted, “All Juniors to bed,” loudly enough to be heard above the chatter of the tack cleaners, and, much to her surprise, people began to put away their sponges and hang up their bridles and soon Sally, Penelope, James, Jean, Joy Boon and Jonathan Lucien were on their way across the field to their tents. Margaret Radcliffe, Martin Minton and Lynne Aldworth, being twelve, were a little harder to pack off and the people of thirteen, Guy Barkham, Gay Millwood and Nicholas Lucien were very difficult to find; they lurked away among the seniors and pointed out that thirteen was much nearer fourteen than ten and that they couldn’t possibly be expected to go to bed at the same moment as Sally and Penelope.
Noel agreed. She suggested that they staggered the bedtimes and people of thirteen went at nine o’clock. As it was already five to nine the remaining juniors put away their tack cleaning things and removed themselves quite cheerfully.
The seniors soon decided that they were exhausted and made their own way to bed and gradually, except for an occasional shriek from the washing tents, the camp grew quiet. The white tents glimmered through the gathering dark and Noel and Henry took a last look round the horse line
s. Tommy was loose again and one of the small chestnut ponies—they decided that it must be Pickles—had his foot caught in his haynet. They gave some more hay to all the ponies which had finished their nets and then they said good night and wandered back to their respective parts of the camp, looking gratefully at the clear sky and wondering what the week would bring.
“Any complaints?” asked Henry, putting his head into the senior boys’ tent.
“‘Yes, Donald snores,” Christopher told him.
“Nonsense, he can’t have been to sleep already,” objected Henry.
“He’s never awake,” answered Christopher.
“Well, you know what you can do if you don’t like it—get out,” said Donald sleepily.
“He doesn’t really snore; he just breathes heavily,” Nicholas told Henry.
“Well, if you’re as tired as I am you’ll sleep through anything,” said Henry with a yawn and he went on to tent Six. “Everyone all right in here?” he asked.
“Yes, rather, this lilo thing of mine’s darned comfortable,” answered Jonathan Lucien. Guy said, “You’d better see if James is still alive, he insists on having five blankets so we’re expecting him to suffocate or roast.”
“The camp list said ‘three or more,’” protested James in a muffled voice, “and I’d rather be hot than cold.”
“He sleeps right down under the lot,” said Guy, “he’s quite loony.”
“He was probably a mole in a previous existence,” suggested Henry. “Are you all right, Martin?”
“Yes, except that that beast Christopher has pinched my torch just because it’s better than his.”
“Well, pinch it back tomorrow,” said Henry. “Good night.”
The occupants of tent Number Three simply couldn’t go to sleep, though they had made several determined and sustained efforts. For a time they would all be absolutely silent and then someone unable to bear their solitary watch any longer, would ask, “Awake?” and the others always were. At last they gave up and decided to talk for a bit.
“Honestly, my bed’s wizard. Six times as comfortable as my one at home,” said Jean.
“I hope Pickles is all right,” worried Penelope. “He’s never been away from home before; at least not since I’ve had him.”
Then from the horse lines came the sound of an angry squeal. “Whatever’s that?” asked Sally nervously.
“Loose horse,” said Jean, sitting up in bed.
“Oh, no,” said Penelope.
“Yes, I bet you it is. I’m going to see.” Jean found her torch and emerged from her sleeping bag, but one step outside the tent she returned for her gumboots. “Honestly,” she said, “the grass is soaking wet and absolutely icy.”
“I’ll come and help you, Jean,” said Penelope, dressing in a riding coat as well as gumboots.
“I’m not; it’s too nice and warm in my bed,” Joy told them. “Anyway, it’s sure to be Tommy and what’s the good of catching him, he’ll only break loose again.”
Sally said, “Oh, dear, I wonder if I ought to go and help them?” But she didn’t. She stayed in bed and fussed while Joy soon fell asleep.
The squeal also wakened most of tent Two. And hard on the heels of Jean and Penelope came Lynne, Margaret and Gay.
“I found it,” Jean called to them, “and it looks like that Minton horse, Mousie.”
“I’ve found a black pony,” announced Lynne from the other side of the horse lines.
“That wretched Tommy again,” Penelope told her.
“The head collar’s bust,” said Lynne. “What shall we do? Wake Noel or the Master of Horse?”
“Mend it, of course,” said Margaret Radcliffe. “I’ll get some baling string.”
When they had settled the ponies the catchers, overwhelmed by a sudden tiredness, began to yawn and long for bed. Kicking off their gumboots they fell into their sleeping bags and in a few moments they were all asleep.
But the ponies didn’t sleep. The well-behaved ones munched the remains of their hay or gazed up and down the line of horses with suppressed excitement, and the others jerked at their head collar ropes, clanking their wood blocks against their iron rings.
Soon Tommy’s head collar broke again and Star’s knot worked loose and Biddy slipped her head collar and wandered away. Sonnet’s frantic neighs wakened Noel and Marion Hunter and they met in the horse lines.
“There are dozens of them loose,” said Noel in dispirited tones.
“The thing is, who lives where?” said Marion with one arm round Biddy’s neck.
“Biddy’s next to Sonnet, that’s what all the row is about and it looks as though Tommy’s loose again and someone else from that end of the line.”
Tommy and Biddy were soon tied up again, but Star decided that she wouldn’t be caught. The pursuit at the boys’ end of the lines wakened Henry.
“Hallo,” he said, “you two having fun?”
“Fun?” said Noel grumpily. “This is the third one. But now you’re here we ought to be able to corner her against the hedge.”
However, Star, realising that she was outnumbered, gave in and allowed herself to be caught and once more quiet fell upon the camp.
4
THE CAMP was awake long before Henry blew his whistle at seven-fifteen on Wednesday morning and from practically every tent came a buzz of chatter which had begun with the daylight. At the first blast of the whistle the members, already fully dressed, poured out of their tents and made a wild dash for the horse lines.
Fortunately Henry had shaved and dressed before blowing his whistle so he was ready for work, but Noel, who was still asleep, found the ponies watered, fed and most of the mucking out done by the time she arrived in the lines.
“Everyone’s been so energetic that we’ve got through in record time this morning,” Henry told her, “but I suspect it’s only the proverbial new broom; tomorrow we shall have to go round and pull the wretches out of bed.”
It was a lovely day and when the before-breakfast work was done, Noel and Henry sat on the bales of hay and surveyed the scene, until simultaneous shrieks from the male and female washing tents, told them that there was no water in which to wash.
“Dear me, dear me, who can have failed us?” asked Henry in old ladyish tones, as he delved in his pockets for the appropriate list. “It’s the Greens—led by Mr. Donald Edge. Poppy and Margaret are the female Greens. Will you dispatch them with watering cans forthwith while I rout out Donald and Martin?”
“O.K.,” said Noel.
Margaret said, “People jolly well ought to fetch their own water if they’re silly enough to want to wash.”
“Oh, you are shocking,” Poppy told her. “Think of their schoolgirl complexions. Anyway they’ll have to bring ours tomorrow.”
Donald seemed indifferent to the whole affair. But Martin Minton was whining that it wasn’t fair, why should he be given a black mark when the section leader hadn’t told him what to do?
“Who said anything about black marks?” Henry asked him.
“Christopher says that we ought to have six each,” wailed Martin, “it isn’t fair when—”
“Christopher is not on the staff,” Henry interrupted him, “so stop this wailing and gnashing of teeth and hurry up with that water.”
At breakfast everyone was relating his experiences of the night and soon there was a general demand that everyone who had caught a pony should be given a good mark.
“The staff will consider the matter,” said Henry, and Noel said, “They’ll start turning the ponies loose so’s to get good marks for catching them.”
“Really, Noel, you shouldn’t judge others by yourself,” protested Marion.
“Where’s the Assistant Adjutant?” Henry asked Noel. “She hasn’t been punctual for a meal yet. Shall I tell her that this camp isn’t a hotel?”
“No,” answered Noel. “The staff can’t have petty quarrels among themselves. I expect she’s gone to see Quaver; she doesn’t trust the major�
�s grooms.”
After breakfast the members rushed off to make their beds before Miss Sinclair’s tent inspection, and then, at quarter to ten, the ponies had to be groomed.
As the Barkhams had never groomed before and several other members seemed to have odd ideas about which tool was for what and how they should be used, Henry and Noel staged a demonstration on Tommy, who, they had privately agreed, looked the dirtiest pony in camp. They demonstrated the use of the dandy brush, body brush, curry comb, water brush, hoof pick, sponge and rubber. They mentioned the evils of the mane comb, as every member seemed to possess a shiny new one, and they forbade the use of dandy brushes on the mane and tail.
“Now,” said Henry, when they had finished, “You’ve no excuse for not grooming properly; you know how it ought to be done.”
But when the pony club members began grooming it soon became evident that demonstration was not enough. Henry made the Luciens take off their coats and exhorted them to put some energy into their body brushing. Noel had to rescue the Barkhams, who could not persuade Star or Smudges to pick up their feet. She found Martin Minton brushing Mousie’s tail with a dandy brush and at least four people with the body brush in the wrong hand for the side on which they were grooming. Martin said that it wasn’t fair and how could he help using a dandy brush when David and Christopher had got the only decent body brushes? And Lynne said that she was left-handed. Noel told them that worn-out brushes were better for tails—they didn’t break so many hairs and that being left-handed didn’t make any difference. Then she hurried to help Penelope who said that the mud on Pickles’ legs simply wouldn’t come off and what was she to do?
Then the top end of the line began to call, “Noel, Noel; come and help us.”
“You don’t need help; you’re much too big,” Noel told them severely.
“Oh, yes, we do,” shrieked Marion.
“Noel, we’ve forgotten what mane combs are for.”
“Noel, Frolic won’t pick up her hoofs.”
“Noel, Marion’s curry-combing Crusoe’s ears. You must come and stop her.”
Pony Club Camp (Noel and Henry Book 5) Page 3