“No,” Lisa said, catching hold of Danny’s lead rope as Judy unsnapped the cross-ties. “You get the vacuum, Stevie, and Carole, you get Danny’s tack. He’s coming to the dance with us.”
“WHAT DO YOU mean?” Stevie asked. “He can’t come to the dance with us! He’s a horse!”
“It’s an open dance,” Lisa said mildly. Her little flicker of an idea had turned into pure determination: Danny was coming to the dance. “Anyone can come, provided they’re invited by a junior-high student. I just invited Danny.”
“But Lisa …,” Stevie said. Usually she was the one with the crazy ideas. This one was nuts. What would Danny do at a dance?
“They said anyone could come.” Lisa held firm. “They didn’t say ‘any people’ or ‘anything but horses.’ ”
“I’m sure it was implied,” Judy said.
“Besides, he might get upset,” Carole said. “All the lights and the crowd and the noise—”
“—are no more than he’d see at a big horse show,” Lisa finished. “You know he’s used to that. I’ve never seen him act excited in any situation. And the tent will seem just like the tent stalls from the rally.”
The others stared at her. Carole knew that what Lisa was saying was true. Before Veronica owned Danny, he’d been a regular on the A show circuit. He’d gone to a different horse show every week of his life. He probably wouldn’t be worried at all.
“But Max said—” Carole began.
“He said we couldn’t leave until the stall, tack, and horse were clean,” Lisa said. “And they are. We’ll take good care of Danny—you know we will. All I want to do is prove to Veronica that her horse is clean.”
As Lisa’s words sank in, Carole and Stevie began to grin. “I guess it is no more than Veronica deserves,” Carole said.
“Certainly not,” said Stevie. “In fact, it’s less than she deserves, but it’s not a bad start.”
Judy laughed. “You three are always up to something!”
“Can we take him?” Lisa asked her. “Please?”
“I guess I don’t mind,” Judy said. “Max shouldn’t have made you stay here—I’m sure he realizes that by now—and you did make sure the horse was clean. Only promise me you’ll keep him safe from the other kids. Don’t do anything stupid.”
“We won’t,” Carole promised. Lisa and Stevie nodded.
“And page me the minute he’s ready to come home. Don’t push him to do anything he doesn’t want to do. I’ll have my beeper on, and I’ll come right away when you call.”
“Okay,” Lisa said. She clucked to Danny. “Come on, buddy. You’re going to the ball.”
WHEN THEY ARRIVED at the junior high, the dance was in full swing. Bright strings of lights surrounded a big, open tent on the green football field; under the tent, at least a hundred kids were dancing. A DJ played records in one corner; on the other side of the tent, folding tables and chairs gave people a place to rest.
Stevie tapped her feet to the music. “Hope Danny’s got rhythm,” she said. Judy pulled her rig up along the dark side of the school. She stopped, and the girls got Danny out and quickly tacked him up. Lisa grabbed his reins.
“We’ll lead him in to make sure he feels calm,” she said. Lisa had no doubts that he would feel calm, and, sure enough, as they approached the tent, Danny seemed no more than mildly interested. He pricked his ears in the direction of the music and walked calmly at Lisa’s shoulder.
“He likes it,” Carole said, watching him. “Look, Stevie. It looks like Danny’s matching his footsteps to the beat of the music.”
“Hey,” Stevie said happily. “People are starting to see us.”
As they led Danny to the side of the tent, more and more kids noticed them and stopped dancing in their tracks. “It’s a horse!” someone shouted. “Look at that!” Everyone who hadn’t seen them stopped and looked then. Lisa saw Veronica in the crowd, talking to the gorgeous new guy. The guy was pointing at Danny. Lisa saw Veronica toss her hair and shrug.
“Let’s go over and see what she says,” Stevie whispered.
Lisa led Danny closer. “Hey, Veronica,” Stevie called. “Look how bright and clean he is.”
They could all hear Veronica’s date saying, “Who would do such a stupid thing, taking a horse to a dance? What weirdos! Horses are so strange, anyway.”
“I have no idea,” Veronica said, leaning on his arm.
“Hey, Veronica! Yoo-hoo!” called Stevie, waving her arm. “Look! He’s clean!” Lisa stopped Danny right in front of them.
“Why are they talking to you?” the hunk asked Veronica.
Veronica shrugged. She turned her back on Danny and The Saddle Club. “Silly little girls,” she sniffed. “Probably couldn’t get dates, so they had to bring a horse.”
The hunk looked over Veronica’s shoulder at Danny. “Don’t they know you?”
“Oh, sure,” Veronica said loudly. “I’ve seen them around the barn where I ride sometimes. But they’re not friends of mine.”
The Saddle Club girls grinned at one another. “At least we know she won’t go ballistic on us,” Stevie said. Carole nodded. She was relieved that Veronica didn’t seem angry that they’d taken her horse from the stable. Of course, when had Veronica ever been truly concerned about her horse?
The song had stopped but another one began. Danny nodded his head toward the speakers. “You got it, buddy,” Lisa said, swinging into the saddle. “Let’s dance.” She rode Danny into the middle of the floor. All around her, students scattered to make room. Carole and Stevie danced on either side of Danny. Lisa tried to do something like a box step: three steps up, three steps sideways, three steps back, three steps over. Even so, she felt as if she were taking up most of the floor. No one seemed to mind. Danny really did have a sense of rhythm. As he began to understand what Lisa was asking him to do, he started moving on his own, forward, sideways, and back, matching his steps to the strong beat of the music.
“Look at that horse dance!” a boy yelled. Lisa recognized him from her social studies class, and she grinned. She spun Danny into a turn on his forehand, and the students cheered. Lisa felt great. Normally she was pretty reserved, but she’d been so angry at Veronica that she’d shed her usual inhibitions. Plus, Lisa loved acting, and dancing with Danny made her feel as if she were onstage.
“Where’s Phil?” she shouted down to Stevie.
“There.” Stevie pointed to a corner of the floor, where Phil, A.J., and Bart were all laughing hysterically. A girl—presumably A.J.’s girlfriend—stood with them. “I just saw them. They must have been getting something to drink when we came in.” She waved the boys over, and they pushed through the ring of dancers that now encircled Lisa and the horse.
“Hey,” Phil yelled above the music, “that horse looks really clean!”
Lisa grinned at him. “He was all dressed up, but he didn’t have any place to go!” she shouted back. Phil gave her an appreciative thumbs-up. Lisa looked to see if Bart had come closer, but he was talking to A.J. Lisa didn’t mind. She felt light and happy.
When the song ended, Lisa stopped Danny square and did a gracious dressage bow. The dance floor erupted in cheers. Danny seemed to think he was at some sort of show and that he had done well: When Lisa dismounted, he nuzzled her hand for a treat. “Beautiful boy,” she praised him, rubbing his head where nearly all horses liked to be rubbed.
“Here,” Stevie said, holding out her hand for the reins. “Give me a turn.”
“Just a minute,” Lisa said. She led Danny over to Bart, who was still next to A.J. and still laughing. “Hi,” she said quickly, before her natural shyness took over again. “You said you were more comfortable with horses than girls. So I brought a horse. Want to dance?”
BART GRINNED, AND Lisa felt her heart beat faster. “Sure,” he said. Then, to her surprise, he took the reins from her and climbed onto Danny! Lisa couldn’t believe her eyes. Bart turned Danny and rode him back to the center of the dance area. Another fast s
ong started playing.
Stevie walked up to Lisa while she was still staring in amazement. “It was supposed to be my turn.”
“Trust me,” Lisa said, “that didn’t work out the way I planned it at all.”
But in the center of the floor Bart halted Danny and looked straight at her. He tipped an imaginary riding hat to her, and then he winked. Lisa had to laugh.
“I wouldn’t feel bad if I were you,” Stevie declared, watching the exchange.
“I don’t,” Lisa assured her.
Carole was talking to A.J.’s girlfriend, Sarah, explaining just who the horse was and why they had brought him. “We’d better get out there and dance,” she added. “I want us to be closest to Danny so that he won’t get jostled by accident.”
But it turned out the students were giving Danny a wide berth, because everyone wanted to watch the horse dance. Bart was a fantastic rider, and in a matter of minutes he had Danny doing something that looked like an electric slide: walking forward, walking back, rocking forward, rocking back, doing a set of sideways crossovers and then spinning jauntily on his forehand for the quarter-turn hop. As soon as some of the students realized what he was doing, they joined it, forming a line with Danny in the center. Danny bobbed his head; he looked completely attentive but completely relaxed. Danny had always done whatever he was asked to do, but now, for the first time, Carole realized, he looked as if he was having fun.
Stevie and Phil were dancing side by side, but after a while Stevie danced closer to Carole and nudged her. “Look at Veronica,” she whispered. “Even the hunk’s starting to get into Danny.”
Carole looked and had to laugh. Veronica’s date was watching Danny and clapping his hands to the music, but Veronica, evidently convinced that he didn’t like horses, held her arms stiffly crossed and looked completely disdainful.
“Bart’s doing a great job,” Carole said, “but I hope for the next song he dances with Lisa instead of Danny.”
Stevie grinned. “I can take care of that. I’ll tell the DJ it’s time for a slow song.” She ducked through the crowd toward the DJ’s station.
By the time the song ended, Stevie was back. As the crowd cheered, Bart halted Danny, waved, and dismounted. Stevie took the reins. “Now it’s definitely my turn,” she said. “Furthermore, this horse needs a rest.”
“I need a rest, too,” declared Phil. As the first few bars of a slow song began playing, Phil and Stevie led Danny to the far side of the tent, near the folding chairs. A.J. and Sarah began to dance, and one of the other eighth-grade boys asked Carole. Suddenly Lisa found herself facing Bart alone in the center of the dance floor.
He smiled at her, and she felt herself blush. Again! Lisa hoped she would someday outgrow blushing. Then, to her relief, she saw that Bart was blushing, too. Somehow this made her feel much more comfortable.
“Great dancing,” she said.
“Thanks,” he said. “Great horse.”
“It was more than that. Somehow it looked like you really could dance.”
“Well, I guess it should,” Bart admitted. “My mother’s been making me go to dance school since the fourth grade. No, don’t laugh—She’s like one of those old society types who thinks every well-bred boy and girl should still know how to waltz.”
Lisa wiped her eyes. “I’m only laughing because my mother is the exact same way,” she said. “Why do you think I had that horse doing the box step, anyway? Only I’ve been taking lessons since the third grade, not the fourth. I’ve been at it even longer than you.”
“Well.” Bart held up his hands. “Seems a shame to let all those lessons go to waste. Shall we?”
Lisa had danced slow dances before, but this was the first time she had ever danced with someone who actually knew how to dance, who didn’t put his arms around her as if she were a sack of potatoes. Furthermore, and more importantly, it was the first time she’d ever slow-danced with someone she cared about. It was wonderful.
Evidently Bart thought so, too, because he looked at her and smiled softly. “I guess all those lessons were worth it after all,” he said.
A few minutes later Lisa became aware that she hadn’t said a word in response. “Should we be talking?” she asked.
“No,” said Bart. “This is good just the way it is.”
Lisa felt as if her feet were floating. She danced and was perfectly happy.
ON THE OTHER side of the floor, Stevie exchanged agonized glances with Phil. When they’d headed for the one dark part of the tent, she’d hoped that—well, was it too much to want a few minutes alone with Phil once or twice in her life? Apparently it was, because they were surrounded by students who wanted to know all about Danny.
“Is that your horse?” a girl asked Stevie.
“No, he belongs to someone from my stable,” she answered. Across the way, she could see Veronica apparently arguing with her date. Veronica was waving her arms and looked as if she was shouting. Stevie grinned. She wasn’t going to mention Veronica’s name.
“Can we touch him?” asked another student.
“Sure,” Phil said. “Pat his neck, that’s what he likes best.”
“How would you know?” Stevie asked in an undertone. “You don’t know Danny.”
“It’s what all horses like best,” Phil said. “Besids, you don’t know Danny, either. Otherwise you would have told me what a great rock-and-roll horse he is.”
Stevie grinned. She showed a swarm of eager students how they could pat Danny so that he would enjoy it rather than be annoyed by it. She answered questions about his breeding and his age.
“What’s his name?” asked a boy.
“His registered name is Go for Blue,” Stevie said. Danny, like all Thoroughbreds, had a fancy name from the Jockey Club registry. “But tonight we’re just calling him Prince Charming.”
A girl brought over a bowl of carrot sticks. “Here. One of the chaperones brought these, and no one’s touching them,” she said. Danny stuck his nose forward eagerly and had half the carrots eaten before Stevie could say a word.
“Thanks,” she finally said. Danny raised his head and dribbled orange slime. Stevie could see Lisa dancing happily. She looked for Carole and was surprised to see that her friend was already walking toward her.
“Go have fun!” Stevie said. “We’re taking good care of him.”
“I just had to see for myself,” Carole said. “Besides, it wasn’t much fun dancing with that guy anyway. I don’t know anything about him except that he likes football and thinks all horses are stupid.”
“So you ditched him,” Stevie guessed.
“I didn’t want to dance with him after he said that!” Carole protested. “I have standards, you know. And I really did want to make sure Danny was fine. I could see you were surrounded.”
“And you can see he’s having a good time,” Phil cut in.
“I can.” Carole stroked Danny’s soft nose. The music switched back to another fast song, and to their amazement, Danny started walking on his own toward the floor!
“He loves it!” Stevie said. She grinned at Carole, who had sprung into the saddle. Carole took Danny for a spin around the dance floor, and then Phil took a turn. When that song was over, the DJ played another slow one. Lisa held out her hands for the reins.
“I guess it’s my turn to take him,” she said.
“Forget it,” Carole said. “I can see Bart looking for you. And I think Danny is getting a little bit tired.” Carole knew that Danny had the energy to keep going for a long time, but she thought she could feel a slight reluctance creeping into his responses. Danny wasn’t enjoying himself as much as he had been. It was time to go home. “I’m going to page Judy,” Carole said. “This should be our last dance.”
“Okay.” Lisa didn’t feel disappointed. She was amazed that they’d gotten to the dance at all, she was tickled that Danny had had fun, and she was thrilled by how much she’d enjoyed dancing with Bart. Plus, she knew she’d get to see Bart again soon�
�their Pony Clubs were having a joint meeting in just over a week. “We’ve got to be going soon,”she told him as they headed back onto the dance floor. “It’s past our horse’s bedtime.”
Carole dismounted at the edge of the tent. She loosened Danny’s girth and tucked the stirrups up on his saddle. A few of her classmates came toward her, but she waved them away. “I think he’s tired,” she said. “If you want to see him again, you’ll have to come out to Pine Hollow.” She walked Danny across the parking lot and called Judy’s pager from the pay phone. Then she walked Danny back to the edge of the tent. She sat on a folding chair and let him graze in the grass near her feet while the last dance ended.
“You good boy,” she told him, letting her fingers run through his forelock and trailing mane. “You really were a Prince Charming. We’re going to take you home now, before midnight, you know. We can’t have you turning into a pumpkin.”
A few more students approached, and Carole stood up to wave them away. “He’s tired,” she said. “We’re going to take him home.”
They came closer anyway. “We’re with the school paper,” one said. “Could we just take one picture of him?”
Carole agreed, but asked them to wait until Lisa and Stevie arrived. The dance ended, and they came over quickly.
“Here.” One of the girls, who carried a camera, moved Stevie into position beside Lisa.
“We’d better hurry,” Stevie said. “Now that the music’s playing fast again, everybody’s starting to ask where Danny is. They thought he was just sitting out the slow song.”
“Let’s dress him up,” the second reporter suggested. “Look!” She held up a baseball hat and an enormous pair of clown’s sunglasses. “Will he mind?”
Lisa looked over Danny’s withers. A big group of students was heading their way. “He won’t mind, but hurry!”
Just as the girl snapped the picture, they saw Judy’s truck and trailer pull into the parking lot. Carole took the hat and glasses off Danny and handed them back to the girl.
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