Riding Holiday

by Michelle Bates

  Izzy and Kate clattered into the yard in high spirits. Of course what had happened at Graytops was bad news, but at least now that they knew what was going on they could understand why everyone had been behaving so strangely.

  “Come on,” Izzy said, jumping down from Prince’s saddle and leading the little pony off. “Let’s get these ponies rubbed down and go find Courtney and Megan.”

  Izzy and Kate led the ponies off into the barn. Although they were anxious to go and find their friends, they were careful not to skimp on their tasks. By the time they had finished, Garnet and Prince’s coats shone like burnished mahogany.

  As Izzy and Kate headed across the grass and climbed the stairs to the porch that evening, the dusk was already starting to creep in.

  “Courtney...Megan,” Kate called, pushing back the front door and walking down the hallway.

  “Up here,” a voice called from upstairs. Izzy and Kate climbed the stairs and pushed back the door to Courtney’s bedroom.

  “We were just listening to some music,” Megan said.

  “Is your mum around?” Kate whispered. “Can we talk?”

  “Yes, we can talk. She’s on the phone to Dad in the study,” Courtney said. “She knows that you know everything now.”

  “And did she mind?” Izzy said.

  “A bit at first – she was kind of worried about you being dragged into it all,” Megan said. “But then I think she realized we couldn’t keep it a secret from you any longer.”

  “So, what have you decided?” Courtney asked. “Are you staying?”

  “Of course we’re staying!” Kate answered.

  “Great!” Courtney’s face lit up.

  “And we’ve had an idea,” Izzy stepped in. “An idea about who could be behind all of this. You see, we’ve come across something like this before back in England.”

  “There was a racehorse at our local racing stables who was being doped,” Kate joined in excitedly. “It caused such a big stir at Sandy Lane when everyone found out how deeply Rosie was involved.”

  “Rosie’s our friend,” Izzy explained, and then, seeing the horrified looks on Courtney and Megan’s faces, she jumped in quickly to explain. “Oh no, she wasn’t involved like that. She was only trying to help. You see she’d got herself involved with this stable lad. He was on the run – accused of having doped a horse. Only, it turned out that it wasn’t him at all-”

  “It was a rival trainer,” Kate interrupted.

  Izzy and Kate paused and looked across to see if they could read anything in Courtney and Megan’s faces.

  “And you think the same thing might be happening here?” Courtney said slowly.

  “Well yes,” Izzy said. “What about the trainer of the horses that came in second?”

  “Actually, we’ve been down this road before,” Megan said gloomily. “And coincidentally they were trained by the same man.”

  “Well that’s it then,” Izzy cried out excitedly.

  “I’m afraid it’s not,” Courtney said firmly. “You see the trainer – Joe Hagan – is a friend of our family’s. He wouldn’t do anything to hurt Dad.”

  “But how do you know that?” Izzy said, putting her thinking cap on. “I mean, what if he was harbouring a secret grudge? Or had money troubles – anything like that might make him act in a way that was out of character.” She looked at Courtney and Megan, expecting them to look pleased with her theory, but neither of them looked pleased at all.

  “It just isn’t possible,” Courtney said.

  “It was only an idea.” Izzy suddenly wished she hadn’t mentioned it.

  “Well, Joe just isn’t like that,” Megan jumped in quickly.

  “All right, so maybe it’s someone else you know,” Kate stepped in, realizing that if she didn’t mediate immediately, they’d be in the middle of a full-scale row. “I don’t think Izzy meant it was definitely him – it was just a thought.”

  “Well, Joe hasn’t been to Graytops in ages,” Courtney said triumphantly. “So it couldn’t be him.”

  “Oh hmm...” Izzy looked disappointed.

  “I don’t even know why we’re talking like this,” Courtney said crossly. “Seattle’s going to be just fine when she races.”

  “Yes, of course she is,” Kate said.

  “Look, Courtney didn’t mean to be defensive,” Megan said placatingly. “She’s just upset. Let’s try and forget about this for now, all right?”

  And that, it seemed, was the end of the conversation. Courtney’s words had been firm and self-assured, and if Izzy hadn’t seen the worried look in her eyes, she would almost have believed her about Seattle’s race. But it just wasn’t true – no one knew for sure that everything would be all right when Seattle ran, and now all they could do was just sit back and wait.

  10

  AN UNUSUAL OFFER

  “They should be trying to work out who could be behind all this, not just waiting for Seattle’s race,” Izzy said, leaning over the top of Garnet’s stall. “It’s all so passive.”

  “I agree,” Kate nodded.

  The weekend had passed quickly – quicker than either Kate or Izzy could have imagined, given the circumstances.

  “But Courtney and Megan seem so unresponsive to any ideas on who it could be,” Izzy moaned. “You heard how they reacted when we suggested it could be Joe Hagan – they completely disregarded the possibility.”

  “Yes, but he is a friend of their father’s,” Kate said fairly. “Think how we’d feel if they accused one of our Sandy Lane friends of something awful.”

  “I guess,” Izzy answered. “But I just can’t believe how uptight they’re being.”

  “But then wouldn’t you be if something as important as this was at stake?” Kate said. “I mean, think of the thing that matters most to you in the world.”

  “Thinking,” Izzy said, conjuring up an image in her mind.

  “Don’t tell me,” Kate laughed. “It doesn’t have a silky black neck and big black eyes, does it?”

  “You guessed it,” Izzy laughed.

  “Well,” Kate went on. “Just imagine if Midnight was going to be taken away from you.”

  “Never,” Izzy said fiercely.

  “Exactly,” Kate said. “It didn’t take much to get a reaction out of you, did it? So we should try to understand how Courtney and Megan are feeling, and if they’re so certain that Joe isn’t involved, then we should just drop the subject.”

  “Yes, maybe,” Izzy said, though she didn’t look entirely convinced. “It’s just that I can’t get it out of my head, and I can’t bear just sitting around doing nothing.”

  “It doesn’t look like you’re sitting around doing nothing to me,” a voice came from the end of the barn.

  Izzy and Kate spun around. “Paula!” They smiled, pleased to see the vet’s assistant. She hadn’t been back to Graytops since last week and it was nice to see a friendly face. “What are you doing here?”

  “Oh, Dr. Doyle’s come to check on Seattle Surprise, so I thought I’d come and see how you two were doing. Are you by yourselves?”

  Kate nodded. “Courtney and Megan have gone out for a ride.”

  “What – and left you to do all of the hard work?” Paula laughed.

  “Well, not exactly.” Izzy jumped to the twins’ defence. She didn’t know why exactly, but since they had revealed so much about what was going on, she felt rather protective of them.

  “We’ve done tons of riding this weekend,” Kate went on. “And Courtney and Megan really needed a break from the farm – they haven’t had a chance to go out since we got here.”

  “Of course.” Paula nodded. “I was only joking.”

  Just at that moment, the conversation was broken up as Ted appeared at the end of the barn. “I thought I could hear another voice in here.”

  “Only me,” Paula started. But she didn’t get very far. Before she could get another word out, Ted had turned on his heel and was walking back down the aisle.

&nbs
p; “Not the friendliest guy in the world, is he?” Paula commented.

  “You can say that again.” Izzy was quick to join in with any criticism of Ted. “He’s been a real nightmare since we got here.”

  Kate frowned at Izzy. It was all right to talk like that to each other, but she didn’t think Sally would be too pleased if she heard they were bad-mouthing the staff.

  “Well, don’t worry about him. What were you two jabbering about anyway?” Paula asked. “It sounded important.”

  Izzy looked at Kate. She was aching to talk to someone else about everything that was going on at Graytops, but she didn’t know how much of it was public knowledge.

  Izzy hesitated. “We’ve just found out some stuff about Graytops, that’s all.”

  “Oh, you mean all the stuff about the doping?” Paula said.

  “Well yes, exactly,” Izzy said. She didn’t know whether to feel relieved that she hadn’t had to let the cat out of the bag, or upset that they were the only ones who hadn’t known. Still, she supposed it was hardly surprising that the vet’s assistant knew just what was going on.

  “It’s terrible, isn’t it?” Paula shrugged. “Their whole business is at stake.”

  Izzy looked at Kate. Should they take Paula into their confidence and tell her their ‘rival trainer theory’? They didn’t know her all that well, but she seemed nice and perhaps she’d be able to look at it more clearly and tell them if they were barking up the wrong tree.

  Kate looked at Izzy and nodded.

  “Well, we had an idea,” Izzy started. “You see, we came across something like this back home – at our local racing stables.”

  “A horse was being doped,” Kate said. “It turned out to be a rival trainer and we thought – well, what if it was the same here?”

  Paula looked thoughtful, but she didn’t say anything.

  “Courtney and Megan went nuts when we suggested it,” Kate went on. “You see the trainer of both of the horses that came in second was a man named Joe Hagan. Courtney and Megan are adamant that he can’t be involved – they say he’s a friend of their Dad’s.”

  “I know Joe Hagan,” Paula looked thoughtful, scratching her head. “His yard’s not that far away from here. I’ve been there with Dr. Doyle. You know, I don’t like him one bit. He’s a nasty piece of work if you ask me. And if the Bryants had to close down their farm he’d probably get some of their horses. I wouldn’t trust him as far as I could throw him.”

  “Really?” Izzy breathed, casting a quick glance at Kate. This was getting interesting.

  “Yeah, really,” Paula went on. “He’s always arguing over our bills...says we’re overcharging him. I don’t know why Dr. Doyle keeps going back there. I guess it must be for the sake of the horses.”

  “So it looks as though Joe Hagan could be struggling financially, does it?” Izzy said.

  “Well, I don’t know about that,” Paula said quickly. “But I don’t think he’s as clean as Courtney and Megan seem to think. But maybe you could do something. If you really want to help Graytops, that is.”

  “Of course we want to help Graytops,” Izzy said immediately. “But Courtney and Megan want us to forget the whole idea.”

  “Well,” Paula paused. “Why don’t you go and check out Joe Hagan’s farm yourselves? You never know what you might find – some of the drugs that were found in the horses – anything like that might give him away.”

  “Oh, but we couldn’t go behind Courtney and Megan’s backs,” Izzy said quickly. “Besides, we wouldn’t know how to get there.”

  “I could take you,” Paula said. “In my car.”

  “You’ve got a car?” Izzy and Kate looked impressed.

  “Well, I am seventeen, you know,” Paula said.

  “Still, we couldn’t exactly just turn up at Joe Hagan’s farm uninvited, could we?” Kate said. “What would we say? Excuse me, are you doping the Bryants’ horses?”

  “Of course you wouldn’t say that,” Paula laughed. “You wouldn’t have to say anything at all if you went there at night-time. Joe Hagan doesn’t lock up the yard, and there isn’t a security guard; it would be pretty easy,” Paula said, getting carried away with her ideas.

  Kate looked shocked.

  “Well, what do you say?” Paula said simply. “We’d only have to climb over a small wall.”

  “We?” Kate looked at Izzy and then back to Paula.

  “Well yes, I’d come with you,” Paula said.

  Kate looked undecided but then she spoke out. “Look Paula, it’s really nice of you to offer to help, but I don’t really think we can do that. We’d be in such trouble if we were caught.” She looked at Izzy, willing her to back her up, but Izzy didn’t say a word.

  “Oh, well, okay then.” Paula looked hurt. “Maybe I could just go by myself.”

  “Oh no, Paula, you can’t do that!” Izzy and Kate looked uncomfortable and they both felt relieved when Paula changed the subject.

  “Anyway,” Paula smiled. “I’d better get out to the paddocks. Dr. Doyle will be wondering what I’ve been up to.” She turned to make her way down the aisle and then she turned back. “Hey, look, I don’t suppose you’d like to go to the movies sometime this week?”

  “Yes,” Izzy grinned. “That sounds brilliant. What do you think, Kate?”

  “Yes, great. I’m sure it would be okay with Sally,” Kate answered, hoping that their enthusiasm might make up for their rather negative reaction to Paula’s other suggestion.

  “Then how about Wednesday?” Paula said.

  “Wednesday sounds good,” Izzy nodded.

  “I’ll come and pick you up at around seven-thirty then,” Paula said.

  And with that, she turned out of the barn. As soon as she was out of earshot, Kate turned to Izzy.

  “You do think we did the right thing, don’t you?” she said. “Turning down Paula’s offer, I mean.”

  “I guess so.” Izzy lingered over her words. “It would be so embarrassing if we were caught – how would we explain it to Sally? To Nick and Sarah? To our parents?”

  “For one moment, I thought you were going to say we should go along with it,” Kate chuckled.

  “No, of course not,” Izzy said, turning back to plait Garnet’s mane. And that was the end of the conversation. Izzy felt relieved when Kate finally went back to grooming Prince. Izzy was sure that if Kate had seen the look of disappointment on her face, Kate would have known she wasn’t sure about turning down Paula’s scheme.

  11

  STAKEOUT

  Life settled down at Graytops to pretty much how it had been before all of the revelations. Izzy and Kate continued to do their fair share of mucking out and grooming – only they didn’t mind helping out so much now that they knew it was all going to help Graytops. And anyway, they were getting to do plenty of riding too. Sally was preoccupied with Seattle’s training that week so it wasn’t until Wednesday afternoon that Kate and Izzy had a chance to broach the subject of their outing with Paula. It was almost time for supper and they were sitting at the kitchen table in the farmhouse, drinking glasses of cold orange juice, when they finally spoke out.

  “So you see, we wouldn’t be back late,” Kate cajoled.

  “Yes, of course you can go,” Sally said. “It’ll be good for you to get away from the farm, but you must be back by ten. I don’t know what time your parents allow you to stay out, but that’s our curfew time.”

  “Thanks, Sally.” Izzy turned to Kate and gave her a wink. They were never allowed out later than nine in England.

  “So where are you two going?” Courtney slid into the kitchen in her socks, nibbling a carrot.

  “To a movie,” Kate said. “With Paula.”

  “With Paula?” Megan wrinkled up her nose. “Well, I’m sure you’ll have fun at the movies, but I can think of other people I’d rather go with.”

  Izzy looked behind her to where Sally was disappearing out of the kitchen. What was it with Paula and Courtney and Megan? If s
he didn’t have it out with the twins now, then she never would.

  “Um, so just what is it that you don’t like about Paula?” Izzy eased in gently.

  “Oh, it’s nothing really,” Courtney shrugged, obviously not willing to talk about it. “Nothing important anyway.”

  “No, come on.” Izzy pushed her, starting to feel a little annoyed. “I mean, I’m interested to hear your reasoning. She’s been nothing but nice to us since we got here, and it’s hard for her being new around here and everything.”

  “Whatever you say.” Courtney didn’t flinch, and that riled Izzy even more. “But perhaps you don’t know her as well as I do.”

  “I’d have thought you’d be grateful to the girl who saved Seattle’s life.” Izzy blurted the words out.

  “Izzy!” Kate stepped in quickly, aware that her friend might have overstepped the mark this time.

  “No, that’s all right, Kate.” Courtney held up her hand. “Just what exactly do you mean ‘saved Seattle’s life’?”

  “Just what I said,” Izzy said, stumbling down a route from which there was no going back.

  “Is that what she said?” Courtney chuckled to herself.

  Izzy didn’t like Courtney’s tone. She didn’t like it one bit. “Yes, that’s what she said.” Izzy jutted out her jaw.

  “Then she’s a better liar than I thought she was,” Courtney said finally.

  “Come on Courtney,” Megan burst out. “Don’t get into this.”

  “Why would she lie about it?” Izzy rose to the challenge. “She recognized the symptoms, she called your mom and you didn’t like it.”

  “Well, that’s what she said.” Courtney snorted. “Paula wouldn’t know the symptoms of colic if they hit her in the face. I was the one who went and got Mom.”

  “It’s true,” Megan joined in. “Courtney saved Seattle’s life.”

  Izzy opened her mouth to say more, and closed it again.

  “Come on, Izzy.” Kate stepped in to save an argument. “We ought to go and get ready.”

  Izzy nodded and, without another word, she followed Kate to the door. She could have kicked herself. They had been getting on so well with Courtney and Megan lately, and now she’d really gone and blown it. It was only when they were safely behind closed doors that Kate spoke.