Jade's Summer of Horses

by Amy Brown

  ‘Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. It’s just a possibility at this stage. Sorry I can’t be more specific yet. But I promise to keep working on it. I wonder, would you mind if I stayed down here for a few days, to follow up on the story?’

  Flora looked worried. ‘I’d love to have you stay, but the house is full.’

  ‘You can stay with us,’ Mata offered. ‘If it helps you stop this Bandt lady from ruining poor Flora’s home and business, stay as long as you like.’

  Over pavlova, Granddad decided that he would drive home later that afternoon, leaving Jade’s dad to spend a few nights ‘researching’ at Ocean Bay. Although there was room at Mata and Ngaire’s for Granddad, little Holly the terrier needed to be taken home and fed. She was currently banished to the backyard, where she couldn’t bother Sir William. The weather had cleared now, and through the window by the dining table a sliver of sea was glistening invitingly.

  ‘Shall we leave the clearing up for later and go out to the garden to open presents?’ Flora suggested.

  ‘Shouldn’t we sit around the tree?’ Andy asked.

  ‘We could take the tree outside — it’s only a branch after all. Or we could decorate the lemon tree.’ Nellie was being facetious, but Andy thought that was a fine idea. While her mum began rinsing and stacking the dishes next to the sink — she couldn’t stand to see dirty dishes sitting on a table — Andy started moving decorations from the macrocarpa branch to the lemon tree.

  ‘Tea or coffee, anyone?’ Flora asked. ‘Or another bubbly?’

  ‘Bubbly!’ Nellie promptly replied. She was in better humour than usual due to the quantity of bubbly wine she had already consumed.

  ‘Why don’t you go outside and sit down? I’ll make the drinks,’ Ngaire insisted. ‘You’ve done everything so far, Flora — it was such a beautiful spread.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Flora said, surprising Ngaire by agreeing. ‘A splash of milk in my coffee, please. And one sugar.’

  When most of the dishes were done, the drinks prepared and the lemon tree decorated, everyone congregated in the backyard. Although it was not quite everyone: Sir William, eyeing Holly and appearing far from impressed, made his way to the youngsters’ paddock to ruin more fieldmice families.

  Andy, who had nominated herself as present-distributor, handed out the shortbread first. Everyone wanted something to dunk in their tea or coffee, despite being overly full from lunch.

  When the biscuits were gone, Andy started reading cards aloud.

  ‘“For Flora, from M and N”.’

  ‘Just hand them all out. If we open them one at a time, it’ll take forever,’ Rhian complained.

  Jade was sitting between her dad and granddad, with Holly in her lap ogling the shortbread. There was a pleasant combination of familiarity and newness, taking part in someone else’s Christmas with her own family present.

  When Flora had thanked Mata and Ngaire for a stripy apron with large pockets (‘Good for the kitchen, or when you’re grooming the horses’), Andy opened a gift of her own from her mother. Surprisingly unhorsey, it was a set of watercolour pencils and cartridge paper.

  ‘Why don’t you give Aunty Flora your present now?’ Andy’s mum suggested, clearly proud of her daughter’s drawing.

  ‘Flora’s already had one,’ Andy protested. ‘And, anyway, it’s from Jade and Nellie, too.’

  ‘But you made it!’

  ‘The suspense is killing me,’ Flora joked. ‘Come on, where is it?’

  At the bottom of the pile, Andy found an A4 envelope.

  ‘It’s from all of us — so is this.’ Andy passed Flora the bottle of wine Jade’s dad had brought.

  Flora was quiet as she examined the picture.

  ‘Aren’t you clever?’ she said, finally looking up from the page. ‘Look, Mata, Ngaire: you have to guess who’s who.’

  ‘Isn’t that super?’ Ngaire said. ‘Though I’m a bit sad that Issa and Basho aren’t there, too. I guess twenty horses is a lot to fit on one page.’

  Of all the presents — the baking, books, apron, pencil set and wine — Andy’s drawing was the most admired.

  ‘I’ll have to frame it and hang it next to the trophies,’ Flora said, giving her niece a quick peck on the cheek.

  Most families would spend Christmas afternoon digesting their lunch and relaxing, but not so at Samudra. Mata and Ngaire took Jade’s dad and granddad and Holly for a walk along the beach towards their bach, while Rhian and Andy’s mum went for a swim. This left Jade, Nellie, Andy and Flora time to pack the truck for the Boxing Day Race. Basil, Piper, Precious and Poppet would be competing.

  Jade felt rather guilty, loading Basil’s gear into the truck while Tani stood at the gate, ears pricked hopefully. He would not be happy in the early morning when the truck left without him. As if reading Jade’s mind, Flora said, ‘You’re doing me a big favour, Jade. Bas hasn’t been out for a proper ride in yonks. It will do him the world of good.’

  ‘Is the race far away?’ Jade asked.

  ‘Not far, but we’ve a lot of gear to take and I don’t want to tire the horses out by walking them further than necessary. You know it’s important to keep the horse’s heart rate regular?’

  Jade nodded vaguely.

  Flora smiled, seeing Jade’s confusion. ‘Don’t worry, just follow Andy — she’s an old hand at the short course now. Also, it’s a very relaxed day. Even though it’s called a Competitive Trail Ride, this one is more recreational than competitive. It is also quite short, so nothing to stress over.’

  ‘That’s good.’ Jade was relieved. Endurance was still a mystery discipline to her, really, and she was well aware of the chance of failure when trying something new.

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ Becca had said earlier when Jade had said she was nervous about riding in the endurance event. Jade had telephoned her friend to wish her a Merry Christmas and ask her how the show season had been going. But instead, Jade had found herself talking mainly about herself and Samudra.

  ‘It is a bit scary, though, riding Flora’s horse in an event I’ve never tried before,’ Jade said. ‘But enough about me: how are you? And Happy Christmas!’

  ‘Thanks. You, too.’ Soon Jade felt less guilty about her selfish conversation: Becca spent the next fifteen minutes, non-stop, giving a thorough account of her winning jump-off at the Flaxton Show. It was only when Flora started frowning and tapping her watch that Jade had been able to say goodbye.

  ‘Mata and Ngaire have very kindly lent me their spare bedroom for the next few nights while I sniff around this nasty Kim Bandt business,’ Jade’s dad told her. He had come back to Samudra to see off Granddad before dinner.

  ‘Will you be working too hard to come along with us to the race tomorrow?’ Jade asked.

  Her dad looked uncomfortable. ‘Probably, yeah. Sorry, sweet.’

  ‘It’s not much of a spectator sport anyway,’ said Flora, who had been eavesdropping.

  ‘I’m amazed that you’re managing to just carry on as usual, going to shows — races, sorry — and so on, while Samudra’s at risk of being closed down,’ Jade’s dad said.

  ‘What else can we do?’ Flora replied simply. She was tossing vinaigrette through lettuce leaves from the garden. ‘Life must go on.’

  Even ‘recreational’ competitive trail rides start early, as Jade learnt the next morning. Rhian and Andy’s mum were still fast asleep when the Samudra truck left the front gate, and the sun was only just beginning to rise over the low tide. It was like the horse shows Jade was accustomed to, in that the animals in the truck had been thoroughly groomed and well fed, but otherwise it seemed quite different: there were no butterflies in Jade’s stomach and no smart clothes to change into. Everyone, crammed into the cab of the truck, was wearing clean but plain jodhpurs, T-shirts and sweaters.

  ‘So, you know what will happen once we get there?’ Flora prepared Jade.

  ‘Unload the horses?’

  ‘After that.’

  ‘Vet check?’
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  ‘Before that we’ll pick up our numbers and maps. But yes, there’s a vet check. Basil is in tip-top condition, so there’s no need to worry; just do what the vet tells you. Watch whoever is in front of you. It’ll probably be one of us.’

  ‘Will we all ride together?’ Jade asked hopefully.

  ‘To begin with, yes. Nell and I are doing the longer course, so you and Andy will finish first.’

  ‘How long are the courses?’

  ‘Not long at all — twenty kilometres for you two juniors, and forty for us.’

  It sounded like a long course to Jade. Flora saw her grimace. ‘You know that Bas has done 120 kilometres, Jade? This will be a walk in the park for him; literally, actually — part of the course goes through Kowhai Park. Keep an eye out for tui and wood pigeons.’

  ‘It sounds like a pretty ride.’

  ‘It is. Very scenic. Honestly nothing at all to worry about. If anything, you may have trouble keeping Bas slow enough. Did you know that you can pass the finish line too soon?’

  Jade shook her head and looked worried again.

  ‘Just try to keep pace with Piper. Pretend you two are on an ordinary ride. Fingers crossed Piper won’t get too worked up with the other horses.’

  ‘She was good last year,’ Andy said. ‘But if you do get ahead, Jade, just ride with anyone. It doesn’t have to be me. Everyone’s really friendly.’

  ‘If there’s a minimum time and a maximum time, how does anyone win?’ Jade asked. ‘Everyone must cross the finish line at nearly the same time?’

  ‘It’s more to do with the horse’s condition. Your time is recorded and compared with the vet-check results — the best combined total wins. But, as I keep saying, it’s really just for fun.’

  ‘Flora only says that because she wins every year,’ Nellie said. ‘It’s just for fun for you, because no one else stands a chance against Samudra horses.’

  ‘That’s something I was meaning to tell you, Jade,’ Flora said, slowing the truck and turning up a gravel road. ‘Even if you get the best time and vet result, Bas won’t be able to win: he’s over-qualified. And you won’t technically be able to win either, as you haven’t been training him. I hope you don’t mind too much.’ ‘No, that’s fine!’ Jade was relieved. There really wasn’t any pressure at all.

  At the end of the gravel road was a heavy gate. Nellie swore colourfully as she dragged it open. At the top of the hill, the dirt road ran out and was replaced by two tyre tracks in the dried-out grass.

  Next to a weatherboard cottage were a few yards and a parking area for trucks like Flora’s, and horse floats. Jade thought it looked like a very small sports day, except with more adult riders than children. Driving closer, Jade recognized Mata and Ngaire amongst the riders clustered at the vet check.

  ‘Did you guys sleep in?’ Mata asked, riding over to the Samudra truck as Jade and Andy led the horses down the ramp. ‘It’s nearly eight!’ It sounded like a joke, and Flora smiled wryly, but the race was due to start at eight-thirty so there wasn’t actually much time to spare at all.

  Slipping the hackamore over Basil’s ears, Jade arranged the parting between his forelock and mane.

  ‘No time for primping,’ Nellie chided. ‘Get your helmet on and go to the house with Flora.’

  Jade could have argued that arranging the mane and forelock wasn’t primping so much as attending to Basil’s comfort; if she were a horse, Jade thought, she wouldn’t want her mane to be caught under the crownpiece of the bridle. But such an argument would not have gone down well at that moment. Jade wondered whether Nellie was missing her cigarettes again.

  At the weatherboard cottage, a woman in a sun hat was marking off names on a list and handing out zip-lock bags of back-numbers and maps. Flora tied Jade’s number onto her back, as if this, too, were a new experience with which Jade needed help.

  ‘I can do it,’ Jade said.

  ‘It’s quicker if I do it. You look at the map. See the highlighter marks? Those are obstacles, or hazards.’

  ‘Jumps?’ Jade asked, her eyes lighting up. Basil looked like a jumper.

  ‘No — don’t you remember that I told you endurance horses don’t jump? We have to keep the heart rate as low as possible. Listen to me when I talk to you, Jade: I know what I’m doing.’

  ‘I thought maybe there were jumps because this was a “competitive trail ride” not endurance,’ Jade said, then wished she hadn’t. It sounded petty.

  ‘They are essentially the same discipline. The basic idea is the same.’ Flora sounded stressed. Although everyone had said how relaxed the day would be, it didn’t seem like that to Jade so far. Of the Samudra group, only Andy was still smiling. As she had said she would be, Piper was uncharacteristically docile.

  When everyone was wearing a number, the group made their way to the vet. One by one, beginning with Flora, they were asked to dismount and trot their horse out. Nellie had to trot Precious out twice, as the first time the temperamental mare shambled in a way that could have suggested lameness.

  ‘She just takes a while to warm up,’ Nellie said stiffly, when questioned by the vet.

  Next the legs and hooves of each animal were checked and another box ticked. Finally, with his stethoscope, the thorough vet noted each horse’s heart rate.

  ‘You’re all fine and dandy,’ the vet said, smiling. He clearly knew Flora from previous events. ‘Better make your way to the start line now; it’s right on eight-thirty. Good luck, everyone.’

  Jade hadn’t a clue where she was going, but didn’t mind a bit. Map-reading was not a skill of hers, and the hand-drawn map, now scrunched in her pocket, seemed somehow unreliable. Best to just follow the others — they were all going the same way, after all. Compared with the hunt the previous winter, this cross-country ride with a group of horses was far more sedate. It was like the scenic route of the luge in Rotorua compared with the racing track. Jade’s mum had taken her there for a holiday many years ago, and Jade remembered feeling both relieved and disappointed in herself that she had chosen the slow track, full of babies and old people, rather than the speedy lane.

  Other than having a fervent dislike of feeling pressure on his reins, Basil was a pleasant and easy ride. Like all of Flora’s horses, he was spoilt in a good way — a way that made him eager to please rather than always taking advantage. Reminding herself not to shorten the reins, a habit she had picked up from pony club, Jade held the rein buckle in one hand as Basil broke into a short, bouncy trot.

  ‘Is this okay?’ Jade asked, turning in her saddle to see Andy.

  ‘Yep. Just go with Bas; he knows what he’s doing mostly. If your speed’s wrong, I’ll call out.’

  With all the decisions delegated to Andy and Basil, Jade took the opportunity to admire the view. She, and the twenty or so other contestants, were now trotting along the fence line of a hilly paddock, so dry that the grass looked greyish white, with no trace of green. Beyond the hills to the right, Jade could see the sea. The beach would be full of sunbathers, swimmers and cricket games today, Jade reckoned, feeling the sun on her arms. Usually she’d be envious of beach-goers on a summer morning like this, but not today. With farmland to the left, sea to the right, and the promise of bush up ahead, past Basil’s charmingly speckled ears, Jade couldn’t think of any where she would rather be.

  As the hill gave way to a downward slope, Jade again resisted the urge to grab at Basil’s reins. Instead she held the pommel of the saddle — an old one of Flora’s — and used her legs to balance Basil over the uneven ground.

  ‘That’s the way,’ Ngaire said. Jade, having let Basil go at his own pace, had caught up to the other horses and left Andy and Piper behind. ‘You know, the fitter you are, and the more you can use your muscles, the more you help your horse. It’s not such an issue on a short ride like this, but over 120 kilometres, the horse really needs all the help he can get, and he notices when you’re getting tired.’

  ‘I guess it’s a bit like jumping,’ Jade said.
‘If the rider’s in the wrong position, the horse has less chance of clearing the jump.’

  ‘A bit,’ Ngaire said. It occurred to Jade that endurance riders seemed, generally, to disapprove of jumping. She decided not to mention it again during the ride.

  ‘Here’s my favourite part of the trail,’ said Mata, who was riding just ahead. They had reached the beginning of Kowhai Park. Past an open gate, Jade could see a narrow track leading into native bush.

  ‘This is the last chance for them to drink for the next few k’s,’ Ngaire said, pointing to a trough next to the gate, where all the riders were gathering. When it was Bas’s turn to drink, he sniffed at the clean water but turned away before drinking.

  ‘As the old saying goes,’ a man behind Jade said to her, ‘you can take a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.’

  ‘I shouldn’t keep trying?’ Jade asked Ngaire. She thought perhaps the man behind her was just in a hurry to water his own horse.

  ‘Bas knows what’s good for him. He prefers the water from the stream in the park, I think. Just you wait, he’ll hold everyone behind him up when he stops in the middle of the trail and has a long drink.’

  Ngaire was right. Fortunately, the two riders stuck behind Jade and Basil — a mother on a stocky standard-bred bay, and her son of about ten on a pretty grey pony that looked part-Welsh, part-Arab — were patient.

  ‘And do you know what that one is?’ the mother asked her son, pointing to a shrub with leaves that had a pale, furry underside.

  ‘No.’ He seemed less interested in learning about native species than his mother was in teaching him.

  ‘That one is called rangiora, or bushman’s toilet paper. Your father and I used it when we went camping for our honeymoon.’

  ‘Mum!’ The boy sounded both disgusted and amused.

  Before Jade could hear more of their conversation, Basil finally raised his head and, still dribbling water from his bitless mouth, splashed across the shallow stream.