AN IMPOSSIBLE OATH?
“I’m really ashamed that Phil’s horse can do something Belle can’t—especially when it’s a dressage movement,” Stevie said. “But I solemnly promise you, the next time Phil sees Belle, she’ll be doing flying changes.” She raised her hand like a Girl Scout taking an oath.
Lisa stifled an urge to giggle. “But Stevie, that doesn’t give you or Belle much time,” she reminded her friend. “Aren’t you planning a picnic ride for Phil’s birthday?”
Stevie nodded. “Two and a half weeks,” she said. “Should be plenty of time. Deborah learned to ride as a wedding present for Max. I’ll teach Belle flying changes as a birthday present for Phil.”
“I bet he’d rather have a new halter,” Lisa said.
“Flying changes,” Stevie repeated grimly. “Two weeks.”
RL 5, 009-012
FLYING HORSE
A Bantam Skylark Book / August 1995
Skylark Books is a registered trademark of Bantam Books, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. Registered in U. S. Patent and Trademark Office and elsewhere.
“The Saddle Club” is a registered trademark of Bonnie Bryant Hiller.
The Saddle Club design/logo, which consists of a riding crop and a riding hat, is a trademark of Bantam Books.
“USPC” and “Pony Club” are registered trademarks of The United States Pony Clubs, Inc., at The Kentucky Horse Park, 4071 Iron Works Pike, Lexington, KY 40511-8462.
All rights reserved.
Copyright © 1995 by Bonnie Bryant Hiller.
The artist gives special thanks to Alison Stubbs.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
For information address: Bantam Books.
Published simultaneously in the United States and Canada
eISBN: 978-0-307-82543-8
Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. Its trademark, consisting of the words “Bantam Books” and the portrayal of a rooster, is Registered in U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries. Marca Registrada. Bantam Books, 1540 Broadway, New York, New York 10036.
v3.1
I want to thank Eve Jordan for inspiring this story one afternoon in Maratea. And thanks, too, to Nancy Moore Hoeflich for her helpful memories of Chincoteague and Assateague.
I would like to express my special thanks to Kimberly Brubaker Bradley for her help in the writing of this book.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Acknowledgments
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
About the Author
“ISN’T THIS DAY just perfect?” asked Stevie Lake. She threw her arms open wide and sniffed happily at the fresh early-morning air.
“I don’t know about perfect,” said one of Stevie’s two best friends, Lisa Atwood, with a slight smile. “I woke up late and didn’t have time for breakfast, I couldn’t find my boot hooks, and Prancer’s thrown a shoe so I’m going to have to ride Delilah instead.”
“Oh.” Stevie’s grin faded in sympathy. “I’m sorry about Prancer, Lisa. Are you sure—”
“I’m sure,” Lisa said. “The shoe’s come all the way off, and she’s lost it in the pasture somewhere. It wasn’t even loose yesterday. I don’t want to hurt her by trying to ride her without it.”
“Not a Thoroughbred,” Stevie agreed. The two girls belonged to a Pony Club called Horse Wise, in which they learned all sorts of things about horse care and training. They knew that while some horses had strong hooves and could be ridden without shoes, Thoroughbreds tended to have weak hooves. Prancer was a Thoroughbred and an ex-racehorse. “Don’t be disappointed,” Stevie comforted her friend. “You’ll have a nice ride on Delilah. The trails will be gorgeous, no matter what.”
“I know,” said Lisa. “I wouldn’t miss this trip for anything.” Horse Wise had been invited by a neighboring Pony Club, Cross County, to go on a trail ride through Cross County’s hunt territory. Lisa, Stevie, and their other best friend, Carole, had ridden at Cross County before, but they hadn’t explored all the hunt trails. They loved to ride somewhere new.
“I wouldn’t miss it for anything, either,” said Stevie, the rapturous smile returning to her face.
Lisa laughed. “That’s because the woods will be so beautiful, I’m sure,” she teased. “Or maybe because you’ll be riding your beautiful horse, Belle? It wouldn’t have anything to do with Phil Marsten, would it, Stevie?” Phil was Stevie’s boyfriend and a member of Cross County. Lisa knew how rarely the two got to see each other.
“Like I said,” Stevie responded, “this is a perfect day!”
“Up, up, up!” Across the yard of Pine Hollow Stables, Red O’Malley, the head stable hand, was helping Veronica diAngelo load her mare into the horse van. Garnet stepped daintily aboard on Red’s command, and Stevie saw Red and Veronica exchange grins—a rare event, since Veronica was a spoiled brat and usually tried to boss Red around. Of course, Veronica had been treating Red a little more nicely ever since his girlfriend, Denise McCaskill, had come to help out at Pine Hollow. Veronica greatly admired Denise. Still—
“Would you look at that!” Stevie said.
Lisa nodded. “Veronica’s helping load Garnet. She’s even smiling. I can’t believe it!”
“It must be something in the air,” declared Stevie. “This really is an amazing day!”
“Except that without my boot hooks I can’t pull my boots on,” Lisa reminded her. She pointed to the tennis shoes she was wearing with her breeches.
“Switch to cowboy boots, they’re easier,” Stevie advised. “But I bet Carole is wearing her dress boots today. She’ll have some boot hooks.” She steered Lisa into the stable. They found Carole Hanson in the main aisle, wrapping shipping bandages around the legs of her horse, Starlight.
“Boot hooks?” Carole repeated vaguely. She straightened, patting Starlight’s neck absentmindedly, and half closed her eyes. “In my cubby, in the tack room, second shelf, toward the back behind the saddle soap on the left-hand side.” Lisa and Stevie grinned. Carole could be incredibly flaky, but she was always organized around horses.
“And Lisa didn’t get to eat breakfast,” Stevie continued.
“There are doughnuts. Maybe in the tack room? Somewhere.” Carole looked around distractedly.
“Here?” Stevie plucked a pile of shipping bandages off a hay bale to reveal a bag of doughnuts.
“There.” Carole smiled and went back to wrapping Starlight’s legs.
“See?” Stevie said to Lisa. “Carole helps you out, and I help Carole help you out.”
Lisa laughed. That was the best part of their threesome—not the way their personalities fit, which they certainly did, but the way they were always ready to help each other. They had even formed a club called The Saddle Club. Members had to be horse crazy and had to help each other out whenever help was needed. Both of those rules were easy to follow for Lisa, Carole, and Stevie.
“Starlight looks beautiful,” Lisa said when she returned from the tack room with her boots on and her arms full of Delilah’s tack. Lisa didn’t have her own horse. She wanted one, of course, but she still wasn’t sure she knew en
ough to give one the care and training it would need. Lisa hadn’t been riding as long as Carole and Stevie, and although she was a good rider, she was also a good enough student to realize how much she didn’t know.
In the stall next to Delilah’s, Jessica Adler was saddling Penny, one of Pine Hollow’s lesson ponies. “I can hardly wait,” Jessica told Lisa as she walked Penny out of the stall. “I’ve never taken Penny on a real trail ride before.” Lisa smiled. Now that she had her boots on and had eaten something, she was starting to feel enthusiastic about riding Delilah. The mare was sweet and would be nearly as much fun to ride as Prancer. The clear sky promised them a warm day, and a balmy summer breeze wafted through the stable, mixing with the smells of horses, leather, and hay. Lisa buckled the throatlatch of Delilah’s halter and paused to stroke the mare’s golden neck before leading her out of her stall. Stevie was right. This was going to be fun.
Outside, confusion reigned. Nearly a dozen Pony Clubbers were going to Cross County, but only four horses had been loaded onto the van. Red was standing by the van’s ramp, trying to organize the horses that were ready to load. It was a short trip so the horses were traveling fully tacked. Denise was inspecting the horses’ tack before they were put on board. Some of the younger riders hadn’t put their saddles on properly or fastened the saddle girths correctly. A few of the ponies had gotten tired of waiting and were beginning to act up. Their riders shrieked and scolded.
Polly Giacomin ran through the crowd saying, “Oh gosh, how could I forget—” Her purple windbreaker flapped loudly in the breeze. The noise spooked Penny, who was just about to step onto the van. Penny backed up, fast, yanking the reins out of Jessica’s hands. The pony wheeled and trotted briskly back to the barn.
“Jessica, what do you think you’re doing?” A loud voice boomed across the yard. Instantly the riders went still. Max Regnery, owner of Pine Hollow Stables and leader of the Pony Club, strode forward angrily. Everyone looked shocked. Max could be a stern instructor, but he never yelled like that, especially not at one of the younger kids.
“She was trying to put Penny on the van,” May Grover, one of Jessica’s friends, said stoutly. “Polly ran past and made Penny nervous.”
“I’m sorry, Max,” Jessica said. “I didn’t mean to let go of the reins, but I couldn’t help it.” Denise came back from the barn leading the pony. She handed Penny to Jessica with an understanding smile.
“Well,” Max said grumpily. “You shouldn’t have let it happen. All of you are making too much noise. It’s no wonder the horses are upset. Let’s have a little peace and quiet around here for once, okay?”
“Geez,” said Stevie, leading Belle up beside Starlight and Delilah. “What’s gotten into Max?”
“I don’t know,” said Carole. “I’ve never heard him talk to one of the little kids like that. He knows Penny doesn’t like to go into the van.”
“He must be missing Deborah,” Lisa guessed. Deborah was Max’s new wife. As soon as they’d gotten home from their honeymoon in London, Deborah, a newspaper reporter, had returned to Europe to cover a political summit. She’d been gone for a week already.
“It’s awful to be separated from the person you really care about,” Stevie said with a sigh. “I know what that’s like.”
Carole and Lisa rolled their eyes. “Well, I don’t,” Lisa said, laughing at Stevie’s dramatics. “But I do know we’ll never get to Cross County until the horses are on the van.”
Carole nodded. “This is a job for The Saddle Club!”
In a minute they had everything organized. Stevie held Belle and Starlight while Lisa loaded Delilah, and Carole helped Jessica with Penny. Then Stevie and Carole loaded their horses, and Lisa helped Denise finish inspecting the younger kids’ ponies. Soon Horse Wise was ready to roll. “Here comes the most perfect part of the perfect day,” Stevie said as they left Pine Hollow.
STEVIE WAS CERTAINLY right about one thing, Carole thought. The trails through the Cross County hunt territory were beautiful. Wide paths cut through pine woods and opened onto meadows and sparkling, sunlit streams. Starlight moved forward at a loose, relaxed walk. He seemed to appreciate the beauty as much as she did.
“This is wonderful,” said Lisa. Carole nodded. They rode side by side, just behind Stevie and Phil. Delilah seemed as contented as Starlight.
Stevie thought she’d never been so happy. Just as she’d said, it was a perfect day. The woods were gorgeous, the weather was gorgeous, and Phil—well, Phil was gorgeous, too.
“I have to hand it to you, Stevie Lake,” Phil said. “I’ve learned so much since I’ve gotten to know you.”
Stevie turned to smile at him, blushing.
“I mean it,” Phil persisted. “Without you, I would never have studied dressage. But since you were so involved in it, I got more interested, and it’s been a big help in my riding.”
Stevie grinned. Although she loved it when Phil said romantic things to her, riding was a more usual topic of conversation between them. Dressage was a highly technical sort of riding, without jumping, that Stevie loved and was very good at. “If I remember right, you got interested in it at about the same time our Pony Clubs had a dressage competition,” she said. “You wanted to beat me.” She was glad she could tease Phil about it. Sometimes the natural competitiveness between them got out of hand and made their relationship difficult.
Phil laughed. “But if I remember correctly, you beat me,” he said. “But honestly, Stevie, I’m serious. I didn’t realize that dressage training could be such a big help with my cross-country riding. Lately Teddy and I have spent a lot of time practicing flying changes, and it’s really helped him to stay balanced when we’re galloping on the trails here. Sometimes the paths twist awfully tightly, and now he can do a flying change whenever he needs to, and keep his legs underneath him.”
Stevie knew that whenever a horse cantered or galloped, it led off with one of its front legs. The lead leg, or lead, was supposed to be the leg on the inside of the direction the horse was turning. For example, the right leg should lead when the horse turned to the right, so that the horse would be better balanced through the turn. The rider told the horse which lead to take when they started cantering, but if the horse needed to switch leads there were two ways to do it. In a simple lead change, the rider asked the horse to slow to a trot and then pick up a canter on the other lead. In a flying lead change, or flying change, the horse switched leads midcanter.
“I’ll show you,” Phil offered. “Watch.” He pushed Teddy into a canter, then lengthened the horse’s stride to a balanced hand-gallop. Once Phil established a good forward pace, he and Teddy proceeded to do several flying changes on the flat, smooth trail. Teddy’s bulky frame became elegant—suddenly he looked as if he were dancing.
“Wow!” said Carole, just behind Stevie.
Stevie nodded. “Wow is right.”
“I saw,” said Lisa. “Those were flying changes, right?”
“Every couple of strides, and on a straightaway, too,” said Carole. “That’s really impressive. I didn’t know Phil could ride like that.”
“Neither did I,” said Stevie in a small voice.
Phil trotted Teddy back to them, his face flushed with pride. “What did you think?” he asked them.
“That was really something,” Stevie told him honestly. “I bet you’re pretty proud of Teddy, too. I didn’t know he could do that.”
Phil patted his horse’s neck. “Neither did I, until I asked him to try,” he said. “But you’re right, I do feel pretty proud of him.”
THE REST OF the ride, in Lisa and Carole’s minds, was every bit as glorious as the start, but they couldn’t help noticing that Stevie seemed less and less euphoric. In fact, by the end, she didn’t even seem to be having fun, and her good-bye to Phil was uncharacteristically subdued. On the car ride home they confronted their friend.
“What’s up?” Lisa asked. “This morning you were higher than a helium balloon, and now you look like
someone’s popped you. You couldn’t have had a fight with Phil, we were right behind you the whole time. What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know.” Stevie scraped some mud off her boot heel with her fingernail.
“You know you can always tell us,” Carole reminded her. “If something’s bothering you, we want to help.”
Stevie looked up, and her friends were surprised at her agonized expression. “It’s Belle,” she whispered.
“Something’s wrong with Belle?” Carole was instantly concerned. “But Stevie, she looked fine—”
“No, she’s fine. It’s just”—Stevie lowered her voice so that the other passengers couldn’t hear—“she doesn’t know how to do a flying change.”
Lisa would have laughed if she hadn’t known how serious Stevie was. “Stevie, that’s not exactly a problem. It’s not like she kicks people, or rears, or has colic or something.”
“I’m just so embarrassed,” Stevie countered. “I’m really ashamed that Phil’s horse can do something Belle can’t—especially when it’s a dressage movement! Lisa, you know I’m better than he is at dressage.”
Lisa wisely didn’t respond. Stevie always fought to be a better rider than Phil. It had caused her problems before.
“Stevie,” Carole said sensibly. “You act like it’s a major fault, when really it’s just a lack of training. You can certainly teach Belle to do a flying change.”
Stevie nodded her head. “Oh, I will,” she assured them. “In fact, I solemnly promise you, the next time Phil sees Belle, she’ll be doing flying changes.” She raised her hand like a Girl Scout taking an oath.
Lisa stifled an urge to giggle. “But Stevie, that doesn’t give you or Belle much time,” she reminded her friend. “Aren’t you planning a picnic ride for Phil’s birthday?”
Stevie nodded. “Two and a half weeks,” she said. “Should be plenty of time. Deborah learned to ride as a wedding present for Max. I’ll teach Belle flying changes as a birthday present for Phil.”
Flying Horse Page 1