by Stacy Gregg
“You’re going to be just fine, Evie,” Willard Fox says. “You don’t need me any more. But if that ever changes, then you know I’m in your corner, and I’ll be right here.”
And I know he will be. Waiting for me, at the end of the blue line.
Epilogue –
Six Months Later
Down here in the belly of the ship, you’d hardly know you were at sea. The roar of the engines drowns out the noise of the waves that smash against the steel hull, and the stench of motor oil and exhaust fumes hangs in the stale air.
This is an inter-island transporter, a passenger vehicle ferry, and the crossing we’re making today is a three-hour journey through the notoriously choppy and dangerous waters of the Cook Strait, the narrow neck of sea that separates the South Island from the North.
I never thought we’d be on a ship again. When Gus and Jock and Moxy and I disembarked from the HMS Canterbury in Lyttelton, I considered our seafaring days over and done with.
My only goal since we moved back home to Parnassus has been to pick up Gus’s training where I left off, hoping that it wasn’t too late to qualify him for the eventing team for Champs.
The journey to Kaikoura had been the best possible fitness test, so I knew Gus had the stamina to make it round the cross-country course. Plus we’d done all that track work with the jockeys in Riccarton. Now my training focused on jumping and dressage. We’d lost a lot of time from our schedule, but I knew if we really focused and worked at it, we’d be ready.
The fences at Area Trials were the biggest I’d ever jumped, and when we came home clear after the cross-country, I had this grin from ear to ear. We went double-clear that day – didn’t even graze a single rail in the showjumping, and we made the team. I know Mum was proud of me, but I saw the look on her face when I was lining up with Gus to get our rosette at the prize-giving, and I knew she was thinking about what lay ahead. Making the Area Trials team for Canterbury meant that I’d qualified to go to National Champs. And the announcement had been made that the Champs this year would be held at Taupo NEC – in the North Island.
There’s only one way to get from the South Island to the North with a horse, and that is on the car ferry that leaves from Picton. The only problem was, State Highway One between Kaikoura and Picton was still shut, so instead of the normal three-hour drive from Parnassus to get to the Interislander, the trip to get us here so far has taken us two days.
Yesterday we drove with a horse float across the Lewis Pass, a journey that took us up to the high summit of the mountains of the Southern Alps, where the roads were treacherous with sheer cliffs dropping away right beside the edge of the tarmac.
Sometimes, when it got really steep, Mum had the car in first gear just to keep us climbing, and when I looked out of the passenger window the whole world seemed to drop away into the depths of the forest-clad ravines below.
“I know you’re an old hand at these dangerous journeys,” Mum muttered as she kept her eyes glued to the road, negotiating the tight hairpin bends, “but I’m not quite the hardened hero that you are, Evie.”
“I’m pretty sure heroes are allowed to be scared,” I replied. And man, those roads were scary! I think the only one in the car who wasn’t terrified by the Lewis Pass was Moxy. She loved it. She spent the entire journey with her paws up on the window, looking out and purring with excitement. Jock, though, was even worse than me and Mum. He lay flat on the back seat looking doleful and pretending the world outside the windows didn’t exist, and he was such a cowardy custard that he didn’t sit up again until we were through the worst of it and cruising down the gentle slopes of Murchison. We overnighted at the Wairau Valley, then this morning we continued on through Blenheim until we reached the Interislander car ferry just in time for boarding.
The way the Interislander works, they get you to drive on board through the back of the ship and then when you leave again at the other end you drive off at the front. Which is pretty smart. They guided Mum in with the horse float as if she didn’t even know how to drive one, which is crazy because no one parks a float better than my mum. She pulled in behind the car in front of us and switched off the engine. I opened the door and nearly gagged when I smelt the car fumes. I could hardly breathe down here.
“How are Gus and Jock and Moxy going to breathe if they have to stay down here?” I asked Mum.
“It’ll clear,” she said unconvincingly as she fussed about getting her handbag sorted and a coat in case it was windy on deck.
“Evie,” she said, “grab a jacket.”
“Umm,” I hesitated, “Mum? I’m going to stay down here.”
“You can’t.” Mum shook her head. “It’s not allowed. Passengers have to go up on to the deck. Animals stay below. You’re not allowed to stay with the vehicle during the voyage.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know, Evie,” Mum groaned. “It’s just the rules, OK?”
“Can I at least come down and check on them?”
Mum shook her head. “They won’t let you below deck until we disembark.”
Mum slammed her car door. I was still sitting in the car and when I didn’t open my door and get out too, she opened hers again and glared at me.
“Evie? What are you doing? We need to get up on deck. They’re going to shut the doors soon.”
“I’m not going.”
Mum groaned. “Oh, Evie, not this again!”
“It’s OK. You go up, Mum. I’m going to stay down here.”
“But Evie, you’ll miss the whole trip!” Mum said. “You won’t see anything.”
I smiled. “I’ve seen enough sea, Mum.”
Mum laughed. “I guess all four of you have.”
She looked at Moxy who was giving me play-bites on my jaw and purring in my arms. “I keep forgetting that you four are inseparable …”
She threw me the car keys. “There’s a bottle of water on the back seat, and some potato chips. See you in three hours. Don’t get caught. I’ll bring you back some lunch.”
***
They sound a siren when the Interislander is about to depart from the port, the final signal to let everyone know that they have to get out of their cars and go above deck. I got out of the car when the siren sounded but I didn’t go up. I called Jock and picked up Moxy, and all three of us climbed in through the jockey door of the horse float to be with Gus.
That’s where I am now – sitting on the floor eating my potato crisps with Jock lying beside me and Moxy in her favourite position on Gus’s rump. The engine roar underneath us is kind of soothing in a way. The sound that worries me is the weird creaking and clanking of the ship as we move through the water. Like, what if they forget to close the doors and all the water comes in? And the smell down here is still really strong – diesel, salt water and car fumes. I know if Gus had been alone here he would have hated it.
There’s been a patrol moving through the ship, checking all the cars to make sure no one has stowed away. They just came past us and this man actually opened the door to the float! I was reading my book and I only just switched the torch off in time so he didn’t see it. I crammed myself up hard behind the door and I could see the beam of his torch as he circled it inside the float. He was about to shine it on me, and he would have probably found me too if Gus, Moxy and Jock hadn’t all started up at him at the same time. It was hilarious! Gus was like, nostrils flared and snorting like a dragon, and Jock gave this really low, throaty growl, and Moxy, she was just furious, standing up on Gus’s rump and spitting and hissing like a cat from Hades.
I saw her eyes, yellow like a demon’s in the patrol guard’s torch beam, and then I saw him step back hastily and slam the door shut again. I heard him right outside, his voice wobbly as he spoke into his walkie-talkie, “Yeah, nah –” he tried to sound cool – “she’s sweet. Nothing here, it’s all good.”
I waited until I’d heard his footsteps move away before I laughed out loud. Now I’m sitting here in the dark. I don�
��t really want to risk putting my torch on again in case the guard sees me. There’s maybe two hours to go before we reach the port in Wellington on the other side. I’ll stay in the darkness until then.
There was a time when I would have been desperate for this voyage to be over. And don’t get me wrong – I’m excited about our goal. We’re on our way to Champs! I am so amped about what lies ahead, because I know that Gus and me are going to ace it. We’re ready for this.
But there’s another part of me, a deeper part I suppose, that feels like you could waste your life just waiting for the future to happen. Sometimes we’re so busy anticipating things, we miss out on the moment that we’re living in right now. Looking back, that journey to Kaikoura was the making of me. And I know that, no matter what is to come, in some ways I’m still back there on State Highway One, and a part of me will always be there. Even when I’m all grown up, I know I will still be her. I will be Evie Violet Van Zwanenberg, with her dog at her heels, her cat at her back and her horse underneath her, with the sea of Kaikoura glittering in the distance, listening for the boom and the train-roar, waiting for the thunderbolt to strike.
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Other books by Stacy Gregg:
The Princess and the Foal
The Island of Lost Horses
The Girl Who Rode the Wind
The Diamond Horse
The Pony Club Secrets series:
Mystic and the Midnight Ride
Blaze and the Dark Rider
Destiny and the Wild Horses
Stardust and the Daredevil Ponies
Comet and the Champion’s Cup
Storm and the Silver Bridle
Fortune and the Golden Trophy
Victory and the All-Stars Academy
Flame and the Rebel Riders
Angel and the Flying Stallions
Liberty and the Dream Ride
Nightstorm and the Grand Slam
Issie and the Christmas Pony
Pony Club Rivals series:
The Auditions
Showjumpers
Riding Star
The Prize
www.stacygregg.co.uk
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