Read all the Saddle Club books!
Horse Crazy
Horse Shy
Horse Sense
Horse Power
Trail Mates
Dude Ranch
Horse Play
Horse Show
Hoof Beat
Riding Camp
Horse Wise
Rodeo Rider
Starlight Christmas
Sea Horse
Team Play
Horse Games
Horsenapped
Pack Trip
Star Rider
Snow Ride
Racehorse
Fox Hunt
Horse Trouble
Ghost Rider
I would like to express special appreciation to Alexandra L. Robinson, III, and to Katie Cooke, who each, in a special way, helped me give the book flavor.
Copyright © 1991 by Bonnie Bryant Hiller
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
“The Saddle Club” is a registered trademark of Bonnie Bryant Hiller.
“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.
Visit us on the Web! randomhouse.com/kids
Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at RHTeachersLibrarians.com
eISBN: 978-0-307-82500-1
Originally published by Bantam Skylark in August 1991
First Delacorte Ebook Edition 2012
v3.1_r1
Contents
Cover
Other Books in This Series
Title Page
Copyright
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
Chapter 14
About the Author
HORSE THIEVES!
“Hey, what’s this?” Lisa asked. She pointed to a piece of paper stuck to the wooden beam above the door to Garnet’s stall. “I don’t remember seeing that there before.”
Stevie gave her a boost and Lisa reached up, pulling the paper down. When she landed, she opened the page and scanned the words printed there in block letters. Then she gasped. “It’s a ransom note. Garnet’s been horsenapped!”
Carole took the paper and read it.
WE HAVE YOUR HORSE. IF YOU EVER WANT TO SEE IT AGAIN, GET $10,000 CASH AND WAIT FOR ANOTHER NOTE FROM US. DO NOT CALL THE POLICE OR IT’LL BE CURTAINS FOR THE NAG!
For Judy Gitenstein,
who has always been horse crazy
“SOMEDAY, I’M GOING to be that good,” Carole Hanson told her friends Stevie Lake and Lisa Atwood. The three girls were watching the performance of an adult rider at Pine Hollow Stables’ combined-training event.
“Of course you will be,” Lisa said.
“No she won’t,” Stevie said. “Carole’s going to be better than that.”
Carole smiled to herself. She was glad that Stevie and Lisa were her best friends, and she hoped they were both right. All three of the girls loved everything about horses. They considered themselves horse crazy and had formed The Saddle Club so they could ride together and talk about horses just about any time they wanted.
Carole was the most experienced rider of the three. She’d learned to ride at the various Marine Corps bases where she had lived with her father, a colonel, and her mother, up until her mother’s death two years earlier. Riding and horses were everything to Carole. Although she hadn’t decided what she would be when she grew up, she knew it would have to do with horses. She might be a rider, a breeder, a trainer, a vet—or maybe even all of them! Her dark eyes shone with excitement at the very thought.
Stevie had been riding for a few years, too, and was almost as good as Carole, though her impulsiveness and tendency toward mischief sometimes interfered with her progress as a rider. Those qualities also frequently got her into trouble with adults and other people who didn’t always see situations exactly the way Stevie saw them. Sometimes even her best friends didn’t see things the way she did, but they always knew that whatever Stevie’s scheme was, and no matter how harebrained it might seem, it was almost guaranteed to be fun.
Lisa, though a year older than her friends, was the newest rider of the three. Their teacher, Max Regnery, said she had natural ability. That, along with hard work, allowed her to keep up with her friends. Lisa enjoyed hard work. She worked hard at school as well as at the stable, and although her mother would have preferred more ladylike skills, such as ballet and painting, Lisa was proud of her accomplishments.
“Look at the way she gets her horse to turn the corner,” Carole said. “That’s what Max always wants us to do.”
Lisa watched. She always learned from Carole and she didn’t want this to be an exception. The rider in the ring, performing dressage—the first of the three sections of the combined-training event—was showing how well the horse and rider worked together in intricate patterns of steps, gaits, and forms. Some people said this was boring to watch. To an experienced rider, it showed more (or less!) skill than the other components of the event, the cross-country and the stadium jumping.
All three girls were competing in the junior events on each day of the competition. Although the events were similar to the adult events, the requirements for the junior events had been devised by Max for his young riders and didn’t always follow the specific international rules of combined training events. He’d promised the girls that the events would be tough, though, and Lisa was sure of that. She was equally sure they would be fun.
One of the things Max was doing differently was that he’d decided to award ribbons in each segment of the competition as well as an award for the best overall competitor. Lisa didn’t expect to win any blue ribbons. After all, she was a relatively new rider. But she hoped she’d be able to get a second or third in something.
“Who’s up next?” Stevie asked, interrupting Lisa’s thoughts while she scanned the program.
“It’s Mrs. McMurtry, but then comes Alicia Downing. She’s really great,” Lisa said.
“And she’s really nice, too. Let’s go wish her luck,” Carole suggested.
“Okay,” Stevie agreed. “But tell me. Who is it you’re wishing luck to? Mrs. Downing or that gorgeous championship Thoroughbred horse of hers, Bodoni?”
“I plead the fifth,” Carole said with a laugh. “Let’s go.”
The three of them left their seats and entered the large, dimly lit tent that had been set up to house the event horses temporarily.
“It’s over this way,” Stevie said, leading the way and looking over her shoulder. Before she knew it she ran smack into something quite large, quite human, and moving very fast.
“Oomph!” she said. She lost her balance and landed on the ground.
“Oh, golly, I’m sorry, Stevie,” the large, fast-moving human object said. It was Donald, Pine Hollow’s newest stablehand. He offered Stevie a hand and helped her back to her feet. “It’s just that I’ve got so much to do. Mrs. McMurtry’s screaming about a smudge on her boots and then I have to see about water for two of the horses and I’m sure Max told me to do something else, but I can’t remember what it was and there are six other things that I’ve got written down, so if you’ll excuse me …”
Before Stevie could excuse him, he was gone. Stevie shook her head in irritation. “I know he’s working hard and I should have be
en looking where I was going, but look at this. I got dirt all over my riding pants and I have to look good for the dressage test, too.”
“It’s okay, it’s just a smudge,” Lisa said. Then she picked something up. It was a pack of watermelon-flavored bubble gum Donald had dropped. “I hate this flavor,” she said.
“I’ll take it,” Stevie said, pocketing the gum. “I’ll chew any kind of bubble gum. Besides, he owes me for knocking me over. Now, what am I going to do with these dirty pants?”
“Let’s go over to the bathroom in the stable and I’ll help you get the dirt off, okay?”
“You don’t need me to help with that, do you?” Carole asked. Lisa shook her head. “Good. I’ll go see Bodoni. Meet you back in the stands.”
Carole worked her way through the maze of aisles in the tent, looking for Bodoni’s stall. She did love that horse. He was a coal-black stallion, a full brother to another horse she’d loved, named Cobalt.
When she arrived at Bodoni’s stall, though, it was empty. All his tack was there, so he wasn’t being exercised. The stall door had been left open and swung out into the hallway, where it could trip somebody or knock into a horse. That was very strange. No horse owner would ever do that because no horse owner would ever want anybody else to do that. Carole was sure something was wrong.
“Where’s Bodoni?” she asked Donald as he dashed past her on the way to one of his many chores.
“Dropped out,” Donald called back over his shoulder.
That was even stranger. Bodoni was almost guaranteed to take a ribbon. Why would he drop out? Even odder, why would someone take him away and leave all his tack behind? Carole sniffed trouble. She wanted to find Alicia Downing and ask her what was up.
The tent was filled with people, but most of them were strangers to Carole.
“Have you seen Alicia Downing?” she asked one of the trainers. The woman just shrugged her shoulders.
Carole realized then that if Bodoni was gone, Alicia would certainly be gone, too. She wondered if she might find Alicia still loading Bodoni into his trailer. Carole dashed along the crowded aisles heading for the parking lot and loading area. She wanted to know what was going on with one of her favorite horses. She just had to see Alicia.
She saw Alicia, all right. At least, she saw Alicia’s station wagon and horse trailer, driving out of the parking lot.
Carole waved to Alicia, hoping she’d stop and Carole could find out what had happened, but Alicia didn’t wave back. All Carole saw was Alicia leaning into the steering wheel intently, and when the driveway turned, she saw the rear of the trailer as it bounced along the rutted path.
It could be a hundred things, Carole realized, and it could be nothing at all, but it could be something …
Carole was confused. The vivid image of the bouncing trailer made her wince on Bodoni’s behalf. It must have been very uncomfortable for the horse. Then it occurred to her that it might have been intentional. It was well known that a horse with colic sometimes got relief by being driven around in his trailer. Maybe Bodoni was sick. That would explain why Alicia had dropped out of the event and left Bodoni’s tack at the stall.
Satisfied that she’d figured out the most likely explanation, Carole decided to go back to the stands to meet Lisa and Stevie. There were four more adult competitors, including the other likely ribbon winner, and she wanted to see them all. When the adult competition was finished, there would be a break before the junior dressage began.
She made her way past the tent and over to the ring. Before she got there, though, she ran into Lisa and Stevie.
“All done,” Stevie said. “You missed the last rider.”
“The last? What about Bill Feeney?”
“He scratched,” Stevie told her.
“Scratched?”
“She means he dropped out, withdrew,” Lisa explained.
“I know what it means. But why?” Carole asked. She was disappointed. He was the other rider most likely to take a ribbon. Like Alicia, Mr. Feeney rode a valuable Thoroughbred. His was a mare named Saturday’s Child, called Sat. She was descended from a Kentucky Derby winner. Carole loved to watch Sat move. Her long legs were so graceful that she seemed to fly. But she wasn’t going to see her today.
“They didn’t say why. They just said Mr. Feeney had withdrawn. That’s too bad for him, but it’s also bad for us because that means we’re on in exactly one half hour!” Stevie reminded Carole and Lisa.
A half hour wasn’t a lot of time and there was an awful lot to do. All thoughts of Bodoni and Sat left Carole’s mind. Every bit of her attention had to be turned to her own horse, Starlight.
The three girls reached the stable together and then split up. They were responsible for their own horses. Carole went straight to Starlight’s stall. He looked wonderful. She’d spent an hour and a half grooming him that morning. His coat was sleek and shiny. His tail was braided. She’d tried braiding his mane, but it was such a pretty deep black when it hung loose that it seemed a shame to braid it. Carole could have sworn that Starlight was relieved when she unbraided the parts she’d braided. Somehow, it seemed too fussy for him.
She carried his tack from the tack room back to his stall and tacked him up. It was a job she did almost every day in almost exactly the same way. This day, however, it seemed different. Carole always cared that Starlight looked well-groomed and well-tended. Today, for the first time, somebody else—namely a judge—was going to care, too. She’d soaped and polished his saddle until it had a deep sheen. She examined it again as she put it on him and she couldn’t find a single blemish. There was no question about it. She was ready.
She patted Starlight and checked her watch. She still had ten minutes. Was there anything else?
She thought about her friends. For all three of them, this was their first real competition. Would it make any difference to them that they were competing against one another?
Carole didn’t think so. After all, they were best friends. Not one of them would think of sacrificing their friendship for a ribbon. Still, Carole wondered. She knew she was going to try her best, and so would her friends. Would their best be good enough? Time would tell.
When Carole was sure there was nothing else to be done, she took a deep breath and opened Starlight’s stall door. She held his reins in one hand and led him toward the stable exit nearest the schooling ring, where the competition was taking place. When she got to the door, she waited.
“Ready?” Stevie asked. She came up behind, leading the horse she rode, Topside.
“I think so,” Carole said.
“Me, too,” Lisa said, joining her friends at the door. Pepper followed her willingly.
“Then what are we waiting for?” Stevie asked.
Carole shrugged. She looked at Lisa. What were they waiting for, her look asked.
“This,” Lisa said. She mounted Pepper and reached up by the edge of the door. The good-luck horseshoe was nailed to the wall there. Lisa touched it with her hand.
The horseshoe was one of Pine Hollow’s oldest traditions. All riders touched it before they went out for a ride. No rider who’d done that had ever been seriously hurt.
Carole lifted herself into Starlight’s saddle and touched the horseshoe as Lisa had. Stevie did the same.
“Now The Saddle Club is truly ready!” Stevie announced, leading the way to the warm-up ring where the horse would have a chance to loosen up and expend some energy.
“YOU’RE FIRST, STEVIE. Good luck!” Lisa said.
“You’ll show them!” Carole encouraged her.
“Boy, I feel like I’m going into battle,” Stevie said.
“Actually,” Carole began, “dressage training was originally developed for battle horses by the Greeks. The theory was that if the horse and rider were perfectly trained to work together, then the horse would be better behaved in battle. That made it a lot easier for the soldier to fight. See, there’s a reason for everything we do—”
Stevie began g
iggling. It was just like Carole to know some obscure fact, and to share it in detail—at just the most unlikely moment.
“I was just trying to help,” Carole said, embarrassed.
“You did. You took my mind off how nervous I am. That helps. Thanks.”
“Ready?” the starter asked Stevie. She nodded.
“Then here you go!”
Stevie heard the signal. It meant she and Topside had sixty seconds to enter the dressage ring. She felt relaxed, but she sensed a tenseness in Topside. She signaled him to walk by squeezing with her legs and shifting her weight forward a little. She made a large circle next to the entrance. No matter how nervous she felt, she had to hide it and make Topside feel as confident as possible. She breathed deeply and sat comfortably in the saddle. Topside relaxed as he walked in the lazy circle. Stevie knew he was ready.
The last word she heard as she entered the circle was “Smile!”
Stevie had been working on the dressage routine for weeks. She knew it by heart. She knew every turn. She and Topside were prepared for every lead change and step. The only trouble was that right then, she couldn’t remember any of it.
Topside helped her out. He’d done the routine so many times before that it was almost automatic. He trotted to the center of the ring and stopped, facing the judges. Then Stevie remembered. The first thing she had to do was salute the judges. She’d practiced that enough, too. Dropping her right hand straight down, she nodded her head respectfully. The judges nodded back. That was done. Now what?
Once again, Topside helped her out. He walked toward the corner where her routine was to begin. The ring, a carefully measured twenty meters by forty meters, was marked, during practice, by one letter at each end and three letters on each side.
Each move Stevie was to make was described by the letters. She had entered the ring at A and trotted up the center to salute the judges at C. But now what?
Stevie took a deep breath. She was stalling for time, but it worked. When she breathed, she remembered that the routine started at M. She began trotting Topside toward the M corner and suddenly, it all came back to her, every move, every change, everything she and Topside had to do.
Horsenapped! Page 1