A Hoof in the Door (Eventing Trilogy Book 2)

by Caroline Akrill

  “But then,” Henrietta pointed out, “so is Legend.” She glanced at me as if to suggest it was the rider who might prove less than satisfactory.

  “I think I’m going to be sick,” I said.

  “Rubbish,” Henrietta countered in an unsympathetic voice. “It’s all in your mind. Don’t be so feeble.”

  As I parked the horsebox, the people next door gave us covert sideways glances. It wasn’t, for once, because we looked so awful. Rather the reverse was true. The horsebox had been custom-built for our livery clients with gleaming black coachwork and a red trim. There was a Rolls-Royce insignia on its bonnet. The sordid truth of the matter was that a hired box would have cost us fifty pounds and we couldn’t have afforded it. As it was, after we had paid twelve pounds to have our unsuspecting pop group’s petrol tank topped up, all we had left of the Training Fund in Nigella’s bead-encrusted Dorothy bag were eight single pound notes.

  The Fanes jumped down from the cab and looked round with appreciation. The combined training ground was a magnificent sweep of sheep-nibbled turf. In the May sunshine the white boards of the dressage arena were brilliant against the emerald turf, and the show jumps in their roped-off ring were a dazzle of red and blue and white. There was a small secretary’s tent and some trestle tables set under a tree where ladies were already laying out cakes, sandwiches and paper cups for coffee and soft drinks. It was a lovely rural English scene, with even a Jacobean mansion away in the distance, but the sight of it all made me feel sicker than ever.

  “I’ll go and fetch the numbers,” Nigella offered, “and the dressage timings. I expect they will be ready by now.” She skipped off across the grass in her zippered ski-pants, newly laundered for the occasion. She had never been to a combined training competition before but already she knew the form; Training the Event Horse had taught her all she knew.

  Doreen was at school, the combined training being on a weekday, so we were without her dubious services as messenger and groom. Henrietta and I got Legend unboxed and took off his rugs and bandages. He was sweating slightly and I realized that I had over-rugged him, unaccustomed as I was to such luxurious draught-proof transport. I tottered around him with a rubber, drying off his wet patches and feeling absolutely dreadful. I didn’t know where I was going to find the strength to mount, let alone ride a dressage test. I had never had such an appalling attack of nerves in my life and I was at a total loss to understand it. Henrietta, observing that I was totally useless, tacked up. The dressage saddle had fitted Legend perfectly. The sight of it should have given me confidence, but it didn’t.

  I sat on the ramp and tried to read through the test. I was sure that I was going to lose my way.

  A Enter at working trot (sitting)

  X Halt. Salute

  Proceed at working trot (sitting)

  C Track Left

  E Circle Left 20m diameter …

  Far from being familiar, it was as if I had never seen it before in my life, and when I got to the complicated bit with the circle off the centre line and the leg-yielding, the print started to move in front of my eyes.

  Nigella came back. She handed me a number and a typed list of dressage timings. The tests were timed at seven minute intervals throughout the morning, leaving the afternoon free for the show-jumping. Mine was the eleventh test on the list, timed for 11.10 am, and there were thirty-one tests altogether.

  “They’re all scholarship candidates,” Nigella informed me, “and they short-list twelve – I asked.”

  “You really must mount, Elaine,” Henrietta said anxiously. “You have to do your schooling, then come back to smarten up, there isn’t much time.”

  “And according to the rules,” Nigella added, “you need to be riding in close to the arena twenty minutes before your starting time.”

  I tried to pull myself together. The first horse was already performing his test inside the white boards; in just over an hour I would be performing mine. I put on my hat.

  “You’ll be perfectly alright once you start schooling,” Nigella said reassuringly, “honestly you will.”

  I hoped she was right. I checked Legend’s girth and mounted, tucking the dressage sheet into the pocket of the jeans I was wearing to protect my good breeches. Legend felt very alert and bouncy as I rode away from the horsebox to find a quiet place to school. The dressage saddle gave me a far greater area of contact and a vastly improved ‘feel’; it was easy to imagine that I was actually part of Legend, not merely a passenger giving directions from on top.

  I began to work Legend in around a majestic oak tree. He felt much fitter and livelier than usual and I made a mental note to tell Nigella to cut down his corn. It took longer than usual to get him to concentrate and to relax, but finally we got into our stride and I began to feel slightly better. My head was muzzy and my throat was dry, but the test had come back to me and I felt there was a sporting chance I might get through it without losing my way. In no time at all three-quarters of an hour had gone and it was time to go and get ready.

  Nigella had fetched coffee for us and I drank mine down gratefully to lubricate my throat. I put on my navy jacket and brushed up my hat, but when I leaned over to buff up my boots, my head felt as if it was going to fall off. I stood up and leaned against the side of the horsebox, agonized.

  “Do come on, Elaine!” Henrietta called impatiently. She had sponged Legend’s bit and oiled his hooves and pulled off his tail bandage. Nigella was giving him a last minute polish with a rubber. I tied on my number. It was thirteen. I felt awful again. If I was going to feel like this every time I had to ride a dressage test, I didn’t think I would be able to stand it; my nerves would never last out. I would be a mental wreck. Perhaps Lala Thornapple was right after all and I was far too stupid ever to become an event rider.

  “What happens if I ride a terrible test? What happens if we don’t get short-listed for the scholarship?” I asked the Fanes. “What happens then?”

  “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Nigella said firmly. She steadied the off-side stirrup whilst I struggled into the saddle. Legend rolled his eyes and pranced a bit. “He’s having too much corn,” I said, “he’s too lively.”

  “Rubbish,” Henrietta said crossly, “it’s just because he hasn’t had enough prep. Honestly, Elaine, I don’t know what’s got into you, you’re being hopeless. Anybody would think you didn’t want to get the scholarship!”

  “I do,” I muttered, “I’ve got stage-fright, that’s all.”

  We made our way across to the dressage arena and watched one of the horses perform its test from the ropes which kept everyone twenty yards from the boards so that their horses should not affect the concentration of the one being judged. “Look,” Henrietta said in delight, “he’s having terrible trouble with his leg-yielding, he can’t do it at all. He won’t get any marks for that!”

  Slightly heartened to see someone else making heavy weather of the dressage, I took Legend off to ride him in within sight of the steward who was in charge of the starting order. The judge was sitting with her writer in a Range Rover opposite the centre line at the C end of the arena and they gave the signal to start by a blast on the hooter.

  If anything, this was more unnerving than the spoon and saucepan lid, and I worked Legend as close as I could get to the vehicle, hoping that by the time our turn came he would be used to it. The tests were running ten minutes late and I was glad of the extra time.

  When my number was finally called Legend had settled and resigned himself to the idea of work. I knew that once he had reached this stage he would be very consistent, not easily shaken out of his stride, and very obedient; he might not be experienced nor very skilled at dressage, but he would try for me, and that was all I wanted.

  We were allowed two minutes inside the boards to accustom ourselves to working in the arena before starting the test. This was a blessing because Legend didn’t like the sparkling boards and leaned away from them, rolling his eyes. If this had happ
ened during the test it would have lost us valuable marks. As it was, he soon got over it and we trotted out of the arena and waited at the top, just behind A. My hands felt clammy on the reins, my eyes felt hot, but I had nerved myself to the test and I was fully in control. The Range Rover sounded its hooter. This was it.

  A Enter at working trot (sitting)

  X Halt. Salute …

  My nerves, my muzzy head, my dry throat, everything was forgotten in the solid concentration of trying to perform a good test. My world was reduced to the plaited neck and the pricked ears in front of me and the level thud of hooves below, contained within the white boards with their black letters, directed by the printed sheet of the dressage test. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else existed.

  Circle Left 20m diameter. I noticed that Legend bent his neck, rather than his whole body. My fault that, not enough leg, must do better next time. K-M working canter, on the right leg, thank goodness, but don’t look down to see. Sitting trot, A Halt, immobile 4 seconds, moved off a fraction too smartly there due to Legend’s over-anticipation. K-M Change the rein at working trot, turn up the centre line, circle 20 metres, a better bend this time. Leg-yielding, started off all right degenerated into crab-wise trot, still, that’s one over. Working trot, canter, turn down centre line, last of the leg-yielding; this time it’s half-pass by accident, but at least we’re trying. D working trot (sitting) G Halt, Salute. Leave arena at A at free walk on a long rein.

  It was over. I rode across to the Fanes feeling weak and light-headed. I could hardly believe that I had got through it. It may not have been a well-executed test, but we had done our best; we had tried.

  Henrietta slapped Legend on his neck as I rolled out of the saddle. “It was a jolly good effort,” she said, pleased, “considering everything.”

  “We’ll go and put Legend away, then we’ll come back and wait for the results to be posted,” Nigella said. She was flushed and excited, sure that we had done well. We stood by the score boards, waiting for my marks to be posted up. Nobody seemed to have done very well. Most of the marks were up in the hundreds. Somebody remarked in a disgruntled voice that it had been a ridiculously difficult test for novice horses to perform; scholarship trial or no scholarship trial.

  The method of scoring was very complicated. There were 140 marks which could be awarded for the whole test, the test being divided into movements for which the judge awarded marks out of ten, the total of marks were added, the penalty points deducted, and the resulting figure deducted from 140. Thus the lower the score, the better the test.

  When my score came up it was 81. It wasn’t a good score as dressage scores go, but it was good enough to put me in the lead. Henrietta and Nigella almost stood on their heads with delight. I went cold and then hot, thought I was going to faint, then bolted for the ladies’ and heaved my heart up.

  9

  Too Awful to Contemplate

  “The jumping’s going to be nothing after the dressage,” Henrietta said in a confident tone. “Absolutely nothing.”

  “The fences are easy,” Nigella said, “look at them. The highest is only three feet six inches, and they're jolly well spread out, it isn’t like a proper show-jumping course at all.”

  “It’s just the combination fence you will have to watch,” Henrietta warned. “Be sure you don’t let Legend run out; you know he’ll try if he thinks he has a sporting chance of getting away with it.”

  Legend and I were standing in the collecting ring waiting our turn to jump. My stomach was churning and I could see spots dancing in front of my eyes. At the end of the dressage tests I had lost my lead and dropped to third place. It was still better than any of us had expected. Now I had to get through the show-jumping. We had walked the course and the Fanes were right when they said it was not a difficult course; the only fences that presented any problems at all were the triple combination and the water jump. We were jumping in reverse order and I was third from the last to jump. There had been a lot of clear rounds, the scholarship candidates seemed to be a lot better at show-jumping than they were at dressage. It was all very nerve-wracking, and right at the last moment I had to shoot off to the ladies’ again, clambering back into the saddle just as the horse in fourth place completed the fourteenth clear round. I rode into the ring feeling very shaky, knowing that I had to get a clear round. Anything less would be a disaster.

  I cantered Legend in a circle, listening for the bell. Either he was feeling a bit strong, or I was losing my grip completely; but it took me all my time to hold him going into the first fence. He flew over it, far too fast, and I heard his hind legs brush through the birch. I managed to steady him in time for the next fence, a Road Closed, and the fence after that, which was parallel poles. He was going on too strongly for the upright gate, but by putting in a big jump, he managed to clear it. I felt myself loosen in the saddle, but I pushed him on towards the water at a fair gallop, wanting to be sure he would make the spread and not wanting to give him much time to think about it. It was the first time we had ever jumped water. To do him credit, Legend didn’t even hesitate; he took a flying leap and landed with yards to spare. By this time my arms felt like lead and I had to summon every last ounce of strength I had in my body to bring him back to a manageable canter. His neck felt like a piece of tensile steel, then, at the approach to the stone wall, he took me completely by surprise and put in one of his hateful, monumental bucks.

  When the Fanes had first bought Legend, he had bucked me off lots of times; he had bucked me off the first time I had ever ridden him. Gradually though, as I had learned to sit on and give him a wallop, instead of flying over his head, he had begun to desist, and now he rarely bucked. Today, he had clearly had enough of my feeble behaviour and he wanted to get rid of me. It was a miracle that I didn’t fall off there and then, but I didn’t. I managed to cling on and push him into the next fence and I was still hanging there by the skin of my teeth as we went, hopelessly fast, into the triple combination. I lost one stirrup over the first part, the other over the second, and when he ran out of the third part I fell over his dropped shoulder and landed in a little group of conifers,

  For the rest of my life I shall never forget how it felt to pick myself up out of the broken flower pots and flattened greenery as Legend flew round and round the ring at an enthusiastic gallop, looking mightily pleased about the whole affair. I had incurred three penalty points for a disobedience, eight for a fall, and every second spent stumbling after Legend was costing me another two penalty points for exceeding the time allowed.

  By the time the ring steward had captured Legend and I had remounted, I was numb with despair. Anger was not far behind. It was anger that gave me the strength I needed to leg Legend into the combination again, get him over it without running out, and to finish the course. It was only when I reached the collecting ring that I noticed my left wrist had blown up like a balloon and that my hand was virtually useless. To cap all the other misfortunes, I had sprained my wrist.

  “You can’t possibly drive home with only one arm,” Nigella said. “I shall have to drive the horsebox.”

  I knew she hadn’t a driving licence, but I was almost beyond caring. Henrietta and I had had a blazing row and we were hardly speaking to one another. She seemed to think that I had thrown away all our chances on purpose. “You knew you had to watch him at the triple,” she had raged. “You just let him run out! You didn’t lift a finger to stop him!”

  “I couldn’t,” I had said. “Once he got going he was too strong. He bucked, he’s too fresh, I told you, he’s having too much corn.”

  “That’s right,” Henrietta had shrieked. “Now it’s our fault. Go on, blame us: as if we care!”

  Nigella had been forced to intervene with calming words and now she was having to drive the horsebox home without a licence. If we had a crash, I knew whose fault it would be. I sat slumped against the door of the cab, feeling like hell. I had just about managed to live through what would quite possibly be the w
orst day of my life, and stretching ahead was a lifetime of penny-pinching and fund-raising too awful to contemplate. I just wanted to die.

  But worse was to come. As we waited at the gateway of the combined training ground for permission to pull out on to the road, the officer in charge of directing the traffic walked across to us. His face looked grim.

  “Oh no,” Henrietta groaned, “he’s all we need!”

  The officer walked up to Nigella’s open window.

  “All right, young lady,” he said in a threatening voice. “Where’s your tax disc?”

  Nigella stared at him, appalled. “I don’t know,” she said, “maybe it’s fallen off the windscreen.”

  Henrietta got down on her hands and knees in the cab, pretending to have a look.

  “You do have a tax disc?” he demanded, in a tone which implied that he knew perfectly well we hadn’t.

  “Yes … well, as far as I know we do …” Nigella faltered, unsure of her ground. “You see I don’t … I mean, it isn’t …”

  “It isn’t what, miss?” the officer said, staring at her with studied patience.

  “What I mean to say,” said Nigella, “is that it isn’t really our vehicle.”

  The officer immediately took out his notebook and wrote down the registration number of the horsebox. “It wouldn’t be a stolen vehicle, would it, miss?” he said in an expressionless voice.

  At this, Henrietta sprang up from the floor of the cab. “It certainly is not stolen,” she said in an annoyed tone. “It’s borrowed from some very good friends of ours! How dare you even suggest it!”

  “Now then, miss,” the officer said sternly, “there’s no need to lose your temper.” He turned back to Nigella. “I shall have to see your driving licence, if you wouldn’t mind.”

  “She hasn’t got it with her,” Henrietta said smartly. “It’s at home.”