“Okay. I like beer and football,” Lucy said.
They laughed again.
Bill looked around the table. “There must be something in the water here. We’re all just too happy.”
“You all deserve to be happy,” Vicky said. “If it’s the water, let’s all drink lots of it, and maybe an occasional ice-cold Bud Light too.”
~ * ~
Ben decided to walk over and check in on the old-timers. Dawn wasn’t due for an hour or so to come take him to his doctor’s appointment. He wasn’t used to having time on his hands and was restless. “I’ll be glad when I get this patch off,” he muttered, walking along. It was odd seeing out of only one eye. “I would have figured I needed to have two eyes to have depth perception.” He didn’t. He held his arm out in front of him.
“Hello to you too, Ben!” he heard Mim call out. He’d recognize her gravelly voice anywhere. He looked ahead and saw her sitting on the back porch overlooking the pastures.
“Ah, it’s a shame about her, Meg,” he said, walking along. She had been Meg’s best friend. “Them damned cigarettes finally got her.” They were all three the same age.
Mim stood with the support of her cane and walked to the porch railing. “Gorgeous morning, isn’t it?”
“Yes, yes. Gorgeous,” he said, “At least half of it anyway.”
Mim laughed. “Come sit with me. I want to talk to you.” Ben climbed the ramp and sat down on one of the chairs. Mim sat down next to him and motioned with her cane. “I want to know who all these horses are.”
Ben looked out over the pastures. “Well, let me see,” he said. “We’ll start with the ones closest, I can see those. Those are the yearlings.” There were four of them. “The gray one is out of All Together by Beau Born. The bay is out of….” He had to stop and think. “She’s out of the Native Dancer mare. I never can remember her name. The two chestnuts belong to Breezeway. They’re both by Beau, the Native Dancer filly too.”
“They’re nice, Ben. And nice how you’re letting them grow up the way God intended and not cooped up in a stall most of the time.”
“We keep them out as much as we can. A big storm or something we’ll bring ‘em in, but aside from that, we leave them out. They’ll be turning the two broodmares out soon. They come in at night. Oh, and then there’s the old broodmare, Sissy. She’s barren now and keeps an eye on the babies.”
“Who are the three in this pasture here over the hill?”
“Oh, that’s Linda’s old ponies Biscuit and uh...Poncho, yes, Poncho. They belong to Dawn now and she and Wendy ride them all over. The kids have ridden them too. The little black horse is Bonnie Bee. Dusty just brought her home.”
“He’s such a softie. I can’t believe he hasn’t brought more of them home.”
Ben nodded. “I keep on them all about that.”
“Yeah, and you’re tough too.” Mim smiled.
Ben sat back. “Well, at least I try.”
Mim motioned. “What about the weanlings?”
“Well, there’s just the three of them.” Ben had to admit he couldn’t see that far. They were in the pasture just this side of the half-mile training track. “There’s a chestnut filly out of that Native Dancer mare and a chestnut filly out of All Together. The dark one is out of a Seattle Slew mare, a granddaughter. That filly’s going to be a nice horse. We just have the two, two-year-olds this year. The Seattle Slew mare slipped that year.” He looked around, could make out the main barn. “They’re usually kept in the biggest pasture just past the stallion barn.”
“I see them,” Mim said. “They’re nice looking.”
Ben nodded. “That All Together - Beau Born combination has proved to be a good one. The other colt’s going to be nice too. He’s got a bit of an attitude, but that’s all right. That doesn’t bother me.”
“Me neither,” Mim said. “Some of the nicest horses I’ve had would chase me out of the stall just for the hell of it.”
They both laughed.
“Beau was like that on the track, except with Dawn. And All Together, geez, that filly was nuts come race day. I thought she was going to kill Dawn a couple of times. Now granted she wasn’t mean, she just got wound up.”
Mim looked at him. “You think the world of that girl, don’t you?”
He nodded. “Meg would have loved her too. She’s the daughter we never had.”
They both sat looking out at the horses for a moment. “Let’s see. Did I leave out anybody?”
“Well, I’d know that one anywhere,” Mim said, motioning again with her cane. A large chestnut was being turned out into a pasture with a bay. Beau bellowed his long and loud stud-horse whinny. “And it is Beau Born in complete command….” Mim sang.
“Yep, we knew from the day he was born. You know that feeling you get, Mim?”
She nodded. “It’s a shame Meg didn’t get to see him run.” Beau was bucking and playing and jogging down the fence line, calling to the mares.
Ben smiled. “She watches him.”
Mim patted his hand. “And I’ll watch them too. That’s why I want to get to know them. I’ll want to watch over all of them.”
~ * ~
Randy and Mark parked outside the barn at Shifting Gears. There were two other cars there. One Randy didn’t recognize. “There’s a high school senior that has been shadowing here. I think that’s probably her car. She can be rather rude.”
Mark looked at him.
“Why am I telling you this? Because she’s also some kind of animal communicator. She can sense what the horses are feeling and even thinking.” He shared the story about Hillary knowing the Foregone gelding’s bloodline.
“You’re kidding.”
“Nope,” Randy said, getting out of the truck. “The main reason we’re stopping is I want you to meet Veronica and Karen.”
The women were not expecting Randy and were pleasantly surprised to see him. “Hello! Who’s this?” Karen asked.
When introduced, Veronica shook Mark’s hand. “Randy, you’re not quitting on us are you?”
“No. I just want you to get to know each other in the event Mark decides to stay and I decide whether or not I want him to stay. So far, so good.”
They all laughed.
“So who’s here?” Randy asked.
“Hillary. Come see what’s she’s done.”
Randy could only imagine. At least they sounded happy about it, even Veronica, the habitual worrier that constantly fretted over the “what if’s” of any given situation.
“Look!”
The young girl had bed the horse’s stall with dirt.
Randy stared. Mark stared. It must have taken her days. Hillary glanced at them. She had on soft mittens and was massaging the horse’s neck and side. “He likes this,” she said.
“I see that,” Randy said. The horse had put on some weight and appeared steadier on his feet. He even looked bright-eyed. “What’s with the dirt?”
“It’s natural,” Karen said. “He has better footing on it. Hillary said he was afraid to move before.”
“I see,” Randy said, repeating himself for lack of anything better to say.
“He’s eating. He’s drinking,” Veronica said. “Who’d have ever guessed?”
Hillary looked at them. “He actually would have preferred being outside. But since that can’t be until he starts doing better, I brought the outdoors to him.”
“It’s not just the footing; it’s the earth,” Karen said, obviously repeating something Hillary had said.
Veronica nodded. “It’s true.”
“I wish I could bring him the sun,” Hillary said.
Randy just stood there, imagining holes over the stall in the barn roof tomorrow. “Okay. Well, since everything’s good here, I think we’re going to head on out now. Keep up the uh…the good work.”
Hillary glanced over her shoulder, still massaging the horse. “He’s glad he’s not getting a shot today.”
Randy looked at her a
nd then looked at the horse. The horse let out a sigh.
“Tell Dawn I said hi,” Hillary said.
Randy nodded. “Sure thing.” Mark followed him out. The two exchanged glances in the truck. “Don’t ask me,” Randy said.
“Me neither.”
They rode in silence. “You know,” Mark said, after a while. “Dirt actually has healing properties, so maybe….”
Randy put on his blinker and pulled into the driveway of his Veterinary Office. “The flatness of the stall makes sense, a little I guess, sturdier footing. When you think about how we’ve taken the horses out of their natural environment, particularly racehorses and show horses, maybe horses that are healing need that natural environment.”
Mark agreed. “I guess it might go back to why do horses eat dirt?”
“He’s probably eating some.”
“Well,” Mark paused. “Dirt is a living, dynamic ecosystem of organic matter; a veritable universe of microbes, bacteria, fungi, other tiny organisms, minerals, water, and plant roots.”
Randy marveled at him. “Is that right off the top of your head? Damn, you’re good! What did you do, memorize the textbooks?”
Mark raised his cellphone. “No. Actually I just Googled it.”
Randy laughed. “Come on, you get to meet our one and only employee.”
Betty, a woman in her mid-fifties looked up from her desk when they walked in. She smiled. “So you must be Mark.”
“Morning.”
She handed Randy several messages. He sorted through them and took out his phone. “This one first.” Betty reached for them and sorted them back to the way she had them initially.
“I hate talking to this man,” Randy said. “He doesn’t want me to come out. He just wants to talk my ear off.” He handed the message to Mark. “Here, you call him.”
Mark read the message. “Horse acting strange for days now, eating good, peeing and pooping good.” He looked at Betty. “Huh?”
“That’s what the man said.”
“Okay,” Mark sat down in the waiting room. “Hold all my calls,” he said.
Betty and Randy laughed.
While Randy made several trips back and forth to his truck loading up supplies, Mark talked to the man. Randy went to the men’s room, came back out, and Mark was still talking to the man. Randy motioned to his watch.
“So,” Mark said. “What time would you like me to stop by today?” When he paused to listen, Randy and Betty exchanged knowing glances.
“Okay,” Mark said. “Four o’clock it is.” He looked at Betty. She shrugged and then nodded. “Let me write down your address. Oh, we have it? All right, I’ll see you then.”
“Sold!” Randy said. “He’s all yours!”
Mark gave Betty his cellphone number in case she needed to get ahold of him and he and Randy headed back to the racetrack. “So basically,” Mark said. “You don’t do any small animal and no clinic exams whatsoever.”
Randy nodded. “I couldn’t keep up. We did everything at first, but basically Doc Jake’s practice was all large animal. I sold that building when it became obvious I was never there and we set up where we’re at. Betty does all the billing and orders supplies, makes appointments. She’s part-time.”
“So it’s all just mainly Thoroughbreds?”
“No, I do other breeds, but Thoroughbreds are the bulk of it.”
Mark was quiet for a while. “So, uh, when do you want me to start?”
Randy looked at him. “I don’t know. How about yesterday?”
“Works for me.” The two men shook hands. “Thank you.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Ben sat with Dawn in the doctor’s office and waited and waited and waited. “Five more minutes, I’m taking this patch off myself and we’re leaving,” Ben said. “What’s the point of making appointments?” He opened the door and looked up and down the hall. “Excuse me. Is anybody home?”
Dawn smiled. She had to admit she was getting a little tired of waiting herself. At least she could read a magazine. “Maybe they had an emergency,” she suggested, flipping pages.
“Maybe they forgot we’re here,” Ben said.
“I’ll go check,” Dawn said.
There was no one at the desk. She stood listening, couldn’t hear anyone anywhere. Finally a nurse came out from a closed door, sipping a cola. “Can I help you?”
“Yes. I’m with Mr. Miller. We’ve been waiting to see the doctor.”
“Oh my!” the woman said. “The doctor has gone.”
“Well, then get him back,” Dawn said.
“Um….” The woman turned around, half circle, then full circle. “I’m so sorry. This has never happened before.”
Dawn sighed. “Where is the doctor?”
“Probably in his office or at lunch I would think.”
“Okay,” Dawn said. “Surely you have an emergency number for him. I suggest you contact him and we’ll either go to his office or he can just come back here.”
The woman looked up the doctor’s office number, dialed the phone, and got the answering machine. “I’m sorry. They’re closed until one.”
“Give me the address,” Dawn said.
The woman wrote it down, talking fast. “I’m sure they’re going to have appointments, so I’m sorry, but it might be a wait.”
“No, I don’t think so,” Dawn said, just as calm as could be. “I’m going to count on you to make sure we’re the first one the doctor sees. I’m sure you understand the situation. Thank you.” She walked down the hall, gave Ben a quick version of the story, and off they went.
“This is just how old people get treated,” Ben said. “Nobody pays attention to us.”
“What? What were you saying? Is there someone talking to me?”
“Very funny,” he said.
“I don’t think this has anything to do with age, Ben.”
“Fine. But when you look at how the old-timers were being treated.”
“Not anymore,” she said.
Ben nodded. “That doctor better be there.”
He was. He was expecting them and was entirely apologetic. “I have no idea how that happened. I am so sorry.”
“Yes, but you knew I had an appointment this morning,” Ben said. “You yourself told me to make it. Didn’t you notice I wasn’t there? I just had my surgery yesterday. Shouldn’t that have concerned you?”
The doctor removed the bandage on Ben’s eye. “I did so many procedures yesterday, Mr. Miller, I can’t even tell you how many.”
“See,” Ben said to Dawn. “I’ll bet they were all old people too.”
“Well, actually,” the doctor said, examining Ben’s eye. “They probably were. It is the nature of the beast, cataracts. Everything looks good. You’re going to have to keep up with the drops in your eyes and you’ll need to wear a patch at night until I see you again.” He glanced at Dawn. “Is the other eye scheduled?”
Dawn looked at Ben, deciding Ben should be the one to answer that. He had a point. Old people do get treated differently. “In a month,” Ben said. “That’s if I decide to keep it.”
~ * ~
Dusty paid a visit to the Brickman barn, hoping to catch him there and talk to him about paying his bills. It was not uncommon for a trainer to fall short on cash now and then, some more often than others, but this particular trainer had been doing this for far too long. The majority of exercise riders and pony boys and girls got paid cash for their work and lived week to week if not day by day. They needed to be paid on time.
The man was cleaning tack. “Afternoon,” Dusty said.
Brickman looked up. “It’s a nice day, that’s for sure.”
Dusty sat down on a bench across from him and stretched out his legs.
“How’s Ben doing? I hear he had surgery on his eyes. Is he okay?”
Dusty nodded. “Cataract. One now, one later. It went well. Knowing him, he’ll be back here tomorrow.”
“He’s a tough old man,” Brickma
n said.
Dusty paused. “How’s things going?”
“All right. I got one in tomorrow. He’s got a good shot.”
“Good, good. Buster Bay in the seventh?”
The man nodded, surprised Dusty knew.
“There’s not much I don’t know,” Dusty said, reading his expression. “Not when it comes to this racetrack.” He looked around. “We’ve come a long way, haven’t we? It wasn’t that many years ago, we were falling apart. I thought we were all doomed.”
The barns were in good repair now, painted every year. They had good lighting. The roads and wash racks were kept clean and with rubber mats for safe footing. There were ice machines at every other barn, muck bins out of the way and dumped daily, awards and recognition for the best-kept barns. It was a backside to be proud of.
“Ben’s done well by us,” Brickman said.
“I know. And we all have to do our part too.”
“Meaning…?”
“I don’t know. Keeping up our share of the bargain. We had to weed out quite a few at the beginning. They weren’t paying their bills. They were stiffing their exercise boys and ponies. Some we helped out; some we showed the door.”
Brickman glanced at him and continued cleaning his tack.
“Let me ask you something,” Dusty said. “What do you think about Hannity taking Jackson’s horse?”
The man hesitated. “Claiming’s claiming. You win some, you lose some.”
Dusty nodded. “I lost my fair share.” He stood and glanced around. “You’ve got, what, five head now?”
Brickman nodded.
“I’m glad you’re doing well and taking care of business.”
“Thank you,” the man said.
“Well, I think I’m going to rattle Hannity’s cage a little. That’s just not sitting well with me. He had the right to take that horse according to the rules of racing. But I think there’s an ever deeper set of rules with some things. No, it’s just not sitting good with me.” He nodded and walked down the shedrow. “Good luck tomorrow.”
Dusty walked through six more barns to get to Hannity’s. The man wasn’t there but his groom was, new to the track this year. Dusty stopped in front of Jackson’s horse’s stall. He wasn’t done up today but looked like he’d just had his knees painted. “How’s he doing?”
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