Horse Heaven

by Jane Smiley

  22 / JUSTA NECK

  March 15. Race 2 (Golden Gate Fields): Rah Rah Mother of Twins Club. Approximate Post Time: 1:15. Seven furlongs. Purse $12,000. For male horses Four Years Old and Upward, 117 lbs. Non-winners of two races at six furlongs or over since January 1 allowed three pounds, of such a race since February 1, five pounds. Claiming price: $10,000. If for $8,000, 2 lbs.

  In Massachusetts, there was a white gelding still running at fifteen. He had almost two hundred starts now. Among the dark Thoroughbreds he ran with, he looked like Hi Ho Silver streaking down the track. He always went off as the second or third favorite, just from sentimental bets. At every track in America, there were horses standing in stalls with more than a hundred starts beside their names in the Form. Two shedrows over from Justa Bob’s stall was a ten-year-old mare who’d run 125 times. She had the end stall and she stood there all afternoon, her chest pressed against her stall door, all her attention focused in the direction of the track. When she heard the sound of the bell and the gate opening, she whinnied. Every three weeks or so, they took her out and ran her in a turf race. As often as not, she won or placed. She hadn’t been away from the track in eight years.

  Justa Bob, six, had thirty-nine starts. Rest day, walk day, jog day, gallop day, work day, race day. He knew all there was to know about each one. Today was a race day. The grate across his stall was closed to prevent interference with his state of mind and state of body. Other horses went out to work and he ate hay. His hay was taken away, then his water bucket. Some horses got nervous or irritable on race day, but Justa Bob just dozed a little more than usual. He knew what to expect, and his only job was to receive it. He expected to be cleaned with extra care, and he was. He expected to have his back legs wrapped and taped, and they were. He expected to be led out and down the shedrow, and he was. He expected to walk around the saddling enclosure, to enter one of the slots, to be bridled and saddled and patted, and to have his feet picked out, and he was. He expected to be led out into the cool sunshine with one horse in front of him and one behind, and he was. He expected to feel the weight of the jockey on his back, and he did. Like an experienced cardplayer who can pick up a deck of fifty-one cards and know that one is missing, Justa Bob could gauge how much weight was on his back, how hard it would be. This formed another of his expectations. He expected the pony who led him around to the gate to be a little irritable, and he was. And so it was that, with all of his expectations fulfilled, Justa Bob was just as relaxed as a horse could be. He took a quiet moment in the gate, then leapt forward when the doors clanged open.

  Once he and all the other horses were out of the gate, Justa Bob had enough experience to know that he could expect certain things. Over the years, he had been bitten, bumped, whipped by another horse’s jockey, fallen against. Though he had stayed on his feet, horses behind and beside him had gone down. This race didn’t look to be any different. There were horses on either side of him, which was preferable to being on the rail. A few of them pulled ahead of him. He steadied himself just a bit for this, then settled into a rhythmic stride. Unbeknownst to all humans, because no studies had been done in this area, though one was planned at UC, Davis, Justa Bob could count to three. That is, he could recognize that there were more than two horses in front of him, but fewer than many, which was defined by his brain as four or more. Thus, there were three. Three was a good number. He galloped and galloped, working at his job, a job he enjoyed. Pretty soon, the third horse tired and dropped back, and Justa Bob decided that the second horse didn’t look very fit, either—his haunches were wobbling just a bit. Justa Bob overtook him, drawing on some of the energy he always saved by being perfectly relaxed. Now there was a single horse in front of him, and Justa Bob recognized his type, the front-running type. They came out of the turn, Justa Bob on the rail and pulling forward. The first horse rolled his eye and pinned his ears at Justa Bob, but Justa Bob recognized this as a bluff. The other horse’s jockey went for the whip, on the left side, and the horse shifted a bit away from Justa Bob. But the shock of the whip caused the other horse to tense just enough for Justa Bob to stretch out and overtake him. Now Justa Bob felt that familiar surge of power that came from the noise all around him, the expectation that the race would soon be over, and the way the jockey on his back was working him. Everything was normal. In front of him the track was empty. The horse at his side seemed to drop away.

  But, of course, expectations are made to be challenged, even equine expectations, and Justa Bob wasn’t the only being at the track who was taken aback when the horse he had just passed reached over, grabbed Justa Bob’s jockey by his pants and the flesh of his thigh and pulled him right out of the saddle. It was hard to say, in fact, who was more surprised, the other horse’s jockey, who had an eyewitness seat, or Justa Bob, who, as a horse, had almost 360-degree vision, and could see it all perfectly. Justa Bob’s jockey was himself pretty surprised at the realization that only a few yards before the finish line he was going to drop between eight pounding legs, with another sixteen not far behind. He did not really want the horse who was biting him to let go, or his pants to rip. The moment, the duration of a stride, perhaps, lasted eternally, but in the end, the horse spit him out and there he was, suspended, his arms around Justa Bob’s neck, and Justa Bob weaving and shifting in an effort to come under him and straighten him up. It was the other jockey who saved the day, by taking his whip and slashing his own horse on the side of the face, to move him suddenly to the outside of the track. When the space opened up, Justa Bob’s jockey dropped off his neck and balled himself up on the track, and two or three seconds later, Justa Bob crossed the finish line riderless. The noise was tremendous. Justa Bob slowed, stopped and turned, then trotted back to meet his groom, who was running to catch him.

  After that, all through the steward’s inquiry, Justa Bob stood on the track with his groom patting him and the jockey limping around and patting him and the trainer patting him and he let the race be in his mind. Was there something to be afraid of? Was there something to avoid? It was hard to decide. All in all, however, Justa Bob decided, nothing like this had ever happened to him before, and so it was just a fluke. Nevertheless, the whole incident did reconfirm his settled opinion that the best winning margin was just a bob. The wait was a long one. He stretched out, dropped his penis, urinated, and relaxed into a doze. The groom laughed and said to the trainer, “Who is this guy?”

  The trainer laughed and said, “Justa Bob.”

  The inquiry took forever. The book said one thing—that a horse must have a rider to win the race—but the heart said another. Far above Justa Bob, the officials discussed and watched the video and discussed and watched the video. Finally, they went by the book, placing the aggressor last and Justa Bob second to last. But it was invigorating all the same, just to see such a thing happen. Justa Bob’s trainer thought it was the best loss he had ever sustained.

  23 / ALL-NIGHTER

  THE MOMENT the phone rang, Krista opened her eyes and looked at the red digits of the clock. It was 1:37. She picked up the cellular phone. She heard her own voice say, “This is Donut. I am foaling. Get up.” Krista sat up and reached for her jeans. Behind her, on the other side of the bed, Pete rolled over. He murmured, “Need me?”

  “I shouldn’t.”

  “I’ll come.”

  “It’s all right. Maia might wake up.” She leaned forward and pulled on her socks. She would have liked to think that she was wide awake and perfectly alert, but when she stood up, she staggered and had to catch herself, so, as she went through the kitchen and passed the refrigerator, she grabbed a Diet Coke. This was the sixth foal of the season. She had eight more to go. So far, nothing she had dreaded had come to pass. This foaling part had been the part that everyone, including Sam the vet, said that she shouldn’t do without qualified help, but a foaling manager was expensive and fourteen or sixteen mares foaling over the course of five months wasn’t enough to warrant the expense. Instead she had invested in a devic
e—there was a little sensor Sam sewed into the mare’s labia, just outside the vaginal opening. When the waters came, the sensor transmitted a signal to a receiver, which called her up. Everyone who had tried it said it was infallible—many fewer false alarms than with a belt thing she had seen that went off when the mare lay down. And so she had missed only three nights’ sleep, really, since one of the mares had foaled in the afternoon and one had foaled at nine in the evening. Each of the three previous seasons she had slept in the barn and tried to keep an eye on whatever mare was waxing or streaming milk, but this method was actually more restful than her months nursing Maia in the night, mercifully now over.

  She pulled on a jacket against the late-March chill and went out to the barn. She had expected this call, since the mare’s bag was full and she had been a little agitated earlier in the evening. The stars were brilliant. She felt terrific. She slipped the cellular in her pocket and thought of the twenty-six colts and fillies she had foaled out over the last three years. It seemed like a lot, like a treasure, like a testament to her devotion and competence. And they were all good-looking—that was the influence of Himself.

  The mare was down on her side in the deep, clean straw, her wrapped tail stretched out behind her, the familiar sight of her contractions that convulsed her enormous belly reassuringly strong. She was an older mare, not a race-horse, but a hunter mare from the neighborhood who had won a lot of blue ribbons and then been retired. This was her first foal. Krista lifted the heavy black tail aside.

  There it was, disaster in the making. The foal had already begun to emerge, but instead of two tiny hooves, offset, and one tiny nose nestled on top of the cannon bones, there was only one tiny hoof. This is called a dystocia, she thought, then she pulled out her cellular and called Pete in the house. He was awake when he answered. She said, “I need you.”

  “I just started giving Maia her bottle. I can be out there in, like, fifteen minutes.”

  “I need someone right now. Sam is forty minutes from here.”

  “Call Margaret Lerner. She said you could.”

  Krista sat back on her heels. The mare gave another contraction, and the malpositioned foal moved slightly, coming more into view. On the one hand, Margaret Lerner was the world’s most helpful person, as well as a veteran with mares and foals. On the other hand, Krista avoided Margaret Lerner on every possible occasion, which was difficult to do since the woman lived right across the road. Pete said, “Krista?”

  She said, “Okay.” She pushed the “end” button and then dialed Margaret’s number. Margaret was awake, too. When Krista described the position of the foal, Margaret said, “Oh, Lord, I’ll be there in a minute.” And she was. And Krista was glad to hear the sound of her truck wheels on gravel and to see her face as she came into the stall. Margaret exclaimed, “Get her up!”

  “I’ve tried. She’s not responsive.”

  Margaret knelt beside the mare’s shoulder and said, “Rise and shine, Mama.” She poked her, then gave her a push. Krista shook the leadrope that she had snapped onto the mare’s halter and the mare opened her eyes wide, looking at her. Margaret said again, “Got to get up, sweetie,” and gave her a resolute, unsympathetic slap on the neck. Finally, the mare rolled onto her sternum and bent a foreleg, but then a contraction took her and she stopped. “Now!” said Margaret. She pushed on the mare, and Krista pulled her to her feet. Then Margaret went behind the mare, moved the tail aside with one hand, and put her large palm into the vaginal opening. She said, “Lean against her shoulder and neck with your shoulder and neck.” Krista did so. Margaret, watching the contractions, suddenly gave a tremendous shove just as a contraction eased. “Okay,” she said. “I did it.”

  “You pushed the foal back in?”

  “Yup. Now we’ve got to walk her.”

  The mare was reluctant at first, wishing to go down again, but with Margaret poking her from behind and Krista pulling her from the front, she took two steps, then two more, then three more. Finally, she was walking steadily around the stall. She was still having contractions, but her belly now extended downward, and Krista could see the shape of the foal dropping backward into that great space. Margaret pulled an obstetrical glove from the pocket of her jacket and said, “Stop a sec.” Then she reached in. Krista could see her arm and shoulder move as she felt delicately for the stuck limb. Finally, she said, “Got it. Just bent at the knee. This we can do, I think. We’ll just give it a little turn, here. The bones are hard, but the joints are loose, aren’t they, Mama? Turn the knee a little to the outside, then find the foot. Ah. Got it. Then hold it and ease it out. Man, I wish I could get two hands in there. Oh, good boy. I can feel the fetlock and the tendon. No problem that I can feel, just turned wrong at the last moment. Little fellow wanted to gallop out of his mama, didn’t he?”

  “I’m so glad you’re here,” said Krista.

  “I’ve seen worse,” said Margaret.

  Krista was sure that she had. She started the mare walking forward again, and Margaret said, “Say, did you hear about those two horses in that barn by the river last week?”

  Krista shook her head.

  “Well, the guy who owned them knew that the road might wash out in that big storm, so he fed ’em extra, and then he went home. He came back two days later, you know, after the big storm, and he didn’t have an easy time getting in there, either. One of them drowned in his stall. Water got in there, and I guess the horse lost his footing and fell in the water. The mud level was as high as the door—”

  Krista closed her eyes and swallowed hard.

  “And the other one had a broken leg from struggling. Had to shoot ’im right there on the spot. The leg was dangling. Two horses. What a fluke, huh?”

  “That’s a terribly sad story.”

  Margaret shook her head. “I think so, too. But why didn’t the guy trailer them out of there?”

  “Maybe he didn’t have a trailer, or the road was already washed out or something.”

  “Then there was this other guy—”

  “Don’t tell me.”

  “No, this is a good one. This has a happy ending.”

  Krista doubted it, knowing Margaret, but she nodded.

  “Guy comes home from the track late. Goes down to visit his horses in his barn, and he’s looking them over, you know. It’s a shedrow barn, and of the four horses, two are looking out their back windows with their ears up. The other two aren’t doing anything, just eating hay, you know. So, anyway, the guy goes out of the stall and up to the house to take a shower, and while he’s in the shower he hears a big noise, and then comes out in his robe. Well, get this, this giant oak has fallen into the shedrow! Not five minutes after he walked out of the stall, the very place he was standing was crushed to nothing by this tree!”

  “I thought you said this story had a happy ending.”

  “No! The horses were fine. Even the one standing in that stall jumped out of the way and pressed himself against the wall. He was a little scared, that’s all. Most of the tree hit the tackroom. Five minutes! Those two horses who were looking out the window, though, they knew something. They felt the ground move, you ask me.”

  “Or they heard the tree creaking, maybe.”

  “I’ve been to that guy’s barn. Biggest tree.”

  “She wants to go down again,” said Krista. The mare had begun to brace herself and paw. When they stopped pushing her forward, her knees buckled. Krista stood back. The mare gave a large grunt and stretched out on her side.

  Margaret said, “Remember that mare of Bob Roberts’ who went up to New Bolton Center, and when she came back she just looked fine. They had her in one of the paddocks out behind their place, it wasn’t breeding season or anything, I think she was barren, and anyway, pretty soon the mare next to her had raging diarrhea—”

  “You know, Margaret,” said Krista, “I don’t think I know anyone who has more stories to tell than you do. It’s amazing.”