Alec kept Black Minx in the middle of the track and away from the packed rails. The stands were quieting down. The screams that had risen with the mounting excitement of the race were over. There was a stunned silence. All eyes turned to the great board, where the number of the winner would be posted any second.
Billy Watts rode Wintertime in a circle, coming within a few feet of Alec. Watts’s face was streaked with dirt that had been thrown up at him by front-running horses for a mile and a quarter. And no longer was it so boyish. Regardless of the results of the race, he had become a hardened, experienced rider with a Derby behind him. And if his number 9 flashed on the board he would ride Wintertime into the circle, one of the youngest jockeys ever to win the classic.
He tried unsuccessfully to smile. “We knew we could beat the chestnut and the gray, but we didn’t figure on your filly being up there,” he said to Alec. “We raced just the way we’d planned except for you and the filly.” His eyes left Alec for Black Minx, and he saw her bleeding leg. “She’s hurt in the left fore. Did you know that?”
Quickly Alec leaned sideways in his saddle. He saw the dark-red stain with some blood still trickling from the wound. He could not tell how deep or how serious it was. She wasn’t limping, for she was too tired to feel anything.
He couldn’t dismount until the results were announced, and besides, he could do nothing for her while he remained on the track. Turning to the jam-packed rails, he looked for Henry. But it was a futile search. No one, not even Henry, could get through to him before the photograph of the finish was developed and the results were posted.
Suddenly he heard a deafening roar. Alec turned to the board. Number 5 was on top! It was over now, officially over, and Black Minx had managed to get her nose in front of Wintertime after all!
He rode toward the presentation stand, thinking of the many times he had criticized her for her lack of courage and will to win. And she had raced as she had with an injured leg!
Henry came down the runway and took hold of her bridle. Alec said, “She’s hurt. It’s the left fore.”
“I know. I saw it happen at the gate when she ran into Silver Jet. You didn’t know.” Henry looked down at the leg. “And she doesn’t yet.”
“We ought to get her right back to the vet,” Alec said. He couldn’t stand any long presentation ceremony now, knowing the filly was hurt.
Henry continued leading her toward the group awaiting them, toward the Gold Cup being held by the Governor, toward the television cameras and the waiting press, toward the world. “We’re not going to cheat her out of this,” he said. “She rates it as much as any Derby winner ever did. Maybe more. She broke the record, Alec. Did you know that? She won in two minutes one second flat.”
“You mean …” But Alec had no chance to say more. They were in the winner’s circle and a blanket of roses was being placed about Black Minx’s neck. Countless photographers were taking her picture, and the television cameras were on her as she stood quietly in the ring, almost posing, as if she knew full well the place she was taking in Kentucky Derby history.
Henry and Alec managed to keep their part in the ceremony as brief as possible. So it was only a short time later that they were back in the barn and the stable veterinarian was taking care of Black Minx.
The area outside the barn was roped off. The press, who had been deprived of their interviews by the short presentation ceremony, waited anxiously for the famous trainer and rider to leave the barn.
It was quiet in the stall. Neither Alec nor Henry mentioned the race. They only watched the doctor and waited. Black Minx had begun limping on the way back to the barn, and now was holding her toe off the straw bedding. Mingled with the smell of sweat and leather was the sharp odor of medication. A tub of hot water steamed beside the veterinarian while he worked, his hands in rubber gloves. Finally he bandaged her leg and stood up.
Alec was afraid to speak but Henry thrust out his jaw and asked, “How bad is it, Doc?”
“Not bad.”
“How bad is that?” Henry persisted. The veterinarian was removing his gloves, putting them away. “Don’t hedge on me, Doc. We’ve been friends too long for that.”
The veterinarian’s steady blue eyes were neither grave nor sad. “You always expect the worst, Henry, don’t you?”
“Then I never get let down.”
The veterinarian smiled. “I guess you’re right, at that.” He turned to the filly, putting his hand on her blanketed body. “You’ve still got a fine filly. She’s all right, and it won’t take long for her to heal and be …”
Alec felt his muscles go limp. He had been tense so long, and now … now he could let go. She was going to be all right. He went to her head, stroking it softly. He never heard Henry and the doctor as they left the stall.
Sometime later Henry appeared at the half-door. “Alec,” he called. “Bring her over here. They want some head pictures of you two.”
Alec turned her around. He wanted only to rest, to relax—and he was certain she did too. But this was part of it all; it wouldn’t end until they left Churchill Downs.
The photographers took their pictures of Alec and the filly. They took pictures of Henry as he sat in the old canvas chair before the stall.
“Cross your knees and look sly,” they told Henry. “Look as if you knew all week that you had the Derby winner in your barn.”
Henry smiled. “But I didn’t,” he said. “I’m as surprised as you are.”
“We’re not so surprised,” they insisted.
While the pictures were being taken, Alec asked Henry, “How did the others finish?”
“Eclipse was up behind Wintertime. Silver Jet was fourth, then came Long Hope, Break-up …”
“But Golden Vanity?” Alec interrupted.
“I’m coming to him. Olympus finished three lengths behind Break-up. Then came Golden Vanity and last of all, Rampart.”
“Boy, Golden Vanity must have stopped cold in that last furlong.”
“He certainly did,” a reporter told him. “He broke every record from the half to a mile and an eighth. Then he was so burned out he finished in a cakewalk. We had a feeling all along he couldn’t go a mile and a quarter.”
Sure, Alec thought, you knew it all along. Before the Derby they were acclaiming Golden Vanity as the greatest colt of all time. Now they were disowning him. How fleeting can fame be?
The reporters had turned to Henry again. “What do you plan to do with that big purse, Henry?”
From his chair Henry looked up at Alec. “We’ll be buying some more mares, among other things,” he answered. “Hopeful Farm is on its way.”
The press turned to look at Black Minx. “Will you race her in the Preakness and Belmont Stakes? A filly’s never won the Triple Crown, you know.”
“I can’t answer that,” Henry replied. “It depends upon how fast her leg heals and how things look to us. We’re not thinking about the Triple Crown now. We got the big one today, and that’s all that matters.”
“Yes,” they agreed, “it’s all that matters. We’re going to say in our papers that never before have we seen such great heart and courage as Black Minx displayed today by holding herself together and turning back Eclipse and then Wintertime in those last few strides … and all with a bad leg. Will you like that, Henry?”
“You couldn’t put it better, boys. I like that very much, and she deserves every good thing you have to say about her.”
They turned to Alec. “Do you have any last comment to make, Alec? When did you know you had the race won?”
“I didn’t know,” Alec said. “Not until our number went up on the board.”
“Do you have anything to say about a filly winning the Derby?” they asked. “It’s happened only once before—and never in such record-breaking time, of course.”
“Just that anything can happen in the Derby,” Alec answered.
They scowled, disappointed and in need of a better comment for their papers. “But
that’s been said before.”
Alec smiled. “I know. You’re the ones who’ve said it. You knew it all the time.”
The filly blew out her nostrils, snorting, as though to add emphasis to his remark. He touched her head and she snorted again.
Henry got to his feet. “That’s all, boys. The Derby’s over for another year.”
They were alone again, just the three of them in the stall. Alec stood at Black Minx’s side and Henry in front of her. The old trainer put his hand in his pocket and withdrew a carrot. He offered it to her.
Alec smiled. “You told me never to do that. You said no hand-feeding, ever.”
Henry’s eyes never left Black Minx. “It’s different this time,” he said softly. “This is the exception to the rule.”
For a moment the filly only sniffed the carrot, her eyes leaving it to look puzzledly at Henry. Then she looked at it again. Finally she took it.
Alec asked, “Do you have any more?”
Henry nodded and put a carrot in Alec’s hand.
Alec offered it to her, and she took the carrot more readily this time. “I’ve waited a long while to do that,” he said.
Henry straightened her forelock, then stroked her head. “You did it,” he told her. “You really did. You’re the gamest filly, the best little filly in the whole wide world.”
Alec’s hand moved lovingly across her neck. “She’s that, all right, Henry. She sure is.”
Black Minx didn’t move. She seemed to know what this was all about. She accepted their offerings, their embraces, in a very queenly way. Her manner indicated that she was getting only what was long due her, and that she had known all along no colt would beat her in the Kentucky Derby.
Perhaps she had known. Alec and Henry wouldn’t have been surprised. She was that kind of girl.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Walter Farley’s love for horses began when he was a small boy living in Syracuse, New York, and continued as he grew up in New York City, where his family moved. Unlike most city children, he was able to fulfill this love through an uncle who was a professional horseman. Young Walter spent much of his time with this uncle, learning about the different kinds of horse training and the people associated with them.
Walter Farley began to write his first book, The Black Stallion, while he was a student at Brooklyn’s Erasmus Hall High School and Mercersburg Academy in Pennsylvania. It was published in 1941 while he was still an undergraduate at Columbia University.
The appearance of The Black Stallion brought such an enthusiastic response from young readers that Mr. Farley went on to create more stories about the Black, and about other horses as well. In his life he wrote a total of thirty-four books, including Man o’ War, the story of America’s greatest Thoroughbred, and two photographic storybooks based on the Black Stallion movies. His books have been enormously popular in the United States and have been published in twenty-one foreign countries.
Mr. Farley and his wife, Rosemary, had four children, whom they raised on a farm in Pennsylvania and at a beach house in Florida. Horses, dogs and cats were always a part of the household.
In 1989 Mr. Farley was honored by his hometown library in Venice, Florida, which established the Walter Farley Literary Landmark in its children’s wing. Mr. Farley died in October 1989, shortly before publication of The Young Black Stallion, the twenty-first book in the Black Stallion series. Mr. Farley co-authored The Young Black Stallion with his son, Steven.
Turn the page
for a preview of an exciting
BLACK STALLION ADVENTURE
BY WALTER FARLEY,
available in paperback from Random House
THE SENTINEL
1
The gray gelding, Napoleon, was built from the ground up and butter fat. His roundness was not due to overfeeding or lack of exercise but to a most placid disposition and an ease of adapting himself to any kind of situation or way of life. He stood with one hind foot drawn in an easy, relaxed position and eyes half-closed. Only his long ears moved, and they just wobbled as if the weight of them was too much for him to bear at this particular moment. He was the picture of contentment; as peaceful as the June night which enveloped him. There was no reason for him to appear otherwise. He was perfectly happy with his life.
The grass of his paddock moved in the night breeze, giving it the soft, liquid motion of the sea. There were stars and a moon, and together they shone frostlike on the fences and roofs of the barns and main house a short distance away.
Finally the old gray roused himself to saunter about his paddock. His movements were slow and quiet. He was very particular in his choice of grass. He would stop only long enough to crop a few mouthfuls, then go on to other grasses that appealed more to his fancy and discriminating taste. But it wasn’t long before he returned to his favorite haunt beneath the billowing oak tree. He closed his eyes again.
All was quiet, and as it should be. The inky silhouette of a tall, black stallion moved in the adjacent paddock to his left. Teeth clicked sharply as the stallion cut the grass low and even.
The gray’s wobbling ears were keen, and by using them he followed the movements of the Black. He was well aware, too, of the whereabouts of the burly, black horse in still another paddock, the one on his right. He had heard Satan snort a few moments ago.
The breeze became stronger, gently whipping his body with a shower of deep evening coolness. After the heat of day it felt very good. That there were no flies to bother him added to his enjoyment. For ideal comfort this was the way it should be. A fly-protected barn during the day, and at night the freedom of the paddocks. For several weeks now the horses had been allowed this privilege. It would continue as long as there was peace in the paddocks. All this the old gray knew very well; his vast experience told him so.
He knew why he occupied the paddock between the Black and Satan. To keep his head, to think for himself, to do what was expected of him … these things he had learned long ago. He did his duties willingly, whether he was on the track, helping to school young and eager yearlings in their first lessons, or here in the paddock, where he was ever watchful of the actions of mature stallions. Knowing that he was wanted, that he had a job to do, gave him a warm consciousness of virtue and well-being. He opened his eyes, took in the paddock fences, and then, as though receiving comfort and security from their great height, permitted his eyelids to drop again. This time he went fast asleep.
He awakened to the sound of a strong wind. The skies had turned black. The moon was blanketed by heavy, running clouds and the stars were mere pinpoints in the heavens, shedding no light below. The oak tree afforded the gray horse protection against the wind and he was loath to leave it. Besides, there was no reason for him to go. He need only stay here and wait out the wind. If it got worse and became a storm, he was certain that soon he would see the lights go on in the house and barn, and shortly thereafter he and the others would be taken into their stalls. He moved closer to the great trunk of the tree, and for a while just listened to the racing winds above him.
It was the wind and the blackness of the night that diverted Napoleon’s attention from the movements of the tall stallion in the next paddock. For a long while the Black had trotted lightly and warily along the fence, only his eyes disclosing the excitement that burned within him. He made no sound except for the slight, hushed beat of his hoofs over the grass. He did not shrill his challenge to the burly stallion two paddocks away from him. It was not yet time. The Black was clever and able to control the savage instinct that sought release within his great body.
The wind whipped his mane, and his tail, set high, billowed behind him. He stopped again to measure the height of the fence. In spite of his long limbs he had to stretch his head to touch the top board. He moved on to the front corner of the paddock, facing the barn. Once more he tested his strength against the center boards at this particular spot. They bent as they had before. He pushed harder this time. They cracked and split. He stopped using
his strength, waiting almost cunningly until deciding on his next move. The fire in his eyes was mounting.
Carefully he lowered himself to the ground, pressing the weight of his body against the bottom board. Then he rolled away and struck a smashing blow against it with his hind feet. It split as had the others. Still on his back, he rolled back and forth, using his great body like a pendulum against the boards. But he did not ram his weight like a blundering bruiser. Instead, with cunning and skill he maneuvered his body, using pressure against the split boards only when he knew they were most apt to give completely. Finally they broke and were swept outward as he rolled under the top board. The Black was free of his confining paddock!
He got to his feet with the speed and agility of the wildest and most savage of animals. A striking change had swept over his glistening body. No longer was he calm and cunning, but trembling and brutally eager to kill. Gone was his domesticity and the inner control that had kept the fire from his eyes and given the coolness to his blood. Now he was inflamed with a terrible but natural instinct to do battle with another stallion. He turned his gleaming, red eyes on Satan, two paddocks beyond; then he hurled forth his screaming challenge, and its shrillness rose above the cry of the wind.
He was already on his way down the dirt road fronting the paddocks when the gray gelding came plunging to the fence. The stallion paid not the slightest attention to him. The gray ran with his ears back, his teeth snapping in rage between the boards because he knew the stallion’s savage intent, and could do nothing to keep him from the black horse beyond. The gelding stopped when he came to the end of his enclosure. He neighed loudly and incessantly, knowing this was the only useful thing he could do. But his warnings of the disturbed peace were deadened by the force of the wind. The house and barn remained dark.
Turning from the dirt road, the tall stallion ran down the corridor between the paddocks. Every possible precaution had been taken to make the paddocks foolproof, to keep one stallion from another, to forestall just such an emergency as this. The paddock fences were strong and high, the corridor wide. Yet the Black was loose, and in spite of the fence still separating him from Satan, his fury was not to be denied. He ran with reckless speed down the corridor and back again, once hurling himself against the fence, only to be repelled. He ignored the gray gelding, who followed his every move still neighing in rage. He had eyes only for the large, black horse who stood so quietly in the center of his paddock. That Satan did not move, that he uttered no scream accepting the challenge, infuriated the tall stallion even more. His nostrils were distended in recognition of the hateful scent of his rival as he finally left the corridor and approached Satan’s paddock from the front.
The Black Stallion's Filly Page 20