Bridle Path (8 page)

“Hurry up!” she chided Carole and Lisa, who gave her very dirty looks.

T
HAT AFTERNOON AT
Pine Hollow, there was no question of wedding rehearsals. There were too many people around, and one of them, Max Regnery, would immediately know something was up. The girls worked instead on trying to complete as many of the jobs he’d given them as they could.

Lisa was given the job of sorting out the various extra stirrups that had been collecting in a corner of the tack room. She was supposed to make them into pairs, whenever possible, and fasten the pairs together with a twister. She found the task was very similar to
sorting socks out of a load of wash. She enjoyed it every bit as much.

“Is this close enough?” she asked, holding up a slight mismatch.

“No,” Stevie and Carole said in a single voice. Lisa looked again.

Carole’s job was to sort out the medicine cabinet. It seemed that Max had collected hundreds of bottles of many different kinds of medicines for his horses. Carole knew that veterinary medicine was very different from human medicine in many ways. One of the ways was that medicines could be administered by owners and the prescriptions weren’t handled the way human prescriptions were. Max had a large collection, so that if Pine Hollow’s vet, Judy Barker, prescribed a common medicine, chances were that Max had it on hand—if he could find it. He’d allowed his medicine chest to get into a frightful state. The biggest problem, Carole found, was that a lot of the medicines had passed their expiration dates and had probably lost strength. There would be no way of telling what proper doses would be. Carole began throwing out all the out-of-date medicines. It took her a while to figure out how to organize the ones that remained. Finally she decided on alphabetical order. It was, at least, order.

Stevie’s job was to dust all of the saddles in the tack
room. That was instead of polishing them all, which is what Max had asked them to do. Most of them were actually pretty clean, and a dusting made them look cleaner. It wasn’t quite what Max had in mind, but since the afternoon was almost over, it was going to be all they had time for.

“Nice job,” Max said, walking past the tack room. Stevie smiled. Then she realized that she should take the opportunity to ask him if he’d actually been able to get tickets for them for the horse show.

“Uh, Max,” she began. He stopped and returned to the tack room. “Did you have time to call—”

His mind seemed to be on something else, though. He interrupted her, asking, “Weren’t you supposed to polish all those saddles instead of just dusting them?”

Stevie gulped. “I’m just about to,” she assured him. “Wanted to make sure they were dust free first.”

“Sure,” he said, but he didn’t sound as if he believed her. Before she had a chance to protest her innocence, he turned and left the tack room. Stevie picked up the tin of saddle soap. A couple of the saddles really were dirty. If she just soaped them, that would probably be good enough. She hoped so, anyway.

Lisa and Carole joined Stevie in the tack room and each picked up a sponge and pitched in. They didn’t
like the idea that Max had noticed their glaring omission.

Lisa grimaced as she polished. “I have to say, though, that maybe if we hadn’t been spending quite so much time on the party for tomorrow, we might have gotten more of these chores done.”

“But the whole idea of the wedding is to thank Max for all he’s done,” Stevie reminded her friends.

“Maybe,” Carole said. “But aren’t we sort of thanking him by doing all this work?”

“It’s been a
lot
of work,” Lisa added.

“Yes, it has,” Stevie agreed. “And Max is just going to
love
it. Tomorrow, while we’re having a blast at the wedding, you will forget all the hard things we’ve done, and all you’ll remember is how much fun we’re going to have. It’ll be the best April Fools’ Day of all.”

“And there
have
been a number of memorable ones,” Carole mused.

“Yeah,” Stevie said wistfully. Her friends thought she was probably remembering the horse-manure episode again. They didn’t think that was anything to be wistful about. Perhaps it was a lucky thing that Stevie had been so busy with this nice April Fools’ prank that she hadn’t had time to do any other ones.

“I guess you’re right,” Lisa said at last. “It’ll be worth it.”

“Girls?” It was Max. He was standing at the door of the tack room. They were worried that he might have overheard some of their conversation, but he seemed to have something else on his mind. “Are you still working? Shouldn’t you be home eating dinner and changing your clothes? We’re going to have to leave here before seven tonight to be sure to get to the horse show on time. You are planning on coming, aren’t you?”

T
HE MINUTE THE
girls entered the arena, they could feel the excitement of the horse show. All around them, spectators hurried to their seats.

“Look, there’s a man in a tuxedo!” Lisa whispered to Carole.

“And look what his wife’s wearing!” Stevie said, gawking at the full-length evening gown the woman had on. “Is this a dance, or what? Are we in the right place?” She looked down at her own very nice blue outfit, but it just didn’t match up to the woman’s gown.

“No, it’s just that it’s traditional for some people to dress up at the horse show.”

“We’re not traditional?” Stevie asked.

“We’re the
new
tradition,” Lisa explained. “Casual dress.”

Then Stevie looked around again. This time she noticed that there were a lot more blue jeans than evening gowns. She smiled.

“Which way?” Carole asked, eager to get past the crowds of people and into the crowds of horses.

Max checked their tickets. “This way.” He pointed to the left.

The girls, Max, and Mrs. Reg made their way through the gate, up an escalator, along a hallway, through a tunnel, and into the arena itself.

“Here? We sit here?” Stevie asked as they located their seats. She was expressing the surprise and excitement all three girls felt when they realized how good their seats were. They were practically
in
the ring. “Shouldn’t we be climbing up some stairs, or sitting behind a pole or something?”

“No, this is where we’re sitting,” Max assured her. “And don’t worry. Mother and I aren’t dressed any fancier than you girls are.”

Stevie sat down. She didn’t sit for long, though, because as soon as they’d all settled into their seats, Dorothy DeSoto showed up. She was in work clothes since one of the horses she trained was competing
tonight. That put Stevie totally at ease. Apparently you could wear anything at the horse show, and the more casually you were dressed, the more important you obviously were!

Dorothy had big hugs for Max and Mrs. Reg and for the whole Saddle Club.

“I’m so glad you could all come tonight!” she said. “This is one of my favorite nights of the horse show. It’s going to be great.” She glanced at her watch. “I’ve got to get back to work,” she said. “But would any of you, say for instance some of the young riders here, like to come with me?”

“You mean like backstage?” Carole asked.

“That’s where I’m headed,” Dorothy said. “You might miss the first class, which is a saddlebred class, but you will get a special flavor of the show.”

Max cleared his throat. “You mean you’re willing to take a chance and let these three wild things loose with all those horses?”

“Sure,” said Dorothy. “I might even put them to work, but more likely I’ll just introduce them to Nigel. I’ve been telling him a lot about these girls.”

“Uh-oh,” said Stevie. “Where’s the nearest exit?”

“This way,” Dorothy said, leading them all through the gate into the backstage area of the arena.

The girls had been backstage at a horse show once
before, in New York. This was a very different place, though. It was much more spacious and comfortable. That was because in the middle of New York City, hundreds of horses had to be housed in a very small indoor area. This arena had more room, both inside and out, for the horses. They had an outdoor warm-up ring, as well as an indoor one. The warm-up ring in New York had been no larger than an average living room.

Dorothy walked past a warm-up ring, straight to the stabling area. Each stable had its own section where its horses were kept. Many competitors just had one stall. Some had five, six, or more, and their area would include not just a space for the trunk that held the horse’s tack and grooming gear, but a whole miniature tack room.

Lisa’s eyes couldn’t take it all in. It seemed that every time they turned another corner (and there were plenty of those), somebody else was saying, “Hi, Dorothy. How’s it going?” or “Have you seen Janice?” or “Good luck!” or “Did I already tell you Jack and I will be at the wedding?”

Dorothy knew everybody there, and everybody there liked her. It made the girls feel all the more important.

Then Dorothy stopped. She was at a large stabling
area that seemed to be covered with red, white, and blue bunting. At first Lisa thought it was American, but then she realized that everybody there was talking with a decidedly different accent, and then it occurred to her that England’s colors were red, white, and blue, too.

“Nigel, here they are,” Dorothy said. “This is Carole, Stevie, and Lisa—better known as The Saddle Club.”

“Ah, the American girls who ride at Max’s stable!” Nigel said. “And Dorothy told me something of your adventures in New York—something about a movie star who needed riding lessons?”

“That’s right,” Carole said, offering her hand. Lisa was glad Carole had spoken because she didn’t think she would be able to. Nigel Hawthorne was the most impressive person she’d ever seen. He was very tall and slender. He had strong features, wide-set dark brown eyes, a fine nose, an even mouth, and impeccably combed hair. In fact, she would have been downright scared of him if it weren’t for his wonderful, warm smile. He shook Carole’s hand and then Stevie’s and Lisa’s in turn. Lisa found herself relaxing a little just because of his smile.

“I suppose it wasn’t really me you wanted to meet, though, was it? It was my horse, right?”

“Well, we do love horses,” Stevie said.

“Then come right this way.”

Dorothy excused herself to go be with the horse she’d been training, saying she’d meet them all back at the seats. The girls followed Nigel.

The British Equestrian Team had four members at the horse show. They were competing in a number of events, including the Gambler’s Choice, which would be this evening. Nigel explained that the team had more members, it was just that the alternates weren’t needed now for this show.

The horses were all stabled in stalls next to one another, and two of the other riders were there as well. Nigel introduced the girls to his teammates, Camilla Wentworth and Alastair Brown. Then they met their horses.

The horses that Max kept at Pine Hollow were pretty good animals. Some of them were even quite valuable. But the girls didn’t think they had ever seen such beautiful and valuable horses all in one place as they were looking at right then and there.

Camilla Wentworth was having a problem with her horse, Elementary, and she wanted Nigel’s help.

“He’s been acting up, very frisky,” she said.

“Isn’t that good?” Carole asked. It had always been her impression that when a horse was lively and fresh
—frisky—that was a good sign and boded well for a top performance.

“Not necessarily,” Nigel said. “And not in this horse. Elementary is a very staid and steady performer. What’s significant here is that his behavior is
different
.”

That made sense. Carole and her friends watched while Nigel and Camilla examined Elementary carefully. They checked his basic health, temperature, pulse, and rate of breathing. Everything seemed normal. He wasn’t showing any signs of lameness or swelling in his legs, and there were no tender areas on him that they could detect. They couldn’t find any reason for a change in behavior patterns.

“I don’t know,” Nigel said, shrugging. “Carole could be right. Whatever it is, if it’s anything at all, it could just help his performance.”

“I hope you’re right,” Camilla said, but she eyed her horse doubtfully. She gave him a couple of pats on his neck and rubbed his cheek. He nuzzled her neck. “I guess he does seem fine,” she said. Nobody could not think her horse was fine when he was in the process of tickling her neck! Camilla decided to walk Elementary around one of the warm-up rings, just to be sure. She snapped a lead on him and took him out of his stall. His motion seemed totally fluid and flawless.
Carole and her friends couldn’t imagine that there was actually anything wrong with him.

Nearby, a groom was working to make Nigel’s horse’s coat shiny and perfect. The Saddle Club always prided themselves on being able to groom a horse well, but they were definitely getting a lesson from the man Nigel introduced as Mark. Majesty, Nigel’s horse, didn’t just look good. He looked perfect! And then Mark worked some more.

“This isn’t an event where the grooming matters much to the judges,” Nigel explained. “But the audience expects the horses to look good, and careful grooming matters to the horses as well. They simply perform better when they know they look good. Horses can be quite vain, you know.”