Cutting Horse (5 page)

“But he took it all?” Lisa asked with a gulp.

“He sure did! Cleaned us right out! Wouldn’t you think he’d realize that the horses need it?” John cried.

Lisa didn’t know how to respond. John had every right to be angry. It would take him the better part of the morning to clear up this latest Hollywood mess. “What are you going to do?” she asked quietly.

John shrugged, his expression grim. “I’ll have to talk to my father,” he said. He focused briefly on Lisa, and his face softened. “Look, I’ll handle it. You go help Carole and Stevie with Stewball. They’ll be glad to have you with them,” he said.

After a minute, Lisa agreed. She knew that she couldn’t do anything more to help John. As she left the loft,
she offered to mention the missing hay to Skye if she saw him.

“Skye Ransom?” John said, his voice full of disdain. “Come on! The big star isn’t going to take time out to deal with a problem like this.”

“You’ve got Skye all wrong,” Lisa retorted. “He
would
care about this. He’s not some stuck-up celebrity!” Without giving John a chance to reply, Lisa hurried down the ladder. She didn’t want to hear John’s response. In fact, she didn’t want to see any more of this side of him. Period.

Running hard, Lisa caught up with Carole and Stevie on their way over. “That was fast!” Carole said.

“We didn’t get to do the haying after all,” Lisa said.

“Why not?” Stevie asked.

“Because Hollywood got to the hayloft first,” said Lisa. “Huh?” Stevie said.

“I’ll tell you later. For now we have to concentrate on Stewball,” Lisa said. Things with John were so confusing at the moment that she wanted to wait to talk to her friends until she could explain everything in detail.

“He looks good, doesn’t he?” Steve asked.

“He’s shining—at least to the extent that a skewbald can shine,” Lisa assured her. Because pintos had so much white in their coats, they didn’t glow the same way a bay or a chestnut did.

“What’s the difference between a skewbald and a piebald, anyway?” Stevie asked. “I’ve never really known the difference, even though I know Stewball’s a skewbald.”

Carole spoke up promptly. “A piebald has large, irregular patches of white and black. A skewbald has large, irregular patches of white and any other color except black. Do you know an easy way to remember?” When Stevie and Lisa shook their heads, Carole continued, “Just remember this: ‘Four-and-twenty
black
birds baked in a
pie.
’ And, Stevie, I think skewbald Stewball looks stupendous.”

“At least he’s not nervous. Stage fright can ruin even the best performers,” Lisa remarked. Lisa knew all about nerves and auditions. She had starred in the Willow Creek Players’ production of
Annie
.

“Yup, I’d say he’s cool as a cucumber,” Carole agreed.

“You mean, as a carrot,” Stevie joked.

The girls kidded one another until they reached the line of trailers that were temporary homes for the cast and crew. It took only a few minutes for Stevie to locate the door marked
BLAKE PRATT
,
DIRECTOR
. She handed Stewball’s reins to Carole and rapped on the door. Almost immediately the door opened and she was ushered inside. Lisa and Carole waited nervously for her to reappear. They knew that Stevie had superhuman powers of persuasion,
but from what they had seen of Blake Pratt, Director, he was a force to be reckoned with.

A few minutes later, Stevie burst through the door. “It’s settled! He’s coming right out! He said he never misses a chance to see new talent. He’ll only give us five minutes now, but I said that was fine. Give me a leg up, will you?”

Patting Stevie on the back, Lisa put ten fingers together and boosted her into the saddle.

“Good luck!” Carole whispered.

The trailer door opened again, and the director stepped out. He put a hand up to shield his eyes from the bright Western sun—and burst into hysterical laughter. “Ha, ha, ha! Very funny! You want me to put
that
in a movie? Good joke!” He turned around and called for his wife. “Honey, you gotta come see this! Funniest-looking horse I ever saw! Everybody, get a load of this!”

Lisa and Carole stood rooted to their positions. Stevie sat motionless on Stewball. It was worse than a bad nightmare. It was totally horrifying, and it was really happening. One by one the trailers’ inhabitants poked their heads out or came outside. In a matter of minutes dozens of people were screeching with laughter and pointing at poor skewbald Stewball.

“She wanted Skye to ride
that
in the movie!” the director screamed, doubling over at his own joke.

“This might be embarrassing to us, but it’s downright insulting to Stewball,” Carole whispered to Lisa. The girls looked over at the horse, whose ears were twitching as he listened to the director’s braying laugh.

There was only one person aside from The Saddle Club who wasn’t laughing. Skye stepped forward from the crowd. “I wish I
could
ride this horse in the movie,” he said defiantly. “He’s the best cutting horse for hundreds of miles. Unfortunately,
some
people know a lot more about ‘lights, camera, action’ than they do about horses!”

Skye’s words fell on deaf ears. The director was already walking off, still laughing loudly.

A
FTER THE MORNING
’
S
fiasco, lunch was a glum affair. Carole tried to be optimistic: At least they could still use Stewball to help train Skye. They were going to give him a lesson that afternoon. But it was going to be touch and go trying to get him ready within a couple of days.

They all felt terrible that they’d exposed Stewball to such humiliation. He was a smart, sensitive horse, and, walking back to the barn, he had looked downcast, as if he had understood that the crowd had been making fun of him.

In an attempt to cheer them up, Mrs. Devine brought out a tub of ice cream for dessert. “Help yourselves, girls, and try to remember that it’s better to face any problem with enthushiasm,” she advised. “I have to pick Kate up in town, so we’ll see you at dinner.” She left the ice cream on the table and headed out.

The Saddle Club decided to follow Kate’s mother’s advice and perk up. They ate their fill, washed their plates, and walked back out to the stable to get Stewball ready for his lesson with Skye.

“Hey, you know what?” Carole said suddenly. “I just had an idea. Why don’t I go and work with Sir Prize while you two teach Skye. I can find out how much he knows and doesn’t know, and that way we can separate which problems are his and which are Skye’s.”

Lisa and Stevie thought Carole’s plan was excellent. Both of them knew that any horse—and particularly any horse as poorly trained as Sir Prize seemed to be—would benefit from a schooling session with Carole. They parted ways at the barn. Sir Prize was not stabled in the main barn but had private quarters in the Devines’ stallion barn, which had been cleared just for his stay.

“I hope His Royal Movie-Star Highness is in his dressing room. Otherwise, I’ll have to chase him down,” said Carole.

“Don’t you mean His Royal
Horse
ness?” Stevie asked.

Carole made a gagging expression and went on her way.

S
KYE
’
S LESSON WENT
better than the girls had dared hope. First they had him ride Stewball around the ring, but that got boring, and Skye was eager to try some cattle work. There were a few steers corralled near the ring. Lisa suggested that Skye work on singling one out of the “herd,” the way he would have to in the movie.

“Here goes nothing!” Skye called as he entered the corral and shut the gate behind him.

Leaning over the fence, the girls gave him the thumbs-up sign.

Stevie’s predictions were right. At first Skye tried to control Stewball. When Stewball stopped to size up the cattle, Skye urged him closer to the steers. Stewball dug his hooves in.

“Come on, Stewball, don’t act up,” Skye urged, using his legs to try to move the horse forward. Stewball laid his ears back and ignored his rider. One of the steers, made restless by the interruption, moved away from the others, looking as if he might bolt to the other end of the corral. Stewball was on him in a flash. He sidestepped, he turned, he stepped forward to intimidate the steer and back to cover him. Finally he stopped and stood stock-still.

“Throw your lasso!” Lisa yelled, and Skye threw, whirling the rope above his head, then letting it fly through the air and around the steer’s neck.

“Yippee!” Skye yelled. He was so thrilled with his performance that Stevie and Lisa had to beg him to let the steer go so that he could try again. “But what if I don’t make it this time?” Skye called anxiously.

“Please, Skye!” Stevie answered. “This is
Stewball
you’re riding. Have a little faith!”

During the rest of the lesson, Skye learned to sit back and let Stewball do the work. Like most Stewball beginners, Skye’s instinct was to try to think for the horse, but Lisa and Stevie coached him into pretending Stewball was an easy chair.

“So all I have to do is sit here and look good?” Skye asked the girls.

“Right. And swing your rope. We haven’t managed to teach Stewball to use a lasso yet,” Stevie replied.

Skye hopped off and patted Stewball as if he’d never stop. It was the most enthusiastic the girls had ever seen him about a horse. Once they had considered making Skye an honorary Saddle Club member, but they had realized that Skye wasn’t truly horse-crazy. Nobody would have believed it, though, listening to him singing Stewball’s praises now.

When Skye had exclaimed “This horse is incredible!” for the millionth time, Lisa cut him off, saying, “You’re not so bad yourself, Skye. You’ve really done your homework for this part.”

Skye grinned sheepishly. “I guess I learned my lesson after
City Cowboy
,” he said.

Lisa and Stevie smiled, remembering the movie Skye had been filming when they had met him.

“Luckily,” Skye concluded, putting his arm around Lisa and giving her shoulder a friendly squeeze, “Lisa Atwood came to the rescue.”

Lisa grinned, looked up, and stopped dead in her tracks. She was face-to-face with John! For a few seconds she was speechless. She couldn’t believe it: Whenever she looked or sounded friendly with Skye, John would appear. It was so ridiculous Lisa would have laughed—except that the hurt, angry expression on John’s face stopped her. What made it worse was that, because of the morning’s disappointment, Lisa had completely forgotten to mention the missing hay to Skye.

“Did you—did you find the hay, John?” Lisa asked tentatively, extracting herself from under Skye’s arm.

“Yes, we got enough of it back to do the morning feeding, and Dad ordered another shipment,” John replied.

Lisa couldn’t tell if he was still annoyed. While she was
trying to think of something to add, Skye spoke up. “I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Skye Ransom,” he said, extending his hand.

John took it but didn’t meet Skye’s eyes. “John Brightstar,” he muttered.

“Do you work on the ranch?” Skye inquired.

John nodded but didn’t say anything.

“Do you ride, too?” Skye asked.

John smirked. “It’s pretty hard to grow up on a ranch and not learn how to ride,” he said.

Skye looked embarrassed. “Of course—I should have known you would ride.”

Even though John was being rude, Lisa felt she should be loyal to him in front of Skye. “John is an excellent rider,” she said. “He’s training his own horse, Tex.”

“Wow, that’s great,” Skye said. “I’d love to have a horse to train.”

“Would you really?” John said sarcastically.

“Yes, I think it would be fun,” Skye answered.

“It’s a lot more than fun,” John retorted. “It’s hard work. But then, you might not know the meaning of those words, since you’re a famous movie star.”

Before Skye could answer, John turned on his heel and stalked off.

“Boy, something’s eating him, huh?” Skye said.

Lisa felt her face flush. She was angry and embarrassed—angry at John for embarrassing her in front of Skye. Stevie came to the rescue. “Come on, we’d better get Stewball back for his rubdown. He’s had a long day,” she said.

Lisa nodded, recovering herself. “He sure has. But I think the afternoon did him good. If I’ve ever seen a horse look depressed, Stewball did this morning.”

Skye shook his head in disgust. “I wish I could have Blake Pratt fired, after the way he acted. Unfortunately, he’s the one who could fire me. If this part didn’t mean so much to my career, I swear I’d walk off the job.

“At least I’ve got Stewball to train me now,” Skye went on. “I’m sure I’ll be able to teach Sir Prize everything I’m learning in no time.”

Lisa and Stevie exchanged glances. Neither of them had the heart to tell Skye that it could take years to train a good cutting horse—and that the horse needed to have the right personality, which Sir Prize didn’t. Having Skye do so well on Stewball was wonderful and disappointing at the same time. It just proved what Stevie had known all along: that if Skye could ride Stewball in the movie, all his problems would be solved. Instead, they were only beginning.