At Risk (25 page)

Someone out there knew who owned a white
dualie and dark-colored six-horse. But that wasn't all I was after.
I was looking for information from anyone who had been the victim
of horse or tack theft or unusual vandalism in the last five years.
Maybe a pattern would emerge. I set aside a stack of letters to
give to Greg and Nick.

As I switched off the computer, light flashed
across the office door. I crossed the room and peered through the
glass. It was only a police car. Officer Dorsett climbed from
behind the wheel as I unlocked the door.

He stepped inside and looked me up and down.
"I'd've thought you spent all your time in the barns."

I glanced down at my jeans. They were filthy,
and when I did get around to doing the laundry, I used the machines
on the farm, which were used for washing the horses' leg wraps,
saddle pads, and blankets, so whether I realized it or not, I
probably smelled like a horse.

"Yeah," I said. "I generally steer clear of
the office if at all humanly possible." I walked behind the desk
and noticed him eyeing the cup of coffee I'd just made. I pointed
toward the lounge door. "Want some, help yourself."

He returned moments later with a Styrofoam
cup in his hand. Steam rose from the cup's rim and curled toward
the ceiling in lazy spirals. "What're you working on?" he said.
"The place is usually dead this time of night."

"Just some paperwork."

He strolled around the office, his gaze
drifting over the clutter that blanketed every flat surface.

I stuffed the last stack of envelopes into a
cardboard box and set it on the floor by the door. Dorsett's patrol
car was parked under the glare of the sodium vapors. A nice touch
as far as security went. Maybe I'd get Dave to make some
official-looking signs about guards or attack dogs.

Officer Dorsett said, "Doing a little
sleuthing?"

I turned around and saw he'd been reading the
stack of flyers. "Nosy, aren't you?"

"Comes with the job."

I picked up the flyers and wedged them in
alongside the envelopes.

"I'm serious," he said. "Have you told
Detective Ralston you're doing this?"

I straightened. "Why should I?

"He's talked to everyone who has Foxdale on
their post," Dorsett said. "Apparently he's frustrated with the
case he's working, and frankly, I think he's worried about you
and--"

"What do you mean, he's worried about
me?"

"Come on, be your age. Whoever's been doing
this," he gestured to my letter, "is probably going to keep on
doing it until they're caught."

"Shit."

"Damn straight. You should tell Ralston about
it." He glanced at his watch. "How much longer you going to be
here?"

"I'm done." I pulled on my denim jacket. "I
just have to check the barns."

"I'll go with you."

I lugged the box of letters outside, dumped
it on the sidewalk, and locked the doors.

When we walked into barn B, Dorsett said,
"Damn, I've never seen so many horses before. And they're not your
ordinary plow horse, either."

I chuckled, "No, they most certainly are
not."

"How much are they worth?"

"It all depends." I jiggled the tack room
lock. "Anywhere from a thousand to forty thousand. Often more."

"Shit."

"Damn straight."

His eyebrows rose. "You don't miss much do
you?"

"Yeah, right."

After checking both barns, we walked down to
the implement building. I flicked on the lights and rattled the
doorknob to Dave's storage room, then I walked around to the back
of the building. We still hadn't gotten around to fencing in the
lane. It was wide open to anyone who might drive in off the back
road. Officer Dorsett unhooked his flashlight and switched it on.
There was nothing to see.

He followed me out like the last time and
waited while I closed and locked the gates, except this time he
didn't follow me halfway home.

Chapter 14

Despite Officer Dorsett's warning, I mailed
the flyers Tuesday afternoon and didn't give them another thought.
At quitting time, I poured myself a cup of coffee and went into the
office. I fished a couple of aspirins out of the first aid kit and
swallowed them. Through the Plexiglas, I watched the six o'clock
warming up. Vicki Lewis was riding Jet, Foxdale's most recent
addition to its string of school horses, and the mare was giving
her a fit, shying in the corners and breaking into a canter at the
slightest provocation. Mrs. Hill was huddled in her coat, talking
to Karen. I blew across the coffee cup and wondered what I was
going to eat for dinner.

Corey Claremont, one of Foxdale's boarders,
walked into the office, said hello, then dropped an envelope on
Mrs. Hill's desk. She turned to leave and paused. "Oh, Steve. You
made me think of something. You know that notice you put up on the
bulletin board? The one about the trailer."

I nodded.

"Well, there's a trailer like that off one of
the trails." She told me how to find it. "Unless you know it's
there, you can hardly see it, but I hacked out that way a lot this
winter, so I know the area pretty good. Thought you might want to
know."

I thanked her, and after she left, I dug Mrs.
Hill's county map out of the supply cabinet and sat down at her
desk. Corey was an experienced eventer, and when she went on a
trail ride, she covered a lot of territory.

Though her directions were a bit complicated,
after a few false starts, I pinpointed the section of park land
she'd indicated. Two roads were close to the location, but without
seeing it for myself, I wouldn't know which was the right one. I
leaned back in the chair. Detective Ralston and I had covered that
part of the county already, so why hadn't the trailer been on the
MVA list?

I called Ralston's number and was told he was
unavailable until Thursday. I went home and emptied a can of
Campbell's Hearty Beef Stew into a pot. After it had heated
through, I took it and a bag of pretzels out on the deck. I sat
with my back to the wood siding and watched the colors fade from
the day. Above my head, a full moon shone in a cloudless sky.

I'd never been much good at waiting. I dumped
the dishes in the sink, slipped a flashlight into my jacket pocket,
and headed back to Foxdale.

I caught Karen between lessons and told her I
was taking Jet on a trail ride.

"She's never gone on the trail alone," Karen
said, "and you're taking her out at night?"

"It's light enough with the moon."

"She doesn't even know the trails."

"She'll be fine," I said. "Besides, she needs
the work."

"Only because half the students can't handle
her," Karen snapped. She lowered the jump cup on the standard and
repositioned the rail. "Which trail are you taking?"

"The one to the north."

"North?"

"To the left, Karen."

She put her hands on her hips.

"I'll follow the river for a while, then
bring her back."

"You get her hurt, it's on your head." She
looked across the arena when one of the ponies faked a shy in the
corner and yelled, "Don't pull back on the reins! Inside leg! Use
your inside leg and push him forward."

I left Karen to her class, tacked up Jet, and
swung into the saddle. We headed down the corridor that runs
between the rows of paddocks. When we reached the woods, I reined
her to the left, and after a moment's hesitation, she followed the
trail as it zig-zagged downhill toward the river. She strode out
well, eager yet relaxed, and it was obvious she was enjoying
herself.

Moonlight filtered through the woods, and
after a while, my eyes adjusted to the light. Tall, thick-trunked
oaks towered above us, their dark tangle of branches dramatic
against the moon-washed sky. Where the trail dropped into a deep
ravine, I leaned back in the saddle and let her choose where to put
her feet. The cool air was curiously still in the shelter of the
woods, her footfalls silent, the creaking leather and our breathing
the only sounds.

When we came to the first stream crossing, I
slipped the reins through my fingers. Jet half-slid, half-jumped
down the slope, then scrambled up the opposite bank. She lowered
her head and cantered down the trail with exuberance, all the while
subtly trying to bounce me out of the saddle. Grinning at her
enthusiasm, I brought her back to a walk.

The mare was still keyed up when we reached
the place where the trail empties into a wide meadow down by the
river. Jet wheeled around, and I almost came off. She bolted into
the woods, and by the time I managed to get myself vertical and her
stopped, she was standing in a grove of pine trees. Her body was
rigid with tension. I could feel her heart pounding in her chest,
and my own was doing a fair job at imitation.

A heavy pine branch arched across her neck,
inches above her mane. If she took a step or two forward, I would
be knocked off. There was no way around it, and I knew she wouldn't
back up in that mess. I gathered the reins in my left hand, slipped
my stirrups, and slid to the ground.

Even with the care I'd taken, she threw her
head up. When she felt the branch brush against her mane, she ran
backward. I ran along with her. Just as I reached the conclusion
that I would have to drop the reins or be dragged across the
ground, she came to her senses and stopped.

It took ten minutes to calm her, five more to
pick our way through the woods, and one second to swing up onto her
back. I had used the time in the woods to check for cuts or
scrapes, and amazingly, she had none. I pointed her in the
direction of the meadow and nearly laughed when I spotted the cause
for her concern.

Deer were browsing among the thick grass and
scattered saplings that grew by the river's edge. They noticed us
immediately but seemed undisturbed by our presence. I stroked Jet's
neck and made her stand until I felt her muscles relax and saw the
lines of tension around her eyes soften. When she was thoroughly
bored, I reined her to the north, away from the deer.

Wooded hills sloped upward on both sides of
the river, and except for a faint gurgling, where fast-moving water
tumbled over a natural dam, the meadow was quiet. I might have
found it peaceful except for the night's objective. I looked at my
watch. Seven-fifty-five. I had two hours before the last lesson was
over, before Karen would check to see if we'd made it back.

When we came to a stretch of meadow where the
footing was safe, I bridged the reins together over the crest of
her neck--to act as a brace in case she stumbled--then crouched low
over the saddle. She automatically lengthened into a
ground-covering canter, the instinct for speed there for the
asking. Her body rocked beneath me, her muscles straining,
footfalls muffled, breath coming faster, louder, filling my ears. I
pressed my knuckles into her mane and relaxed into her stride. The
brisk air stung my face and pulled tears from the corners of my
eyes. The ground beneath us was a blur, the speed intoxicating for
both of us.

Where the meadow narrowed into a track not
much wider than one of the old logging roads, with trees thick on
both sides, I brought her back to a walk. Jet swiveled her ears and
tossed her head in irritation.

"Sorry, girl. Can't run here." I patted her
neck. Steam eddied through her coat, curling upward in tendrils,
and I could smell her sweat, stirringly primitive. A link to the
past. The result of countless years of man and horse working
together.

It took me half an hour to find the trail,
but when I did, I had no doubt I'd found the right one. Corey's
directions had been dead on. "Right at a wide fork, go two-hundred
yards to another fork, make a left. The trail rises sharply, then
follows the crest of a narrow ridge that runs north to south with a
fence line just visible on the western slope." We followed the
trail for several miles, and it was there, where the trees thinned,
that I saw the trailer.

I reined Jet to a stop. Fifty feet down
slope, the woods gave way to pasture land that backed up to an old,
white farm house and dilapidated bank barn. A trailer that looked
remarkably like the one I'd had my ride in was parked behind the
barn in a rickety-looking corral out of sight from the road. I
studied the house. Lights were on downstairs, casting yellow
squares across the grass, but the back porch light was dark.

I spent all of five minutes making up my
mind.

I slid off the mare, tied her to a tree, and
squeezed between strands of rusty barbed wire. It was only 600 feet
to the trailer. Six hundred feet of open ground under a full moon.
But if no one was looking, it wouldn't matter.

I took off at a dead run. Midway between the
woods and corral, a drainage ditch I hadn't noticed stretched
blackly through the tangled grass.

I vaulted over it, landed on my knees and
scrambled up the other side, wondering what else I might have
missed.

By the time I got to the old split-rail
fence, my lungs were burning. I reached out to grab the top rail
and brushed my hand against an electric wire. Inhaling sharply, I
jerked my hand back, then wasted precious seconds looking for a
place where I could squeeze between the rails. I slipped through
where one of the rails had sagged and crossed the rough ground to
the trailer.

Standing with my back against the trailer, I
tried to catch my breath and listened for distant voices, barking
dogs, anything that would indicate I'd been seen. All I could hear
was my own breathing. The escape door was on the side closest to
the barn. I pushed myself off the cool metal, moved to the front of
the trailer, and peered around the corner. The barn was dark and
silent and blocked my view of the house. I crouched down and
crossed under the nose of the trailer, between the trailer's body
and hitch. As I inched my way down to the escape door, I curled my
fingers around the flashlight.