Catch Rider (9780544034303) (13 page)

When I pulled over, the deputy asked to see my license. He was Barry Sitlington, who'd just graduated from my high school. I looked like a filthy gingerbread man in those Carhartt coveralls, my hair still had shavings in it, and I had dirt on my face. Looked like I had just escaped from a nut house, or maybe a chain gang.

“I don't have my learner's yet,” I pleaded. “You know my daddy died, and I had to work for my mom, and I'm sorry—I will never do it again. I know I was going too fast.”

He escorted me all the way to Covington and tipped his hat when I got off 64. He was kind of cute with that gap between his front teeth, but why the heck would anybody want to be a deputy?

I couldn't wait to tell Wayne I was going to get another chance to ride Idle Dice, and not just any chance—I was taking him in a Maclay class. A real Maclay equitation class, a qualifying class for Madison Square Garden. Not that I would place, but I would get around those ten fences if it killed me.

But when I got to his farm, Wayne was nowhere to be found. His truck was gone. I waited around for a while, and then I went home.

I called him that night and the next morning. I drove up there after school. He wasn't there, and he hadn't been back. Grittlebones was there and meowing for food. No water, either. I dug around in the mudroom until I found a bag of cat food. I knew it! Wayne didn't want anyone to know he'd bought food for a cat. I gave Grittlebones some food and water and scratched his head.

I saw that the horses hadn't been fed that day, threw two bales of hay out into the field, and broke them up. The white bathtub had only about six inches of water in it, so I filled it. I didn't know where the hell Wayne was, but I was worried. I wrote him a note and left it on his door.

 

I hope you're alive. If you are, you might want to let me know, and you might want to feed your horses, because I ain't driving over the mountain to do it every day. I'm riding Idle Dice in the Maclay class at the Charlottesville Horse Show on Saturday morning.

 

Sidney

O
N
S
ATURDAY MORNING
, I woke up at dawn and drove straight to the show in Charlottesville. I was so worried about being pulled over, I drove under the speed limit the whole way. I figured I'd be lucky if I didn't wind up in jail before I got my learner's.

Edgar was there when I drove in. He gave me Kelly's boots and a navy pinstriped coat that fit me nicely. He made me take off my hat and try again to pull my hair into a ponytail and flip it up into my helmet.

Wes brought me some coffee and a roll, and he hugged me hello, for good luck, I guess. I never thought about boys, or kissing, or anything like that, but if I did, it would have been right then. He smelled kind of sweaty, and like soap, and I could see that his brown eyes actually had green in them. He had big hands and short, filed fingernails. When he adjusted my helmet, I froze like a scared rabbit, and I was glad when it was over.

When the judges posted the course for the Maclay class, everyone flocked over to see it. I kept looking around for Wayne. Dutch walked the course with all the other trainers and riders. I followed him, but he only talked to Kelly.

The course looked kind of hard, with a weird coop coming off a corner. A lot of horses might shy at that one. Where was Wayne?

“What are you looking for?” It was Edgar.

“My uncle.”

He looked away, like he might know. “I've got to help Kelly in this class. Do you need anything?”

“I don't know what I need. Let me ask you one thing— does this horse have a stop in him?”

I pointed out the weird jump on the course. I had to know if the horse would refuse a jump like that.

He chuckled. “This horse won't stop at that fence.” He shook his head. “Ever.”

They posted the order, and there I was, tenth out of twenty-two. Kelly was first.

I watched her in the warm-up ring. Her mare was hot—jogging in place, pulling, shying.

“Did you lunge her?” asked Dee Dee.

“Yes,” Kelly answered.

Dee Dee leaned in toward Dutch trying not to be overheard but I heard her say, “Dutch, we don't have time for Kelly to ride her down.”

I saw Dutch whisper to Kelly. She dismounted and they walked the mare back to the barn. I heard Kelly say to Dee Dee, “He's going to give her a little something.”

“Where are they going?” I asked Edgar when he walked by. I wanted to hear it from him, but he didn't acknowledge my question. He looked angry and defeated.

“Edgar?” I said, louder. He glanced at me. “What are they doing?”

“I have no idea,” he said. I could tell he didn't approve, and that was why Dutch was doing it himself.

Edgar saw the outraged look on my face. “You focus on
you.
Understand?”

I didn't answer. They were going to shoot the mare up with something to make her seem more calm, then sell her to some poor fool. My respect for Dutch evaporated. Did that mean I should disregard everything he said?

“It's confusing,” I said.

“Dutch is a great trainer—he knows what he's doing. But he wants to win too much.” Edgar ran his hand down the bridge of Idle Dice's nose. “Look who you get to show today. I think you're the one with the advantage.” He smiled.

I walked Idle Dice around the show grounds, waiting for the class to start.

A little something.

Kelly came back with her horse and put in a beautiful round to applause and Dutch's loud whoops at the in-gate. The mare was cool, relaxed, totally different. I wondered what they'd given her.

I stared at the course until I knew it forwards and backwards. The ring starter was going through the list the way they always do after every round. “Jamie, then Kaitlin, then Emma, then Morgan, then Liza, then Eleanor, then Catherine.” And finally, my name was called. My hands were sweating, my heart was pounding, I was about to hyperventilate. We went into the ring, just me and Idle Dice.

We picked up a canter and he clicked into gear. He took each fence like a pro, but his stride was big, so I really had to work on keeping him collected. When I pulled back on his mouth, it didn't help. I had to both sit up straight and relax. I took deep breaths and pretended, when I breathed in, that the air was going all the way down into my feet, the way Wayne had taught me. I thought about him saying, “Just get in there and do the course. Stop worrying.”

Idle Dice collected his stride. When we came around the corner to that spooky fence, I worried that he might stop, so I gave him leg, and he charged up to it nearly at a gallop. “Whoa!” I said, pulling him back as we landed, then turning one hundred and eighty degrees and doing the outside line, oxer to oxer.

Phew!
We were done. I patted Idle Dice's neck and trotted him out of the ring.

The first person I saw was Martha. “You galloped up to that vertical.”

“I was afraid he wouldn't go over it.”

“This horse will not refuse a jump. You could have pulled the rail.”

I knew she was right, but I really didn't care. I'd just completed a Maclay course.

I hopped off the horse, rolled up my stirrups, and tried to give the horse to Edgar, but he stopped me.

I watched the other riders go, sizing up each one. They were all more polished than I was, but all of them made mistakes. It would be up to the judges which errors were forgivable and which would push the rider out of the ribbons. I had no idea if I would place, and I braced myself for the worst.

“Please jog your horses in the following order. Ninety-five . . . One hundred fifty-one . . . Eighty-nine . . . One hundred twelve . . .” said the announcer.

I'd won the class.

Speechless, I jogged Idle Dice into the ring to accept my ribbon.

The ribbon was the deepest, darkest blue I had ever seen, like the wings of an indigo butterfly. It was the most beautiful thing anyone had ever given me. I kept touching the white centerpiece and running my fingers over the gold letters on the ribbon itself. All ribbons are beautiful, and I'd gotten a few of them at the local Bath County and Goshen shows, but I had nothing like this one. The streamers were long, and I folded them gently in my hand the way I'd seen the top riders do.

I patted Idle Dice while he chewed on the bit. The horse knew we'd won. There was no doubt. His ears had shot forward when I jogged him into the ring, and he'd beamed.

Then there was a flurry of people talking around me. Martha was smiling but still complaining that I rode too forward. Kelly was patting Idle Dice and baby-talking to him.

“You just got thirty points. You qualified for the regionals!” a lady said to me.

“Thirty points?” I asked. I had only been thinking about getting through this trip.

“You're very lucky—this year it's right close by, in Warrenton. Last year it was in Kentucky.”

“This is my first Maclay class,” I said.

“Wow! Then you better take this horse to the regionals.”

Wayne came down from the stands, half-drunk and red-faced. I didn't know what to say to him. I felt as though he'd abandoned me. He looked at me through all the booze and I could see his eyes were welling up with tears. He couldn't even speak, he was so overcome. We both wished he was sober.

“How long have you been here?”

“I saw your round,” he said.

Wes jogged over to congratulate me. “Beautiful!” he said.

“I get to go to the regionals!” I said to him.

“I know!” His smile faded, just a little. “But you got a problem. Kelly just qualified, too. She's riding Idle Dice in the regionals, so you'll need to find a horse.”

Right on cue, a groom came and took Idle Dice back to the barn.

“You want some lunch?” Wes asked.

“No thanks,” I said.

He patted my arm. “You'll just have to find something to ride.”

I stood there with Wayne, my helmet still on, and we watched Idle Dice leave.

Edgar came over and congratulated me, and then we all just stood there, the three of us. There I was, holding my blue ribbon, horsehair on my pants, and no horse to ride.

Kelly was squealing and jumping up and down with her friends from the barn.

“I think Dutch shot Kelly's mare up with something before the class,” I said to Wayne.

“I don't doubt it,” he said.

Edgar looked away as though he didn't want to talk about it.

“What happens if USEF comes and tests horses?” I asked.

“I've been to hundreds of shows, and I've seen USEF about three times,” Edgar said.

I turned to Wayne, who was leaning on the fence.

“What am I going to ride? I have two weeks.”

“You really want to do this?” Wayne asked.

“Yes!”

He looked at Edgar. “Beezie,” he said.

“Yep,” said Edgar. “Beezie.”

B
EEZIE
W
INANTS
. The crazy old horse lady Wayne used to date. Rich as Croesus and smoked like a chimney. Lived in a trailer in Craigsville. Bought horses at Keeneland every year, only got around to breaking half of them.

Wayne drove me to Beezie's place. A bunch of foxhounds stood on their hind legs in a pen howling as we got out. Wayne knocked on the trailer door and Beezie came to the window looking like an old ghoul. Then she saw him and smiled.

She had a lot of land, maybe eighty acres, and about twenty horses. Most of the horses were turned out full-time. They looked good, but there were about ten of them in each paddock, and they were biting and kicking each other. They had mud caked all over them.

She opened the door. She was wearing dirty wide-wale corduroy pants, rubber galoshes, and an old sweater. The trailer smelled like cat, and sure enough two black and whites came to the front door. One took a look at us and saluted with his back leg, licking his ass.

“You taking care of all these horses yourself?” Wayne asked.

“Hell no. I ain't that stupid,” she answered, and she winked at him. “How are you, sweetie?”

“Well, I'm fine,” he said.

“Want to come in and set for a spell?”

We went into her trailer, which was packed full of horse equipment, like she'd brought the barn into her living room. Buckets, brushes, a hose, a box of bits, and a stack of yokes and tracings from a carriage. She saw me checking out the tracings, which looked so pretty all wound up and oiled.

“You like to drive?”

“A little bit,” I said.

“She can drive a team,” Wayne said.

“I remember you, Sidney Criser, from when you were a little girl on that nasty pony, Little Bear.”

I laughed. I had loved our crazy trail rides with that pony.

“Ornery little thing with no tail,” she said.

She was right. Some kid had tied Little Bear's tail to a tree, and when he'd taken off, his tail had broken, so they amputated it. After that, he just had a little puff of horsehair in the back, so you had to carry a flywhisk when you rode him.

I wondered when Wayne was going to get down to business.

“You got any good ponies?” she asked. “I'm looking for a real broke Welsh pony. Medium or even large.”

He laughed. “Ain't we all!”

“Well, you find one and I'll buy it from you.”

“I'll keep that in mind.”

Ask her, Wayne. Just ask her,
I thought.

“You know, I lost that black gelding. He had toxemic colitis, I think,” she said. “What a shame.”

“I'm sorry to hear it,” Wayne said.

“He was down and sick when I went out to feed. We got him in the trailer and took him to Staunton—couldn't get to Virginia Tech in time. He died before it got dark. Terrible diarrhea, all day.”

“That's awful,” I said. I hated stories like that.