Dante of the Maury River (20 page)

A bright, early star sparkled high in the sky, sitting below a shard of daylight moon. Opposing each other in the sky, the moon and sun hurried me along my way. Soon, one would take over and the other would take off.

The riding trail ended at the north bank of the Maury, which was running shallow that fall. I waded on into the riverbed, and my hooves sank down into the soft silt. The exposed pebbles and rocks allowed me to pick my way across. The water calmed me and helped me to focus. I paused and let myself acclimate to the river. I needed to think and to breathe.

So far, Napoleon was nowhere to be seen or heard or smelled. Not on the banks of the Maury and not within eyesight or earshot. Only a few little wrens scavenged along the river’s edge, but no trace of a pony.

Right then, I thought about turning back, but behind me I heard Macadoo whinnying. “Remember: ears, nose, whiskers! We’re with you, Dante!”

The single star hanging in the sky glimmered brighter, and I thought I’d best keep moving, like the Belgian suggested. No time for fear and no time for a swim.

M
y prize for crossing the Maury was spotting a ferocious tangle of teeny-tiny hoofprints left on the muddy south bank.

I whinnied and whickered and whinnied again.

Nothing.

A few steps out of the river and the ground turned hard and dry, and it became impossible to track the Shetland any farther. Three trails branched out at my feet. One south. One east. One west. I figured that with my luck, the pony had wandered off into the deepest hidden crevice of the mountain’s forest, so I took the southerly route down instead of the trails flanking east and west that went up and around toward the bald, exposed peak.

Fortunately, Mrs. Maiden and Stu kept the paths around Saddle Mountain navigable and easy to see with good footing. The mountain had long ago been logged. Back then, dirt roads had been cut to allow in trucks and dozers to seize the biggest trees. Breeds like Macadoo’s would have done such work. Although the Belgian and I often butted heads, I’ll admit that right then I closed my eyes and wished him with me, but I needed to prove to the herd that they could count on me.

Around the bend, I heard autumn leaves crunching and fallen limbs snapping. I dropped my head to sniff the path and, lo and behold, picked up a fairly fresh scent of hay and sweet feed. Napoleon for sure, I figured.

My whiskers came in handy, just as Macadoo had predicted they would. I sensed a subtle motion in the ground up ahead of me, so I hurried down the hill toward the sounds and vibrations and smells.

Then, I stopped dead. Because I knew if I didn’t make the right decision, I might end up that way myself, and Napoleon might, too.

Oh, I saw the little fellow, all right. Not more than a tall tree’s distance away. Ears pinned back and doing all he could to make himself invisible and fierce at the same time.

Trouble was, something stood between us. Not a beaver nor a bobcat. Not a coyote nor a fox.

The
something
was a black bear. By the looks of her, easily outweighing Napoleon. As hefty a pony as he was, this bear had him beat by at least a body. Maybe more.

Let me explain exactly how a horse who’s never been on a mountain or in a forest, never explored a wild piece of earth, knows a bear when he sees one.

For one, the absolute fear that started at the tip of my ears and shot simultaneously to my eyes and my gut told me that whatever that critter was, posturing on its hind legs there between the Shetland and me, well, it was not my friend.

Horses are, as everybody knows, genetically inclined to make one of two choices when faced with a scary, unknown thing: fight or flee. And I couldn’t fly away, even though that’s what I was best at. Not without the Shetland.

Now, I had never faced a fight in my life. Not counting the pretending that Covert and I used to do at Edensway, and not counting all the dirty kicking and pushing and shoving that went on at the track. I could give as good as I got in my racing days, but taking up with a bear on its home turf was an entirely different test. I found a little courage and made a big diversion.

First things first. I whinnied with everything I had to draw the bear’s attention off Napoleon. A high, shrill whinny carried a message to the Shetland: “Get to the river. Get home.”

Napoleon’s one smart little guy. He didn’t bother with salutations or formalities, but took advantage of the confusion.

“She’s quite a crabbit, that bear. Lovely in her own way, but contrary,” Napoleon cautioned as he galloped right past me.

I hoped to gain him enough time to reach home.

Now, I could see the bear had four legs — not altogether unlike mine, but shorter and stumpier. At present, she was pawing with two and standing on the other two. And further, I deduced that if I ran faster on four legs than two, then so did Mrs. Bear.

If I could keep the angry beast upright for as long as possible, Napoleon might get down the mountain and across the Maury. So I reared up, too, and that made me appear to grow at least a pony’s length taller than that bear.

Just then, two little balls of black fur came rolling and tumbling out of the forest, down the bluff. The bear cubs — I admit they were cute — had left their hiding place to come see about all the fuss. I do know a thing or two about protective dams. Cute as they were, the little cubs provided two excellent reasons for their mother to fight to the death. She let out a roar that smelled like trout and sounded like thunder.

A gravelly growl of my own was rearing to get out. I let it fly and struck out at the bear. Believe me, she struck back. We danced around that mountain together, both of us on two feet, until I knew I had to quit fighting and start flying. A bear, I learned in an up-close-and-personal way, has got two things that a horse hasn’t: sharp claws and nasty, sharp teeth. I never had liked pointy things. The time had come to flee.

I prayed Napoleon had safely reached home. The bear was throwing one heck of a hissy-tissy fit, and I couldn’t hold her off any longer. I didn’t know I had it in me to whip around in a spin worthy of Daisy, but that’s what I did, and I retraced my steps at racing speed. Splits that would’ve astonished old Gary.

T
he bear proved herself a grand runner. She gave a contest, all right. On the sunny side, I was as tickled as teasel to know that I could still move like lightning.

I didn’t glance back once because I didn’t need to. Her hot breath panted at my hind end so close that I used her exhale for fuel in getting to that extra gear and then some. On the gallop back to the field, I used my large heart for the purpose to which it was most familiar — working with oxygen, and lots of it. I burned along the old logging trail — hooves afire — and sent a covey of quail and a rafter of wild turkey scurrying down into a ravine to get out of my path. Not a moment for dillydallying.

I hit the Maury River only about six lengths ahead of Mama Bear. I learned two more things before the chase was over. Bears can run fast. And I can run faster.

Truly, sixty lengths would not have been a comfortable enough win for me. I tore across the Maury in about four strides. Left that bear on the south bank, glowering at me to come back and fight. By the time I picked up the trail leading to the gelding field, I was weaving around, breathing hard. I slowed to a trot, praying little Napoleon would be there to greet me.

As our pasture came into view, I recognized him standing there on top of the gray boulder that jutted out of the ground. It was too dark to tell a buzzard from a hawk, but I knew it was him standing guard. He started whinnying a greeting like I’d been gone for way too long.

Right away, I spotted a problem getting back inside the field. Evidently, enough time had passed between Napoleon’s return and mine for Mrs. Maiden to stop by for night check and repair the fence. I figured now they were out looking for me. I just hoped they’d brought some protection.

Trouble was, now I had no way in.

I wasn’t afraid of the dark, but I surely was afraid of being eaten by an irate predator. Although I was fairly confident that the bear had decided I wasn’t worth the effort of crossing the river, I did not savor the idea of spending the evening all by my lonesome on the wrong side of the safety zone.

“You’ll have to jump it,” Napoleon hollered at me.

I stared blankly at him. “Negative,” I said. “I’m a racehorse, not a jumping horse.”

“I’m afraid you’ve no choice. None at all, Mister Dante.” Then he added, “Come on, I believe in you.”

Naturally, seeing how he looked up to me, I didn’t want the frightened pony to know that I quivered at the idea of jumping anything, but a horizontal wire charged to zip-zap my tenders was unnerving.

By now, it was nearly dark. Napoleon would be needing his story soon, and if I could make it back to our field, boy, did I have a doozy for him. One I expected he’d ask for again and again.

I paced back and forth, trying desperately to figure another way over, under, or through.

The Shetland started to get restless watching me.

“My friend, have you not ever jumped before?” he asked me.

I whinnied; time to fess up.

“No problem, no problem. Not. A. Problem,” Napoleon assured me. “A little help over here?” he called to the others, and that brought all the geldings and mares to the fence line.

Down the back line, all of them started to whinnying. Cowboy. Jake and Charlie. The Belgian. The mares — Daisy, Gwen, and a couple of the boarded ladies, Lilac and Princess. I wasn’t convinced any of them could help, but I sure had an audience. From the sounds of it, the Maury River Stables’ horses had given me long odds at making it over the fence. My favorite kind of wager.

“Here’s what you do,” Napoleon advised me. “Back up a bit. Yeh, good. No, quite a bit more. There you are, right. Now, pick up a canter, and when you get one stride out from the fence, lift your front feet and hurl yourself up and over, right? Lift. Hurl. Got it?”

So I picked up the canter. The bit about lifting and hurling eluded me, but with the mares and geldings all watching, I was determined to succeed. Just maybe not on the first try.

“No, No, NO. Front feet up and hurl over. Really go for it,” Napoleon said. “Up and over. You didn’t do that part. You stopped cold, as we say.”

I backed up farther down the trail. Seemed as though I was the evening’s entertainment, because this time all the geldings and mares counted out my strides in unison. From way far back they counted, “One, two. One, two. One, two. One, two.”

While they were so exuberantly carrying on, the Shetland stayed focused on coaching me home. A few strides out he said, “Get ready to lift your front feet quite a lot.” Just as I was about to, he shouted, “Oh, and I forgot; push off with your back legs. Yeh, don’t forget them, your back legs.”

I slammed on the brakes and almost slid into the fence, all coiled and ready to shock if I didn’t make it.

“Dirty stop!” yelled Daisy.

“Come on, fancy boy,” Cowboy said.

“How’s that pedigree working out for ya, Dante’s Infirmo? Get it? Infirmo?” Jake was always trying to one-up Cowboy. I’d have to work on helping those two find a new place to board once I made it back into the pasture.

Napoleon hopped down from the boulder and waved me over with a front hoof. “Yeh, right. I see the problem. You’re looking at the ground. Can’t do that. You’ve got to find your takeoff spot — the spot that’s close enough but not too far from your obstacle. When you hear me say ‘jump,’ I want you to lift —”

I cut him off. “— And hurl!”

“Right. And remember to push off with your hind. Now, back up. Quite a lot more. Still more. Really lift this time. Give it your all. Yeh, good, come on. Now, everybody count!”

All the mares and the geldings joined in. “One, two. One, two.”

“Get ready,” the Shetland called. “One, two. One, two. One, jump!”

I lifted and pushed and hurled myself straight up off the ground. Mares-in-heaven, if I wasn’t floating like a bug on water. Up and over I went. Neither hair nor hide felt the slightest singe. Lo and behold, I cleared the electric fence. Not gracefully, but clean. I landed clumsily, all four legs splayed out in all four directions like a newborn foal unsure how he got there.