Gold Medal Rider (11 page)

A horse and rider galloped over the crest of a small rise in front of them and headed for the finish. “That’s Kate!” Lisa cried. They ran after her.

Kate pulled Southwood up with a look of triumph on her face. She patted him briefly before vaulting off his back and undoing the girth of his saddle. The rest of The Saddle Club hurried to help. Dorothy had brought supplies right to the finish line so they would be able to take care of Southwood immediately. Lisa held Southwood and patted him, Carole slipped a cooling sheet over his back, and Stevie began to sponge his legs and neck with water. Southwood was lathered and breathing hard, but he looked magnificent.

Dorothy laughed at The Saddle Club’s industriousness.
“Do you get the feeling we’re not necessary?” she asked Nigel.

“It’s a nice change,” Nigel said. “Perhaps we should hire them.”

Stevie looked up, laughing. “Maybe in four years, we’ll
all
come live with you.”

“Shhh,” Carole warned. Kate came back from setting Southwood’s saddle against a tree. “Great job, Kate!” Carole said. “You looked fantastic!”

“Southwood was awesome,” Lisa added. “We saw you go off that broken bridge. He flew!”

“Thanks,” Kate said briefly. She was out of breath and sweating, and she hardly looked at her friends. Most of her attention was on Southwood. Kate checked his legs closely and put her hand on his chest to see how hot he was. “Let’s get him walking,” she said.

“Wasn’t that fun, Kate?” Stevie asked. “I bet you wish you could do that more often.” Lisa elbowed her into silence.

“How was it?” Nigel asked.

Kate turned to him. “Fast and clean,” she said. “No penalties.”

Nigel and Dorothy smiled and The Saddle Club whooped.

“The favorite, Panache, had a refusal at the water,” Nigel told her.

Kate nodded. “I know.”

“Most people have had trouble making the time allowed, too,” Nigel added.

Kate nodded again. “I know. Southwood was great.”

“So were you,” Dorothy pointed out. “You’re one of the leaders now.”

“I know,” Kate said simply. The tense expression on her face didn’t change. She pulled on Southwood’s reins and began to walk him. The Saddle Club followed.

If Dorothy had said that to me
, Carole thought,
I would have been thrilled beyond belief. If I had just finished a round like that, on a horse like that, I’d be so happy I wouldn’t be able to hold still. I’d hug everyone I saw. At the very least, I’d smile.
She began to feel more concerned about Kate.

“Wasn’t that fun, Kate?” Stevie asked again as they walked across the field of grass. This time it didn’t sound like a pep talk. This time it sounded like a question. “Was it?”

Kate shook her head. “No,” she said. “It wasn’t.”

They stared at her. “But it should be fun,” Lisa said, almost to herself.

Kate turned. “I agree,” she said, “but it wasn’t. I liked doing it—I guess I’m glad I did it—but it wasn’t
fun.
” She paused and bent to wipe a fleck of mud off Southwood’s leg. Her friends exchanged glances over her head.

“It should be,” Lisa insisted in a whisper. Stevie shrugged.

Carole didn’t understand. How could being able to ride
so well be anything but fun? And yet Kate didn’t seem to be enjoying herself at all.

A
T
DINNER
N
IGEL
announced the standings after cross-country. Kate was second in her division, behind Karen and her horse Singalong. Nigel grinned from ear to ear, and the girls leaped from their chairs to hug Kate.

Kate shook her head. “If Karen jumps perfectly tomorrow, then I can’t win,” was all she said.

“That’s right,” Nigel replied, looking puzzled. “But you’ve done your best.”

“Not really,” Kate said. Her friends didn’t ask her to explain. Lisa thought that there were suddenly a lot of things about Kate that she didn’t understand. She wasn’t even excited about being in second place. Second place! Out of thirty-three! And most of the riders were much more experienced than Kate. Lisa thought that Kate should be thrilled.

Kate knew what she meant when she said she hadn’t done her best. She’d tried to fake Karen out before dressage. The glory of her wonderful cross-country ride on Southwood was completely obscured by the memory of the bitter and untrue words she’d said to Karen. Kate sighed. She had promised herself that this event would be different, but it wasn’t turning out to be different at all.

L
ISA
WOKE
UP
and rolled over sleepily. The illuminated face of the hotel clock shone in front of her: 6:45. Lisa yelped, throwing back the covers. “We’re late!” she cried. She snapped on the bedside lamp. “Kate, Kate, we’ve overslept!”

Kate shot out of bed and frantically began pulling on her breeches. Stevie rushed to help her, yanking Kate’s white shirt and stock tie out of the suitcase. In her haste she tripped over the edge of the suitcase and sprawled across the floor. “Stevie!” Carole yelled. She grabbed Kate’s shirt and handed it to her, then went back to help Stevie to her feet.

“What time is it, Lisa?” Kate asked. “Why didn’t you set
the alarm right? How could you!” She was trying to stuff her uncombed hair into a ponytail. She’d mismatched the buttons on her shirt and the collar bunched beneath her chin.

“Quarter to seven! What happened to the wake-up call?” Lisa wailed.

The others went still. Kate collapsed on the bed with a sigh. Stevie looked down ruefully at the rug burn on her knee, and Carole began to giggle.

“Maybe Dorothy didn’t call us because we didn’t have to get up until seven,” Carole suggested brightly. Stevie began to giggle, too, then Kate, then Lisa. Soon the room roared with laughter.

Kate wiped tears from her eyes. “My heart is still beating so fast,” she said. “I think I’m going to die. Lisa, I’m sorry I snapped at you.”

“I’m sorry, too,” Lisa said. “I saw the clock, and we’ve been getting up so early …”

“It’s strange,” Stevie said. “Imagine thinking that seven o’clock in the morning is late!”

Kate began to rebutton her shirt. “Since we have a few extra minutes this morning,” she said, “I believe I will take the time to brush my hair. And by the way, Stevie, there are Olympic rings carved into the soap in the bathroom. There were Olympic rings dug into the frosting on the cake I had at dinner last night. Olympic rings seem to be following me this weekend.” Stevie started to speak, but
Kate held up her hand. “I don’t want to know why, not right now. I just wanted you to know that I’ve noticed.”

Carole laughed. She knew Stevie had been drawing Olympic rings wherever Kate might see them, but she hadn’t seen the soap. Carole was relieved that Kate looked happier than she had the night before.

T
HERE
WASN
’
T
MUCH
to do at the show grounds that morning, even with the early horse inspection. Dorothy checked over Campfire and Southwood closely. Neither horse showed any sign of lameness or injury from the exertions of cross-country.

Kate had had all of the previous afternoon to make sure Southwood was comfortable, to groom him, to rebraid his mane, and to clean his tack. She and the rest of The Saddle Club gave him a quick going-over before the final horse inspection, but they didn’t need to do much. Southwood looked magnificent. He trotted out in perfect form, bold and energetic.

“He doesn’t look at all tired,” Stevie said admiringly as they walked him back to his stall.

“
I’m
tired,” Kate said. “Let’s take a rest, can we? My show jumping won’t be until this afternoon, and I’ve hardly talked to you guys all weekend. How about a Saddle Club meeting?”

“Sounds great,” Carole said. They made Southwood happy in his stall with a full hay net and a handful of
carrots, then settled themselves on the grass near the stable.

Kate lay back and stretched herself in the sun. “So nice,” she murmured. “Listen, I really haven’t been able to spend much time with all of you this weekend, and I wanted to. One of the problems with showing is that it takes so much concentration and work. I hope you aren’t upset with me.”

“We understand,” Lisa said quickly. “This event was really important, not to mention difficult—of course you had to concentrate! We’d never be upset with you about that, Kate.”

“We think it’s great you got to compete on Southwood,” Carole said. “We’re glad we were here to watch you do it. You did so well.”

“You’re in second place going into show jumping,” Stevie said. “Think about it, Kate! You could win!”

Kate’s face screwed up in sudden agony. Her friends stared at her, shocked. “I am thinking about it,” she said. “It’s not that I don’t want to do well—of course I do—but it seems like all I can think about, at times like this, is winning. Winning, and beating Karen, because right now she’s the only person ahead of me. I dreamed last night about it. I woke up this morning and thought about it. I ate breakfast and thought about it. Groomed Southwood and thought about it.” She forced a smile. “Sat on the grass and thought about the three of you—my three best friends,”
she continued. “You’ve always been such a good influence on me. If it weren’t for you, I would have given up riding entirely. Remember?”

The others nodded somberly.

Lisa pulled the hood of her jacket closer around her face. The wind was still chilly, and the look on Kate’s face made her colder still. “Wanting to win isn’t bad,” she said. “When I’m at a show, I want to win. I’m sure Nigel wants to win.”

“I know I do,” Stevie added, and the others laughed.

“Yes, but it isn’t the
only
thing you think about, Stevie,” Kate countered. “It always becomes the most important thing to me. Take this morning. I’m in second place, right? So if Karen has a clean show-jumping round, I can’t beat her. At horse inspection, I was thinking it wouldn’t be so bad if her horse had maybe just a little cut on its leg from hitting a fence yesterday. Nothing that would hurt it permanently, you understand—just a little cut, something to keep it from passing the inspection today.”

Kate’s voice broke and her eyes filled with tears. “And that’s a horrible thing to think!” she said. “Why would I ever want any horse to fail inspection? And you heard what I said to her yesterday before dressage. She’s a very nice person—she loaned me the clothes I’m wearing, and yet I’m lying to her to try to break her confidence. It’s no good. I used to do stuff like that all the time, and now, after only one horse trials, it’s all coming back. Parts of this
event were fun. I love Southwood, and I think he’s a great horse. But I’ll never do this again.”

Kate wiped her face and looked up at her friends with a determined expression. “I gave up competing for good reasons, and I’m not going back.”

Lisa, Carole, and Stevie felt stunned. “B-But,” Lisa said, stammering a little, “we wanted you to ride in the Olympics!”

Kate stared at her. Her stern expression softened into a smile, and she began to laugh gently. “Me!” she said. “So that’s why you kept drawing Olympic rings in things!
You
can ride in the Olympics if you want to. I’ll stick to cow ponies. The Saddle Club helped make riding fun for me again, and I’m not about to give that up.”

Carole frowned. “Why is it so hard for you, Kate?”

Kate shrugged. “I wish I knew. I don’t understand it myself.” She paused, then continued, “I’ve tried to change and I can’t, so I guess it’s just the way I am. I don’t have the right kind of heart to be an Olympic rider. In the end, I’m just not cut out for it.”

Carole leaned forward to give her friend a hug. She realized that Kate was making the right choice for herself. “I keep expecting you to think the same way I do,” Carole said. “I’m sorry. I can see now why you stopped competing in the first place.”

“I’m sorry that our Olympic plans for you won’t work out,” Lisa added. “But I guess they were
our
plans, not
yours, and I know we all understand. I love horses, but I’m not ready to spend my whole life around them, either.”

“Me either,” Stevie agreed. “I don’t like waking up at five every morning. I don’t even like six-forty-five.” She winked at Lisa.

They laughed. “We still have this competition to finish,” Carole said. “I mean, you do, Kate.”

Kate shook her head. “ ‘We’ is right,” she said. “When I saw the way you three looked at me after I was such a snot to Karen, I knew I had to change my attitude. I’ve been thinking about myself ever since. You really helped.”

“Even if we didn’t mean to?” Stevie asked.

“Even then.”

“It’s too bad,” Lisa said, “because, you know, we practically had our bags packed for Australia. We were going to go watch you bring home the gold.”

“Maybe if Southwood goes, we can all go watch,” Kate suggested. “He’ll be a great horse, no matter who rides him. Let’s go get him ready for show jumping.”

United in spirit, they headed for his stall.