Horse Magic (14 page)

The waitress wrote it all down, trying not to grimace. Then she quickly took Carole’s and Lisa’s orders and hurried away without another word.

Stevie immediately returned to her previous topic. “So if it wasn’t Phil, who was it?” she said. “I couldn’t figure it out. For a while I thought it might have been Dinah—after all, she had the motive, and she could have done some of the pranks. She could have planted the book and the chair when she said she was going to the bathroom. And she could have done the currycomb thing just as easily as Phil.” Stevie shrugged. “But then I remembered that she hadn’t even arrived yet when the saddle soap disappeared. And she couldn’t have rounded up all those cats—she wasn’t out of my sight at all before that happened. Besides, she and Phil were both busy with the magic show during the last couple of pranks.”

“So who do you think it was?” Carole asked.

“Yeah, who?” Lisa added.

Stevie was gazing into space thoughtfully, so she didn’t notice the unusually mischievous twinkle in her friends’ eyes. “I just don’t know,” she muttered. “It really bugs me. I can’t think of one person who could have pulled off all those crazy pranks.”

“Maybe it wasn’t one person,” Lisa suggested meaningfully.

Stevie sighed. “Don’t start with that poltergeist stuff,”
she said. “Even if I can’t figure out who did it, I still am not going to believe it was some troublemaking ghost.”

“I don’t think that’s what Lisa meant, Stevie,” Carole said with a giggle. “She didn’t mean it wasn’t one
person
. She meant it wasn’t
one
person.”

By this time Lisa was giggling too. Stevie stared blankly from one to the other of her friends for a moment. Then a look of realization dawned on her face. “You mean, you two were in on it together?” she exclaimed.

“Not just us,” Lisa said. “Us—
and
Phil and Dinah.”

Stevie smacked herself on the forehead. “I can’t believe it!” she exclaimed. “You all ganged up on me?”

“Well, not at first,” Carole said. “At first it was just Phil. But when he realized you were on to him, he enlisted Dinah’s help. He figured you would never suspect that the two of them were working together since they’d just met.”

“He was right,” Stevie admitted. “I never would have thought they were working on anything together except the magic show.”

“Of course not,” Carole said, giving Lisa a meaningful glance. “Nobody would.”

Lisa blushed. She knew Carole was thinking of Lisa’s suspicions about Phil and Dinah.

Luckily Stevie didn’t notice a thing. She was busy thinking back over all the pranks that had occurred during the past week and figuring out who had been responsible for each one.

“So I guess Phil must have been behind the black cat trick,” she said.

Carole nodded. “He got to Pine Hollow earlier than you thought he did and rounded up all the cats. Then he came into the locker room, pretending he had just arrived, and came up with an excuse to send you to the tack room.”

“That rat!” Stevie exclaimed. “What about the book? I suppose that had to have been Dinah. She must have bought it at the mall when I was waiting in line at the pizza place. Then she planted it while I thought she was in the bathroom.”

“Lucky for her the mall was so crowded,” Lisa commented. “Otherwise she might have had more trouble with that one.”

“Then I guess they just took turns stealing the book back and then leaving it in strange places, like Belle’s stall,” Stevie said, thinking back. “And Dinah must have knocked down those hats. And either she or Phil must have stuffed my locker with those currycombs.”

“Phil,” Carole confirmed, “with Dinah standing guard at the door to distract anyone who happened by. Phil was also the one who hung the bridles upside down, by the way.” She grinned. “See, the hardest part of each trick is the acting. You have to make your audience believe the impossible things they’re seeing are really happening.”

“Very funny,” Stevie said dryly, remembering that Dinah had said the same thing during Phil’s magic act. It was true, though. Her friends had done such a good acting job that
Stevie hadn’t suspected a thing. “What about the rest of the pranks?”

“Well, Phil left Mrs. Reg’s phone in Belle’s feed box,” Lisa said. “I kind of ruined that one. I wasn’t in on the joke yet, so when I found the phone I just returned it and forgot to even mention it to you.”

“And the grain burger?” Stevie asked, making a face as she remembered the taste.

Lisa giggled. “That’s where Carole and I came in,” she said. “When Dinah and I were riding back to Pine Hollow after the treasure hunt, she told me she and Phil had been behind all the pranks. So I told Carole, we made up a fake burger while Phil kept you out of the way for a few minutes, and the rest is history.”

“Well, almost,” Stevie said, giving Lisa a sidelong glance. “I’m still waiting to hear what happened out there during that rainstorm. All I know is that you and Dinah were practically at each other’s throats all week, and then presto—you’re best friends.”

“Well, it wasn’t quite that simple,” Lisa said. Taking a deep breath, she told Stevie and Carole the whole story. “So once Dinah and I started over, we got along fine,” she finished.

“It’s almost like Prancer ran away on purpose,” Carole said. “You know, to get you two to be friends.”

Stevie rolled her eyes. “Come on, Carole.”

“Well, okay, maybe not,” Carole admitted. “But you have to admit, horses did bring Lisa and Dinah together. I always
suspected that horses could solve almost any problem, and in this case it was true. And never mind about poltergeists and all that other mysterious stuff. What I’m talking about is horse magic. That’s the best kind of magic there is.”

Lisa couldn’t help agreeing with that. “Although I think ‘horse magic’ is just another name for ‘friendship,’ ” she pointed out. “Or should that be the other way around?”

“Well, whatever it is, I’m glad we’ve got it,” Stevie said. “After all, it was horse magic that brought The Saddle Club together.”

“True,” Lisa said. “And that’s another thing I wanted to tell you guys. After making up with Dinah and hearing her point of view about things, I realized more than ever how great The Saddle Club really is.” She paused and smiled at Stevie. “Although I have to admit that I’m glad there’s only one major practical joker in the group!”

Stevie grinned back. “Well, I don’t know about that,” she said. “You guys seem to be catching up.” She paused and glanced down at the poltergeist book. “There’s still a couple of tricks I can’t figure out,” she admitted.

“Which ones?” asked Carole.

“The disappearing soap, and the braided mane and tail,” Stevie said. “
Especially
the braided mane and tail. When I stopped by Belle’s stall during the magic show, someone had braided her mane and tail with those ribbons you saw. But all four of you guys were present and accounted for during the time it had to have been done. So who did it?”

Lisa grinned. “Hmmm … must have been that darn poltergeist,” she said, shaking her head. “Pesky thing.”

Carole nodded. “You know how they are,” she added.

“Very funny,” Stevie said, crossing her arms.

“Okay, okay,” Carole said. “We confess. It wasn’t the poltergeist. It was Mrs. Reg.”

Stevie gasped. “Mrs. Reg? She was in on this, too?”

“And Max,” Lisa confirmed with a nod. “Phil checked with them before he started the whole thing—that’s what he was doing when he pretended he’d lost his watch. He knew he’d never get away with it otherwise.”

“Those—those sneaky rats,” Stevie exclaimed. “So that’s why Mrs. Reg told that ridiculous poltergeist story.”

“It was also why my dad rented us that movie,” Carole said. “He knew about the whole thing even before Lisa and I did, from Max. They figured that if we watched that, we’d get even more crazy ideas about poltergeists.”

“I guess we ruined that part of the plan,” Lisa said. “We barely made it through the first half hour.”

“I can’t believe it,” Stevie declared.

“What?” asked Lisa. “That we fell asleep?”

“No! That I didn’t figure this all out myself,” Stevie said, shaking her head.

Carole shrugged. “I guess this means Phil is King of Pranks now, hmm?”

“No way!” Stevie said quickly. “If I hadn’t been distracted by that whole Black Magic mess—I suppose I have
Phil to thank for ruining that one, too—I’m sure I would have guessed the truth right away.”

“Uh-huh,” said Lisa skeptically just as their ice cream arrived. She thanked the waitress, then picked up her spoon and took a bite of her hot fudge sundae.

“No, really,” Stevie said. “Anyway, Phil may think he’s won now—but not for long.”

Carole and Lisa exchanged slightly nervous glances. They recognized that gleam in Stevie’s eyes—she was out for revenge. But would she concentrate on Phil or include all of them in her scheme?

“Uh, Stevie,” Carole said. “Now that Halloween’s over, that means no more pranks until next year, right?”

Stevie didn’t answer for a moment. She just smiled, picked up her spoon, and dug into her black-and-orange ice cream concoction. After taking a bite, she finally replied, “Live in fear!”

Bonnie Bryant is the author of nearly a hundred books about horses, including The Saddle Club series, Saddle Club Super Editions, and the Pony Tails series. She has also written novels and movie novelizations under her married name, B. B. Hiller.

Ms. Bryant began writing The Saddle Club in 1986. Although she had done some riding before that, she intensified her studies then and found herself learning right along with her characters Stevie, Carole, and Lisa. She claims that they are all much better riders than she is.

Ms. Bryant was born and raised in New York City. She still lives there, in Greenwich Village, with her two sons.