Million-Dollar Horse (2 page)

“Look, here’s a saddle that would do the whole thing! Just one buyer and CARL will have its trailer!” Stevie said. She pointed to her latest catalog discovery.

“If you’re a rhinestone cowboy,” said Lisa.

“And if any self-respecting horse would wear the thing,” Carole said.

Stevie had to agree. The saddle in question was a specialized item for dress rodeo wear—large, heavy,
and showy, studded with sterling silver—hardly the kind of saddle Stevie and her English-riding friends would need. Besides, they all had perfectly good saddles—none of which cost anywhere near five thousand dollars.

“Here’s something I want,” Carole announced. “And I’m going to order it right this second.”

Stevie looked over Carole’s shoulder. “Great! I’m trying to find a buyer for a five-thousand-dollar saddle and Carole picks out a halter for four dollars.”

“The longest journey begins with a single step,” Lisa said philosophically.

“Sure,” Stevie agreed. “I was just hoping the step might be bigger than the forty cents that’ll earn toward CARL’s trailer.”

Carole tugged the order form out of the catalog and began filling in the blanks.

“Oh, it’s you,” a familiar voice greeted them.

Lisa was the only one who looked up, being too polite to ignore even the most unwelcome greeting.

“Yes, Veronica,” she said. “Hello to you, too.”

Veronica diAngelo was also a rider at Pine Hollow, a member of their Pony Club, and a classmate of Stevie’s at Fenton Hall, a private school in Willow Creek. That was where Veronica’s common ground with The Saddle Club stopped. She was the richest, snootiest
girl any of them had ever had the burden of meeting. She considered herself way too good to hang around with the likes of The Saddle Club. She rode only purebred horses, and she talked only with purebred girls. She considered herself too good to do such common tasks as look after her own horse, clean her own tack, or help anyone else do anything. Her usual way of caring for her Thoroughbred, Danny, was to complain about the way Red, Pine Hollow’s head stable hand, did
her
work.

The Saddle Club didn’t have much time for Veronica and generally tried to avoid her. But if there was one thing of which Veronica seemed to have an endless supply, it was money.

“We’re just looking through the Cross County catalog,” Lisa said. “Have you seen all the neat things they have? Isn’t it great that if we buy things from them we can help earn the money for CARL’s new trailer?”

“Oh,” said Veronica, as if she hadn’t been there for Judy’s presentation.

“You’re going to buy something, aren’t you?” Lisa persisted.

“From Cross County?” Veronica asked, wrinkling her nose as if she smelled something bad. Lisa was undeterred.

“Stevie saw a really nice saddle.…”

“As you already know, I have all my saddles made for me,” Veronica said.

“Oh, right, but how about other things, like a blanket, or … I noticed a scratch on Danny’s tack trunk—”

“I’m having that refinished,” Veronica told her. “And Danny’s new blanket is coming from Scotland this week.”

“But what about CARL?” Lisa asked. “Don’t you want to help?”

“Why should I?” Veronica asked with a genuinely puzzled look on her face. “I mean, those horses are really just worthless animals, aren’t they? I don’t understand what all the fuss is about.”

Not for the first time, The Saddle Club was struck dumb by the depth of Veronica’s insensitivity. None of them could think of a thing to say while Veronica finished selecting a lead rope from the overhead rack and then left.

They were still sitting in stunned silence when Max Regnery, the owner of Pine Hollow, came into the tack room.

“Oh, good, I’m so glad you’re still here. I’ve got a little job for you,” he said.

“I knew we should have left for TD’s already,” Stevie said. TD’s was the ice cream shop.

“Oh, this won’t take long,” Max said, a twinkle in his eye.

“Oops,” said Carole, thinking Stevie was right. Max’s idea of a little chore sometimes took up a whole afternoon. Still, although the girls might complain about it, they knew that the work they did around the stable was important. It was important for the horses, but it was important for them as well. All the riders were expected to pitch in, and that was one of the most important ways Pine Hollow kept its costs down.

“Okay, so where’s the moving van full of hay we have to unload?” Carole teased.

“Or the fifty-foot manure pile we have to move?” Stevie asked.

“Or the trunk full of tack that we should be able to see our faces in by the time we leave?” Lisa added.

“Follow me,” Max said. “Oh, and bring along some pitchforks and a wheelbarrow.”

“So what else is new?” Stevie said, stuffing the Cross County catalog into her back pocket.

“I
THOUGHT WE
already mucked out all the stalls,” Stevie protested while she pushed the wheelbarrow down the aisle after Max.

“You did,” he said.

“And?”

“Right this way, ladies,” Max said, turning one corner of the U-shaped stable. He stopped at the large corner box stall.

“The foaling stall?” Carole said. “Are we going to have a new baby in the house?”

“Nope,” Max said. He unlatched the gate for them and they entered the extra-large box stall.

Although Pine Hollow was primarily for riders, both owners and renters, Max had expanded into breeding a
while back when he’d acquired a valuable stallion named Geronimo. It was the usual practice to have mares who were about to foal come to the stable to have their little ones. Soon after the birth, they could be bred again, so it made sense to have them near the stallion at that time. The girls had enjoyed helping out with more than one foaling. Apparently, though, this wasn’t why they were cleaning the stall.

The stall wasn’t really dirty. It had been cleaned out after the last resident had left a few months earlier. But if a new horse was going to live there, the stall needed a good sweeping and some fresh shavings.

“So, tell us about the new visitor,” Carole said, now very curious.

“Resident,” Max corrected her. “This horse is arriving Monday afternoon and will be living here permanently.”

“In the foaling stall?” Lisa asked.

“For now,” Max said. “Eventually, we may build an extension.”

“An extension for just one animal? This must be a valuable horse,” Stevie said.

“In a way,” Max said. “A very real way. In fact, I guess you’d say it was a million-dollar horse.”

“A million bucks?” Stevie said, her jaw dropping.

“A million dollars?” Veronica echoed. She’d just
been passing by, but the words
million
and
dollars
in one sentence would always be enough to catch her attention.

“Yes, a million dollars,” Max said to her pointedly.

“Well, I suppose a horse like my Danny would fetch almost that much—if I were of a mind to sell him, which, of course, I’m not.”

Everybody there knew perfectly well that, valuable as Danny was, he was not worth anywhere near a million dollars.

“Well, Veronica, if your horse is so valuable, perhaps you could explain to me why it is that Red tells me you left his stall door unlatched
again
 …,” said Max.

“He claimed I did it?” she asked.

“Well, since Danny’s your horse, it’s your responsibility to latch the door when you put him away after a ride.”

“I’m not at all sure that Red wasn’t the one who put him in his stall.”

“I’m sure you tried to get him to do it …,” Max said, allowing the implications to hang in the air.

“You’ll have to speak to Red about that,” Veronica said.

“I have,” said Max. “I take my responsibility to our resident horses seriously. I can’t be responsible for the owners, however. See that it doesn’t happen again.”

“Well, then,
I’ll
speak to Red,” said Veronica as she moved on down the hallway, indicating that the conversation was over.

Stevie, Lisa, and Carole all looked at one another, stifling giggles. It was always a glorious moment to see Veronica (a) caught doing something unforgivable like leaving a stall unlatched, and (b) getting bawled out for it. They didn’t want to let Max see their glee, however. Veronica’s oversight was foolish and dangerous to her horse. Max didn’t take anything that imperiled a horse lightly, and neither did they.

“Million-dollar snob,” Stevie whispered to her friends.

“Ahem,” Max said, letting them know he’d overheard. It was enough to remind them that they had a job to do, and a weird one at that. Since it wasn’t a mare about to foal that was going to live in the foaling stall, what was it?

“I bet it’s another stallion,” Carole said.

“Why do you say that?” Max asked.

“Well, because stallions can be sort of temperamental and need space. Also, this has a small paddock attached, and that would allow the stallion to be outdoors but kept separate from the other horses. Am I right?”

“Your logic is good, but your conclusion is wrong. It’s not a stallion.”

Stevie heaved a load of shavings on the floor, and while Lisa and Carole smoothed it out with pitchforks, she shared her idea.

“It’s a show horse and it’s in training,” she declared.

“Nope,” said Max.

Lisa had an idea. “It’s not in training, it’s already been trained and it’s won a zillion ribbons. The horse needs the extra wall space for the cabinets that contain its trophies.”

“Nope,” said Max.

For a moment Carole leaned on her pitchfork. “The most valuable horses around here are the best of the schooling horses. If a stable like Pine Hollow has a new and great schooling horse, one that any student can ride at any level, that’s like a treasure. I bet that’s what’s coming.”

“Nope,” said Max.

He was definitely not being helpful.

“Come on, Max. Tell us,” said Stevie, brimming with curiosity.

“Well, I’ll tell you one thing,” he said.

“Yes?” Lisa asked.

“You’re not even close.” He grinned mischievously. Stevie tossed a handful of shavings at him.

“And flattery will get you nowhere. Hard work might, however.”

With that, he left the three of them to complete the
chore. It wasn’t hard to do and it was certainly something they’d done often enough to be able to finish without supervision.

“This is strange,” said Stevie, ever interested in a mystery.

“It’s probably that Max doesn’t have a permanent stall available right now and that’s why he’s using the foaling stall,” said Lisa.

It was logical, but it didn’t fit in with Max’s contention that this was a million-dollar horse and that he might eventually build an extension on the stable for it.

“Maybe it’s a really rare breed or something,” said Carole, trying to think what kind of horse would be so unusual that it would be worth a million dollars.

“Maybe it’s just really big, like a Clydesdale, and it’s too big for a regular stall,” said Lisa.

“They can be valuable, but usually in matched sets, like the ones that pull that beer wagon,” said Carole. “And a million dollars? No way. Not even the ones that pull the beer wagon.”

They were stumped, but speculating made the time pass quickly as they finished the work on the stall. Just as Carole was smoothing out the last scoopful of wood shavings, Max returned. He was carrying something in one hand and a screwdriver in the other.

“Ah, the name!” Carole said. “Maybe it’s like
Secretariat
!”

“Secretariat’s dead,” Lisa reminded her. The Triple Crown–winning stallion had been worth a million dollars at least. “And besides, Max said it wasn’t a stallion.”

Max handed the screwdriver to Stevie. He took the horse’s nameplate and lined it up with the screw holes that were already in the stall door. Then he handed Stevie a screw and motioned for her to fasten the nameplate.

She stepped forward and read the new tenant’s name for the first time.

“Honey-Pie?” she asked, astonished.

“That’s right,” said Max.

“That doesn’t sound like a million-dollar horse,” Carole protested. “That sounds like the kind of weird name an old lady would give her puppy!”

“Now you’re getting warmer,” Max said mysteriously, handing Stevie the second screw. He didn’t say another word to the girls while Stevie finished fastening the nameplate to the door. He just smiled, took the screwdriver from Stevie, and walked back to his office, clearly enjoying every minute of his mystery.

“I’ll be here on Monday,” Lisa declared.

“I wouldn’t miss it for … for—well, a million bucks,” Stevie agreed.

“I bet whatever kind of horse it is—and I’m pretty sure Honey-Pie
is
a horse—is going to take a lot of extra care,” said Carole. “That’s got to be why Max wanted us to help out in the first place, and I know he’ll need us to help out in the future. We’ll
all
be here on Monday to welcome, um, Honey-Pie”—the sickly sweet name didn’t come easily to her lips—“to its … his … her new home.”

“Sure we will,” Stevie agreed. She picked up the handles to the wheelbarrow and began to push it back to where it was stored next to the tack room. Her friends carried the pitchforks. They’d finished preparing Honey-Pie’s new home, and now it was time to head for TD’s.