The Horse Dancer (10 page)

Someone shouted, ‘Woo-hoo!’ from the pavement, and there was a collective murmur of concern from some people behind her. And then he was down. And Papa was swinging his leg over the back of the saddle, the only sign of his exertion the dark shadows on his blue shirt.

He murmured something to the horse, running a hand slowly down his neck, thanking him, then handed her the reins. She wanted to ask how he had done it, why he no longer rode if he could ride like that. But he spoke before she could work out what to say.

‘He’s trying too hard,’ he said dismissively. ‘He’s too tense. We must take him back a stage so that he worries less about his balance.’

A group of women were sitting on the grass, watching from a safe distance. They were eating ice lollies, their skirts above their knees, revealing sunburnt legs.

‘Do it again,’ one called.

Sarah was still a little stunned by what she had seen. ‘Do you want me to keep trying?’ she asked.

Papa ran his hand down Boo’s neck. ‘No,’ he said quietly. Then he rubbed his own face, his hand coming away slick with sweat. ‘No. He’s tired.’ She let out the reins and Boo stretched his neck gratefully.

‘Mount up. We’ll walk home,’ he said.

‘There’s an ice-cream van over there,’ she said hopefully, but he didn’t seem to hear her.

‘Don’t feel too bad,’ he said, as he walked. ‘Sometimes . . . sometimes I ask too much. He is young . . . you are young . . .’ He touched her hand, and Sarah realised that that was as close an admission as she would get that he had been wrong.

They walked once round the perimeter of the park to allow Boo’s muscles to stretch and relax, then headed down the footpath to the park gates. Papa was apparently lost in thought, and Sarah didn’t know what to say. She kept seeing her grandfather riding. He had looked like someone she had never seen before. Papa had been one of the youngest riders at Le Cadre Noir, she knew. Her nana had told her that only twenty-two were allowed to wear the black uniform with the gold braid that marked them out as masters of their art. Most had already represented their country at international level – in dressage, cross-country or show-jumping – but Papa had done it the hard way: he had risen up through the ranks of cavalry until finally the son of a peasant farmer from Toulon had been accepted, as one of the élite, into the classical school.

When she had first seen him, Nana had told Sarah, gazing at the photograph of them together, she had thought him so handsome on his horse that her heart had stalled and she had thought she might faint. She didn’t even like horses, but she had travelled to watch him every day, standing at the front of the public auditorium, lost in contemplation of the man who was himself lost in concentration of something she couldn’t understand.

That was what Nana saw, Sarah thought, remembering how he had seemed just to sit there, and Boo had understood, as if by telepathy, what he was being asked for. She had seen magic.

With a nod and a wave to the gateman, who never minded them, they walked up the road towards home, Boo’s hooves clattering on the tarmac, his legs moving heavily.

Finally, as they crossed the main road towards the stables, Papa broke the silence. ‘John told me he is thinking of selling up.’

He only referred to John by his name, rather than as ‘the mad cowboy’, if it was serious. ‘But where would we put Boo?’ she asked.

‘He says we don’t have to go anywhere else. The yard is to be sold as a going concern.’

Barely a month went by when Cowboy John wasn’t offered money to move out of the yard, sometimes vast amounts, sums that made him giggle they were so ridiculous. He had always refused, asked the would-be buyer to explain where he was meant to put his horses, his cats, his hens.

Papa shook his head. ‘He says someone close by is interested, and that nothing will change. I don’t like it.’ He paused to wipe his face, seeming distracted. ‘We got the eggs, eh?’

‘I told you we did, Papa. They’re at the yard.’

‘It’s this heat,’ he said. His collar was dark with sweat. If anything, it was worse than it had been when he was riding. He reached up to the horse’s neck as if for support, and ran a hand along his mane, murmuring to him.

When she thought back, she decided she should have noticed then how his mood changed, how he failed to correct Boo when he wouldn’t stand quietly at the kerb – he always insisted that a horse stood four-square and quiet when told to halt. Two lorries drove past and the driver of one made a rude gesture. Papa had his back to her so she returned it. Some men liked to believe that girls rode horses for the wrong reasons.

They crossed into the quieter streets, the chestnut trees offering welcome shade. Boo stretched out, pushing at her grandfather’s back, as if for attention, but Papa didn’t seem to feel it. He rubbed his face again, then his arm. ‘Omelette tonight,’ he said. ‘
Omelette aux fines herbes
.’

‘I’ll do it,’ Sarah said. They were crossing the road that led back to the yard, and she held up a hand to thank the driver who had slowed for them. ‘We could have a salad too.’

Then Papa let go of the rein he had been holding. ‘You take . . . egg,’ he said, and screwed up his eyes.

‘What?’

But he wasn’t listening to her. ‘Time to sit . . .’

‘Papa?’ She glanced at the waiting car. They were still in the middle of the road.

‘All gone,’ he murmured.

She couldn’t work out what he was doing.

‘Papa,’ she cried, ‘we need to get across.’

Boo was fussing, his hooves kicking up sparks on the cobbles, his head jerking back. In front, Sarah’s grandfather began to sit down, as if he was folding himself on to a bed, his body angled slightly to one side. The man in the car sounded his horn once, impatiently, then seemed to grasp something was wrong and peered through the windscreen.

Everything slowed down around Sarah. She threw herself off the horse, landing lightly on her feet. ‘Papa!’ she yelled, pulling at his arm as she hung on to the reins.

His eyes closed, and he seemed to be thinking hard about something going on deep inside his head so that he couldn’t hear her, no matter how loudly she shouted. His face had sagged on one side, as if someone was pulling it, and this strange crumpling in a man she had only ever known as held together and contained frightened her.

‘Papa! Get up!’ The shouting made Boo dance and pull against her.

‘He all right?’ someone bellowed from across the road.

He wasn’t. She could see he wasn’t.

Then, as the man climbed out of the car and walked briskly to her grandfather’s side, she clung to the wheeling horse and shrieked, her voice shrill with fear: ‘John! John! Help me!’ The last thing she remembered was Cowboy John, his normal saunter vanished as he took in the sight in front of him, shouting something she couldn’t hear as he ran stiffly down the road towards her.

The cleaner moved slowly up the linoleum, the twin brushes of his polisher humming efficiently. Cowboy John sat on the hard plastic seat beside the girl and checked his watch for the forty-seventh time. Almost four hours, they had sat here now. Four hours, and only one nurse stopping by to make sure Sarah was okay.

He should have been back at the yard by now. The animals would be hungry, and he had been forced to lock the gates, so likely tomorrow he’d be getting seven shades of hell from Maltese Sal and the kids about not being able to get in.

But he couldn’t leave her. She was just a kid herself, for Chrissakes. She was sitting very still, her hands clasped tightly in her lap, her bleached face a mask of intense concentration, as if she was willing the old man to be well again. ‘You okay there?’ he asked. ‘You want me to get you a coffee?’

The cleaner passed them slowly. He allowed himself a brief glance at Cowboy John’s hat, then headed steadily for the cardiac ward.

‘Nope,’ she said, then added quietly, ‘Thank you.’

‘He’ll be okay,’ he said, for the tenth time. ‘Your grandpa’s tough as old boots. You know that.’

She nodded, but without conviction.

‘I bet you someone’ll come out any minute now to tell us.’

A slight hesitation. Then she nodded again.

And they waited, ignored by the nurses, who whisked past in plastic aprons, listening to the distant beep and hum of machinery. John fidgeted, wanting an excuse to get up and distract himself. He couldn’t get the old man’s face out of his mind: the anguished, furious look in his eyes, the jaw still rigid, as he went down, clearly mortified that something like this should overtake him.

‘Miss Lachapelle?’

Sarah had been so deep in thought that she jolted when the doctor spoke. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Is he okay?’

‘Are you . . . family?’ The doctor’s eyes were on John now.

‘As good as,’ he said, standing.

The doctor glanced back towards the ward. ‘Strictly speaking, I can’t discuss this with anybody but—’

‘I’m as good as you’ll get,’ John said slowly. ‘The Captain has no other living family, just Sarah here. And I am his oldest friend.’

The doctor sat on a seat beside them. He addressed his words to Sarah. ‘Your grandfather has suffered a cerebral haemorrhage. A stroke. Do you know what that is?’

She nodded. ‘Sort of.’

‘He’s stable, but he’s a little muddled. He can’t talk or do anything for himself.’

‘But he’ll be okay?’

‘He’s stable, as I said. The next twenty-four hours are pretty important.’

‘Can I see him?’

The doctor looked at John.

‘I think we’d both like to know he’s okay,’ John said firmly.

‘He’s hooked up to a lot of machinery. You may get a bit of a shock.’

‘She’s tough. Like her grandpa.’

The doctor checked his watch. ‘Okay. Come with me.’

Jesus Christ, the old man was in a sorry state. He seemed suddenly thirty years older than he was, tubes up his nose and taped to his skin, his face grey and sagging. John had raised a hand to his mouth involuntarily. Around him machines drew neon lines, calling to each other with soft, irregular beeps.

‘What they doing?’ he asked, to break the silence.

‘Just monitoring his heart rate, blood pressure, that kind of thing.’

‘And he’s okay?’

The doctor’s response was smooth and, John suspected, meaningless. ‘Like I said, the next twenty-four hours are pretty crucial. You did well getting help so quickly. It’s vital in stroke cases.’

The two men stood in silence as Sarah moved to the edge of the bed and sat on the chair beside it cautiously, as if she was afraid of disturbing him.

‘You can talk to him if you want, Sarah,’ the doctor said softly. ‘Let him know you’re here.’

She never cried. Not one tear. Her slim hand reached out to touch his, and held it for a moment. But her jaw was tight. Her grandfather’s granddaughter.

‘He knows she’s here,’ John said, and stepped outside the curtain to give her some privacy.

It was dark when they left. John had been outside for a while, pacing the ambulance drop-off point, smoking, ignoring the dark looks of the nurses who walked past. ‘Sweetheart,’ he told one, ‘you should thank me. I’m just keeping you guys in a job.’ He needed his smokes. The Captain had always been strong, had given the impression that he’d be there, proud and unbending, solid as a tree long after John had gone elsewhere. Seeing him there, lying helpless in that bed like a baby, nurses wiping him and fixing the drool on his face – well, it made him shudder.

Then he saw her standing by the sliding doors with her hands thrust deep into her pockets, shoulders hunched. She didn’t notice him at first.

‘Here,’ he said, realising she had brought nothing with her. ‘Take my jacket. You’re cold.’

She shook her head, locked in private misery.

‘You’ll be no good to the Captain with a chill,’ he said. ‘Besides, he’ll call me all manner of them sorry French swear words if I don’t take care of you.’

She looked up at him. ‘John, did you know my grandfather could ride – I mean, really ride?’

John was briefly unbalanced. He took a theatrical step backwards. ‘Ride? Of course I did. Can’t say I agree with all that prancing around but, hell, yes, I knew. Your granddaddy’s a horseman.’

She tried to smile, but he could see it was an effort. She accepted the old denim jacket he thrust over her shoulders, and they walked like that, the old black cowboy and the girl, all the way to the bus stop.

 

 

 

The lights were on in the house. She stared as she killed the ignition, trying to remember whether she had left them on that morning. She never left the curtains open: it advertised that no one was in. Except someone was.

‘Oh,’ she said, as she opened the front door. ‘You were supposed to come weeks ago.’ She sounded ungracious; she hadn’t meant to.

Mac was standing in the hallway, holding an armful of photographic paper. ‘Sorry. Work went a bit mental. Things came up. I did leave a message on your phone this afternoon to say I’d be over.’

She rummaged for it in her bag. ‘Oh,’ she said, still electrified by his presence. ‘I didn’t get it.’

They stood facing each other. Mac, there, in her house, their house. His hair slightly different, a T-shirt she didn’t recognise. He looked better, she saw, with a pang – better for having spent the best part of a year without her.

‘I needed some of my equipment,’ he said, gesturing behind him, ‘except it isn’t where I thought it was.’

‘I moved it,’ she said, thinking as she spoke that this, too, sounded unpleasant, as if she had been determined to remove all trace of him. ‘It’s upstairs, in the study.’