Horse Magic (7 page)

“No, I don’t think so,” Stevie said, narrowing her eyes at Phil and stroking Regret’s head. Phil just shrugged. Stevie glanced around. “The only one missing is Snowball,” she commented, referring to Carole’s own black cat. She clucked her tongue. “Come on, kitties! Back to work. You have mice to catch, you know.” With her friends’ help, she shooed most of the cats out of the tack room.

“Back to work for us, too?” Carole asked.

“I don’t think so,” Stevie said. “Dinah and I have to get home. My parents are taking us into Washington for dinner.”

“Lucky you,” Phil said. “You can tell who has the rest of the week off from school. Before you go, maybe Dinah and I should plan our practice schedule for the show.”

“Okay,” Stevie said. “While you do that, the rest of us will clean up in the locker room.” Lisa and Carole followed Stevie as she hurried down the hall, dodging cats at every step.

“B
OY
,
WHO WOULD
have guessed the mall would be so crowded?” Stevie complained as she and Dinah walked into the stable the next afternoon. The two girls had spent the morning shopping for costume parts and other Halloween props for Saturday.

“I guess everyone wanted to get out of the rain,” Dinah said, shaking the water out of her hair.

“Well, I think every parent in Willow Creek with a pre-school-age kid must have been there,” Stevie said. “If I hadn’t gotten in line at the pizza place while you were finishing up at the bookstore we would have starved to death.”

Max rounded the corner at that moment and saw the two girls standing there. “What’s this? Two sets of idle hands?” he demanded.

“We just got here, Max.” Stevie held up the shopping bag she was holding. “And we got lots of great stuff for the party!”

“That’s nice,” Max replied. “But while you’re doing all this party planning, don’t forget we have horses to take care of. For instance, I just noticed some pretty dirty stalls that could use cleaning …”

“We can take a hint, Max,” Dinah said with a laugh. “We’ll get right to it.” She handed Stevie another shopping bag. “But first I’m going to the bathroom. I’ll be back in a sec.

“Okay,” Stevie said. Humming to herself, she carried both bags into the locker room and dropped them on a bench. Then she took off her jacket, shook most of the rain off it, and shoved it into her locker.

While she waited for Dinah, she dug through the bags of goodies from the mall, pleased with their purchases. They had decided that the treasure hunt should have three categories
of hidden objects: monster masks for Halloween, gold and silver for tradition, and lollipops for fun. The girls had taken care of the last category at the mall, buying a huge bag of multicolored lollipops. They had also found a few inexpensive gold and silver objects at the dime store, such as a big, gold-colored plastic crown. Stevie couldn’t wait to start hiding the objects, but she knew she’d have to. If she left any of them in the woods for too long before the kids started searching, raccoons and other animals would be sure to make off with them. She would have to hide most of the treasure on Saturday morning.

“I’m back,” Dinah announced, walking into the locker area. “And I had a great idea. Before we get to work, why don’t you finally introduce me to Black Magic? I’m sure she can’t be out on the trail today—not in all this rain.”

Stevie gulped, her mind racing. “Uh, she’s not here to-day,” she said. She’s, um, on the—I mean, at the farrier’s, being fitted for special shoes.”

“She’s at the farrier’s?” Dinah repeated. “But shouldn’t the farrier come here?”

“Not for this kind of shoe,” Stevie explained. These shoes have to be specially fitted with a special kind of machine, so the horse has to go there to have it done. She won’t be back until Saturday morning.” Stevie could hardly believe Dinah was buying the ridiculous story, but she didn’t seem suspicious at all. “It’s all the rage these days here in Virginia,” Stevie added helpfully.

“Oh, well,” Dinah said sadly. “I hope I get to see her sometime before I leave.”

“I’m sure you will,” Stevie assured her. “Now, come on. There are some pitchforks out there with our names on them!” She hurried out into the aisle before Dinah had a chance to respond—or to think any more about Black Magic’s high-tech shoes.

Rounding the corner toward the tack room, Stevie stopped short. Dinah almost ran into her. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Someone left a chair in the aisle,” Stevie replied. Sure enough, there in the aisle in front of the tack room was one of the folding chairs from Mrs. Reg’s office. Sitting on it was a paperback book. Stevie stepped forward and picked it up. “
Poltergeists
:
The Mischievous Menace
,” she read aloud. “It’s a book about poltergeists!”

“Really?” Dinah hurried over and grabbed the book from Stevie. She paged through it, pausing to examine some of the photographs inside. “Wow! Check this out.” She held up the book to show Stevie. “Look, it has pictures and everything. It says the word ‘poltergeist’ is a German term that means a noisy ghost that flings things around. And there’s a whole list of examples of places that were haunted by poltergeists. Pretty spooky.”

“There’s only one spooky prankster around this stable,” Stevie declared. “And his name is Phil Marsten.” She dragged the folding chair down the hall and shoved it back into Mrs. Reg’s office.

“But Stevie, how could Phil have done this?” Dinah asked, handing the book to her. “He left at the same time we did last night. If he’d sneaked away to set this up we would have seen him. And besides, you know as well as I do that Max and Red would never let this chair sit around in an aisle all night.”

Stevie shrugged. “I don’t know how he did it, but I’m sure he did,” she declared. She walked back to the locker room and tossed the poltergeist book onto one of the benches. “Still, maybe I’ll take that book home. We can read it to get ideas for tricks to play on Phil.”

Dinah shrugged. “Well, if Phil was behind this, I’ll have to admit I’m impressed,” she said dubiously. “I sure can’t figure out how he could have done it—not without skipping school, anyway.” Like Carole and Lisa’s school, Phil’s was in session that day.

“Oh, he did it all right,” Stevie said. “He did the other pranks that have happened around here, too—the missing saddle soap and the black cats in the tack room. And I’ll figure out how, just you wait and see.”

W
HEN
P
HIL WALKED
in with Lisa a few hours later, Stevie didn’t say a thing about the chair and the book. She just smiled sweetly. “Hi, Phil. Hi, Lisa. How was school?” she asked.

“Fine,” Phil replied. He set down his school backpack and pulled out a black vinyl bag with the words “The Magnificent
Marsteno” lettered on the side. “But I’m sure you two had more fun here.”

“That’s for sure,” Lisa agreed. “My math teacher gave us a pop quiz. I think half the class failed. I’m just glad I did a little studying last night after dinner.”

“I’m sure you did well,” Stevie said. “You always do. And without anything like the escaped-bull story, right, Dinah?”

Dinah giggled. “That was a good one,” she said.

“What?” Phil asked. “Is this another story about some terrible prank you guys pulled in school?”

“It sure is,” Stevie confirmed. She gave Phil a sidelong glance. “I’m sure you’ll like this story—after all, you do have some experience with pranks yourself.”

“This was a great one,” Dinah said eagerly before Phil could respond. “Mrs. Tatnall decided to give us a pop quiz in science class one Monday, and nobody was prepared for it—especially not me and Stevie.”

“That’s right,” Stevie put in. “We had spent the entire day before here at Pine Hollow and hadn’t even thought about homework.”

“So just as Mrs. Tatnall was passing out the test papers, Stevie suddenly jumped out of her chair and started yelling that she’d seen a bull escape from the field across the street.”

“That was before they built the new post office there,” Stevie explained. “There was just a huge field with some cows and a big, mean bull in it. Luckily the bull was nowhere in sight at that particular moment, so I just explained
that I could have sworn I saw him taking off across the street and heading around the corner of the school toward the playground.”

“Mrs. Tatnall panicked and ran out to tell the principal to bring in the first-graders from recess,” Dinah said. “She spent the rest of the class with the other teachers searching for the escaped bull. They kept looking until they finally noticed him coming over the hill—safely
inside
the fence.”

“Later, I just told them that the shape I’d seen might have been the school janitor on his tractor. But better safe than sorry, right?” Stevie finished with a grin.

“Especially since we never did have to take that quiz,” Dinah added. She glanced at Lisa. “Some people might like studying and taking tests, but not us—right, Stevie?”

Stevie glanced at Lisa. Dinah’s remark had obviously been aimed at her, and Stevie was surprised. It wasn’t like Dinah to be purposely mean. It seemed that she and Lisa were bringing out the worst in each other, and Stevie couldn’t think of a thing to do to help. “Say, Lisa, where’s Carole?” she said quickly instead of answering Dinah’s question. “I thought she would come over with you.”

“She couldn’t,” Lisa replied. “She has a dentist’s appointment today, remember?”

“Oh, that’s right,” Stevie said. “Well, I guess we’d all better get to work then, since we’re one hand short. Max already made Dinah and me do all the chores in the entire stable, so the rest of the afternoon is free for party preparations.”

“Great,” Phil said. He picked up his black bag. “Then my assistant and I can do some rehearsing. Okay, Dinah?”

“I’m ready when you are, O Magnificent Marsteno,” Dinah said. “Where should we practice?”

Phil glanced at Stevie and Lisa and raised an eyebrow. “We’d better find a top-secret location,” he said. “Far away from prying eyes.”

Stevie snorted. “As if Lisa and I care about your silly little magical secrets,” she said, waving a hand dismissively as the pair headed out of the room. “We have much more important things to do, thank you very much.”

After they had gone, she turned to Lisa. “Now. What kinds of important things do we have to do?” she asked.

“First of all, we’d better finish those name tags we started yesterday,” Lisa said, pulling the materials out of her locker. She was glad Dinah had gone off with Phil. It would be nice to spend some time with Stevie without the other girl around.

The two friends got to work. Stevie began lettering names onto the tags, copying from the list Max had given them. After she finished each one, Lisa drew a picture on the name tag and then attached a safety pin.

“I didn’t want to say anything when Phil was in the room, but we had another visit from the Pine Hollow poltergeist today,” Stevie said.

“Really?” Lisa asked, concentrating on the bat she was drawing. “What happened?”

“Someone—as if we couldn’t guess who—stuck a chair in
the aisle near the tack room,” Stevie said. “This book about poltergeists was on it. Subtle, huh?” Stevie got up and looked around the room. “Hmm. That’s odd,” she muttered.

“What?” Lisa asked, looking up.

“The book,” Stevie replied. “It’s gone.” She shrugged. “Oh well. Maybe Dinah has it.” She looked around once more, then shrugged again. “That must be it,” she murmured. “She must have picked it up and moved it when I wasn’t looking. Or maybe Phil stole it back.”

“So you still think Phil is responsible for the weird things that have been happening around here?” Lisa asked.

“Of course,” Stevie replied a little impatiently. “Who else could it be?”

“I don’t know,” Lisa said. “But it seems like some of these pranks would be hard for Phil to have done. I mean, what about that first thing, the saddle soap that disappeared on Tuesday. He wasn’t even at Pine Hollow that day.”

“So what’s the explanation?” Stevie asked. “Do you really think a poltergeist is behind everything?”

“Of course not,” Lisa said. “I’m just saying that most of it could have been coincidence. Maybe Mrs. Reg didn’t put as much soap in that bucket as she thought she did. Maybe those cats chased a mouse into the tack room …”

“Only the black cats?” Stevie said skeptically. “And then who shut the door—the mouse? No, I don’t think so. Besides, that book turning up in the aisle was definitely no coincidence. Somebody put it there, and I’m sure that
somebody was Phil. And I’m going to prove it.” With that, she settled down to work.

A few minutes later, Lisa peered over Stevie’s shoulder at the list. “How many more names do we have to do?”

“After the one I’m doing now, about half a dozen,” Stevie replied.

Lisa stood up and stretched. “Well, we’re running low on safety pins,” she said. “I’d better go see if Mrs. Reg has any.” She wandered out of the locker room and down the hall toward Mrs. Reg’s office. As she got closer, she heard giggles coming from the tack room. She glanced in as she walked past, then froze. Phil and Dinah were inside, their heads close together, talking and laughing. Phil’s magic bag was lying near the door, unopened.

At that second Phil looked up and met Lisa’s eyes. He stopped talking immediately and jumped to his feet awkwardly. “Oh—um—hi, Lisa,” he stammered. “I didn’t know you were standing there.”

Dinah stood up too. Her face was beet red. “We were just—um—talking about the show,” she said. “You know, practicing.”

“Okay,” Lisa said, backing away from the doorway. “Sorry I interrupted.” She hurried into Mrs. Reg’s office. No one was there, but Lisa spotted a small basket full of paper clips and safety pins on the desk. She grabbed a few of the pins, quickly scribbled Mrs. Reg a note telling her what she’d taken, and left. She didn’t look into the tack room as she hurried past.

* * *

“… S
O
THEN
P
HIL
looked really embarrassed and said something about not seeing me standing there,” Lisa told Carole over the phone. Lisa had called as soon as she arrived home from Pine Hollow. She hadn’t said a word to Stevie about what she had seen in the tack room. She hadn’t known what to say. But Lisa figured that if anybody could offer a sound second opinion on the situation, it was Carole.