Macadoo of the Maury River (9 page)

Poppa spoke clearly. “I am sober, Izzy. I am.”

“Then, what is this, Poppa?” Izzy shoved the bottle toward his poppa. “This is your drink. I remember. After Mom passed away, when I first came here, I found bottles just like this one everywhere, all around Cedarmont, until we got Mac. Why? Why now when everything is so good?”

Poppa rounded his shoulders and hung his head. He brought his hardworking hands to his face. He didn’t speak.

“Izzy, I can’t explain why I didn’t threw that last bottle away. I found it in the tack room yesterday when I was setting up your new saddle. I must have hidden it here some time ago — before you came, even. But I swear I have had not one drink from it. See my steady hands? Look into my clear eyes,” he said.

Izzy shut his eyes; he shook his head.

I think Poppa realized that Izzy was scared. He ran his hand through his hair. “Yes, the whiskey is mine,” he admitted. “I couldn’t pour it out, but I didn’t drink it either. I’m trying, Izzy. I’m trying.”

Izzy looked up at Poppa. He started to go to him, but instead he stopped and demanded, “Is there more?”

“Yes,” Poppa said.

“Get it and pour it out now.”

The old man sighed and shrugged.

“Poppa, please,” Izzy pleaded.

“I can’t,” Poppa said.

Izzy threw the whiskey bottle onto the floor. The glass shattered and the barn started to smell of spoiled corn. “We’re supposed to be a family! You’re supposed to take care of me and Cedarmont.”

Without a jacket or hat, Izzy ran out. I wasn’t sure how I could help Izzy and Poppa, but I was going to try. I followed my boy from the barn.

W
e left Poppa, Job, and Molly behind. They didn’t follow. I caught up to Izzy, and we walked across the meadow and into the forest. The snow had stopped and the sky cleared just enough to let the winter sun slice through the bare sycamore trees, white like the ground now. At a boulder ledge near the Maury River, Izzy climbed onto me. I was big enough, strong enough, now to hold him for a little while.

Izzy didn’t speak. I understood that he was only a child, yet had been shouldering a terrible burden — a burden I was old enough to help carry. I stood facing the mountain while Izzy poured out all his grief and anger and confusion. I thought then how wrong my father was when he told me that there is no heavy work left for the draft breeds. This work was just different. Izzy’s heavy lifting had only just started, and I was his willing partner.

For a long while after his tears stopped, Izzy stayed silent and I did, too. Not grazing or even sniffing at the grass. After a bit, he lifted his head and sighed. “Thanks for coming with me, Mac. I wanted to be alone but not really.”

I reached back and touched my nose to Izzy’s boot, still wet from walking in the snow.

“Good boy, Mac.” He patted my shoulder. “We’ll just stay for a little while, until I know what to say to Poppa. I like the quiet. I like the trees and I like the sky. The mountain helps me think.” His mouth softened; I could feel it. “I learned that from Poppa.”

The sunshine cut in through the forest understory and shone down through the bare river birch onto us. I blew out to watch my breath spiral and swirl around in the last daylight.

Izzy stretched out on my back and let his legs dangle against my barrel. The two of us kept still and silent until the sun only glistened at our feet, on its way below Saddle Mountain, on the other side of Rockbridge County. Izzy slid down to lead us home. We passed an empty pine strand that Poppa had recently cleared for timber, then came to a grassy place on the side of hill.

“Come on, boy, this is a shortcut. We cross here and we’ll be back in your field in no time. Poppa showed me once.” Izzy scratched his head. “I think this is the way.”

I whinnied into the open and my own voice answered. I refused to go farther in the direction Izzy wanted. Izzy was wrong.

I squared up my feet and sunk them into the ground. Whether he knew it or not, Izzy needed me to get him home. A barred owl had already made its first surveying flight; soon there would be no sunlight left at all. I pulled on the lead rope to get Izzy to turn around.

“Mac!” Izzy shouted. He yanked too hard on the rope, snapping the chain to pull my head down. “Walk on!”

I refused. Izzy was leading us down deeper into the mountain base, away from home. I whinnied, again, and called out for help. No one called back to me. Not Molly. Not Job. I used all my strength until Izzy let go of the lead and gave in.

“All right,” said Izzy. “We’ll go your way.”

He climbed up onto my back. I whinnied every few minutes, but Izzy and I were alone, with darkness enclosing. Izzy started to shiver. He hadn’t any gloves on, but warmed his hands in my winter coat. I kept walking toward home, all the while whinnying for someone. Finally, I heard a reply, but it was not a whinny or a nicker.

It was Poppa.

I followed his voice, calling out our names without stopping, until I could see the light from the house, then the light from the barn. Poppa stood waiting just in the barn doorway. Izzy slid down and ran to him.

Poppa opened his arms. “Please, Izzy,” he said. “Believe me. You and our little herd are the reasons I am healthy and sober.”

Izzy rested his head on Poppa’s shoulder and nodded. “I was so scared without you,” he said. “I’m glad to be home.”

O
ver the years, the bond between Poppa and Izzy grew stronger. Poppa needed his cane all the time now, but still he kept riding every day. Izzy did turn out to be like Charlotte in one way. By the time he was thirteen, he was as tall as Poppa and still growing.

I kept busy learning all I could from Molly and Job. After I’d been at Cedarmont for several years and had reached a good height and weight, Poppa gave me the conditioning and schooling that I needed to go with Izzy. Some days we built up my strength, power, and suppleness, and on others we worked to improve my focus, attention, and discipline. Poppa praised my gentle nature, and he never asked Izzy to win a ribbon or a trophy, only to ride in the mountains like he wanted. We had become a family. Poppa, Molly, Job, and I. And, we trusted in one another.

The first time Izzy took me out on the trail our trust was tested. I had learned how to listen and obey the aids from Izzy. His legs, seat, and hands were stronger than words. The reins and the bit even stronger. But, Poppa never taught how Izzy’s breath was an aid, too. This I learned on my own.

Early one August morning, while the air was cool but still muggy, we rode out with Poppa and Molly.

I often knew how Izzy wanted me to go, even before he asked. But, part of my job was to help him learn to use his aids correctly. Still, I should have taken better care of him on our first trail ride. I had more learning to do, too.

Being out on a trail was different from our practice with Poppa in the ring. On the trail, in the forest, and in the mountain, I could hear and see and feel better than Izzy could. My mistake that day was not taking care of my boy from our first step out. The trouble started when Poppa asked if Izzy felt ready to canter.

“Yes, I know what to do. You always say that riding Mac’s like riding a sofa; he’ll take care of me.”

“That’s right, Mac is easy and safe. Now, sit deep, grab mane, pull your leg back —”

Izzy shortened my reins. He breathed a full deep breath, placed his calf at the girth, and then pressed his boot into my barrel.

“I’m a good rider,” Izzy said to himself. “I can do this.”

He rose just out of the saddle, posting faster and faster, and I picked up speed with him until we were cantering.

In all the excitement of cantering on the trail, I lost sight of Poppa and Molly, so instead I followed Izzy’s hands and legs. But Izzy wasn’t paying attention either and soon he had steered me into a nest of long vines, thicker than the limbs of an old dogwood. Poppa and Molly had disappeared so we stopped while Izzy tried to figure his way out.

“Poppa, come back. I can’t see which way to go.”

But Poppa didn’t answer.

I halted and asked the mountain which way to go. Job had taught me to think of myself as part of the mountain and to pay attention to the air and the ground, the river and the sky, and to every living thing.

Izzy panicked. He kicked at my sides, urging me forward. He pulled the reins left then right. He pressed the heel of his boot into my side, telling me to turn, then changed his mind and pulled on the reins and made the bit tight in my mouth. He wanted me to back up. He was afraid.

I blocked out all of the confusing, fearful aids from Izzy. To get him safely reunited with our family, I ignored his squirming and kicking and his fast, shallow breathing.

“Poppa, help! Where are you? What do I do?” Izzy panicked and shouted into the trees.

No answer came. Not from a mule or a blue jay or a goldfinch. With another jab to my barrel, Izzy tried to make me move again. Somehow, we had gotten turned around. Izzy didn’t know which way to go.

“We’re lost, Mac! What if Poppa can’t find us? I don’t know what to do. What if we never find him?”

If we were to find our family, I needed to take over. As long as Izzy stayed in the saddle, I could lead us. If he dismounted, Izzy would lead me or I’d have to overtake him. If I could get to the Maury River, we could find Poppa.

Straight ahead, the forest understory was a twisted, tangled mess of vines so thick that sunlight could barely pass through.

To our west, a beaver had gnawed down young hardwoods and left a jagged path of pointy stumps. The footing was loose with rocks that covered a steep cliff. Nearby a still-wet snake had coiled herself in the sun to dry. I smelled around for the dampest spot of earth.

A small copper butterfly with gossamer orange wings flitted around us. She landed near my cleft ear and I thought of my father.

“You don’t even know who you are. Who we are,” he had said.

The copper fluttered up, then back down on me. I tried to twitch her away, but she clung to my ear with her dainty legs.
Remember.

And even though I had been gelded at John Macadoo’s and didn’t have the blood of a stallion, there in the mountain forest I found that I could remember. “We are movers of mountain and forest,” my father had also said.

With the copper’s help, I realized that the beaver and the rocks and the snake were pointing the way to the Maury River. I heard tumbling water below and the
chip-chip, po-ta-to chip
of a goldfinch. We would find our family there, but we would need to go down. Straight down.

I reached back and nudged Izzy’s boot to get his attention and nodded my head toward the river. Izzy picked up his reins — glad to be moving — and when he did, I walked on and took the shortest way, straight toward the cliff. Once we started, Izzy remembered to lean back, and his weight helped balance us. Izzy relaxed his hands and gave me a long rein. I headed straight for the river, keeping my eyes and nose close to the earth.

We reached the bottom safely, and Izzy let out a great sigh. Soon, we joined our family, waiting for us downstream in the shallow, rocky part of the Maury River.

When we arrived, Poppa let out a great sigh, too. “There you are, my lost loves! I was giving you ten more minutes before I came looking. There’s a reason I’ve brought Mac into the mountains with the mules so often, Izzy. Nothing startles them, and mules are smarter than people in the woods. Out here, your Belgian is almost as bright as Job or Molly. They’ve taught him well.”

Izzy grew as a rider that day, and his confidence grew, too. Mine did, too. For a moment on the trail, I thought I had lost my way until I remembered who I was. Who we were. I wondered if my father would have been proud.