Six Ponies (12 page)

He caught the ponies, which were turned out in a large meadow with several of Colonel Manners’ pedigree Jersey cows, and, mounting Turpin off the gate, he rode up the rutty cart-track to the farm-yard leading Blackie. He put her in Dick Turpin’s box and tied him in one of the cart-horse stalls; then, whistling merrily, John fetched the tack, which he hadn’t cleaned since the first Pony Club rally. Turpin’s saddle was rather big for Blackie, but the rubber snaffle, which he had bought with the money he had won in the junior swimming race at his school, fitted perfectly when fixed on Turpin’s bridle. John put the bridle on over the halter, as Major Holbrooke had instructed, for, naturally, Blackie had to be controlled by the halter until she had been taught the meaning of the rein-aids.

When he was ready, John fetched his mother and, while she held Blackie, he went all through the business of putting his weight in the stirrup, lying on his tummy on her back, and finally slipping his leg across and sitting in the saddle. Then, as the pony seemed quiet, John asked his mother to lead her round the box.

“Thanks awfully, Mum,” said John as he dismounted. “Will you help me again to-morrow?”

Mrs. Manners said she would, and then she asked whether he had thought of a permanent name for Blackie. yet.

“No,” said John despondently. “Nothing I think of seems to suit her. Now Jackdaw is an awfully nice name, but it’s no good for a mare, and it’s the same with everyone I think of. If only she were a gelding, I’d have had the choice of dozens of super ones.”

“Have you thought of Sweep or Jet?” asked Mrs. Manners.

“No,” said John. “Sweep isn’t bad, but it’s rather common. Ponies in books are often called it, and, of course, it’s really more suitable for a gelding—you don’t have women sweeps. But Jet,” he went on reflectively, “I like
that better. It’s nice and short, and I don’t know any ponies called it. It’s all right for a mare, and Blackie is certainly jet black enough. You know, Mum, I think that’s what I’ll call her.” And, fetching the lunge-rein, he added, “Thank goodness that’s settled at last.”

“If you’re going to lunge her before lunch, you’ll have to hurry, dear,” said Mrs. Manners, “for you know how dad hates you to be late.”

“All right,” said John. “I shan’t be long; though I don’t suppose the world would end if I was five minutes late for lunch. One might just as well be at school if dad’s going to make such a fuss about being in time for things.” And, pulling Jet round roughly, he led her into the dairy-cows’ field, which was the nearest, and started to lunge her. For some unknown reason Jet, who usually behaved perfectly, decided—as horses and ponies sometimes will—that she was not going round to the left, and when John told her to, she just swung round and trotted off to the right. The first few times John did his best to obey Major Holbrooke’s instructions for dealing with this sort of trouble: he shortened the lunge-rein and placed himself even more behind Jet, so that he was in a better position to drive her forward, but, unfortunately, he wasn’t quick enough in anticipating her, and his aid to go forward generally arrived after she had turned, and only served to make her go round in the wrong direction faster than ever. It was about the sixth time Jet did this that John, who had become hotter and crosser with every moment, lost his temper completely. He hit her savagely several times with his whip. Terrified, she leaped forward, and, pulling the lunge-rein out of John’s hand, she galloped to the far end of the field. Red in the face with rage, John ran after her. She had pulled up in the shelter of a group of chestnut trees, which stood on the brow of the hill—sentinels for the sleeping pastures of Basset Bottom lying in the windless valley below—but when she saw John coming she walked nervously away, though not before he had grabbed the end of the trailing lunge-rein. Pulling her up short, he struck her across the nose with his
clenched fist. She started back. He jagged her mouth viciously and hit her again and again. Jet was terrified; she trembled and shook all over, but John was too angry to care. Picking up the whip, he made her canter round and round on the lunge-rein, hitting her if she showed the slightest sign of slowing up. At last, when his rage had burned itself out, John turned the exhausted, giddy and frightened pony out in her field and wandered morosely in to lunch.

Susan had to wait until Saturday to back Sunset, for Noel, who had promised to help her, was still in bed, and Susan was determined not to ask Bob, partly because she felt the other members might think it unfair if her groom helped her and partly because she knew that Bob’s ideas on breaking were, almost entirely, culled from “cowboy films,” and would be unlikely to agree with Major Holbrooke’s more humane, though less spectacular, methods. So she resigned herself to await her father’s return on Saturday. Mr. Barington-Brown wasn’t really interested in horses, but he was a good-natured man, and, since Susan was the only member of his family whom it was possible to satisfy, he liked doing things for her. After the usual unpleasant lunch-time, when Mrs. Barington-Brown had complained that the peaches were unripe, the servants insolent, and the new fur coat Mr. Barington-Brown had bought her—musquash instead of mink—and Valerie had brought up the eternal argument over the lounge, Mr. Barington-Brown, delighted to be able to please someone, readily agreed to hold Sunset while Susan backed her.

They had very little trouble, for Sunset was not at all nervous, and since Susan, who had taken Major Holbrooke’s advice very much to heart, had been careful not to pinch her with the girth, she had almost given up being difficult to saddle. Mr. Barington-Brown was very impressed by the way in which “his little girl”, as he always thought of Susan, handled her pony, and he thought what a good thing it was that he had braved Mrs. Barington-Brown’s displeasure and bought Beauty. Later on that day, when he
was sitting in the lounge—the old-fashionedness of which so exasperated Valerie—smoking his after-dinner cigar, he imagined Susan winning class after class at Olympia and being presented with enormous gold cups by the King and Queen. He heard himself, mildly triumphant, say to Mrs. Barington-Brown, “So you see, Mother, buying that pony wasn’t such a waste of money after all.”

Richard did not back Red Rufus until the last day but one of the holidays. Each day he put it off to the next. First he had promised to go for a bicycle ride with Michael Thorpington, a friend of his, who lived at Friar’s Fenchurch; next it was too wet; then he had no one to help him; and when Jill offered to, he felt too tired. But at last he realised that the holidays were almost over, and, deciding that it was a matter of now or never, he borrowed Wendy’s felt saddle and jointed-snaffle bridle and began the tedious task of putting them on Rufus, who from the first had learned to dread being bridled. He looked on it as we do on an unpleasant visit to the dentist’s, though without the comforting knowledge that the dentist will hurt as little as he possibly can; for Richard carelessly banged his teeth, poked his eyes, tweaked his ears, and was generally too lazy to alter the bridle to fit him. So throughout the lesson Rufus’ lips would be stretched into a false and painful smile and his cheek-bones rubbed by the too high noseband. It was not surprising that, as soon as he saw Richard carrying the tack, he began to dash round the tree to which he was tied—the Morrissons had no stables, for when Mr. Morrisson had built the house he had dismissed them as an added and unnecessary expense. Richard dumped the saddle on and made a grab for the girth, but Rufus, with the memory of many painful pinches, cow-kicked at him.

“Stop it, you little brute,” said Richard, jumping out of reach and hitting him sharply on the shoulder. Rufus whirled as far round the tree as his halter would allow him. The saddle fell off and he trod on it. Richard said several words which would have shocked his parents, but not his
school-fellows, and tied Rufus up much tighter. Then, picking up the now muddy saddle, he tried again, this time with more success. He got it on and pulled the girth up with a triumphant wrench, pinching a large piece of the tender skin under Rufus’ elbow, and when he retaliated with a nip, Richard hit him again, muttering, “Will you stop that, you vicious little brute!”

Richard fetched Jill to help him with the bridle, and it took the pair of them at least ten minutes to put it on. Both of them were hot and cross and Rufus upset and excited when they led him into the hen-run—the only enclosed place they could think of—and Richard tried to mount. But Rufus did not even give him time to put his foot in the stirrup; he just whirled round and round, and Jill was quite unable to hold him still. Richard hopped after him, becoming hotter and hotter and grumbling at Jill, who said it was his fault for being so slow at mounting and that she betted June’s pony stood like a rock.

At last, when he was exhausted from hopping, Richard suggested that Jill should have a try while he held Rufus. Jill didn’t like the idea of this at all, and she was just about to refuse when Richard said, “Oh, well, never mind if you’re afraid. You’d better run along and play with your dolls, Baby.”

“I’m not a baby,” said Jill, stamping her foot at him, “and I didn’t say I wouldn’t try.” Flinging the halter-rope at Richard, she rammed her foot into the stirrup and, digging her toe in Rufus’ side, which made him leap forward, she landed with a crash in the saddle. Rufus braced himself for a buck, but Richard just managed to pull his head up in time to prevent it.

“Jolly good,” he said. “Now hold tight and I’ll lead you round a bit.”

Now that Jill’s rage had evaporated, she felt very nervous, and knowing this made Rufus feel more frightened than ever. Neither of the children spoke a reassuring word to him. The pinching girth, the tight bridle and the unaccustomed weight on his back were almost unbearable. He tried
to buck, but Richard held him in an iron grasp. Rufus wondered how he could get rid of all these horrible contraptions. He wished he were back in the big field in Hampshire. Suddenly he felt so miserable and lonely that he stopped to neigh. He neighed to the five other ponies to ask if they were being treated like this, but his neigh wasn’t loud enough. It didn’t reach to the lush pastures of Basset Bottom, where Jet, having eaten her fill, was lying, replete and sleepy in the thin autumn sunshine; nor to Sunset, waiting, bored stiff, in her box for Susan to come and ride her. Rocket and Romany, racing up and down their field, heard nothing but the wind in their manes and the drumming of their hoofs; while Grey Dawn, resting a leg in the paddock at Dormers and listening enthralled to one of Golden Wonder’s anecdotes of the show-ring, had no ears for anything but the story. The neigh only startled the respectable Rhode Island hens, and was borne away on the breeze towards Friar’s Fenchurch.

“Come on, can’t you,” said Richard crossly as he dragged Rufus forward, “and stop making that beastly row.”

Chapter V

J
UNE
was the only horse-breaker whose pony was far advanced enough to be ridden loose by the end of the summer holidays. Evelyn Radcliffe tried to ride Romany one day when none of her family was about, but she was bucked off twice, and then she gave up. The rest of the Pony Club members remembered Major Holbrooke’s advice about making
quite
sure that their pony understood the leg- and rein-aids before trying to ride without an assistant to help, if he became excited or started to play up. The Major had pointed out that there was nothing brave or clever in riding a pony off the lead-rein before he was ready. It was asking for trouble, and, when trouble came, the only way to control a pony which didn’t know the aids was by strength. That, he had said, was the old-fashioned rough-rider’s method, and quite out of place in modern horsemanship, where our aim was to produce, through a series of suppling and balancing exercises, a well-schooled animal with free action, good head carriage, and, as would automatically follow, a good mouth; not a bucking broncho careering about on his fore-hand, quite unstoppable because he had learnt to fear, and then to avoid the bit before being taught how to obey it.

Certainly neither Jet nor Rufus understood the aids, and John and Richard went back to their boarding schools grumbling bitterly about the unfair advantage the girls would have because they would be able to school their ponies every week-end throughout the term: for all of them were at day schools except Hilary and Evelyn, who were weekly boarders at St. Crispin’s, in Gunston, a cathedral town some twelve miles from Brampton. Susan also went to school in Gunston, but, as Mrs. Barington-Brown thought boarding schools an unnecessary expense, she was driven in daily by Cookson. June, and now Noel, went to Pinelands, in
Brampton, which June loved, as you played games all the time and never learned anything, and Noel hated for the same reason. Jill Morrisson went to a very babyish school at Upper Basset, where you made raffia mats. Margaret and James Radcliffe were there too, but they were lucky, for they had to go only in the mornings, because Dr. Radcliffe didn’t approve of people of their ages—which were seven and nine—learning too much, so in the afternoons they were allowed to ride Pixie and Darkie in the small field or out with Mrs. Radcliffe if she took the dogs for a walk, on the days when she didn’t go to London, where she had a dress-designing business.