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  BLACKMAIL AT MOOSE HILL?

  As they passed Barry, Stevie paused. She was dying to find out if her blackmail theory was correct. In books and movies, detectives were always getting people to confess with well-timed, probing questions. Maybe she could do the same thing to get Barry to reveal his troubles.

  Ignoring Carole’s disapproving look, Stevie walked over to Barry. “Hi,” she said, trying to sound casual. “Looking for anything in particular? A little extra money to pay off some debts, for instance?”

  Even Stevie couldn’t have predicted Barry’s reaction. “Wh-What?” he stammered. “I mean, uh, no! Not at all—nothing’s wrong. Why don’t you leave me alone?”

  Before the surprised girls could say a word, Barry whirled and raced out the door.

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  RL 5, 009-012

  SUMMER RIDER

  A Bantam Skylark Book/July 1997

  Skylark Books is a registered trademark of Bantam Books, a division of

  Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. Registered in U.S. Patent

  and Trademark Office and elsewhere.

  “The Saddle Club” is a registered trademark of Bonnie Bryant Hiller.

  The Saddle Club design/logo, which consists of a riding crop and a riding hat,

  is a trademark of Bantam Books.

  “USPC” and “Pony Club” are registered trademarks of

  The United States Pony Clubs, Inc., at The Kentucky Horse Park,

  4071 Iron Works Pike, Lexington, KY 40511-8462.

  All rights reserved.

  Copyright © 1997 by Bonnie Bryant Hiller.

  Cover art copyright © 1997 by Paul Casale.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or

  by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or

  by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing

  from the publisher.

  For information address: Bantam Books.

  eISBN: 978-0-307-82568-1

  Published simultaneously in the United States and Canada.

  Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. Its trademark, consisting of the words “Bantam Books” and the portrayal of a rooster, is Registered in U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries. Marca Registrada. Bantam Books, 1540 Broadway, New York, New York 10036.

  v3.1

  I would like to express my special thanks

  to Catherine Hapka for her help

  in the writing of this book.

  Contents

  Cover

  Other Skylark Books

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  About the Author

  “PSST—LISA. HEY, Lisa!” Stevie Lake said in a loud stage whisper.

  Lisa Atwood tore her attention away from the Moose Hill Riding Camp instructor in the center of the ring and gave her friend a questioning glance.

  Stevie checked to make sure the instructor hadn’t heard her. “Did you see the T-shirt Todd’s wearing today?” she whispered to Lisa. “He looks pretty cute in it, don’t you think?”

  Lisa sighed and rolled her eyes. She should have known. “You’d better not let Phil catch you talking that way,” she said with a weak smile.

  “Very funny,” Stevie replied. Phil Marsten was Stevie’s boyfriend. The couple had met during Stevie’s first stay at Moose Hill, and she had been hoping to relive a lot of romantic moments at camp this year. But for the first week, Phil had spent most of his free time hanging out with his cabin mate, Todd. Eventually she had felt so neglected that she had stopped talking to Phil for a few days, but the couple had made up. Now that she was friends with Phil again, she was friends with Todd, too. And for the past several days she had been dropping not-so-subtle hints to Lisa about how terrific he was.

  The instructor, oblivious to Stevie’s whispers, was still talking. “You’re training your horse every time you ride him,” he said. “Even if you’re just going for a leisurely trail ride, the horse is learning from you all the time. His training never ends.”

  What he was saying was interesting, but Stevie had heard most of it before from her own riding instructor, Max Regnery, at Pine Hollow Stables. She leaned toward Lisa again. “Todd was really funny at breakfast this morning, wasn’t he?” she said. “His imitation of Barry was a riot.”

  “Uh-huh,” Lisa said, doing her best to listen to Stevie and the instructor at the same time. She had thought Todd’s imitation of the camp director was pretty funny. That didn’t mean she wanted to date him, though. She had too many other things on her mind—like paying attention in class so she could do well in the big horse show at the end of camp. It was less than two weeks away, and she knew she had a lot to learn before then.

  Stevie opened her mouth to make another comment about Todd, but at that moment the instructor turned and looked at her. She shut her mouth and smiled innocently, while Lisa heaved a sigh of relief. Maybe now she would be able to pay attention.

  Meanwhile, Carole Hanson, who was in the same riding class, hadn’t heard a word of the exchange between her two best friends. For the past few days she had hardly noticed a thing besides her horse, Starlight. The big bay gelding had arrived at Moose Hill on Saturday, two days earlier. Carole had spent the first two weeks of camp riding a different horse, a skittish Appaloosa named Ditto. She and Ditto hadn’t gotten along at all, but that just made her appreciate Starlight all the more now that he was here. She couldn’t wait to ride him in the big show.

  “It’s important for you and your horse to remember that you, the rider, are in charge,” the instructor told the class. “But I happen to believe it’s equally important to think of everything you do as a partnership, a joint effort with each of you doing your part. In that way, you could say that riding is all about teamwork.”

  Carole smiled and gave Starlight a pat on the neck. The two of them definitely made a good team.

  She was still thinking about that a few minutes later when class ended. As she walked Starlight around the ring to cool him down, Stevie and Lisa joined her with their own horses.

  “Pretty interesting class, huh?” Carole commented.

  Stevie shrugged. “I guess. But it was the same kind of stuff Max tells us all the time.”

  “True,” Carole said. “But I think it bears repeating. Teamwork between rider and horse is important.”

  Suddenly Stevie’s eyes lit up. She nodded vigorously, giving Lisa a sly glance. “You’re right, Carole. It is important. So are other kinds of teamwork—between a boy and a girl, for instance.”

  Carole chuckled. She knew th
at Stevie was trying to fix up Lisa and Todd. It was obvious that Lisa wasn’t interested, but that didn’t stop Stevie from trying. “I don’t know about that, Stevie,” Carole said. “But I know what the most important kind of teamwork is—Saddle Club teamwork.”

  Stevie and Lisa wholeheartedly agreed with that. The three girls had formed The Saddle Club soon after Lisa had started riding at Pine Hollow. The club only had two rules: Members had to be horse-crazy, and they had to be willing to help each other with any problem, great or small.

  Carole glanced at Starlight. The class hadn’t been very strenuous, and he was already cooled down. “Good,” she said. “Since you both agree with that, I have an important Saddle Club project for you.”

  “What?” Lisa asked.

  Carole grinned. “To figure out how quickly we can get these horses put away so we can go to lunch. I’m starved!”

  TWENTY MINUTES LATER the three friends left the stable and headed toward the mess hall. They cut across the large, grassy meadow that formed the center of camp. Halfway across, Stevie stumbled over a rock and almost fell.

  Carole glanced back at her. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” Stevie said, looking around for the rock. Soon she spotted it and picked it up. “But I’d better take this and toss it in the woods so one of the horses doesn’t trip on it.” As she was about to turn to follow her friends, a flash of sunlight on chrome caught her eye. She shaded her eyes and gazed at a vehicle that was pulling up in front of the rec hall, which stood across the meadow from the mess hall.

  “Hey, look at that,” she said.

  Her friends stopped and turned around. “What?” Lisa asked, squinting to see what Stevie was looking at.

  Stevie pointed. “That car,” she said. “Doesn’t it look like the same one we’ve been seeing since the beginning of camp?”

  “You mean the gangster car?” Carole asked with a smile. When The Saddle Club had first arrived at Moose Hill, they had seen a long, black sedan parked alongside the camp road. At the time, they had joked that the car looked as though it belonged in an old gangster film.

  Lisa had spotted the car by now. She shrugged. “It does look like the same one,” she said. “I wonder what it’s doing back here?” The girls had seen the car again—or a very similar one—just a few days earlier. They had assumed that it belonged to the family of a camper.

  Stevie was still watching as the car doors opened and several men in dark business suits climbed out. She narrowed her eyes suspiciously as the men headed into the rec hall. “I don’t know,” she said. “But I think it’s safe to say they’re not here to try out the new arts and crafts room.”

  “They’re probably meeting with Barry about something,” Carole said with a shrug. The camp director’s office was in the rec hall.

  “What business could Barry possibly have with people who look like that?” Stevie asked. “This is Moose Hill, not Wall Street. There’s something very suspicious about all this.”

  Carole and Lisa exchanged glances. Stevie had a curious look in her eye. And when Stevie was curious, she didn’t rest until her curiosity was satisfied—no matter how much trouble it got her into.

  “I’m sure it’s nothing suspicious, Stevie,” Carole said quickly.

  Lisa nodded. “What do we know about running a camp?” she said. “For all we know, Barry might have meetings with businessmen all the time. In fact, he probably does, since we’ve seen that car around so much.”

  “Maybe it’s not even the same car,” Carole suggested. “It could just be a bunch of similar-looking ones. Maybe business types like their cars to match each other, just like their suits.” She giggled at the thought.

  But Stevie wasn’t laughing. She was still gazing thoughtfully at the rec hall. “Barry has been acting awfully peculiar this year,” she mused. “When you talk to him these days, he doesn’t pay attention half the time. And he wasn’t very sympathetic when Lisa ended up in the wrong cabin, remember?”

  Lisa remembered. She had accidentally been assigned to a different cabin than her friends, and Barry hadn’t tried very hard to fix the mistake. She hadn’t been able to move until a few days ago. That had meant The Saddle Club had been separated for two weeks.

  “So Barry’s a little distracted these days,” Carole said, turning and heading toward the mess hall again. “Big deal. Maybe he’s not feeling well. Maybe he’s in love. Or maybe he’s just overwhelmed, since there are more campers this year than ever before.”

  “Or maybe something mysterious is going on and he’s keeping it a secret,” Stevie countered, her eyes bright with excitement as she walked beside her friends. “Maybe someone is blackmailing him. Or he could be mixed up in some kind of illegal horse-trading scheme.”

  Lisa rolled her eyes. She thought Stevie was being a bit silly, and she was quickly losing interest in the whole conversation. As far as she was concerned, camp was action-packed enough without inventing wild mysteries revolving around a car and a bunch of businessmen. “Come on, Stevie,” she said. “If that car was here for something like that, do you really think it would pull right up to the rec hall in broad daylight?”

  “Logical as always, Lisa,” Carole said with a smile. “And right as always, too. I’m sure those businessmen are here for some totally ordinary, boring financial meeting or something.”

  Stevie shrugged. “Don’t be too sure,” she said. “Maybe it’s not horse rustling, but something strange is going on around here. I’ve sensed it since we got here.”

  “Really?” Carole said skeptically. “This is the first time you’ve mentioned it.”

  “No it’s not,” Stevie replied as the girls reached the mess hall and paused just outside. “We saw someone mysterious in the woods that time, remember?” Carole and Stevie had heard someone or something moving away through the woods behind the cabins one evening. Stevie had thought it looked like a man in a suit, though she hadn’t gotten a good enough look to be certain.

  “Right,” Carole said. “A very mysterious bear.”

  Stevie opened the door and held it for her friends. “You may not believe me now,” she said, “but I’ll find out what’s going on around here. Just wait and see.”

  STEVIE WAS STILL talking about her mystery half an hour later. The Saddle Club was sitting at a table in the mess hall with Phil and Todd.

  “Is she always like this?” Todd asked after Stevie had described the mysterious car for the fourth time.

  “You mean completely insane?” Phil joked, helping himself to a handful of carrot sticks from the platter in the middle of the table.

  Todd nodded. “Exactly.”

  A week earlier, Stevie would have been annoyed at Todd’s comment, but now she just grinned at him. “Sure I am,” she said. “It’s one of Phil’s favorite things about me. In fact, it’s one of everybody’s favorite things about me. Right, Lisa?” She turned and gave Lisa a big smile. Lisa hadn’t been taking part in the conversation, and Stevie wanted to make sure she and Todd got every chance they could to talk to each other.

  Lisa looked up from her plate. “What?” It was obvious she hadn’t heard a word Stevie had said.

  Stevie rolled her eyes. “Never mind.” Suddenly she had another idea. “Hey, I was just thinking—you haven’t tried out the new tennis courts yet, have you, Lisa? How about a game this afternoon after classes? It could be boys against girls.” She elbowed Phil in the ribs.

  “No way,” Todd said quickly. “Even fantastic players like me and Phil couldn’t beat all three of you at once.”

  “Oh.” Stevie glanced at Carole. “Um, I don’t think Carole wants to play. Right, Carole?”

  Before Carole could answer, Lisa spoke up. “You and Carole go ahead, Stevie,” she said. “I have some other things to do this afternoon.”

  Carole frowned. “You mean your reading list?” One of Lisa’s teachers had given her a summer reading list, and Lisa had brought every single one of the books on the list to camp. She was de
termined to finish them all before she went home. During the first two weeks Lisa had spent so much time reading that her friends felt as though they had barely seen her. Now that they were all in the same cabin, Carole and Stevie had hoped that Lisa would spend less time on schoolwork and more time having fun with them.

  “Actually, no,” Lisa said. “I do have to get some reading done tonight—I’m only halfway through Jane Eyre—but this afternoon I was hoping to put in an extra hour or so with Major.” That was the name of the horse Lisa was riding while she was at Moose Hill.

  “Ugh,” Todd put in. “I like riding as much as the next guy, but after a whole day of classes, it’s nice to do something else for a while.” He turned to Phil. “Since nobody seems to be into this tennis plan, how about you and I do some boarding before dinner?”

  Stevie grimaced. As far as she was concerned, Todd’s one major drawback was his obsession with skateboarding. He had brought three skateboards to Moose Hill, despite the few paved surfaces on the camp’s rural grounds.

  Todd noticed her expression. “Hey, Stevie, don’t look so bummed out,” he said. “You can borrow my spare board if you want to come with us.”

  “Thanks, but no thanks.” Stevie sighed. “I’ve developed this strange fondness for my kneecaps,” she said. Getting Todd and Lisa together wasn’t turning out to be as easy as she had expected.

  Lisa had tuned out the conversation again. She was busy planning her evening. There was a lot to accomplish, and she wanted to make sure she had time to get it all done. If she worked with Major for forty minutes after her last class and took another twenty cooling him down and putting him away, that still left half an hour before dinner for reading. Suddenly she had an idea: If she brought her book to the stable with her, maybe she could read while she was cooling Major down. He was a calm horse, and she was sure he wouldn’t give her any trouble if she read while they walked.

  She smiled, pleased with the idea. Then the smile faded as she started to calculate how much longer it would take her to finish all the books on her reading list. The more she thought about it, the farther behind she realized she was. Camp was already more than halfway over, but Lisa was less than halfway through the twenty books on her list.