Stevie Read online

  Speaking of which, you’ll never guess who I saw at the school library today with her nose buried in a whole huge stack of books.

  Veronica!

  Yes, you read right. Veronica diAngelo was making like a study buddy after school. Don’t ask me why. But I saw it with my own eyes when I stopped in to return a book. I assumed it must be just one more symptom of her weirdness disease. But then I noticed that she didn’t even seem to be reading. She had a book open in front of her, but she was just sort of staring into space. She didn’t even see me watching her.

  I was about to go over and say something to her—I mean, I was pretty curious about this. She hasn’t made a snotty remark or insulted me in well over a week now. But just then Betsy Cavanaugh came into the library and saw me looking at Veronica.

  “Poor thing,” she whispered, with this really sympathetic look on her face. “She’s just killing herself on that assignment.”

  “What assignment?” I asked quickly. Veronica is in a lot of my classes, and I started to panic that while I was concentrating on my extra-credit report, one of my teachers had slipped in some huge project when I wasn’t paying attention.

  Betsy looked uncertain. “Well, I guess it’s not really a secret,” she said, glancing around to make sure no one else could hear. “Miss Fenton is making Veronica write an extra-credit report. You know, because her grades have slipped these past few weeks.”

  I tell you, my jaw practically dropped on the floor at that one. I couldn’t believe it. So Veronica has the same assignment I do! Isn’t that bizarre? Who would have guessed that Little Miss Perfect could ever have problems with her grades just like the rest of us? I’d always assumed that she just paid all the teachers to give her As and Bs, or maybe paid her servants to do her homework for her. I wouldn’t put it past her.

  That’s not all. After Betsy wandered away, I got ready to leave. But just then I saw Veronica suddenly glance at her watch. Then she gasped, jumped up with a worried expression on her face, and rushed straight out of the library, brushing right past me without even noticing I was there. Naturally, she didn’t bother to put away any of the books she’d been using, either.

  I can’t even begin to imagine what’s up with her. It’s totally mysterious. Maybe after I finish my report I’ll have time to figure it out!

  But it will definitely have to wait until after I finish. Because right after I left the library, I ran into Miss Fenton. And from what she said, I know now—if I didn’t before—that this report had better be good. It went something like this:

  MISS FENTON: Hello, Stephanie.

  STEVIE: Hi, Miss Fenton. I was just on my way home to work on my report.

  MISS FENTON (looking down her nose like she always does): Good. Because I’m really looking forward to reading it. And I expect all your hard work to show.

  STEVIE: Oh, it will! And I am. Working. Hard, that is. Um, gotta go.

  MISS FENTON (calling after me): Monday morning, Stephanie! Bright and early! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

  Okay, I made up that wicked laugh at the end. But the rest is true. She was giving me this really intense look when she said it, like she suspected I was really goofing off all day instead of working on the report. Which is so totally not true this time. I’ve just got to make sure there’s no way she can possibly think that I didn’t put my best effort into this.

  So I’d better get to it, huh? I’m going to try to call Dorothy DeSoto now to ask her some questions about that dressage demonstration she did. I want to include a lot of information about it in the report. Do you happen to know the time difference between here and London? Never mind. I’ll just go ahead and call—if she’s sleeping, she won’t pick up the phone, right? And I can just leave a message.

  Wish me luck—I’ll need it!

  MEMO

  TO: All Horse Wise Members

  FROM: Max

  RE: Fox hunt

  As some of you may have heard by now (thank you, S.L.), the Cross County Pony Club has invited all members of Horse Wise to participate in their upcoming fox hunt. We will be holding a mock hunt of our own prior to the real hunt to give us all some practice in the field. Well discuss that further next week.

  You’ll find permission slips attached to this memo along with the schedule for the meetings etc. leading up to the hunt. Please have your parents sign the slips and drop them off at the office by Friday so I’ll know who will be participating.

  Foxhunting is a sport with many traditions and a long history. In order to participate in the upcoming hunt, you must learn to appreciate same. You will be expected to familiarize yourself with the following list of terms by our next meeting.

  Master of the hounds—The person who is in charge of everything about the hunt except tracking the fox.

  Huntsman—The person in charge of tracking the fox.

  Whippers-in—Riders assigned to assist the huntsman and help keep the hounds on the track.

  The field—Everybody on the hunt who isn’t the master of the hounds, the huntsman, one of the whippers-in, or a hound.

  Drag meet or drag hunt—A hunt in which the “fox” is actually a bag of scent that has been dragged across the countryside to lay an artificial trail for the hounds to follow.

  Capping fee—A sum of money paid by visitors to a hunt official. (Don’t worry, you can save your allowances. Our hunts will be free to Pony Club members.)

  Couple (of hounds)—The proper foxhunting term for a pair of foxhounds. The hounds are always referred to as such—“a couple of hounds” rather than “a pair of dogs.”

  Giving tongue—What the hounds do when they are on the trail of a fox.

  Full cry—Similar to above; indicates they’re following a trail.

  Riding to hounds—Another way of saying going on a hunt.

  Holloa—The call a whipper-in makes when he spots the fox breaking cover.

  Breaking cover—Running out into the open.

  Larking—Jumping unnecessarily during a hunt; a sure sign of an ignorant hunter.

  Thank you for your attention. If you have any questions about this list you may feel free to ask me or Mr. Baker, the director of Cross County.

  Tallyho!

  Welcome to My Life …

  The above memo is what’s known as foreshadowing. (See? Despite what Ms. Milligan may claim, I do pay attention in English class!) You see, Max handed the memo out to us at our Horse Wise meeting on the morning of Prancer’s race. Because in case you’ve forgotten in all the excitement of more recent events in this report, we were all still looking forward to that fox hunt that Phil’s Pony Club was sponsoring.

  Judy picked Carole up at the stable right after the meeting. Carole still had no idea that Lisa and I were coming to the track, too.

  “Bye, Carole,” I called after her innocently as she left. “Have a really fun day!”

  Lisa giggled. “Say hi to Prancer for us, okay?”

  “Bye!” Carole called back, hardly stopping long enough to wave as she followed Judy to her truck. Seconds later, they were gone.

  Lisa and I went back inside to finish taking care of our horses. We chatted a little bit about the memo Max had just given us and how exciting it was that we were going to be in a real fox hunt soon. But mostly we talked about our upcoming day at the races.

  I was feeling a little bit sleepy. I had been up very late the night before, finishing every last word of To Kill a Mockingbird. It had been such a fascinating book that I didn’t really mind, but I couldn’t help being kind of tired. I figured the excitement of the racetrack would help perk me up, though.

  “Come on,” I said. “Let’s hurry and finish up here. We don’t want to be late!”

  We finished our stable chores in record time and ran all the way back to my house. My parents were ready to go. Fortunately, my three brothers—who, as you know, Miss Fenton, are not among the most intelligent or discerning students at Fenton Hall—had declined to join us and were nowhere in sight. So the four of u
s climbed in the car and took off.

  Lisa and I talked about Prancer the whole way there. Even though we’d never laid eyes on her, we were totally sure she was going to win her race. After all, she had The Saddle Club cheering her on! I guess my parents weren’t that interested in hearing about her, though, because they kept trying to distract us with boring questions about stuff like the weather and our homework. (Not that homework itself is boring, of course. But you know what I mean.)

  We finally arrived at the track. My dad paid our way in, and then we all huddled just inside the gate.

  “Okay, girls,” Dad said. “We have reserved seats in the clubhouse, but we don’t have to stay there the whole time. Feel free to wander, but stay together. And check in with us at least every hour, okay?”

  “Sure, Dad,” I agreed. I grabbed Lisa by the arm as she started some long-winded thank-yous for the ride there, and dragged her off as my parents headed for the entrance to the clubhouse (which was really just a part of the grandstand, which is the building where the audience sits to watch the races).

  “This is so exciting, isn’t it?” Lisa said, staring wide-eyed at the bustling scene surrounding us.

  It really was amazing. In case you’ve never been to the racetrack yourself, Miss Fenton, I’ll do my best to describe it. First of all, you have to picture the track itself—a huge oval, a mile around, of smooth brown dirt. The finish line is a wire hung over the track in front of the grandstand. The starting gate (you’ve probably seen those on TV, at least) is attached to a tractor thing that pulls it to the right spot or whatever distance the race is supposed to be. There are people out there, including some people on horseback—outriders, they’re called. But on the whole, the scene out on the track itself is fairly peaceful—in between races, at least.

  It’s just the opposite inside the grandstand. There are people everywhere—sitting in the stands, buying food at the snack bar, standing in line to place bets at the betting windows, wandering around staring at their race programs. And everybody seems to have an opinion on who’s going to win. For instance, as we were walking over to buy ourselves a program, Lisa and I overheard two men talking about Mr. McLeod’s horses, including Prancer.

  We spent a few minutes exploring the rest of the track. Then we bought a large popcorn to share and headed upstairs to our seats. We didn’t want to miss the start of the first race.

  “I wonder what Carole is doing right now,” Lisa remarked as we got comfortable.

  I shrugged and peered down toward the track, not wanting to miss my first glimpse of the post parade, which is what it’s called when all the horses walk in front of the stands before heading to the starting gate. “Who knows?” I said. “Probably having tons of fun behind the scenes.”

  “Probably,” Lisa agreed, reaching for another handful of popcorn.

  Just then the horses appeared, so we were pretty quiet for a while. My parents returned with their betting tickets, which I expected to be interesting-looking but were really just boring little slips of white paper with some numbers on them.

  “Who did you bet on, Mr. Lake?” Lisa asked politely.

  My dad grinned and winked at us. “I overheard a tip,” he said. “The number four horse. It’s practically a sure thing.”

  My mother rolled her eyes and laughed. “That’s what you kept saying the last time we were here,” she told him. She leaned over to help herself to a few pieces of our popcorn. “It’s a good thing I made you stop betting after you lost twenty dollars, or we wouldn’t have been able to buy gas for the ride home.”

  My dad laughed good-naturedly at my mom’s teasing. I grinned at Lisa, glad that everyone seemed to be having such a good time. I know I was! That’s the kind of life experience you just can’t get from a textbook.

  Then I turned my attention back to the post parade. Each sleek racehorse pranced by with a jockey on its back. Each racehorse also had another horse walking beside it. I had seen the same thing on TV.

  Lisa noticed, too. “Why are those other horses there?” she wondered aloud. “Is it just to keep the racehorses calm?”

  I shrugged. “Probably. Remember, these are Thoroughbreds we’re talking about. I mean, Topside is so calm and even-tempered most of the time that it’s easy to forget that a lot of Thoroughbreds are pretty jumpy. It probably helps to have a calmer horse lead them.”

  My dad heard us and leaned over. “I can’t believe I’m actually about to tell you two something about horses,” he joked. “But I think those horses are known as lead ponies.”

  I grinned at him. “Hey, maybe you’re not totally useless after all, Dad!”

  (Don’t worry, Miss Fenton, I was only kidding. I actually have a great and profound respect for my father and all adults.)

  After the post parade, all the horses warmed up by cantering or galloping for a few minutes. Then they all headed around the track to the starting gate. Some track workers loaded them in one by one, and then, with a clang of a bell and a whoop from the crowd, they were off!

  It was an exciting race. Three different horses kept battling for the lead, but in the end a spunky little bay mare leaped forward just in time to win.

  “That was great!” I cried, a little breathless from the excitement of it all. Thinking back, I realized I had been shouting and cheering the whole time, even though I wasn’t exactly sure which horse I’d been cheering for. The only bad part was that I’d been so excited that I had ended up spilling most of the popcorn all over the floor.

  “It sure was!” my dad agreed. Glancing over, I saw that he was grinning broadly. “I just won some money!”

  I checked the tote board that showed the numbers of the winning horses. Sure enough, the little bay was number four!

  “Cool!” I said. “Does that mean the next round of popcorn is on you?”

  My dad grinned as he got up to go cash in his ticket. “I’ll even throw in some sodas.”

  And now, Miss Fenton, if you will indulge me—I found myself so inspired by the athletic poetry of those noble racehorses that I have composed a brief ode in their honor. I think it will help make clear what an unmissable and life-changing experience this was, regardless of what other experiences I might have been neglecting at the same time (like those word problems I never quite got around to doing). Here it is:

  A DAY AT THE RACES

  A completely original poem by S. Lake

  There once was a nice girl named Lake

  Who decided she wanted to take

  A trip to the track.

  She might never come back!

  ’Cause the horses there just took the cake!

  First came a cool post parade

  Of the track a big circle they made

  Each with an outrider

  Riding beside ’er

  Then they headed to the starting gate.

  With a ring of the bell they were off!

  At their speed no one ever could scoff

  The browns and the bays,

  The chestnuts and grays,

  Left me too breathless even to cough!

  I learned so so so much that day

  All the learning just blew me away

  Who will win, who will show?

  Does it matter, or no?

  That’s important, now wouldn’t you say?

  Anyway, I think that poem sums up some of what I was feeling about the grandeur and majesty of racing—which is known as the sport of kings, by the way.

  So the next couple of races came and went. There was almost half an hour in between each one, so Lisa and I had plenty of time to wander around and see the sights.

  “Hey, I wonder where Carole is? I can’t believe we haven’t even seen her,” I said once we got back to our seats.

  Lisa nodded. “I’m starting to think we may not see her at all,” she said. “Judy’s probably keeping her busy back in the—”

  Suddenly she let out a loud gasp. I turned to see what she was staring at. It was Carole! She was down by the ra
il near the gap leading back to the stable area. One of Mr. McLeod’s horses, Hold Fast, had just walked past, and Carole was waving at the jockey.

  My dad had looked up. He spotted her at the same time I did. “Look, there’s Carole.”

  “We’ve got to get her attention,” I declared. Without waiting for Lisa to answer, I took a deep breath and shouted as loudly as I could: “Caaarooole!”

  Lisa joined in, and Carole heard us almost immediately. After looking around for a second, she spotted us waving wildly at her from our seats. She grinned, looking surprised, and waved back.

  “Wait there!” I shrieked at the top of my lungs, hoping she could hear me. Then I turned to Lisa. “Come on. Let’s go say hi.”

  We raced downstairs and found our way to where Carole was.

  “There’s so much to tell you guys,” she said breathlessly. “You just wouldn’t believe everything that goes on here and everything I’m learning. This whole place, this whole thing—horse racing, I mean—is another world. It’s hard to believe it’s all done with the same animals we love so much at Pine Hollow.”

  “Purebred Thoroughbreds aren’t exactly what we’re riding at Pine Hollow,” Lisa put in. “Except for Topside, I mean.”

  “But they’re all horses, aren’t they?” I commented.

  “You’d hardly think so around here,” Carole said. “It’s more like they’re some kind of precious commodity.”

  “I don’t know about you, but that’s just the way I feel about them,” I said.

  “Me too,” Carole agreed. “Definitely. But it’s more than that. It’s money. It’s business. It’s something we never think about.”

  “I think about money all the time,” I said.

  “That’s because you always spend everything you’ve got,” Lisa said. (She was just kidding. I’m as responsible about money as I am about everything else.) “To you, two dollars is a precious commodity. I think what Carole’s saying is that these animals are worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, and they’re treated as if they’re royalty.”