Eventer's Dream by Akrill Caroline

Author:Akrill, Caroline [Akrill, Caroline]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Published: 2014-10-29T16:00:00+00:00

Two days later, we were out exercising when we passed some horses in a dealer’s field. There was nothing unusual in this as we passed the field practically every time we rode out. It was usually peopled with a few nondescript animals and a flock of geese who sometimes opened their wings and hissed at us, making the horses shy. Today the geese were on the far side of the field amongst some rank clumps of grass, and they didn’t bother us, but amongst the plain and pottery dealer’s stock, there was a magnificent bay horse.

“Heavens,” Nigella exclaimed. “Just look at that in Harry Sabin’s field!” And we stopped to have a look.

The horse was a threequarter-bred gelding of about sixteen-two and he was absolutely beautiful. He was a rich, dark, whole colour with black points, and when he trotted across the field to investigate our horses, he moved like a dream.

“He certainly is some horse,” Henrietta said admiringly. “You don’t see too many with his sort of quality.”

“You don’t see too many with his sort of quality in Harry Sabin’s field,” Nigella said. “I wonder how he came by it?” She leaned forward over the old bay mare’s bony shoulder and tickled the bay gelding under his chin. “He’s very friendly.”

The bay gelding stretched out its neck enquiringly towards the old bay mare. He wasn’t clipped, and his thick coat had a soft, satiny gloss. The old bay mare squealed and tossed her mane like a four-year-old.

“There has to be something wrong with it,” Henrietta decided. “There has to be a snag somewhere; otherwise Harry Sabin wouldn’t have it. He doesn’t deal in high class animals like this.” She stood up in her stirrups and peered over the hedge at the horse’s lower limbs, as if she expected to discover some appalling deformity.

I stood in the lane with Nelson and the bad-tempered chestnut and I thought that the bay horse looked familiar. I had seen him somewhere before.

“It might not be something you can see,” Nigella pointed out. “It could be gone in the wind or have an irregular heartbeat. It could be a crib-biter.”

“It’s the tall, thin man’s horse,” I told them. “The one Henrietta was going to offer him fifty pounds for.”

We all stared at the bay horse.

“So it is,” Nigella said, astonished.

“Let’s go and ask Harry Sabin how much he wants for it,” Henrietta said. “It might be cheap.”

We rode down a track which led into a dirt yard. There were a few ramshackle buildings and a scruffy cottage with its thatch patched with corrugated iron. There were some chickens scratching in the dirt and a blue-eyed, cream pony was wandering loose, like a dog. A wiry, weathered little man in a brown warehouse coat was tinkering about under the bonnet of a cattle wagon.

“Harry!” Nigella called. “How much is the bay gelding?”

Harry Sabin looked up from his tinkering in a leisurely sort of manner. “Now, Miss Fane, which bay gelding would you be talking about?” he enquired.

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