The Connemara Stallion by Ann Henning

Author:Ann Henning [Ann Henning]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: F
Publisher: SAGA Egmont
Published: 2022-03-08T00:00:00+00:00

6

T wo girls were racing each other on bicycles up the long slope at Gorteen. They were Doreen and her friend Sheila—a girl of slight build and delicate features, though hardy enough, as the saying goes in Connemara to describe a tough healthy child. You’d want to be hardy to grow up in such a wild place, where the simplest thing, like going to school in the morning, will sometimes turn out to be a fierce battle against the elements.

Every day Sheila travelled on her bicycle the five miles from her home in Murvey to the school in Roundstone and back. This morning it had rained heavily and she had arrived at school dripping wet. Not that she minded. Sheila loved cycling, it was her main, if not her only interest. Her dream was to become Ireland’s first girl cycling champion, and in her new green-and-purple trainer suit and her short curly hair, she felt she was beginning to look the part.

Doreen, too, had got very wet that morning, coming from Inishnee on the bike she had borrowed from her brother Tom. She didn’t share her friend’s enthusiasm; to her the bicycle was merely a means of transport that enabled her to go and see Cuaifeach every day after school. The exercise was getting her very fit, though not as fit as Sheila, who, as usual, was the first to reach the top of the hill. There she slowed down, waiting for Doreen to catch up, and then the girls rode easily together while getting their breath back. It was quite safe for them to cycle side by side on the narrow road: in the stillness that surrounded them, any approaching car could be heard a long way off, long enough for them to get back into single file. The rain had finally stopped and though the haze was still thick over the mountains, the sun shone dimly over the rocky headland beyond Dog’s Bay. The sea was a pale blue-green, diluted, as it were, by so much water, and the white sand on the beaches glinted with a newly washed look. The air, still humid, carried a sweet scent of fresh sea grass and wild honeysuckle.

“How much longer will your pony be stopping at Ballyconneely?” Sheila asked and saw her friend’s face light up as it always did whenever anyone mentioned Cuaifeach. Fancy being so crazy about a horse, Sheila thought.

“We’re bringing him back Saturday,” Doreen replied happily. She was delighted that the three weeks were coming to an end. Christy, explaining that “Molly was taking her time”, wanted to keep the stallion for another week, but this Doreen had refused. Having heard about his recent break-out, she couldn’t wait to have him safely back home again.

“Oh.” Sheila was disappointed. Though the girls did not have many interests in common, she liked Doreen’s company for cycling, and now that school was about to break up, she had hoped that the other girl would still have call to be coming her way.

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