More Than a Horse Page 3

  "This horse came right to me and let me ride him."

  "That's Sassy. Short for Sassafras. He's friendly enough, but always leaping fences and going off somewhere so Amos or somebody has to chase after him."

  "Really? Well, then why isn't he pleased I brought him back?"

  "Tell you what," Hanna said. "You want to make friends with Amos, you can bring the dessert out to the shed where the cowboys eat. Serve him an extra big piece of apple pie and he'll melt like butter."

  "First eat your own dinner," Rose said.

  "No rush," Hanna advised. "Those fellows won't be eating for another hour or so. They have to take care of the horses after the last trail ride. Usually we feed the guests first and the cowboys get theirs last."

  Dinner was delicious. Tomato stew, scalloped potatoes, and roast chicken with a spinach salad. The meat Rose had been cutting up was meant for the next night's meal. She set it to marinate in a gigantic roasting pan. After eating, Leeann helped with the clean up. Hanna was telling Rose that the Holdens were getting too old to do much besides sit behind the desk, greet guests, and see they paid their bills when they left.

  "Don Holden and Amos are both pushing seventy. Maybe Holden's a few years older," Hanna said.

  "Are the Holdens going to continue running this ranch?" Rose asked apprehensively.

  "Well," Hanna said cheerfully, "she wants him to sell out and retire, but he keeps holding out for another year. I think he'd like to die in the saddle, so to speak. His daddy ran this place before him, and he loves it here. No sense worrying about our jobs till we have to, Rose. Things always work out somehow," Hanna said.

  The shed where the cowboys ate had screened windows and a low-pitched roof. Nothing was in it but a long picnic table with benches. Leeann cut Amos an extra large hunk of pie. Robuck, the skinny young cowboy, frowned at that but he didn't say anything. Hank, the middle-aged man with droopy eyelids and a thick mustache, didn't seem to notice her at all.

  "I found that horse you saw me riding in the old riverbed," Leeann said to Amos. "He seemed friendly and I figured he was lost. That's why I rode him back."

  "Dangerous to pick up with an animal you don't know. You could get kicked or bit or knocked senseless falling off," Amos answered.

  "But he was lost, wasn't he?"

  "Always is. Can't keep that Sassy inside anything. That's why we still got him. Comes back like a bad penny every time he gets sold."

  "He has to be sold? Couldn't he be used for riding? He likes people."

  "He likes his own way. Can't trust him to stay in line on a trail."

  "Was Sassy born here?" Leeann asked. She was thinking she was getting her research done even if Amos hadn't warmed up to her yet.

  "Son of Darth Vader and a mare we had to shoot. Broke her leg before she'd weaned her colt. We had to mother Sassafras too much. That's why he turned out wrong. He don't know he's a horse."

  "But if he can jump? Isn't that good for something?"

  "Yeah, for making trouble."

  "He butted Amos into the water barrel the other day," the skinny kid said. He snickered.

  Amos glared at him. "Just keep away from that horse," he said to Leeann.

  She asked him if he wanted another slice of pie. "Don't mind if I do," he said mildly. There was one piece left. It wasn't fair not to divide it, but she needed Amos to melt like butter—especially since she had no intention of keeping away from Sassy.

  CHAPTER 4

  On Tuesday, Ms. Morabita started off English class with more familiar activities than projects. First came oral book reports and then a lesson on clauses, followed up with worksheets to do for homework. Leeann was reassured. This was the kind of work that came easily to her. It was only in the second hour of their time with her that Ms. Morabita set the class loose on their projects.

  Instantly, chairs scraped the floor and the noise level shot up. Leeann was glad she already had a group to join, especially when Joy greeted her by name and patted the desk next to hers in welcome.

  "Guess what?" Joy said as Leeann folded her long legs under the desk top. "I went horse shopping last night with my dad and Alan." Leeann's surprise must have been obvious, because Joy explained, "Alan knows a lot about horses. You know, from his sisters. They each have one."

  "I'm their stable boy," Alan said. His smile showed even white teeth above the cleft in his chin, and his pearl-buttoned western shirt looked freshly ironed.

  "You like horses that much?" Leeann asked him.

  "Me? No, I'm no horse junkie," Alan said. "My sisters pay me to take care of their animals while they're away at college, and I can ride any time I feel like."

  "Lucky you, Alan," Zach said. He was sitting on his desk, hanging over the others like a buzzard or a skinny question mark. "I get up at five and do chores until the school bus comes, and Dad still gives me the same allowance I got in kindergarten."

  "Stop your whining," Alan said. "You've saved every nickel of that allowance. You must be rich by now."

  "Well, I could get rich, maybe, if I win the calf-roping contest at the rodeo next spring," Zach said.

  "If you don't break an arm again like you did last year," Kristen put in. Her braces flashed when she smiled, but so did a pair of dimples.

  "Last year I was puny. This year I've been working out." Zach pumped up a skinny arm to show a tennis ball-sized muscle. Joy snickered. Zach smiled as if she'd complimented him.

  "Zach's crazy," Alan explained to Leeann. "We only put up with him because we know he can't help it."

  Zach socked Alan in the arm and said, "Anyhow, I already got my report done. I wrote about our Percherons and how they pulled the dump truck out of the wash."

  "I remember that," Kristen said. "It was in the newspaper last winter."

  "Yeah, that's where I got my material," Zach admitted. "That reporter got more out of my dad than he tells me in a year. Everything about our horses was in that article."

  "Cheater," Alan said. "You're supposed to do research. At least three sources, Morabita said."

  "I'll look at the encyclopedia if I have the time," Zach said.

  "Most of my stuff'll come out of my journal," Kristen said. "I've written about two hundred pages on my horse, Moley. I've been writing about him ever since I got him, but he was already nineteen then, and I wish I knew what happened to him before."

  "You're going to hand in a two hundred page journal?" Joy asked.

  "No, I'll just copy out the best stuff."

  "What are you going to do, Leeann?" Joy asked.

  Leeann sighed. "I guess I can write about a horse named Sassafras on the ranch where my mother and I are living. He's a kind of escape artist."

  "You're living on a ranch? Which one?" Zach asked.

  Leeann told him, and he said, "Oh, yeah. They hire us to do moonlight wagon rides with the Percherons. How come you're there?"

  "My mother's friend is the cook. She broke her wrist, so Rose's helping her."

  "Your mother's a cook?" Joy asked at the same time as Zach asked, "You call your mother by her first name?"

  Leeann answered Zach first. "I always have. She thought it was funny when I started because I was little, and it kind of became a habit." She turned to Joy and said, "Rose isn't a regular cook. She's an interior decorator, sort of. I mean, that's what she studied in college, but..."

  Leeann shrugged, reluctant to admit that her mother hadn't been able to make a living at interior decorating. "My mother can do lots of stuff. She even had her own upholstery business and she did wallpapering," she finished.

  "I could do that," Kristen said. "I helped my mother wallpaper my grandmother's house."

  "Kristen's mother runs the campaign against drunk drivers," Zach supplied.

  "Mostly she does church work," Kristen said. "Lots of church work." Kristen's small earnest face was unreadable, but her emphasis on "lots" sounded negative.

  "Your church used to send us casseroles and cakes when my mom first took sick, but they ga
ve up on us. Figures," Zach said. "My dad never did think much of churches. I bet I haven't been in one since I was six."

  "Your mom's been sick as long as I've known you," Joy said.

  "Yeah," Zach said.

  Leeann wondered what was wrong with Zach's mother, but she was shy about asking. Her father had been ill a long time, too. He had begun dying when she was three. Instead of dance class and music lessons, her childhood had been spent in hospital visits and the waiting rooms of doctors' offices. Her father had died when she was eight.

  Ms. Morabita appeared. "How are you guys doing?" she asked.

  Zach whipped out a spiral notebook scrawled full of notes. "I'm gonna do our Percherons," he said.

  "Nice start, Zach," she said. "And how about the rest of you?"

  "My horse doesn't even come until my birthday Saturday, Ms. Morabita," Joy said.

  "You could research different kinds of horses meanwhile," Ms. Morabita suggested. Before she could quiz the rest of them, her attention was diverted to a group who were shooting paper airplanes at each other, and off she went.

  "Good job, Zach, you got us off the hook," Alan said.

  "Ah, Morabita's okay. It's just that this is her first job, so she's jumpy."

  "You know what would be fun," Joy said eagerly. "How about if you all ride your horses over to my house on Saturday so we can fool around in the ring with them?"

  "Your father built you a ring already?" Zach asked.

  "Don't you know Joy's daddy will do anything for his little princess," Alan said. "He's going to buy her a pricey palomino, too."

  "No, he said it was way too expensive," Joy said wistfully.

  "You wanna bet it'll be there when you wake up on your birthday?"

  Joy cupped her freckled face in her hands. "Oh, I wish," she said with a blissful smile.

  Before school ended, Joy drew Leeann a map of how to get to her house. "Try and be there at one," she said when she handed Leeann the instructions.

  "But I don't know if I can borrow Sassy. He's not mine, Joy."

  "Don't be silly," Joy said. "Your mother works there, doesn't she?" At Leeann's nod, Joy continued blithely, "They'll let you borrow a horse. You know, if you go around the butte, the way I showed you on the map, it's only a couple of miles between your place and mine. We'll be able to ride together whenever we want."

  Leeann nodded again. There was no point arguing with Joy. When she didn't show up, she could explain on Monday that Amos wouldn't let her take Sassy. Not that she didn't want to go. She did. She liked Joy. In fact, she liked the whole horse project group. Zach was comfortable to talk to. Kristen seemed overly serious but nice.

  As for Alan, he was the kind of cool, good-looking boy who usually made Leeann nervous, but since he was Joy's boyfriend, he didn't bother her. If only she had the use of a horse, she'd be part of a group.

  Leeann was daydreaming about the horse Big John would send her as an apology for deserting her and her mother when the school bus lurched to a stop and the driver started yelling out the window. "Get out of the way, you four-footed fool. Can't you see this bus is bigger than you?"

  Past the driver's shoulder, Leeann could see Sassy standing broadside to the bus in the road ahead of them. She guessed it was Sassy because of the inquisitive expression on the animal's face as he chewed a clump of long grass and regarded the bus. The grass extended from either side of his mouth like green whiskers. The bus driver tooted her horn. Sassy's lip wrinkled back to show his teeth in a goofy-looking smile as he worked on the scraggly grass. But he didn't budge from the middle of the road.

  "I'll get him out of the way," Leeann offered when the bus driver began spluttering angrily at the animal.

  "Go to it," the driver said.

  She released the door and Leeann swung off the steps, calling, "Here Sassy, here boy. You don't want to get hit, do you?"

  Sassy peered over his shoulder at Leeann, then stepped toward her, bobbing his head in a friendly way. Leeann rubbed his mushroom-soft: nose while the driver angled the bus around his hindquarters, which still protruded into the road.

  "Do you do this often?" Leeann asked him. "Block traffic, I mean? I know it must be fun to stop such a big machine, but you could get hurt. I mean really, you could."

  Sassy snuffled, brushing Leeann's cheek with the remaining grass ends. It wasn't far to the ranch. "Go on," Leeann told the driver. "I'll walk Sassy home."

  "Better that than me having to give that horse a ride," the driver joked and took off.

  It was the second time Leeann was returning Sassy to the corral for Amos and she hadn't been there a full week. He had to appreciate her usefulness. But when Amos saw her coming toward him with her arm slung over Sassy's neck, he glowered and asked, "What you doing with that horse now?"

  "I'm not doing anything. My school bus almost hit him. He was in the road."

  Amos kicked the gate open. "We don't sell him soon, he's gonna break a leg and make himself worthless." Amos slapped Sassy's flank and slammed the gate shut after the horse trotted into the corral. Not that it mattered. Sassy had already proven he could jump out when he felt like it.

  "I was wondering," Leeann began. "Would it be all right if I—"

  Amos was halfway to the door marked "office" in the ranch house. "I'm too busy to talk to you now, girl," he said.

  So much for gratitude, Leeann thought. If she wanted a horse to ride to Joy's on Saturday, she'd have to steal one.

  Sassy had stayed put on the other side of the gate. "Want to get stolen and go for a ride with me?" Leeann asked him.

  The bright eyes watching her were so full of mischief that the answer was obvious.

  "The thing is, I'd have to steal a saddle and bridle as well, and that would be sort of hard and more like really stealing. Well, let me think about it. Okay?" Leeann said to Sassy.

  She laughed when the long brown head shook up and down. Even if Sassy was just ridding himself of a fly, the timing was incredible.

  CHAPTER 5

  The kitchen of the big ranch house was long and furnished with rough wooden shelves and scarred wooden counters. A chorus line of pots and pans hung from the ceiling. The tangy scent of chicken grilled over mesquite sweetened the air, which was steamy from the dinner Rose and Hanna had cooked for the guests. Leeann felt good to be part of the action as she loaded the commercial-sized dishwasher. A commotion outside made her glance out the open kitchen door.

  The moon lit the shadowy corral area. Beside it, like an apparition from pioneer days, was a wagon drawn by two enormous pale horses with white manes, but the horses were too solid to be ghosts. Intrigued, Leeann set the last dirty dish in place and slipped out to investigate.

  She was hailed by a vaguely familiar voice. "Leeann, I got something for you."

  "Zach?" He stepped off the ramada at the front of the ranch house into the shaft of moonight, and she realized the big horses were his father's Percherons. "What are you doing here?" she asked him.

  "Pop's got business with Mr. Holden." Zach nodded toward the horses. "We came by wagon to give Peter and Paul practice hauling people instead of machines." Zach went over to the wagon and reached under some bags. "Here," he said, holding out to her with both hands a lightweight saddle with a bridle wrapped around it. "You said you might could get hold of a horse but not a saddle. This is my mom's, so it's just a loaner. Okay?"

  Now Leeann remembered confiding to him on the ball field at school while they were waiting their turn at bat why she probably wouldn't be able to get to Joy's on Saturday. She'd guessed that Zach would understand, because it seemed that he, like her, had fewer things that cost money than the others in their group.

  "Zach, that's so nice of you," Leeann said now. "But I don't think I should. I mean, your mother's saddle..."

  "She'll never use it again," he said curtly. "I would've asked her and she would've said sure, but I didn't want her mentioning it to Pop. He's funny about stuff that belongs to her."

  "What's wro
ng with your mother?"

  "Multiple sclerosis. She's been in a wheelchair four years now."

  "I'm sorry."

  He shrugged. "She says it's not so bad. She likes looking at birds, so I keep the feeder filled for her."

  "But who takes care of her?"

  "Pop and me mostly. We feed her. The county sends a lady to bathe her and do stuff like that."

  "That's got to be hard on you." Leeann remembered her mother's exhaustion in the last year of her father's life, when he had been bedridden.

  "Nah. I'm used to it. And Mom's not a complainer. She says she's blessed to be able to watch me growing up. And up and up and up." He grinned. "My mom's a real sweetheart."

  "But if your father finds out about the saddle..." Leeann pushed it back toward him. She didn't want Zach getting in trouble because of her.

  "Not to worry. If he found out, Pop'd grumble at me, that's all. Basically we get along fine."

  Men's voices resounded from the darkness of the ramada.

  "So it's a deal, then?" The stranger's voice was deep as a well.

  Mr. Holden's sounded high by comparison as he answered, "So long as you take care of the campfire, it's a deal, Sam. Moonlight rides on the desert are a real drawing card. The ladies think it's romantic to lie down in a bunch of straw and be bumped around in the night." Mr. Holden chuckled.

  Zach's father stepped into the light. He was built like his horses. Tall, skinny Zach looked fragile by comparison. Zach stood so that the saddle was hidden behind him. He nudged an elbow at Leeann, and she took the saddle and ducked behind the building before his father could see what she was carrying. She felt guilty about borrowing the saddle and wondered how much risk Zach really was taking for her. Well, she'd be sure to return his mother's tack promptly after Saturday.

  Now the big question was if she could catch Sassy when she needed him. Tonight he had stayed quietly in the corral with the other horses. Unpredictable was the word for Sassy.