Mystery Ride (5 page)

“It’s fresh,” Carole agreed.

“That’s not all,” Lisa said. “Take a look at that.” She pointed to the back end of the print. Most horseshoes leave prints that are open at the back, but this one wasn’t. “That’s some kind of weird shoe,” Lisa said.

“It’s a bar shoe,” Carole said, touching the shoe’s impression in the mud. “A horse’s hoof has to be flexible. It needs to spread when it hits the ground because it’s like a shock absorber in a car. Without the flexibility of the hoof a horse’s leg bones would break. But some horse’s hooves spread and then don’t snap back. These horses need a bar shoe to keep the sides of the hoof together.”

Carole never forgot a fact that had to do with horses.

“It’s a clue,” Stevie said. “Trust Max to come up with something brilliant. And trust Lisa to have seen it.”

Lisa glowed with pride. Carole and Stevie knew more about horses than she did. But here she had made an important discovery.

“Let’s go,” Stevie said. “The trail is hot.”

“You mean wet,” said Carole.

“Definitely wet,” Stevie agreed.

Carole and Lisa mounted their horses and headed around the puddle. This time none of the horses objected, because they could sense the riders’ excitement.

“Let’s gallop,” Stevie said. “Sorry, I mean canter,” she added, remembering that Max had forbidden them to gallop. “The thief can’t be far ahead.”

But Carole shook her head. “If we canter, we’ll lose the trail. What would have prevented the thief from riding off into the forest and disappearing?”

They looked at the woods. The thief could have gone in a hundred different directions. The girls rode on slowly.

“There’s one,” Carole said, pointing at a barred print on the edge of the trail.

“There’s another,” said Lisa, pointing to one on a sandy mound.

They rounded a grove of maples that were almost bare except for a few yellow leaves.

“I see two prints,” Stevie said.

The two bar prints were practically filled with water.

“We’ve got him,” Stevie said. “He can’t be more than a few minutes ahead.” She looked up with a grin of triumph. “I can’t wait to see the look on Veronica’s face when she finds out we’ve solved the mystery.”

Belle’s ears twitched. She sniffed. Suddenly she was acting oddly.

“What now?” Stevie grumbled. Belle was a great horse, but sometimes she could be willful, like when she nipped at Stevie’s pockets to see if she had any apples.

“Hey,” Carole said. Starlight was dancing sideways.

Then they heard it, the clang of the stable bell. It was faint enough to make them realize how far away from Pine Hollow they had ridden.

“We’re almost there,” Stevie moaned in frustration. “In five minutes we’ll have solved the crime.” She looked at the trail ahead with a devilish light in her eyes. “Who would know if we just kept going?” she said. “Wouldn’t it be worth it to catch a dastardly saddle thief?”

“Stevie!” Carole said. “Think about horse honor.” Max was always impressing on Horse Wise the fact that he couldn’t be around to supervise them all the time. For their horses’ sake and their own, they had to do what they knew was right. This was called horse honor.

“Would Sherlock Holmes have turned back?” Stevie said. “I don’t think so.”

“Stevie!” Carole said. “We
are
turning back. Do you want to get stuck out here in the dark?”

Stevie looked at the trail ahead. It was tempting. Everyone would be amazed if they solved the mystery on the first night. Veronica would gnash her teeth. On the other hand, the woods at night were dark and cold.

And maybe dangerous.

S
TEVIE DIDN
’
T COMPLETELY
cheer up until she smelled the pizza.

As Deborah opened the cardboard box Stevie realized that she was starving. The Saddle Club had been out in the woods a long time, and she was ready to eat.

“I don’t suppose it has anchovies,” Stevie said.

“This one does,” said Deborah with a smile. “And it has pepperoni, sausage, onions, mushrooms, olives, and extra cheese.”

“Hmmm,” Stevie said. “Sounds like an okay pizza.” At TD’s, the local ice cream parlor, Stevie liked to make wild combinations of ice creams and toppings. With pizza it was the same thing. The more ingredients, the better.

“A Stevie pizza,” said Jasmine. “I want some.”

“Me too,” said May, who was still pale but looked more cheerful.

“Me three,” said Corey.

“It’s a tribute to your riding, Stevie,” said Carole. “They think that if they eat pizza like you, they’ll ride like you.”

“Then they should eat pizza like you,” said Stevie to Carole.

“Too dull,” said Carole, looking at the slice of mushroom pizza she was munching on.

Actually, May, Jasmine, and Corey considered themselves the little sisters of The Saddle Club. Anything that Stevie, Lisa, and Carole did, they wanted to do, too.

“You could have normal pizza,” said Lisa to Corey, who was bravely chomping on the anchovy, pepperoni, sausage, onion, mushroom, olive, and extra-cheese pizza.

“This is great,” said Corey. “I love it.”

As soon as Deborah had distributed the pizza slices, the groups gathered in knots around the loft, talking about clues and trying to figure out what to do the next morning.

“Do you hear what I hear?” said Stevie with a grin.

Carole looked up and listened. “It’s the sound of whispering.”

“Look at Jessica and Jackie and Amie,” Lisa said. The three girls had their heads together, talking excitedly.

“They’re doing really well,” Carole said. “I was worried that they’d have trouble with the clues, but they seem to be digging right in.”

Stevie sat back and sighed. “We could have saved them a lot of trouble if only …”

“Stevie,” Carole said. “The teams don’t have to share clues.”

“I bet we’re the only ones who saw those bar prints,” Lisa said. “All we have to do is go back tomorrow and follow them.”

“We’ll go back nice and early,” Carole said.

“But not until after breakfast,” said Stevie. “I hear that Max and Deborah are going to cook up something special.”

“Like breakfast cereal,” said Carole with a grin. She knew that Stevie loved big breakfasts.

“Not cereal,” Stevie wailed.

“Well, it might be something better,” said Carole.

“Were anybody’s horses spooked?” Veronica’s voice rose over the whispering.

“A nut hit Macaroni on the head,” May said. “He practically jumped out of his skin. I mean coat.”

“The creaking of the trees was driving Penny crazy,” said Jessica. The onset of the cold fall weather was making the trees groan.

“Garnet didn’t have any trouble at all,” Veronica said with a smile. “It shows what breeding will do.”

“Thank you, Veronica,” Stevie muttered. “Just in time to give us all indigestion.”

“You mean your horse has breeding?” said A.J., his green eyes wide, his red hair seeming even redder than usual. “That old plug?”

There was a titter around the group because Veronica’s horse, Garnet, was a purebred Arabian, and Veronica never let anyone forget it.

“Garnet is the best horse at Pine Hollow,” Veronica said. “If you knew anything about horses, you would have seen that right away.”

A.J. was an excellent rider. Veronica’s comments did not bother him at all.

“Arabs are good for endurance,” A.J. said. “And they have good speed. But for true artistry you need a Thoroughbred. They’re much better jumpers.”

“I’ve owned a Thoroughbred, thank you,” said Veronica.

“And he was a great jumper, right?” said A.J.

At this Carole felt a lump in her throat. She could never forget Veronica’s previous horse, a Thoroughbred named Cobalt. Veronica had neglected Cobalt, just the way she did Garnet, so Carole had groomed Cobalt and exercised him and loved him. Cobalt, who was a stallion, was too
much of a horse for Veronica. One day Veronica had asked him to take a jump in an impossible way, and Cobalt had too much heart to refuse. His leg had been broken, and he had to be put down.

Unperturbed, Veronica said, “Personally I prefer Arabians. They’re so much more aristocratic.”

Just then there were footsteps on the stairs. The riders turned and saw Judy Barker, the Pine Hollow vet. She was wearing jeans, as usual, and a down vest. All the Pine Hollow riders liked Judy because she was never too busy to answer questions, and she loved horses as much as they did.

“Judy has something important to tell you,” Max said. “It bears on the theft of May’s saddle.”

With the mention of her saddle, May bit her lip. She looked as if she was going to start crying again.

“I want you to know that you’re not the only one,” Max said to May. “Judy called to alert us to a rash of saddle thefts, and I asked her to come over and talk about it.”

“There have been at least six saddle thefts I know of in the area,” said Judy, “and with May’s that makes seven, and there have probably been more.”

“You mean there’s someone who just steals saddles?” said May. “Like it’s his job?”

Judy nodded. “It sounds like a professional. Unfortunately,
tack theft is pretty common. Saddles last a long time, so there’s a big market for secondhand ones.”

Carole nodded. “I got mine secondhand.” Carole could never have afforded her saddle when it was new. It was beautifully made, with doeskin knee flaps and a square cantle.

“Because there’s such a large secondhand trade in saddles, and because they look so much alike, it’s hard for the police to trace stolen ones,” Judy said.

“I cleaned my saddle before I went to school this morning, and when I came home it was gone,” May said.

“That seems typical of this particular thief,” Judy said. “Saddles are taken in broad daylight, even when people are at home. The thief takes only one saddle, and it’s usually the newest and most expensive one.”

May nodded. Because her father trained horses, some of his saddles were worth more than May’s, but they had been locked in trunks. Hers was out in the open, along with several of lesser value.

“Sometimes a very expensive bridle is also taken,” Judy said, “but nothing else is ever disturbed.”

“I have a nameplate on my saddle,” Stevie said. “Does that make it less likely to be stolen?”

A couple of other kids nodded.

“That’s not enough, unfortunately,” Judy said. “Those
nameplates can easily be removed with a screwdriver. The best way to identify a saddle permanently is to engrave your Social Security number in the leather on the underside of one of the knee flaps.”

“What if you don’t know your Social Security number?” said Amie.

“Ask your mom or dad. They’ll tell you,” Judy said. “The other important thing is to keep your tack room locked when there’s no one in the barn.”

“We do that at Pine Hollow,” Max said. “I lock the tack room every night—and I’m certainly going to do it tonight.”

“I’ll tell my parents,” May said. “They always lock the tack room at night. I’ll get them to lock it during the day, too.”

There was a moment of silence while people thought how bad it was to have a saddle thief in the neighborhood.

“I’m sorry to be here on such unhappy business,” Judy said. “But I thought you needed to know.”

“Thanks,” said May, who had conquered her tears. “At least I know I’m not alone. Do you think the police can catch the thief?”

“May, the truth is that these woods are so full of trails it’s easy for a thief to get away undetected,” Judy said.
“The police are going to need some real luck to catch him.”

Jasmine and Corey put their arms around May. They went back to their team meeting.

“What do you think?” said Carole, stretching her long legs.

“It’s diabolical,” Stevie said happily. “This is the craftiest, sneakiest, most underhanded ploy I’ve ever experienced. Max should be totally proud of himself.”

“You think that Judy’s visit was part of the Mystery Weekend?” asked Carole incredulously.

“Of course!” Stevie said.

“You think that Max got May to lie about her saddle being stolen and about calling the police, and then he arranged for Judy to lie, too?” Lisa asked.

“Max has a lot of tricks up his sleeve,” Stevie said defensively. “And this is an MW.”

“Oh, come on,” Carole said.

“Well,” Stevie said, raising one eyebrow, “wouldn’t it be great if it were true? Suppose Max
has
faked everything? This would be the greatest MW in Pine Hollow’s history. In fact, if I were in charge of an MW, this is exactly the kind of thing I’d plan.”

Carole and Lisa looked at each other and shook their heads. “Maybe it’s a good thing you didn’t arrange this
weekend, Stevie. Sometimes you have a slight tendency to go overboard,” Carole said.

“Me?” said Stevie innocently.

“Let’s get back to facts,” Lisa cut in. “I’m really bothered by those barred prints. I don’t see exactly where they fit in.”

“They were fairly large,” Carole said. “They’d be too big for one of the smaller ponies, like Dime, but Nickel is sturdy.”

“Nickel has big hooves,” said Lisa. “I rode him when I was a beginner. I remember when I picked his hooves I was always surprised at how big they were.”