Stable Groom (5 page)

W
ALKING BACK TO
Stevie’s house after the stop at TD’s, the girls had a lot to discuss. Stevie had invited Lisa and Carole to spend the night at her house, so they had plenty of time to talk. All three of them thought Denise was a great addition to Pine Hollow. Stevie mentioned again how impressed she was with how fast the older girl had seen through Veronica’s act. “It just makes me feel better knowing Veronica won’t be getting any special favors while Denise is around,” she explained.

Carole and Lisa nodded knowingly. Stevie had a competitive streak a mile wide when it came to Veronica. Anybody who saw Veronica as she really
was—rich, rude, and spoiled—immediately won a place in Stevie’s heart.

“Fortunately for us, that scene with Red really gave her away,” Carole commented.

“The sad thing is that even if Denise thinks Veronica treats Red badly, she can’t do anything about it. Veronica will tone down around her, the same way she acts better in front of Max. But as soon as she catches Red alone, she’ll blame him for everything, as usual, and then tattle to Max—about nothing!” Lisa said. That was the problem with Veronica. She could turn her moods off and on, depending on who was around. If it was someone she wanted to impress, she was perfectly behaved. But if it was someone she didn’t care about, she would scream, sulk, cry—do anything to get her way.

“Without Max there, the second half of camp is really going to be a bad week,” Carole said.

Stevie nodded. “It’s not that Red can’t do the work, but it’s going to be agonizing to have Veronica taunting him every single day.”

“And Red will be working harder than ever. He’ll have double duty, taking care of the stables and teaching us,” Lisa said glumly.

The Saddle Club knew from experience that when Max went away, Pine Hollow was a very different
place. All of a sudden the stables didn’t run themselves, the way they usually seemed to.

“I say we don’t go to sleep tonight until we think up a way to help Red,” Stevie declared as they drew near her house.

Agreeing to stay up late wasn’t exactly a problem for Lisa and Carole. Most of the time, no matter whose house they were at, the three of them talked until they were shut down by someone’s parents or got so exhausted that they fell asleep midsentence.

Back at the Lakes’, Stevie’s brothers had constructed a fort out of tents and blankets on the front lawn. Stevie took one look at it and suggested they go in through the back door. “I know they’re hiding in there, and I also know that Chad and Alex and Michael just bought new water guns,” she explained. “Of course, I’d be happy to take them on, but I wouldn’t want to involve you two in a messy fight, especially before dinner.” She led the way around the house. As the girls reached the backyard, three darkly clad shapes jumped from behind a row of shrubs, squirting madly.

“Oh, no—the fort was a fake-out! Run for it!” Stevie cried. She, Carole, and Lisa sprinted for the back door. By the time they got into the kitchen, they were drenched.

Mrs. Lake shook her head at the sight of them. “All right, everybody upstairs to Stevie’s room to change,” she said. “And if you girls agree, I think the boys should set the table and do the dishes tonight.”

The three girls hooted with laughter as they charged up the stairs. At the top, Stevie turned and looked down. “Really, Mother, you should try to keep better control of your
other
children,” she said with a sniff. The three girls burst into laughter. Mrs. Lake shook her head, but then she broke into a chuckle, too.

“Sorry, guys,” Stevie said later when the three of them had changed into dry shorts and T-shirts and were gathered on her bed.

Carole and Lisa brushed off the apology. It was a fact that coming to the Lakes’ involved a certain amount of risk. You never knew what Stevie and her brothers would be at war about, but you always knew that they would be at war.

“Maybe that’s what we should do to Veronica,” Lisa suggested with a laugh. “Wait in hiding for her to say something rude to Red and then squirt her down.”

“Too bad her temper tantrums usually occur around horses. Otherwise, I’d agree,” Carole said.

Lisa nodded. “You’re right—it would spook the horses. But we could kind of hide out around the stable
and at least make a list of all the times she gets out of hand. Then we could report back to Max.”

Stevie gave her a pained look. “And have The Saddle Club become a bunch of tattletales like Veronica? No way. Besides, Max knows she’s horrible to Red, and unless he kicks her out of Pine Hollow, he can’t do anything either.”

“And that’ll never happen,” Lisa said matter-of-factly.

It was well known that whenever Veronica had done something outrageous, Mr. and Mrs. diAngelo would come to Pine Hollow and plead with Max to forgive her. They were important people in Willow Creek, and they donated lots of money to good causes. Offending them would be bad for business, and it wasn’t something Max was eager to do.

“I wish Veronica would wake up one morning and decide to be nice to Red,” Carole said wistfully.

“That would happen if Red woke up one morning with credentials like Max’s or Denise’s. That’s the only way Veronica would respect him,” Stevie said.

Lisa’s eyebrows shot up. “That’s a brilliant idea!” she exclaimed.

“What’s a brilliant idea?” Stevie asked. She was used to stumbling upon solutions that she didn’t notice until Lisa pointed them out.

“What you said. Red needs credentials to make Veronica respect him. So what’s to stop us from getting him some credentials?”

“How can we do that?” Carole asked. “Unless he changes his mind about competing, he’s never going to win trophies. I doubt he’d want to study at the university—when would he find the time? And he’s too old to be a Pony Clubber, even though I’m sure he’d be an ‘A.’ ”

“True. But he’s not too old for that other certification thing that Denise has,” Lisa said excitedly. “What was it again?”

“Certified Riding Counselor,” Stevie replied promptly. “Equestrian Center, 101 Danvers Drive, Munroe, Indiana, 00335.”

Lisa and Carole stared at her as if she were an alien from outer space.

“Is there a problem? That’s the name and address of the place where Denise got her certification,” Stevie said innocently. Then she cracked a smile. “I may have trouble memorizing algebra formulas and irregular French verbs, but when I’m looking at something that isn’t any of my business, I never forget a comma.”

Lisa and Carole congratulated her: Sometimes it helped to have a friend with a criminal mind. “So all we have to do,” Lisa continued, “is write a letter to
the organization and tell them to send someone out here to give Red an examination. No doubt Red will pass with flying colors.”

The more the girls thought about it, the more they liked the sound of Lisa’s plan. Even if the certificate was just a piece of paper, it was a piece of paper that would give Red the respect he deserved from Veronica. “The whole thing is perfect,” Carole said. “It will give Red the credentials he should have—”

“—and put Veronica in her place for good!” Stevie shouted gleefully.

“Girls! Dinner!” Mrs. Lake called from downstairs.

The girls promised to carry out the plan that evening. “Say, Lisa?” Stevie began as they went to wash up. “Would you mind thinking of a plan that would put my brothers in their places, too?”

A
FTER GOBBLING UP
their macaroni and cheese and their salads, the girls headed for Stevie’s bedroom to draft a letter to the Equestrian Center. Sweeping by them, Stevie cast a haughty look at Chad, Alex, and Michael, whom Mrs. Lake had stationed at the dishwasher.

“Little did I know that their attacking us with water guns would come in so handy,” she confided to
Lisa and Carole once they were upstairs. “But now we have extra time to get this letter done.”

“It shouldn’t take too long if we can just think up the right thing to say,” Lisa said. She stuck a pen in her mouth and began chewing on it for inspiration.

“How about starting with ‘To Whom It May Concern’?” Carole suggested. “I know a lot of Dad’s official-type letters begin that way.”

“Excellent. If it’s good enough for the United States Marine Corps, it’s good enough for us,” Lisa said, jotting down the phrase. A colonel, Carole’s father held one of the highest ranks in the Marines.

“What do you think, Stevie?” Carole asked.

Stevie looked up from the movie magazine she had pulled out from underneath her bed. “Huh? Oh, yeah, sounds great.”

Lisa shot her a withering glance. “I’m sure you’ll find a lot of stuff about the certification process in that article on Hollywood hunks,” she said dryly.

“I’m just not good at this!” Stevie wailed. “I practically failed the business letter part of our English class. But, listen, I trust you two completely. Write whatever you want, and I’ll sign it.”

“Thanks a lot,” Carole said sarcastically.

Stevie closed the magazine. “Okay, okay—I’ll listen.”

Lisa and Carole looked doubtful. “And then, when we’re done,” Stevie added hastily, “I’ll type the letter onto my mom’s computer.”

“I forgot you had a computer,” Lisa said. “That’ll be even better. It will look very serious.”

After several tries, the draft was finished. Stevie had gotten directions to Pine Hollow from an old horse-show flyer so that the examiner would be able to find it. Lisa had thrown in a lot of big words to make it sound good. She read it aloud to Stevie and Carole. “ ‘To Whom It May Concern: We believe that there is a person at Pine Hollow Stables of Willow Creek, Virginia, who is worthy to receive your certification as a Riding Counselor. He is skilled in all aspects of horsemanship, including riding, training, grooming, and instructing. Please consider this a formal request for you to send an official examiner to Pine Hollow to give Red O’Malley the required test so that he may gain certification as soon as possible. We enclose directions to the stables and look forward to seeing you. Sincerely yours, Stephanie Lake, Carole Hanson, and Lisa Atwood.’ ”

Stevie and Carole clapped enthusiastically. “The only problem is that we don’t know Red’s real name,” Lisa pointed out.

“You mean Red isn’t it?” Carole asked.

“I doubt it,” Lisa replied. “It sounds like a nickname to me.”

“We’d better put something else, then,” Stevie said.

“Like what? How do we know what it’s short for?” said Lisa.

Stevie thought for a minute. “I don’t know—how about … Redford?”

The three of them looked at one another and burst out laughing. Somehow, Redford was as different from Red as a name could be. The idea of Red secretly having a stuffy, stuck-up name like Redford was hysterical.

“I’ll bet Veronica would treat him better just for having that name!” Carole cried between snorts of giggles.

Stevie stood up to do her Veronica imitation. “Excuse me, Redford? Could you kindly prepare my mount for me? I shall be going hunting this afternoon.” Carole and Lisa threw pillows at her.

When they had gotten control of their giggles, they went down to Mrs. Lake’s study to type the letter. In the final draft Red became Redford O’Malley.

“You know, it’s beginning to grow on me,” Stevie said as they waited for the letter to print out. “Maybe we should see if Red answers to it.”

Lisa whisked the piece of paper out of the printer.
Each of them signed her name, using Mrs. Lake’s fountain pen. Then they stood back to admire their handiwork.

“If I were the Equestrian Center and I got this letter, I’d send somebody out to Pine Hollow,” Carole said.

Stevie folded the letter, stuffed it into an envelope, and sealed it with a flourish. “I’ll ask Mom to mail this tomorrow. So I guess now all we can do is wait for the person to show up.”

“Do you think we ought to warn Red?” Carole inquired.

Lisa shook her head. “No, I don’t think we should say anything. He might not love the idea. It’ll be better if we wait until the examiner arrives at Pine Hollow. Then he won’t be able to say no.”

Although it was still early, the girls decided to change into their nightgowns and pajamas. That way they could get into their sleeping bags and talk. Stevie had discovered that her parents tended to be more lenient about her and her friends’ talking until all hours of the night if they got into bed early. “I think Mom and Dad figure that we’re getting rest just by being in bed,” she said.

Now, with the problem of Red and Veronica at least temporarily taken care of, The Saddle Club had
other things to discuss. Since it looked as if camp had a chance of working out, the three of them could hardly wait for it to start. It was always a great opportunity to work on individual riding problems, and the end-of-camp exhibition had never failed to delight both the parents and the students. Besides riding in drill teams, the camp group had performed dressage rides to music, played Pony Club games, and jumped over fences in hunt teams. Max believed it was good for his students to try all different kinds of riding. It kept them interested while sharpening their skills and giving them an appreciation for other riders’ abilities.

“I wonder if Max will decide what the exhibition is going to be before he leaves, of if he’ll let Red choose,” Carole mused aloud. She and Lisa were spread out on Stevie’s floor amid sleeping bags, blankets, pillows, and stuffed animals.

Logical as ever, Lisa guessed, “Probably they’ll decide together, since they’ll each be running camp for one week.”

“I hope the exhibition is a re-creation of a Wild West stampede,” Stevie said, not very realistically.

“Yeah, I’m sure the parents would just love to see their kids galloping madly around Pine Hollow, wouldn’t they?” Carole responded dryly.

In the midst of talking about horses and the fun they were going to have at camp, the girls drifted off to sleep. “Just remember,” Lisa reminded them as her head dropped to her pillow, “we have the Groom’s Bath to organize before anything else.”