The Black Stallion's Blood Bay Colt (15 page)

Jimmy had gone home after noon, but returned around four o'clock. He came into the shed, carrying a large envelope. “Come on into the tack room, Tom,” he said, stopping outside the stall. “The colt will be all right now, and I want you to help me with something.”

Seeing that the colt was interested in his hay, Tom nodded and left the stall to follow Jimmy into the tack room. George was there, sitting beside the small electric heater.

Opening the envelope, Jimmy withdrew a long application blank and set it down on the table before him. He took off his cap, baring his gray, almost white head, then unwound his muffler from about his neck. Sitting down at the table, he took out a pen and said, “We're goin' to register the colt with the Association, so we can race him.”

Looking over Jimmy's shoulder, Tom saw the outline drawings of a horse's body profiles and head. On them, Jimmy was to put any of the colt's identification marks, but his pen didn't touch the drawings. “No marks on our colt,” Jimmy said. “He's as clean as they come … no stockings, no blaze, no star, no nothin'.”

When he came to the line below he started writing. “
Color:
Blood Bay”; then he encircled
“Horse”
from the selection headed,
“Horse, Gelding, Mare.”
He stopped to look at George and Jimmy when he came to
“Name Selected.”
“We don't have a name for him yet. We'll let that go until we finish the rest of the application.”

Turning again to the paper, he continued writing.
“Foaled:
June 26;
Bred by:
Jimmy Creech, R.D. 2, Coronet, Pennsylvania;
Name of Sire:
The Black;
Name of Dam:
Volo Queen;
Sire of Dam:
Victor Volo;
Name of Second Dam:
HyLo;
Sire of Second Dam:
Hollyrood Bob.…” Jimmy Creech went on writing for a long while before he had finished giving all the pertinent information required for the colt's registration.

“Why are we doing this now?” Tom asked George. “His racing days are a good way off.”

“He'll be a yearling on January first,” George said. “It costs only five bucks to register him now but fifteen once he's a yearling. Jimmy's figurin' on savin' that money.”

Tom's brow furrowed. “But the colt will actually only be about six months old on January first,” he said.

“For the records and racing he'll still be a yearling,” George said, removing his cap to scratch his bald head. “An' the following January first when he's eligible to race he'll be a two-year-old. Yep, and some of the early colts—those born earlier in the year than ours—will have some months on him when they all go to the post.”

Jimmy looked up from his writing to say, “But the colt is goin' to be as big and strong as any of the early ones. I know that just by lookin' at him now.” When he had finished filling out the last line of the application blank, he turned to them again. “A name. We've got to have a name for him. That's all we need to finish this thing.”

“A good name,” Tom said.

George nodded. “Yeah, it's gotta be a good name, one that fits.”

The colt was striking the wood of his stall, so Tom left the tack room to look at him. Finding him all right, he returned quickly, for he wanted to help select a name for his colt.

Jimmy said, “He's goin' to have a black mane and tail and a red body. So how about calling him Red and Black?”

Shaking his head, George said, “Naw, Jimmy, that's too long. Let's get something good an' short. How about just naming him Red?”

Jimmy and Tom shook their heads simultaneously.

“Whatever we call him,” Jimmy said, “let's all agree on it. He belongs to all of us.”

“Red Prince,” Tom said. “He's out of a Queen.”

“Not bad,” Jimmy returned. “But I'd like to give him just one name, if we can think of something good.”

“How's just Prince?” George suggested.

“No, that's not right, either,” Tom said.

“Robin?” Jimmy asked. “He might fly like one.”

“I don't like it,” George answered.

“He's going to be big,” Jimmy said, getting up to
leave the tack room to take a look at the colt. When he returned he suggested, “Big Red?”

“You jus' said you didn't want two names,” George muttered.

“Yeah, so I did. Well, let's keep on thinking. I want to mail this application tonight.”

For another hour they continued submitting names for one another's approval, but came to no agreement. As though in the hope of helping matters along, they separated frequently, walking down the long shed to look at the colt or to do odd jobs which weren't necessary.

The winter sun was setting rapidly when George decided to burn some crate boxes that had accumulated in a corner. “I'll do my thinkin' outside,” he told them, leaving the shed.

Tom went into the colt's stall to handle him while Jimmy walked into the tack room. The colt still neighed for the Queen, but only at long intervals. Tom changed his water, and while the colt drank he scratched him on the forehead. His eyes took in the short black mane and whiskbroom tail, the red furry body.
When his winter coat's gone
, he thought,
he'll be so red he'll seem to be burning in the sun. And that, together with his black mane and tail, which will be long then, should make him a very beautiful-looking colt. He'll need a name worthy of his looks and the fire that I know is burning inside of him
.

“How about just King?” Jimmy Creech called from the tack room.

“I don't think so,” Tom yelled back. “There are a lot of horses named King.”

Jimmy was silent for a long while and finally
Tom left the colt to go into the tack room again. He found Jimmy looking out the small window at George, who had the fire going a good distance away in the track's infield.

Jimmy said quietly, “George always goes what seems miles away from the sheds to build his bonfire. He never takes any chances of starting a fire around here. A careful guy, George is—and you couldn't find a better friend,” he added quietly.

But Tom wasn't listening to him. Instead he said to himself, “Bonfire.” He liked the sound of it. You didn't hear that word much any more; people usually just said “fire.” There was a tattered dictionary on the shelf above the table. Going over to it, Tom took it down from the shelf.

“What're you doing?” Jimmy asked.

Tom didn't say anything until he had found the word he wanted. Then he read to Jimmy from the dictionary: “Bonfire—a large fire in an open place, for entertainment, celebration, or as a signal.” He looked up from the book. “As a signal, Jimmy,” he repeated, “—our signal to everybody
now
that he's on his way, starting today.
Bonfire!
”

“Bonfire,” repeated Jimmy, and the way he said it and the light in his eyes gave Tom the approval he wanted. Together they turned to look at the flames, leaping brightly toward the darkening sky. “A signal to all,” Jimmy added, “—just as you said. Come on!”

Minus hats and mufflers they rushed from the shed to join George, and together they shouted,
“Bonfire!”
George just grinned and shook his head in approval without taking his eyes from the flames, so careful
was he to see that no flying embers found their way to the sheds.

In his stall, the subject of it all sniffed the corners of his feedbox, cleaning up the last bit of oats; then he stretched his long, supple neck to the hay in the rack above him.

Bonfire was learning to be on his own.

It didn't take very long—only two or three days, just as Jimmy had said—before Bonfire ceased neighing for the Queen. Uncle Wilmer wrote, telling them that the mare had arrived safe and sound and “liked her old stall, all right.” He said too that he had hitched her to his wagon and had driven the Queen into town for his weekly supplies. “She's a fast stepper, all right,” he wrote. “Lester Eberl rode in with me and he says she's the fastest mare in Berks County. I believe it.”

“The work will do the mare a lot of good,” Jimmy said, after reading the letter.

January came, Bonfire was a yearling, and Jimmy Creech spent more and more time with him. On nice days the colt was put into the paddock to romp and play and get all the exercise he needed. When the weather turned bad, Jimmy kept him in the stall and started breaking Bonfire to bridle and harness. Each lesson was taught so slowly and patiently that Tom's respect for Jimmy's thoroughness knew no bounds.

“They don't break colts better than Jimmy breaks 'em,” George said. “He talks about not havin' patience. But he's got all the patience in the world when it comes to schoolin' a colt. There aren't many left like Jimmy.”

And it was true, Tom knew. For weeks Jimmy tied Bonfire in his stall or at the paddock fence for a few minutes each day, teaching the colt to stand tied and to respect the rope holding him. Tom watched Bonfire, fearful at first that he might try to get away. But the colt hadn't fought the rope, and Tom's eyes had shone with pride when Jimmy said, “The work you did with him at the farm is payin' off, Tom. Makin' it real easy for me, it is.”

He repeated this compliment to Tom's early work time and time again. Jimmy put a light bridle and bit on Bonfire and the colt did nothing but play with the bit while he moved about his stall. As the days went by he got so used to it he even ceased playing with it. Jimmy nodded in approval, and during February he placed the light racing harness on the colt's back. Bonfire didn't take to the harness as quickly as he had the bridle, but Jimmy was patient with him and within a few days the colt moved about his stall complete with bridle and harness.

And that, together with daily handling of the colt's body, especially his feet, was all that was done during the winter months.

With the coming of spring, Bonfire shed much of his winter coat under Tom's daily grooming. He was a tall colt, standing almost fifteen hands now, and still growing.

George remarked, “Jimmy said he was goin' to be
over sixteen hands, an' he's goin' to be. He's filling out, too.”

There was no doubt about that, for even now fine, hard muscles stood out prominently beneath his sleek red coat.

George turned to Tom while the boy pulled his brush through the black mane, which now fell halfway down Bonfire's neck. “And you're growin' with him, Tom,” he said. “You're puttin' on weight yourself.”

Tom's frame was gaunt no longer and there was a full, healthy look to his face. Going to the colt's tail to brush it, he laughed and said, “It's the hard work, George.”

“You've sure made things easier for us,” George admitted, taking a plug of tobacco from his pocket. “When you get our age, y'need young hands around.” Then, seeing Jimmy drive Symbol past the shed, he added, “We'll be needin' your help even more now with spring here. Jimmy'll start workin' harder now, and worryin', too, about the season ahead of us.”

During the weeks that followed, Tom understood more and more what George had meant. For Jimmy worked tirelessly and became quieter and, at times, irritable. Symbol's workouts were stepped up, and Tom stopped driving him on Saturdays, for Jimmy was attempting to lengthen the black horse's stride. He changed Symbol's shoes often and tried heavier toe weights to encourage a longer stride; but all this was of no avail, and Jimmy's drawn face was evidence of his anxiety about the fast-approaching races.

At the same time, he spent many hours with the colt, very often leading him around the track with one
hand while he drove Symbol with the other. Bonfire's strides were low, and beautiful to watch, but even they didn't comfort Jimmy just now.

“He couldn't ask for more than a colt like that,” Tom said, watching Bonfire's effortless stride behind the uneven, ponderous-gaited Symbol. “He should feel wonderful.”

“He does feel good about the colt,” George said. “But there'll be time enough next year for Jimmy to get real excited about Bonfire. Right now he's thinkin' of the season comin' up ahead of him, and wondering whether or not he can make enough money to buy feed and hay to keep us going for another year. It's always been that way for Jimmy this time of year,” George added with concern. “Sometimes I wonder why he keeps goin' on his own. He could have had all kinds of jobs trainin' and racin' for other people; then he'd have no money worries.”

“But it wouldn't be the same to him,” Tom said quickly.

“No,” George admitted. “It wouldn't. Jimmy wants his own horses. He wants it the way it's always been for him. But it's tough making a go of it these days, an' he knows it.”

The month of May came and with it an early hot, summer sun. Even so, Jimmy Creech was reluctant to open the shed doors or to remove the heavy muffler from about his neck. It was, Tom thought, as though Jimmy didn't want to accept the fact that the racing season was drawing near, as though he knew that Symbol wasn't ready for it and neither was he. Tom's knowledge of horses told him that Symbol never would be
ready again, and he was convinced that Jimmy knew this as well as he. Yet Jimmy was going out with the black horse, and Tom could only hope for the best.

One Saturday morning Jimmy experienced the first stomach pains since his attack at the farm. He was in the colt's stall with Tom, working over Bonfire's feet, when suddenly he went down on his knees and clutched his stomach.

“Jimmy!” Tom dropped down beside him while the colt moved away, then came back to shove his soft muzzle against Jimmy's head. Tom pushed him gently away while helping Jimmy to his feet.

“Just indigestion again. Something I ate,” Jimmy said, as they left the stall.