The Warble (26 page)

Graham stood very
still, watching Kristina descend the road. Then as she was about to turn a
curve, he hollered, “You should really watch your back! You never know what
could be lurking around in these woods!”

Graham’s words brought
goose bumps to Kristina’s arms. She thought back to when she had first met him,
way back in kindergarten, Graham had always been a bothersome, mean kid, but
for some strange reason, when school started back up two Christmases ago—after
Graham, Hester, Davina, and she had come back from Bernovem—Graham’s demeanor
had changed. For instance, instead of being immature and annoying—like when he
would throw spit wads across the aisle at her while a test was in session, or
let out silent but deadly farts that would linger around her for ten minutes or
more, or squish chewed-up food through his teeth and then show it to her—he had
become more poised and self-assured. He stopped his crude jokes and would
instead just stare at her from his desk or from across the lunchroom. Then when
she would look at him, a cynical smirk would envelop his heavily freckled face.

Thinking back on these
creepy memories only solidified Kristina’s decision to go home.

Kristina was relieved that the road
curved and she was finally out of Graham’s view, but still feeling uneasy, she
quickened her pace. It was going to take about ten more minutes to get to the
office, and as the road wound deeper into the woods, the hot air began to
dissipate, and in its place, cool air lingered. She felt good to be out of the
hot sun, and she slowed her pace slightly. She was finally beginning to relax,
but no sooner had she done so, then she heard, off to her left, some rustling
in the woods. She stopped dead in her tracks, and her eyes searched between the
trees. She was sure that she had caught sight of a person passing from behind
one tree to another. “Hello?” she called out, but there was no response, just
more rustling.
Maybe it was a deer.
Then Graham’s words entered her
mind:
“You should really watch your back. You never know what could be
lurking around in these woods.”
Even in the coolness of the shade, her
hands grew clammy. She started to run, her heavy backpack pounding on her back,
and she didn’t stop until she had made it to the front steps of the main
office. Panting, she leaned on the stair rail and looked up into the window. A
woman was standing behind the front check-in counter, talking on the phone.
Kristina climbed the stairs and entered the office. The bell on the doorknob
jingled, causing the woman to glance through cat’s-eye glasses at her. Seeing
Kristina, the woman’s eyebrows lifted, revealing an agitated expression.
Kristina approached the counter, and the woman lowered her voice to a whisper.
Then the woman went into a back room and closed the door behind her.

Standing at the
check-in counter, listening to the woman’s annoying laughs behind the closed
door, Kristina finally decided that she might as well sit down. There was a
couch behind her, so she plopped her overheated body down on it, and grabbed a
Horse and Rider magazine off the adjacent table.
If only my cell phone got
reception out here, I could have already called my mom, and she could have
already been here, waiting for me by now.

Suddenly, she heard a
noise from outside—heavy footsteps running up the porch stairs. The doorknob
turned, and the bells on it jingled. She looked up from her magazine to see
Davina standing in front of her, panting heavily. “Listen, I need to talk to
you.”

Kristina scowled at
her. “If you’re going to try to coax me into staying here, don’t even bother,
because it won’t work. My mind is already made up. I’m calling my mom to come
get me, as soon as the check-in woman comes out of the back room.” Kristina
exhaled. “That is, if she ever decides to come out.”

A persuasive smile
suddenly appeared on Davina’s face. “What if you were able to ride the most
beautiful horse here—would you change your mind?”

Kristina thought she
seemed like a used-car salesman trying to close on a deal. “As if that’s going
to happen.” She stuck her nose back into the magazine.

“Well, this just
happens to be your lucky day, because Hester has arranged for you to ride what
she thinks is the best horse here.”

Kristina slowly peered
over the top of the magazine. Her expression changed to a more suspicious one.
“What? Why would Hester arrange that for me? There’s got to be a catch.”

“No … I think she just
feels bad for how she treated you yesterday.”

“Huh!” Kristina frowned
at Davina. “Hester’s never felt bad about anything she’s ever done to me, so
why would this time be any different? And it wasn’t all Hester’s fault; you had
just as much to do with it, maybe even more. Actually, I bet it was all your
idea in the first place to snoop through my diary.”

“Okay!” Davina shouted.
Then more quietly she said, “Why don’t you just forget it, and I’ll forget the
many times you’ve irritated me as well.”

An argument was about
to ignite, but the door behind the check-in counter suddenly opened, and the
woman came back into the lobby. “What in the world are you two doing here?” She
had a Southern accent and seemed to just realize that someone other than
herself was in the office. Chewing gum obnoxiously loud, she blew a bubble,
popped it, and then began chewing again. “Don’t ya know that y’all are supposed
to be heading to the dining hall for breakfast?”

To be able to ride the
best horse on the ranch was sure tempting Kristina. She felt trapped in a
sticky situation and looked over at the check-in woman, and then back at
Davina. She thought quickly. “Uh … I just wanted to let you know … that we’ve
run out of toilet paper at our cabin,” she said, making it up, of course.

“That’s odd.” The
woman’s eyes narrowed and suspiciously shifted back and forth between the two
girls. “I’m sure that there were three extra rolls in there just before you
arrived.”

“Oh, there was, but
Davina had a little problem last night after she ate about three bags of
marshmallows. Sorry, but she used up all three rolls.” Kristina smiled at
Davina to agree with her.

“Did she plug up the
toilet?” The woman chewed away on her gum and looked worried.

“Uh … yeah!” Kristina
lifted her eyebrows and smiled at Davina.

The woman frowned at
Davina.

“But don’t worry. She
used the plunger, and the toilet is working fine now.” Kristina winked at
Davina.

Davina’s hot face grew
even hotter and her eyes grew wide as she stared at Kristina. Then, very
suddenly, Davina changed her expression and looked up at the check-in woman
with a sheepish grin on her face. “Sorry,” she said and glared at Kristina
again, her mouth shriveling up like a closed sea anemone.

The check-in woman
sighed, rolled her crow’s-feet-clustered eyes, and grabbed a large wad of keys
out of a drawer behind the check-in counter. Then she slammed the drawer shut,
and again went into the back room. Kristina jumped up from the couch and Davina
and her hurried out of the office.

“Wow! I can’t believe
you ran all this way to catch up with me,” Kristina said, changing the subject,
hoping Davina would forget about being mad at her.

“It wasn’t that hard.”
Davina forgot already.

Sitting on the dirt
road, just below the stairs, was a motorized cart, like the ones driven around
on golf courses. Hester was sitting in the driver’s seat.

So that’s how Davina
made it here so fast, Kristina thought. It must have only been the stair climb
that tuckered her out.

Davina got in the front
end of the cart and Kristina got into the back, and as they drove off, the
check-in woman came out of the office with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth
and three rolls of toilet paper in her arms. “Hey! Aren’t y’all forgetting
something?” she yelled at them.

~ ~ ~

Hester, Davina, and
Kristina sat on horses in the riding arena, awaiting their English riding
lesson. Davina was definitely right; the horse that Kristina got to ride was
the prettiest one in the group, at least Kristina thought so. She was white
with a rippling, silver mane, and she reminded Kristina of Taysha, Werrien’s
horse in Bernovem. Why Hester arranged for Kristina to ride her, still wasn’t
clear, but it was most likely because Hester would probably have gotten in big
trouble from her parents for causing a camper to leave the camp early.
Whatever
the reason,
Kristina thought;
it’s a very nice peace offering.

The door to the riding
arena suddenly opened, and the riding instructor, a woman, dressed in English
riding attire, entered. She walked over to Hester. “That cousin of yours didn’t
clean the stalls this morning. Do you happen to know why?” she asked in an
annoyed whisper.

“How am I supposed to
know? I’m not Graham’s babysitter,” Hester responded rudely.

The instructor sighed
and shook her head, as if realizing what a waste of time it was, expecting
Hester to help her out. “I guess that I’ll deal with him later.” She went and
stood in the middle of the arena. “Good morning, campers. My name is Ms.
Oldham. I will be your riding instructor for the duration of your stay at the
Tranquil Trails Ranch. We will start the lesson by having you all follow
Hester, counter-clockwise around the edge of the arena.”

The first few time
around the arena, the horses walked, and all of the girls seemed quite good at
this basic task, but then on the third time around, Ms. Oldham hollered, “Now
you will trot and post!”

Hester’s horse started
the group trotting, and the other horses automatically trotted behind hers.
Hester was good at riding, because she had been doing it since she was five
years old. Davina, on the other hand, who had only sat on a horse once before,
when she was eight, was very awkward, and she bounced all over the saddle in an
opposite rhythm of the horse’s trotting. She looked quite silly, like a
jack-in-the-box, right after it springs out of the box. As for Kristina, she
had never ridden a horse, other than in Bernovem, where she became fairly good
at it. She caught on pretty well and was able to post, keeping time with the
rhythm of her horse’s trotting. Actually, she did so well, Hester took notice
of her, and by the look on Hester’s ruddy face, shadowed beneath her English
riding helmet, she didn’t seem too thrilled about it; she seemed rather jealous
that Kristina was riding so well.

Hester brought her
horse’s speed up to a canter, and the rest of the girls’ horses did the same.
All the girls handled the cantering fine, except for Davina, who had let go of
the reins and was holding on to the front of the saddle for dear life. Her legs
were flopping haphazardly at the horse’s sides, causing the horse to buck up.
Then Davina lost control altogether, and her horse headed straight for a jump
in the middle of the arena. Ms. Oldham, who was standing in the middle of the
arena, scurried out of the horse’s way to avoid being trampled.

Kristina felt compelled
to help Davina, and she charged with her horse directly behind Davina’s horse.
Luckily, Davina’s horse didn’t bound over the jump, but instead, when about a
foot away from it, took a sharp left and headed for the arena door. The saddle
slid down the horse’s left side with Davina still in it. Then the horse made an
abrupt stop at the arena door, causing Davina to fall to the ground.

Ms. Oldham quickly
rushed to Davina’s side, and while this was going on, Kristina’s horse bounded
over the jump. In astonishment, all the girls’ mouths, including Davina’s,
dropped open. Kristina handled the four-foot jump with ease. Then promptly, she
turned her horse around and headed over to Davina, who was lying on the ground
with her English helmet on lopsided.

“I hardly think this is
a time to be showing off!” Davina yelled half out of breath at Kristina.

“I was only trying—”
Kristina started to say.

“This will conclude our
riding lesson for today!” Ms. Oldham’s nerves were on fire due to the episode.
“Now all of you will move on to learning how to clean the stalls.”

By the looks on the
girls’ faces, it was obvious that this was something that they weren’t keen on
doing.

“I’ll take Kristina and
Davina and teach them,” Hester said hastily.

“Very good!” Ms. Oldham
said.

Hester waited for Ms.
Oldham and the remainder of the campers to leave. Once they were out of sight,
she turned to Kristina and Davina. “Now that they’ve gone, why don’t we three
go on a real horse ride?”

Kristina’s face beamed
with enthusiasm, but Davina looked like she might up-chuck her breakfast.

“What’s the matter,
Davina? Would you rather stay here and clean smelly horse stalls?” Hester
taunted.

Of course not!” Davina
said defensively. “It’s just that—”

“Oh, come on, Davina,
don’t you know that the best way to conquer your fear of falling off a horse is
by getting right back on?”

“What about the other
girls? Won’t they be curious as to where we’ve gone off to and wonder why they
weren’t invited?”

Hester snickered. “What
do you care what they think? Besides, Ms. Oldham will be taking them to do some
studying on horse history in the ranch library right after they’re done
cleaning the stalls.”

“But what about the
stalls we’re supposed to clean?” Davina grabbed at any old excuse not to go.

“I’m sure as heck not
going to do Graham’s job, which, I might add, he gets paid for!”

“I’d love to go on the
ride,” Kristina finally chimed in.

“Sure you would. You’ve
probably been riding horses your entire life,” Davina said.

“No. That’s actually
not the case.”

“Well, then,” Hester
said impatiently, “what are we waiting for?” She began leading her horse out of
the arena.

Once Davina and
Kristina caught up with her, Hester whispered in Davina’s ear, “Trust me. This
is going to be so worth it.”