“Sure, sure. Nothing to hide. Not like some others around here. Nothing to hide, me. You might say that’s ’cause I got nothing. Lost it all. Losing it all. First the economy, now the damned inspections at the shows and all the bad publicity. Really hurting business. You can’t imagine.”
“Guess not,” Billie agreed.
“What kind of horse you want, Miz Snow?”
“Call me Billie.”
“Billie. I got horses. Some of ’em are nice. Were nice. But I’m selling out.” He waved his hand at the barn aisle. “I can show you what I’ve got. Of course they’re not really ready to show just yet. Well, one of ’em is. If you tell me what you’d like to see, I could fix it up, and you come back later to see it.”
“Show me now,” Billie said. “If I see something I like, we can decide what to do about it.”
“What kind of riding you want to do? You looking for flat shod? Plantation shod? Trail? Big Lick?”
“Big Lick,” she said. “I mean, I think that’s it. I want to go to horse shows and do well in the big classes.”
“Performance horse, then. Big Lick. I’ve got a horse for you.” He led her to a stall with a black horse standing in it, his halter tied to the wall. He had been recently groomed; she could still see brush marks on his hide. He wore stacked shoes, and his forelegs were wrapped in fleece bandages. “This here’s a two-year-old stud colt,” the man said. “He should be the champion this year. He’ll be top two-year-old in the country. I’ve got to sell him, though. Darn shame. I’ll get him out for you, and you can try him right now. Royal!” he hollered.
“Is that his name?” Billie asked.
“Royal,” he yelled again. “My boy,” he said to her. “ROYAL!”
The man who appeared from the murk was a younger version of his father, maybe in his forties. Fat festooned his belly and puddled just above his knees. “Whatcha want?”
“Lady wants to ride Jazz. Help me git him ready.”
Billie felt panicky. “Isn’t he too young? Just two?”
“He’s not even two yet, coming two’s more like it. But he knows his job. Don’t he, Royal? Royal this is Miz Billie Snow. She’s horse shopping. Miz Billie, this here is my son.”
Royal nodded toward her. She tried to smile back at him. He looked as soft as a glob of tapioca, but he moved almost gracefully, as if his weight were nothing to him. He slid his eyes over her, leaving prickles between her shoulders, but after he’d glanced, he turned away to his work and didn’t look back.
Royal swung open the stall door and stepped inside. He grabbed the colt’s halter, clipped a lead shank to it, and turned him toward the door.
“You sure I should ride him now?” Billie asked. “I could come back.”
Both men stared at her, but Royal brought the colt out into the barn aisle.
“You’re not a goddamned tire kicker are you?” Royal asked. “We get a lot of them, people faking an interest for one reason or another. You’re not one of them, right?”
Simeon disappeared into a room and returned with a flat, slick-looking saddle over his arm, which he set atop a tack box. He went back and returned with a bridle with a wicked-looking shanked bit and hung it on a hook by the saddle.
Royal handed Billie the lead rope and briskly went over the horse with a brush. Dust flew out from beneath his strokes. He ran a rag over the young stallion, set a saddle pad onto its back, then the saddle. Within what seemed to Billie like mere seconds, the colt was saddled. The father took the lead rope from her and bridled the horse while she tried to think of a way out of riding. She could not ride a hurt horse, and this youngster was obviously being sored.
“I haven’t ridden in ages,” she lied. “And I’ve never been on a stallion.”
Royal guffawed. “Just don’t sit on his balls.”
Simeon lumbered back into the tack room and emerged with a handful of chains that he dumped in a clatter on a metal chair. Grunting, he undid the fleece wraps on the colt’s legs, balling them expertly into rolls as he tossed each from hand to hand. He straightened up to toss them onto the tack box then, gasping, he bent and unwrapped the cellophane that had been beneath them. He handled it with his fingertips, and when he was done, wadded it and threw it in a wastebasket then wiped his hands on a rag.
“You going to get on now I’ve got him ready for you?” he asked Billie.
She looked at Simeon and Royal, about to refuse. But in their faces, she saw pride in this horse they had trained. Both men were watching her, ready for something. She felt their eyes judging her, ready to dismiss her, to get mad, to throw her out. She could just leave, plead fear or allergies or something, but if Frank found out she’d had a chance to ride one of these horses and hadn’t, he’d outright sack her.
Silently she apologized to the horse then put her foot in the stirrup and swung aboard. The stirrups were too long, and the horse quivered with power. It was power, she decided. Not pain.
“I say this is the horse for you,” Simeon assured her. “Royal, put his bracelets on him so he steps out sweet for her.”
Royal grabbed chains from the pile on the chair. Billie heard him grunt as he bent and wrapped them around the horse’s pasterns. He stood up by pulling himself up the stallion’s leg, hand over hand.
“I’ve never ridden a walking horse,” Billie said.
“Like fallin’ off a log,” Royal chuckled.
“What should I do?”
She saw that Royal was about to crack another one, probably say something like “Keep one leg on each side of your horse,” when
