Jill and the lost ponies, p.12
Jill and the Lost Ponies, page 12
I now felt absolutely torn. I was sure Dinah would look after Black Boy perfectly well: but both my ponies would be looked after perfectly well, by people who would love them. The thing was, which did I want? Because I couldn’t see any way I could have both. I felt like that chap in the Bible who’s asked to choose who has the baby. Well not quite like him, because thinking about it, it wasn’t his baby, but I’m sure you know what I mean.
The easy thing to do would be to let Dinah keep Black Boy, but when I thought about going off and leaving him behind it was as if someone had taken out all my innards and tied them in a knot.
“Well?” Dinah asked. “What do you want to do?”
22
I simply didn’t know what I wanted to do, and what was best for the ponies. Through the window I could see down the valley to where Ann and Rosalie were standing.
“Do you mind?” I said, as I got up. “I think I need to think it over.”
Dinah nodded, and I let myself out and walked down the path to the field. Ann had found some grooming tools from somewhere, and she was grooming Black Boy. He was standing with his eyes half closed, and his ears flopping outwards, which he always does when you use the body brush. Rosalie was sitting on the fence, stroking one of the chestnut ponies, who was standing nose to tail with the other chestnut. Every now and then a chestnut tail flicked out to keep the flies off. One tail flicked across Rosalie’s face too, but she didn’t seem to mind.
Ann spotted me. “What’s happened?” she said. “We’ve been nearly expiring down here wondering what’s been going on.”
Black Boy woke up when Ann spoke, saw me, and did one of those quick little blows ponies do to say hello.
“Hello Boy,” I said, and I scratched behind his ears while he searched my pockets to see if there was anything there for him.
“Well?” said Rosalie, looking over from her perch on the fence. “What happened? We’re dying from the suspense.”
I sighed. “You see, she thinks it wouldn’t be fair on Black Boy to take him to London, and that as I only have enough money to buy one pony back and keep them, I should buy Rapide and leave Black Boy with her.”
“Wouldn’t that be all right?” said Rosalie. “You’d at least have one of them. You are jolly lucky to be able to get even one of them back,” she said, and she stared very hard at the chestnut pony’s back, before she started to stroke her again.
Ann and I looked at each other, and I knew Ann knew exactly how I was feeling. I sighed again. Black Boy had eaten the oats I kept in my cardigan pocket, and was now drifting off again. I buried my face in his mane, and breathed in the wonderful smell of horse.
As I straightened up, I saw the bit of mane that always flopped over the wrong way, and took me ages to sort out whenever we went to a show, and the little patch on his near fore where the hair had grown back white after he’d scratched himself on a nail not long after I’d got him. He turned round and nudged me with his nose, just as he always did before we went out for a ride. I scratched his nose, and he blew over my fingers.
“Right,” I said. “I’d better get this sorted out.”
I gave Black Boy a last pat and set off back up the path to the cottage, my heart feeling like lead. I could see that the door was open and Dinah was standing in the doorway, waiting. It was horribly off-putting taking every step under her unblinking gaze, and I felt as if my feet had grown several sizes and no longer knew where to put themselves.
“I’ve been thinking,” Dinah said, when I reached the top of the path.
“Oh,” I said, and I can tell you I felt as if my heart had climbed up my throat and was in my mouth. I could scarcely breathe.
“I’ve still got the jacket and jodhs you gave me. I expect you’ll think it’s a bit pathetic, but it was the first time in my life anyone ever gave me anything I actually wanted. I wish there’d been more like you at school.”
Dinah had that sort of inward expression people get when they’re remembering something foul, and I felt a complete heel, because as you know, I hadn’t been exactly a saint where Dinah was concerned.
“You can have Black Boy back. I don’t want anything for him. You gave me a present, and now I’m giving you one back. But if you ever have to sell him, you must promise to send him straight back here.”
“Only if I’m absolutely desperate,” I said, but then I stopped as I realised that wasn’t quite what I meant.
“I know what you mean,” Dinah said. “So you do want him back then?”
I couldn’t say a thing. I just nodded. I told the nagging little voice inside me that was wondering how fair I was being to Black Boy to shut up, and it did subside in the absolute joy of having my pony back.
I was beginning to get a bit sniffly at this point, and Dinah was too, but we pulled ourselves together and agreed that I’d get in touch with her when I had somewhere to keep Black Boy, and then she’d send him up on the train.
Dinah looked thoughtful again. “I don’t think I’ve been getting my horse saving quite right. I still think that anyone who has a pony should keep it to the end of its days unless it’s impossible, but the sort of ponies I’ve got here don’t really need saving. There are plenty of neglected horses and ponies out there, and I’m going to make this place into a sanctuary for them.”
“Gosh,” I said, overwhelmed by this nobility in one so young. “I’m going to pay for Black Boy’s keep until I have him back. Look on it as the start of the fund for all those horses and ponies you’re going to save. And I bet I can get all my friends back in Chatton to do a splendid gymkhana for you. We’ll do teas, and ices.”
Dinah looked frightfully bucked by this.
“There’s just one thing,” I said. “Why did you use the name Smythe when you bought the ponies?”
Dinah blushed, and looked at her feet.
“Oh, I sometimes pretend that I’m the daughter of a famous rider. Daddy will sign whatever I tell him to, but of course I had to use my real name with Susan. The different address was Daddy’s idea. He would have liked to have been a spy, and pretending we were on some sort of mission was the only way I could get him to agree to drive the box for me.”
I must say, I can’t think when I’ve heard anything sadder. It just goes to show what a life Dinah must have had. I simply didn’t know what to say, and Dinah didn’t either, but then I heard a yip, turned round, and saw Ann and Rosalie, who’d been bobbing about at the foot of the hill. I waved, and they charged up, and in the general atmosphere of joy, we got over the awkward moment.
Dinah invited us back in, and we ended up making rather a mess of the glamorous kitchen when we made ourselves piles of cheese on toast and finished up another tin of biscuits Dinah found. Almost full enough to burst, we said a fond farewell to Black Boy and the other ponies, and staggered back on the long-ish walk back to Westerham. You know how when one thing goes well, it seems as if everything else decides it’s going to fall along behind? Well, we managed to cadge a lift with the same farmer who’d dropped us off (he was going to fetch some more chickens from the train); the train was waiting for us on the platform; Ann found 6d for some chocolate from the station machine, and we managed to find an empty carriage, which we collapsed into.
“Well,” I said. “What a day.”
23
The train heaved itself slowly out of Westerham, and as Ann asked Rosalie about what Robin was up to in Yorkshire, I drifted off into a dream. The thing is, while I was in that field with the ponies, I’d decided to let Dinah keep Black Boy and buy Rapide back, but once she said she’d give Black Boy to me, I’d forgotten everything I’d decided in the joy of getting him back. Although I knew I had to stick with that decision, it felt as if I was losing Rapide all over again.
I sighed.
“Are you all right?” asked Rosalie. “Because you’re not behaving like someone who’s just got her pony back.”
Ann sighed too, and muttered something about Yorkshire being such a long way away.
“Gosh, whatever is the matter with you two?” asked Rosalie. “It’s like being in a carriage with a pair of walruses. Here, have some chocolate.”
I simply couldn’t.
“No, not for me either,” said Ann.
“Of all the mutts,” said Rosalie. “I just don’t understand you two.”
We sat in gloomy silence until Dunton Green, where we got off to find we were standing right next to the military gentleman who’d been so irritated by us on the journey down. He goggled at us in horror, snorted, and marched off to the other end of the platform.
That made us giggle, which lightened the mood a bit, and after all, I couldn’t stay gloomy for too long because I did still have one of my ponies back, and although I wasn’t going to start skipping around like Basil the Birdsong Boy, I was beginning to feel a bit better.
“Have you got any of that chocolate left?” I asked Rosalie.
“Ha!” She said. “I knew you couldn’t hold out for long.”
The train for London arrived, and we climbed on. We settled ourselves down, and once we’d sorted ourselves out, I asked Rosalie:
“How busy are the other stables near Park Lane? Do you think they’d be able to fit Black Boy in?”
“Oh, is that what’s biting you? Why didn’t you say? I shouldn’t think there’d be a problem. Captain Williams usually keeps a couple of horses and ponies to sell on, and I know the liveries come and go. Ours always did.”
“And do you know how much he’d charge?”
Rosalie told me what they’d charged, and said Captain Williams usually charged about the same, though less if he used your pony for rides. It was rather more than I’d been expecting, but I thought if I was very strict with myself, I could do it.
“Let’s call in at the stables on the way back,” I said.
“Sorry,” Rosalie said. “I’ll have to go straight home. Mummy’s getting ready for the private view tonight. You hadn’t forgotten, had you?”
“No,” I said, though actually the whole thing had completely slipped my mind.
Fortunately Rosalie didn’t appear to have noticed.
“And besides, Susan’s been going through her clothes because she’s decided nothing she brought with her from Switzerland is right for London. They’re just right for me though, so I’m going to go through them and pick some things out. There are piles of them. You’ve never seen anything like it.”
Ann and I caught each other’s eye, and I knew we were thinking the same thing. Susan had turned up to college in a very smart black and white dogtooth check jacket with bracelet length sleeves and a matching skirt that she’d bought in Paris which I would have given my eyeteeth for, and the next day in an equally nice gingham dress that Ann had taken one look at and fallen in love with. They made our tweed skirts, which we’d been very pleased with when we bought them in Ryechester, look very ordinary indeed.
We spend the rest of the journey mulling over just what was in Susan’s pile of discarded clothes, and whether we could all actually rock up to college wearing her cast offs. The train seemed a lot keener on its journey back to London than it had been on its way out, and we were soon drawing into the station. We said goodbye to Rosalie, got the tube to Hyde Park Corner, and walked up Park Lane. There was an evening ride getting ready to go out. Captain Williams was helping a tall, tweedy man with his stirrups (however many tweedy men were there in London? I wondered), and he looked up and saw us.
“Miss Crewe, Miss Derry,” he said. “What can I do for you?”
I explained that I needed livery for my pony. Captain Williams finished sorting out the stirrups, nodded to the man and turned to us.
“That shouldn’t be a problem. Would you care to come to the office, and we’ll discuss terms?”
There was nothing I’d have liked better, but we needed to get back to college before Miss Dodds went out for the evening so we weren’t locked out, so we agreed that I’d take away a list of charges, and come back tomorrow.
Ann and I trotted back across the Park, and once we’d got back to college, we went upstairs to the eyrie to get ready for the private view. I got out my Revlon Fire and Ice lipstick, and Ann had some Cherries in the Snow nail varnish, so we put that on as well, and it wasn’t quite the same shade as the Fire and Ice, but it wasn’t far off, and we both felt frightfully sophisticated. We weren’t quite sure what you wore to a private view, but it wasn’t as if we had bulging wardrobes from which to choose, so we made do with our tweed skirts, and I had a silk shirt I’d bought with my earnings from our pony job period, and Ann had a pretty Susan Small one her mother had bought her for her birthday, and so we were set.
24
The private view was being held in a gallery near South Kensington tube station, so we didn’t have far to walk.
The gallery was filled with people, all doing that frightfully loud cocktail chat where you can’t hear yourself think. Rosalie’s mother was holding court, kissing people left, right and centre as they congratulated her on the paintings. Rosalie saw us and whizzed over.
“You’re here!” she said. “Don’t disappear off, will you? Keep Jill pinned down, Ann – there’s someone coming later who wants to talk to her.”
“Who?” I said, but Rosalie laughed, said we’d see and meanwhile why not go and look at the paintings? She shot off over to the other side of the room.
“I have no idea, before you ask, what’s going on,” said Ann.
“I think it’s Captain Cholly-Sawcutt,” I said. “He always seems to turn up when you least expect him.”
Ann said she expected I was right, and we decided that as we were at an exhibition of paintings, it might be an idea to try and see them. It was a battle to see anything at all in the crush, but as the paintings appeared to show only bits of the zebras, perhaps it didn’t matter. One had a single hoof, another had an ear and an oddly out of proportion eye. Each painting had progressively more zebra in it, until you got to the one of Susan amidst the ruins. It was still called The Decay of Beauty, and it already had a red sold sticker on it. Susan was standing next to it, being photographed by a society photographer. Next to him someone was standing with a notebook, writing down everything Susan said.
Susan saw us and waved.
“Jill! Ann!” she called. We wandered over, and the scribbling person scribbled a bit more, and then moved on to her next target.
“Who’s that?” Ann asked.
“Someone from The Tatler,” Susan said. “I’m going to be in it. They’re doing a piece on young Society beauties.”
“Gosh,” I said.
“Yes, Daddy’s thrilled,” said Susan. “Oh, I say,” she said, looking over my shoulder. “Aunt Beatrice!”
Ann and I turned round and looked, and there was a large, tweedy woman bearing down on us, clutching a pile of books.
“My dear!” she yelled. “I’m so honoured.”
“Oh, do you want to buy the painting, Aunt?” said Susan. “I’m afraid it’s already sold.”
“Don’t be so silly, Susan,” she said. “Of course I don’t.”
And she turned towards me.
“I was so thrilled when I found out you were a friend of little Rosalie’s, Miss Crewe. So very thrilled. So delighted when I found out you’d be here.”
I goggled at her. A tiny bit of me had hoped that perhaps Mummy might be the person who was wanting to see me, but no, I was going to have to make do with one of her fans.
“Look at this,” she said, and she thrust one of the books she was holding at me. The cover picture was of a particularly winsome tot, the sort that Mummy writes about. The tot had long brown curls tied up with a pink bow, and enormous brown eyes, and the artist had drawn her holding her little white hands clasped together under her chin, as she gazed out at the reader. She was surrounded by equally winsome animals, all gazing up at the tot as if she’d just been given the power to feed them for a year. The title was Emilia’s Faery Forest.
“Oh gosh!” said Ann. “Did you write this?”
Aunt Beatrice gave a modest little smile. “Yes, I did. It’s gone down frightfully well in America. It’s all down to your mother, Miss Crewe. Whatever’s happened in my life, there’s always been something in Catherine Crewe’s books that’s lifted me up. She was my inspiration, and I hope my little book can follow on in the path of her greatness. You know,” she said, peering at me intently, “her books should be made compulsory reading in all schools. They mean so very, very much. They speak great truths, but so simply.”
I couldn’t think of anything worse than being compelled to read Mummy’s books, but I am always loyal to Mummy, and so I nodded. Aunt Beatrice carried on:
“Now you’re here, you must have a copy of my book.”
Aunt Beatrice bunged a couple of books at me, and a couple at Ann, and then she galloped off to go and talk to dear old Chuffy, whom apparently she had known in the fourth remove at school.
“What are we going to do with these?” asked Ann. I shook my head.
“Hello!” said Rosalie, bouncing up to us. “Isn’t it going well? Mummy’s sold five paintings and she’s absolutely delighted. What have you got there?”
Inspiration struck me. “You have all Mummy’s books, don’t you? This’ll be right up your street. Here you are.” There was a sharp intake of breath from Rosalie when I gave her the book. “It’s all right,” I said. “No need to thank me.”
“Oh, that isn’t fair,” said Ann. “I was going to give one to Rosalie. Now what am I going to do with them?”
“Search me,” I said. “I’m going to give one to Mummy and then that’s mine gone.”
“Give me what?” said a voice. I froze. It was Mummy.
“Mummy! Mummy!” I yipped, as I flung myself at her. “What on earth are you doing here? Is something wrong? Why are you home? You haven’t finished your stint in America yet have you?”
