Pony Surprise Read online

  Pony Surprise

  Patricia Leitch

  Contents

  1. A Discovery

  2. Catching Augustus

  3. Penny Goes Shopping

  4. Trouble for Linda

  5. New Shoes

  6. The Paperchase

  7. Night-Time Hunt

  8. The Fête

  9. Pony Club Rally

  10. A Photographic Session

  11. Training for the Games

  12. A Wet Journey

  13. Bad Start

  14. Augustus the Hero

  15. Goodbye Augustus

  16. Pony Surprise

  Publishing history

  Also by Patricia Leitch

  Jane Badger Books

  1

  A Discovery

  “I don’t care what you say, if I had a pony of my own, I would not ride it with all that ironmongery in its mouth or all those straps buckled round it holding it down like that. I just wouldn’t. She’s got a double bit, a standing martingale, a running martingale and she’s talking about buying a drop noseband. Honestly! I’d school it in a field until I could control it in a snaffle. I would. So there!” stated Penny MacDonald.

  “All right, all right. Keep your hair on. I only said that if you’d been run away with as often as Jane Pearson you would be quite keen on stopping Black Knight, no matter how you did it,” said Penny’s brother Ewan. “He bolted down the High Street the other day, galloping mad through all the traffic.”

  “Well, I don’t blame him. A double bridle with Jane Pearson’s hands holding the reins. I’ll bet you you’d bolt. If he was mine, I’d ride him in the field until I could control him and then he couldn’t get away from me.”

  The two children trailed slowly homeward on that summer evening. Though scarcely quarrelling, they were both feeling more than fed up with life. They had just been to an unmounted rally of the Rayer branch of the Pony Club. Since it had been unmounted, they would not have needed a pony even if they had owned one, but other children kept saying things like: “Buster is getting so fat. I’ll need to start keeping him in during the day or I’ll never get his girth done up”, or “Jayne can jump four feet now. I’ve been schooling her over spread jumps and it’s made all the difference.” While Ewan and Penny could only listen enviously.

  The MacDonald household boasted a fridge and a washing machine but no pony.

  “I would do all the washing by hand, and I’d ride down to the shop for extra milk and things whenever you needed them,” Penny assured her mother. “Then you could sell the beastly machines and buy a pony for us.”

  “You are wasting your breath,” said Mr. MacDonald.

  “I know,” said Penny miserably. “But I have to keep on trying. One must never give up.”

  But the fridge and the washing machine stayed, and Ewan and Penny continued to plod ponyless to all the horsy gatherings in the district.

  Ewan was twelve. He was tall and thin with straight black hair and a wide cheery grin. He had an easy-going nature, not minding what he did if it kept other people happy. He nearly always thought that things worked out best if you didn’t make a fuss.

  Penny was ten. She had two long black pigtails which she hated but which her mother liked, so they stayed. She was inclined to be what her friends called “sturdy” and her enemies “fat”. But neither her friends nor her enemies could say that Penny’s fat was due to laziness. Unlike her brother she felt that things were there to be organized to suit Penny MacDonald and her whole day was dedicated to organizing her affairs—hopefully pony affairs. Anything at all to do with ponies which might possibly lead to someone saying to her, “Do you want a ride, Penny?”

  It was the first week of the summer holidays and seven long weeks of freedom stretched ahead of them but so far, despite all Penny’s efforts to organize the summer, they were still seven utterly ponyless weeks.

  As she walked home beside her brother, Penny went over pony possibilities in her mind.

  Marian Sprig’s Jester had a strained tendon and was not to be ridden for at least five weeks. Marian was a pale and nervous child who disliked riding and hated everything to do with ponies. Mrs. Sprig was a large, loud-voiced woman who knew nothing at all about ponies but liked Marian to be seen at all the local shows and Pony Club events. So they were both quite keen to have Penny around to help and usually Jester was one of their best bets. Major Hewitt, who owned the local riding school, had never looked favourably upon helpful children and now had definitely taken against them. Some undiscovered child had left a box door open and Major Hewitt’s show mare had got out onto the road, slipped, come down and broken both her knees. There was now a large notice in his tack room stating that the yard was private property and only open to regular pupils of the riding school. Penny and Ewan were faithful pupils, but due to lack of money, not regular. Miss Connell’s Dinkie had a two-week-old foal and although Penny went to see it almost every day it meant that Dinkie couldn’t be ridden. Mr. Dunn’s Flopsy, a New Forest pony that had belonged to Mr. Dunn’s daughter Sandra, had been turned out to grass. The outlook was very black.

  “Wouldn’t you think that Mr. Dunn could let us have Flopsy while Sandra is at university? I mean, obviously she’s never going to want to spend all her time riding a pony now that she’s more or less grown-up. It would have been far better for the pony, too. She’s going to do nothing but eat and eat and end up with navicular and have to be put down.”

  “You will be able to go and poultice up poor old Flop’s feet and Mr. Dunn will say, ‘Dear Penny, I am eternally grateful to you. Take Flopsy … she is yours. You have saved her life’.”

  “It is not funny,” stated Penny.

  Penny and Ewan lived in a smart, modern bungalow with whitewashed walls and a red tile roof. It was one of six bungalows all exactly the same, all sitting in their own pocket handkerchief of garden. They had been built in the grounds of Camworth House after Mrs. Harrison had died and the house crumbled into a ruin.

  The children turned down the lane that led to the bungalows. There was a smooth tarmacadam road that also led to the bungalows but Penny and Ewan always went home by the lane. It was spooky and overgrown and on windy nights the trees creaked and groaned overhead. Going home by the lane also meant that they passed Miss Frobisher’s cottage.

  Most grown ups seemed to think that Miss Frobisher was slightly mad but Penny and Ewan thought that she was just about the only really sane adult they knew. She was the only person that they knew who took advantage of being old enough to do what she liked and spent her life doing something that she really enjoyed. Miss Frobisher was a potter. She made dishes, vases, jugs, mugs and pots of all shapes and sizes. She fired them in her own kiln, decorated them and glazed them and then sold them to different shops. Usually she painted flowers and squiggles on them because she said this was what people wanted but sometimes to please Penny and Ewan she would paint shaggy ponies on them.

  “Do you think Mr. Dawes would let me ride Henry?” Penny was asking. She did not have much hope because Mr. Dawes thought Henry was dangerous and would not let anyone near him except himself, when Ewan suddenly stood stock still.

  “Look!” he shouted pointing to the field at the side of Miss Frobisher’s cottage. “Look!”

  “What is it?” asked Penny, annoyed that Ewan wasn’t paying attention to what she was saying.

  “There you idiot. Look!”

  Penny’s gaze followed Ewan’s pointing finger. “I don’t see … ”

  Then she saw what he was meaning. She opened her mouth to shriek in delight but the surprise was too great. For almost a minute Penny stood with her mouth open in utter surprise.

  “It is,” she gasped at last. “It is a pony. It really is! I don’
t believe it. The field was empty when we went to the rally. I mean there couldn’t have been a pony there and we didn’t see it.”

  “Of course it was empty then and of course it’s really there now,” said Ewan.

  As if to prove that he really did exist and was not just a dream, the grey pony who was grazing at the far corner of the field lifted his head and looked at the children. Cautiously he took a few steps towards them, pricked his ears in the dense thickness of his shaggy mane and peered more carefully at them through knowing dark eyes. Then the long-lashed, white eyelids drooped lazily, the pony yawned twice, shook himself and with a swish of his luxuriant tail he went on grazing.

  It was not the first time that Augustus had met children who stared at him with a gymkhana look in their eyes. In his long life Augustus had often had to deal with such children. He knew that the best place for a pony was standing in its own little field grazing and one of the worst places for a pony was dashing madly round at gymkhanas. In his well-ordered life Augustus had seldom allowed this to happen to him. He chewed a sweet mouthful of grass and checked again on the two children who were still staring so rudely at him. He didn’t think he would have too much trouble sorting them out.

  “Come on,” shouted Penny. “What are we standing here for? If he’s in Miss Frobisher’s field she must know about him. I mean ponies don’t just drop out of the sky.”

  They raced down the lane and turned up the path to the cottage. They both pounded on the door but there was no reply.

  “Pottery,” said Ewan and they dashed down the side of the cottage and along the weed-grown path that led to Miss Frobisher’s pottery.

  Miss Frobisher was sitting at her potter’s wheel. On a bench at her side were six newly thrown pots, the clay still gleaming. As the children burst in she sliced a seventh from the wheel and carefully set it down beside the others.

  Miss Frobisher looked like a witch. Not the fairy tale type of witch with a hump back and a wart on her hooked nose but a very elegant, evil witch. She had green eyes, a straight pointed nose, a wide mouth and short black hair. Instead of a cat she kept two pugs, Popsa and Mopsa. They were fawn and fat, with black snuffly noses and tails like coiled springs. Instead of a broomstick Miss Frobisher rode an ancient bicycle with a basket into which she tucked Popsa and Mopsa. She had sat her driving test seven times and after the seventh failure had sworn that they were not going to get any more of her money. She had gone out and acquired her bike.

  “Miss Frobisher, you’ve got a pony in your field,” gasped Penny, fending off Popsa and Mopsa’s wet, snuffling welcome.

  “I am fully aware of the fact,” said Miss Frobisher darkly. “Augustus arrived this evening. He is spending his summer holidays with me.”

  “But where did he come from?” asked Ewan.

  “He has the very best credentials. He belongs to Miss Baxter, an old friend of my schooldays. Or it might be more accurate to say that she belongs to him. Years ago she went on holiday to Scotland and stayed at a hotel that runs pony trekking. Baxy was in a car and had no intention of having anything to do with ponies, but on this day she was driving along and met a trek. It had rather seized up because one of the animals had sat down and was refusing to move. The trek leader, who was naturally rather annoyed, was hitting the reluctant animal with a stick. Miss Baxter jumped out of her car and having read Black Beauty as a child dashed across to the man and tried to stop him beating the pony. When she tells the story Baxy is vague about what happened next. But whatever took place, Baxy came home from Scotland … plus Augustus. She has never been on holiday since because she doesn’t like to leave him alone. This year she had the chance of a holiday in Greece, so after much reassurance on the subject of his Lordship she has gone and Augustus is mine for the summer.”

  “Yours?” said Ewan.

  “Mine,” assured Miss Frobisher.

  “But you don’t really know anything about ponies, do you?” suggested Ewan.

  Miss Frobisher looked straight at Ewan. “I know nothing about ponies,” she stated. “Not a single thing.”

  “D’you think then … ” began Penny and stopped. The whole thing seemed too good to be true. She was almost afraid to ask.

  “Yes?” demanded Miss Frobisher. “Were you going to ask something?”

  “Please could we help you? I mean you can’t just leave a pony in a field. You have to look after it.”

  “You have to make sure it doesn’t cut itself and take care of its feet and then there’s lice. You have to be sure it doesn’t get lice,” encouraged Ewan.

  Miss Frobisher burst out laughing.

  “I told Miss Baxter that her beloved Augustus would be in good hands while he was here,” she said. “I expected a MacDonald visit first thing tomorrow morning but I might have known you’d be here tonight.”

  “We can help you then?” Penny demanded, almost beside herself with excitement.

  “You may,” said Miss Frobisher.

  “And does help mean ride?” demanded Penny who liked to make sure about things.

  “It does,” said Miss Frobisher. “Augustus has brought his saddle and bridle with him. Come along and we’ll pay him a visit and see if he approves of his new residence.”

  With the pugs bustling in front of them they all went down to the field.

  “Augustus! Augustus!” shouted Miss Frobisher. “Really I suppose we should have brought something with which to lure him to us.”

  But Augustus didn’t need any luring. When he saw them come into the field he came trotting towards them, whinnying a welcome through wide nostrils.

  He looked about fourteen hands high and was dapple grey with a long white mane and tail. He had enormous quarters, a vast round barrel and swelling shoulders.

  His thick forelock more or less covered his large head and his lower lip hung down, quivering slightly. When he trotted, the ground shook under his feet as Augustus thundered over it. He had the hairiest fetlocks and the biggest, roundest hoofs that Penny had ever seen in her life.

  “He’s like a carthorse,” said Ewan in amazement.

  “Baxy says he is a Highland pony,” said Miss Frobisher, wondering if the massive bulk of horse was going to stop or just pound on, trampling them all into the ground.

  Augustus trotted right up to them. Then, taking no notice of any of the humans, he skidded to a halt and lowering his head he breathed lovingly over Popsa and Mopsa.

  “He’ll be good with hounds,” said Penny.

  Obviously Augustus was not the shape of horse to do terribly well in showing classes and Penny had to admit to herself that he didn’t look as if he was cut out to be a show jumper either, so she was making the best of any points in his favour.

  “You don’t hunt in mid-summer,” Ewan pointed out scathingly.

  “Come and ride him tomorrow,” said Miss Frobisher, “All his stuff is in the shed. You can sort it out for yourselves.”

  As they walked away Augustus whinnied fondly after the pugs and when Penny and Ewan were going home down the lane, he was still standing at the gate resting his head on the top bar, his bottom lip sagging as he gazed longingly in the direction of the pugs’ departure. “Arkle the second,” laughed Ewan.

  “You should never judge a horse until you have ridden it,” said Penny. “Perhaps he’s tired after his journey.”

  But even Penny had to admit that there were horses in the Pony Club who might be a little faster than Augustus.

  “But we’ll know tomorrow,” she added, walking backwards so that she could view the dozing Augustus. “Perhaps he will be the most super ride.”

  2

  Catching Augustus

  Both MacDonalds had been up since dawn but their mother had refused to let them out until they had helped her with the washing up and tidied their bedrooms.

  “Don’t you realise this is probably the most important day in my life? When I’m a famous showjumper people will remember this day. The day when I first had my own pony!”

/>   “He’s not,” said Ewan.

  “And all you can think of is, ‘Penny have you made your bed.’ At times I’m quite sure I’m a changeling.”

  “You may be a changeling if you feel like it,” said her mother. “As long as you make your bed.”

  “I am just going to do it,” answered Penny, bouncing her way upstairs.

  “Well buck up,” said Ewan.

  But at last they had everything done and were running down the lane to Augustus’s field. There was no sign of Miss Frobisher so they went straight to the shed and looked at Augustus’s tack.

  “It looks like almost brand-new tack,” said Penny, examining Augustus’s saddle and bridle. “And terribly clean.”

  “Here’s the halter,” said Ewan. “We’ll take his stuff down to the gate and tack him up there.”

  “Have you got the bread to catch him with?” asked Penny as she dumped the saddle at the gate.

  “Bit crumbled,” said Ewan, fishing it out of his pocket. “Still, he seemed an easy pony to catch. Probably trot over to us when he sees us. Augustus! Come on pony.”

  “He’s not going to come this morning,” said Penny as Augustus lifted his head at the sound of Ewan’s voice, took a long, hard look at them and then turned and trotted to the far corner of the field. “We are going to have to go to him.”

  The two children walked across the field to Augustus.

  “Come up then pony,” said Ewan, encouragingly holding out the slice of bread in the palm of his hand.

  Augustus’s sleepy eyes gleamed through the thickness of his forelock. He stretched out his neck, his nostrils quivering as he smelt the bread, his thick lips drawn back from his long yellow teeth as he poked his head forward.