The Island Stallion Races (10 page)

Jay turned back to Flick. “Well, you’ve hurt Steve, even if he has the graciousness not to speak of it. How do you intend to make up for what you’ve done?”

Flick shook his head in disgust, but a troubled look appeared in his eyes. “I know what you’re suggesting,” he said, “but I don’t propose to do anything about it.”

Jay’s eyes opened wide in astonishment. “But you
must
, Flick. After all, you can’t expect me to forget two such grave infractions of the rules … this and what happened on Mao. Actually I’ve done nothing to compare
with either of them, as you very well know. I’m afraid I’ll have to speak to Julian.”

“You’re being silly,” Flick said hastily, but the uneasiness remained in his eyes. He turned to Steve. “I’m certain Steve doesn’t want to go to the races with you,” he added, a note of desperation creeping into his voice.

Jay also turned to Steve, and they silently awaited his answer.

Steve looked at them. Race Flame? Is that what he was being asked? Is that what he had to decide? Now?

“Well, Steve?” Jay asked, holding the boy’s eyes. “I promised you that no one will learn your
secret
.”

Steve answered, “Flame wouldn’t go with you. He’d kill you!”

“Oh, no, Steve. You’re wrong,” Jay said. “It’s just that at this point Flame isn’t being very receptive to anything we try to tell him. Isn’t that right, Flick?” he asked, turning to his friend.

Flick nodded numbly, for he was looking at Steve’s eyes and knew that Jay had won again. The boy really wanted to race his horse.

“You see,” Jay continued, trying to make Steve understand, “Flame thinks we’re evil because he heard you shout this morning when I was … ah, when
we
were trying our little experiment. He thought I was hurting you, and now his mind is closed tight to anything but hatred of us. Right, Flick?”

Again the other’s cropped head moved in sad and resigned agreement.

“Now all we need is an opportunity to reach Flame again, Steve,” Jay continued. “The only possible way, of course, is for him to see you enjoying our company. It
would be nice if you’d just put your arms around our shoulders. Your laughing at anything we have to say would also help. Flame will then rid himself of that mental barrier that’s keeping us from reaching him. It’s as simple as that. We can take the first step now by sitting down below rather than here. Come, Steve.”

They went down the trail and when they were only a short distance from the valley floor they sat down. Steve saw Flame leave the band and come toward them at a run. The red stallion stopped when he saw them, his intent eyes watching every move they made.

“
Now
, Steve … laugh, please,” Jay said, “and put your arms around our shoulders.”

Steve did as Jay had requested, but his laugh was forced. It couldn’t have been otherwise, for he knew that before long he and Flame would be passengers on that ship of light.

A little over an hour later Steve was sitting alone on the trail. Jay and Flick had gone moments before, and Flame was moving up the valley. Steve watched the stallion but his thoughts were of Jay’s final warning.

“Of course, the big job will be yours, Steve. Do you think you can manage to get Flame out to the ship? And then once you’re at the track you’ll be on your own too. So please make sure you have absolute control over him. It would be terrible if he put on a bad show!”

Steve continued sitting there for many minutes, while Flame and the band moved to the most distant shadows of the valley. He wanted to go to his horse but he wasn’t certain just then that his legs would bear his weight.

Finally he got to his feet, wavering a bit at first, then steadying himself enough to make his way down the trail. When he reached the valley floor he attempted a whistle but what came out wasn’t loud enough to attract
Flame’s attention and save him any steps. He had to go halfway up the valley before Flame saw him and stepped out of the shadows into sunlight.

Steve waited for his horse, and when Flame came to a stop beside him he put both hands up, one finding and grasping the long red mane, the other on the high withers. He steeled himself for the jump, knowing that it would take all of whatever strength he had left. He was furious at his weakness but there was no fighting it … or that to which he had committed himself and Flame.

There was a quivering of the stallion’s muscles. Flame knew what was coming and was waiting impatiently. He sidestepped and his finely molded body moved away from Steve. Snorting through wide nostrils, Flame waited for the boy to mount. He turned his small, wedge-shaped head, his eyes surprised and puzzled at Steve’s unusual clumsiness. His small ears almost touched at the tips when he pricked them forward inquisitively.

Once more Steve put his hands upon Flame. This time he jumped as high as he could, pulling at mane and back. He hung on face downward, his legs dangling. Flame whirled, and Steve’s hold upon him became even more precarious. He pulled harder on the mane with one hand, the fingers of the other pressing deep into Flame’s withers. Only then did the stallion come to a halt as though in sudden realization that something was terribly wrong.

Steve was successful in getting more of his weight on the off side of his horse, and finally he swung
around. Flame bolted immediately, and for a while Steve made no effort to control him. He simply hung on as the stallion swept across the valley.

When Steve had brought Flame to a stop he straightened and then sat still for a moment, making certain he was all right and that he was prepared for what he had to do. After all, what had begun as the wildest of dreams was now very close to becoming a reality!

Satisfied that he was in full control of himself, he touched his horse and took him down the valley at a slow walk. Flame tried to break from it, crab-stepping and tossing his head, telling Steve in no uncertain terms that he wanted to run. But Steve did not give in to his demands. Instead, he turned Flame often, sometimes making large circles that swept them from one border of cane to the other; then again he took him in small, tight circles that made of Flame’s hindquarters little more than a pivot for his tall body.

The stallion fidgeted constantly but made no attempt to break away. And that was what Steve had needed to know. He had never before asked so much of Flame at any one time.

Later he reversed the circles, keeping Flame at a walk; then he took him through figure “eights,” some large, some very small and tight. Finally, allowing Flame to move into an easy lope, he made the circles and the figure “eights” again. When he had finished he was as hot as his horse, and almost as impatient.

But he did not dismount. Instead, he took Flame through the field of cane in a hard run. He kept him at that gait until they emerged from the cane and started
over the stony ground near the western wall of Blue Valley. There he slowed him to a walk again and went on to the hollow near the marsh.

Flame came to a stop before the murky veil of gray and his nostrils curled. He did not like the smell of rotting vegetation any more than Steve did. But he went forward again when the pressure came from Steve’s legs, his hoofs making soft, sucking sounds in the wet ground. Although he knew his way, he was very, very cautious. He had been given his head, for he was no stranger to this cloud-like world, but his eyes never left the path.

Steve glanced at the slimy wilderness of swamp ferns and high reeds on either side of them. Most of all he feared those still black pools. One false step, a slip, and he and Flame would become victims of these horrible quagmires.

Moments later they left the marsh behind, and there was a quickening of Flame’s strides. He chose his path through the twisting gorge as carefully as he had done in the marsh. They went up the dry stream bed, their way strewn with rocks and boulders, the high yellow cliffs rising on either side of them. At the end of their climb the walls widened, and stretched before them was the smaller valley.

Flame broke into a run when he stepped onto dry grass again, and Steve let him go. He felt the stallion gather himself just before reaching the brook that cut the middle of the tiny valley. He knew Flame was going to jump the water rather than go through it, so he was ready when the stallion sprang from one bank to the other.

Soon after, he slowed Flame, for they were moving in a rush toward the far wall. The wall was split by many narrow chasms and Steve purposely guided Flame down one that came to a dead end. As the high, precipitous walls closed in about them, the red stallion stopped in his tracks.

He disclosed no hesitation or uneasiness when Steve asked him to back up. Instead, he let his rider become his eyes, moving his hindquarters in quick response to Steve’s touches. And finally he was free of the narrow, twisting chasm.

Steve felt no great elation at Flame’s easy and prompt obedience to his requests. The test of final, complete control over Flame was yet to come.

He rode Flame alongside the wall, and then turned him into the chasm that led to the sea entrance. Soon he could hear the dull thud of waves beating against the outer wall. He stopped Flame at the end of the chasm and dismounted.

“Come on, boy,” he said, entering the high cave. There was no need to look back, for he heard Flame’s hoofbeats behind him.

He hurried through the large cave, having no trouble making his way in the dim, gray light. Flame followed him with equal ease for he, too, had been there many times. At last they entered the great chamber, and the winds from the sea whipped about them. The crash of waves outside was thunderous as was the rush of water in the canal. The motor launch rocked against the wooden piles. It was here, Steve knew, that the final test of his control over Flame would come.

The stallion stopped just within the chamber. Steve
glanced back at him, and then went to the launch. He hauled out the wide planks that were used in sliding barrels and heavy boxes onto the sunken deck and then called to his horse, “Come on, boy!”

Flame came quickly, showing no fear or hesitation until Steve stepped aboard the launch and continued calling him. Then he stopped, his eyes on the boy, and backed away, only to come forward again. He snorted and pawed the sand, sending it flying. He carried on for many minutes without setting hoof on the planks. He knew what he was being asked to do.

Steve sat down in the boat, talking to Flame, and waiting. His task would take a long time, if he succeeded in it at all. Whenever Flame moved away from the launch Steve called to him again. The stallion’s eyes were bright in his bewilderment, and once he ran out of the chamber. Steve stayed in the boat and finally Flame returned to plunge about the sandy floor, his snorts softening the crash of waves outside.

“We’re not going anywhere,” Steve told him. “I just want to see if you’ll do it.”

It was a long while before Flame even consented to lower his small head to smell the wooden planks. He walked up and down the canal, sniffing the hull of the launch. Then he turned abruptly away and began plunging about the chamber once more. Finally he settled down but stood in a far corner, waiting patiently for Steve to return to Blue Valley.

After a half-hour had passed Flame lost his patience. As he snorted and came forward, Steve rose and stood close to the planks. “Come, Flame,” he said softly, “and then we’ll go back.”

Flame angrily tossed his head and rose high on his hind legs, almost touching the top of the chamber. When he came down he stood still, watching Steve and listening to him. He put one hoof on a plank, then quickly took it off. He tried the other hoof and this one remained planted on the plank. A few seconds more and the second hoof had joined it. And thus he stood, making no sound, two hind feet on sand, two forefeet on wood. He listened to the rhythm of the boy’s voice and inched forward carefully. Then he stopped again, undecided.

When he finally went down the planks, it was with an abruptness that shook the boat. There was a lurching of his great body, the hard thud of all four hoofs on wood planking, and then a restless shifting of his weight once he was aboard.

Fortunately the
Sea Queen
was a sturdy vessel and she easily withstood the stallion’s constant movement. Steve stayed close to Flame’s head, talking to him, comforting him. The sides of the launch were not very high, and Flame could have jumped onto the sandy floor. But he didn’t. He knew Steve wanted him in the boat and for the moment he was willing to stay there. He had no room to turn, he could hardly move. Finally he quieted and looked inquisitively at the wheel and the glistening brass objects behind Steve.

Steve backed up to the wheel then and Flame, taking a cautious step forward, followed. Now very curious and unafraid, he thrust his small head beneath the wooden overhang. Seeing this, Steve realized that he would be able to take Flame in the launch, but that it would be a hazardous trip for the first few hundred
yards. He’d have all he could do to guide the boat safely through the submerged coral rock, much less have time to watch his horse.

Was he actually considering taking Flame from Azul Island? Even if they were successful in reaching Cuba, what about the still greater risks they’d be taking at the track? Jay knew nothing of the rules and regulations governing the running of a race of this magnitude, and neither did he! What would he say when the officials asked him where he and his horse were from?
The Windward Islands of the Caribbean Sea?
Would that satisfy them? Would they accept such a vague answer and allow him to race Flame? Just because the poster had said that the International Race was open to the world? Of course not! In the end they’d make him divulge everything and Flame might even be taken from him!

“Come on, Flame,” he said. “We’re going back
to stay
.” He stepped out of the launch and his horse followed him eagerly, glad to be returning to Blue Valley.

Steve moved away from the stove where he had been cooking his evening meal. Flame and the mares were drinking at the pool below. For a long while Steve stood watching them, the skin drawn tight on his angular face. He wasn’t going to race Flame at the risk of losing him! He didn’t care what he had told Jay. He had changed his mind … and Jay couldn’t make him do anything he didn’t
want
to do. Hadn’t Jay said so, time and time again?