The Island Stallion Races (20 page)

Steve had Flame all the way around now, facing the backstretch again. “Good boy,” he said. “Slow and easy now. We have lots and lots of time.” He wanted to wait until the other horses were in their starting stalls, out of the way, making it easier for him to take Flame down to the gate.

“Number Eight,” the announcer continued, “is Mister Tim from Ireland. Number Nine is …”

There was a pause and for an instant Steve stopped talking to his horse.
Here it comes
, he thought.
For the first time on any track. If they only knew … if they only knew!

“Number Nine,” the announcer repeated, “is Flame from the Windward Islands. He’s been excused
from the post parade and can be seen on the far turn. The horses are now in the hands of the starter, ladies and gentlemen, with one minute before post time.”

Only the distant rumble of the tremendous crowd could be heard then. Suddenly above the roar Steve heard Jay’s high-pitched voice calling him and then he saw the little man running across the track’s infield. He had never seen Jay’s legs move so fast before.

Nearing the rail, Jay shouted, “Go back and race, Steve.
Hurry!
” He waved his cane at them, and Flame, seeing it, shied across the track.

“Put your cane down,” Steve called angrily. “I want to wait until the others are in the gate. It’s the only …”

“I don’t care what you’ve planned,” Jay interrupted. “Don’t keep them waiting a minute. Every second counts now. It’s terribly important. Hurry, Steve, hurry!”

Steve got Flame over to the rail, and only then was he near enough to take a good look at Jay’s face. First he was aware of nothing but a deep reddish color that distorted every feature. Then before his eyes Jay’s face became nothing but a nebulous fiery swirl which spoke to him, the voice matching the terror that was in the blurred image. “You must hurry or I’ll be left behind….”

Steve was already turning Flame, and as he rode him away Jay’s thought message reached him, as clear and distinct as his spoken words had been.

“I’ve heard from Flick. Something has happened, and the others are returning to the ship today. We’re leaving, and if I shouldn’t get back in time …”

The message faded, and Steve heard only the
increased pounding of Flame’s hoofs as he urged him faster and faster toward the starting gate. Then suddenly Jay’s thought message came again, fainter this time.
“I won’t leave you here alone, Steve, but you must hurry, hurry, hurry….”

Steve leaned forward as his horse went into the turn. “Run, Flame, run!” he called, his own words echoing the urgency of Jay’s message. He didn’t want to be left behind, either!

Alongside the starting gate and just off the track, the official starter stood on a high platform watching the red horse come around the far turn. The man’s heavy eyebrows swept upward in astonishment and then he shook his head. His voice was awesome and threatening as he called to a member of his ground crew, “Bert, go meet that fool rider! Slow him down!”

The starter turned back to the gate and to his immediate problem of quieting the horses which were already inside the stalls. The padded doors were being closed behind Gusto but the big brown gelding was trying to back out.

“Straighten his head, Cellini. Keep him in there,” he barked through his amplifier to Gusto’s rider.

The Italian jockey shouted back at him but the starter couldn’t understand a word since Cellini spoke his native tongue. The starter turned his attention to the Number Five horse, the gray from France who was backjumping in back of the gate, refusing to go into the narrow alleyway that was his stall.

“Get that Tout de Suite horse inside, Joe,” he rasped at another of his ground crew, “but don’t upset him. Easy, now.”

The French jockey was screaming something too, but as with Cellini the starter couldn’t understand a word. He shrugged his shoulders in a gesture of helplessness, and wished that he had never taken this job of starting such a race. Back in the States he could keep jockeys in line, but not these jibbering riders who were supposed to understand and speak English, and didn’t!

The jockey on El Chico was making as much noise as the rest of them and, of course, was speaking
his
language. The fellow up on Bismarck, the German horse, was the only quiet one in the bunch, and that included the two jocks from the States. But at least he could understand those two.

Braddish up on Kingfisher was screaming, “No chance! No chance!”

Of course there was no chance of his opening the gate yet. He had no intention of sending them off without that Number Nine horse. “Quiet!” he bellowed. “
I’ll
do the talking!”

Anxiously the starter turned to see what was holding up Number Nine. The red horse had been brought to a stop by his rider a short distance away, and was now rearing high on his hind legs. The sight sickened the starter. No wonder Bert wasn’t going any closer! The crewman, his arms raised high, stood in the middle of the track a good twenty feet away from the horse.

As if he didn’t have enough trouble without
this
! the starter thought. He fingered the button that would cut the current from the magnets holding the front doors of the gate shut. All he had to do was to touch it and the race would be on without Number Nine.

He realized that the great stands were suddenly
quiet, so he was not alone in his amazement that the red horse should be here at all. Of course, that animal couldn’t be what he looked like … a wild, unbroken stallion. Not here in such a race. He must be just part of the show, and a very spectacular show it had been with the field parading in the flag colors of their respective countries. But the starter was very tired of all these preliminaries. He wanted to send the horses off, as he’d been paid to do, and then go home.

“Bring that Number Nine horse down, Bert,” the starter barked through the amplifier. “Don’t be afraid of him.” He had decided not to send the field off without the red horse. After all, difficult as the job might be, he had his reputation to maintain.

The more the starter looked at the red horse the more convinced he became that the animal was part of the show. A very beautiful horse, with fine classic features … too fine to be a race horse, really. He wore nothing but a rope hackamore with two long golden tassels hanging from it. His rider was sitting bareback and wore no silks, just T-shirt and jeans. Strange, very strange indeed. But the starter was not one to question what went on so long as there was no trouble at the gate. There was no doubt that this horse was being brought under control by his rider. However, he would like to have seen a bit in the stallion’s mouth. He wished, too, that the jock would bring him down to the gate. Bert, apparently, wasn’t going any closer in spite of his orders. He’d settle with Bert later.

Impatiently, the starter turned to one of the two red-coated outriders who had led the post parade before turning over the field to him and his crew. The nearer
outrider was just beyond the gate, waiting to catch any runaway. The starter thought that he might just tell him to get that red horse down to the gate. However, he didn’t have very much confidence in these track employees. Oh, the outriders tried hard enough and he supposed they had courage. But he doubted that they had the true
skill
to help out if trouble really started. It took a good horseman with many years of experience to stop a horse that was superior in speed to his own. Now back in the States he wouldn’t have hesitated a moment to order an outrider after that red horse. He finally decided that if he was to get this race off at all, he’d better not hesitate here, either. Take a chance on the track’s outrider. It was better than waiting any longer. He signaled to the man to bring the red horse down.

The starter watched the outrider go past the gate, eager enough but taking his horse along much too fast. He barked through the amplifier for him to slow down, and then finally to stop altogether.

The starter’s bushy eyebrows had drawn together in dismay. He had seen something unexpected in the red horse, a wild, trembling eagerness to fight that hadn’t been there before. “Forget him,” he told the outrider, nervously. “Get your horse back and leave him alone.”

When the outrider was safely away, the starter turned to the red horse again. He called to the hunched figure on the horse’s back, “I’m sending them off! Bring your horse down, if you’re going with them!” He used his most authoritative tone.

The starter watched the horse take a few steps forward. It was amazing enough that such a fractious
animal was here at all, and more incredulous that his rider seemed to have him under some kind of control. The starter decided that he might get the field off without trouble if he put the red horse in the far end stall with three cages between him and the others.

As the red horse neared the gate, the starter could make out the jagged scars on his body. He took hold of his amplifier, clenching it hard. It couldn’t be, of course! But where else would a horse get such scars but in battle with other stallions?

“Take that Number Nine horse to the stall at the very end!” he shouted to the rider. “Don’t get him near the others!” His hand moved to the button that would open the stall doors. All he wanted to do was to start this race and catch the next plane home.

As Steve let the wet lines slip another inch between his fingers, and Flame approached the gate, he tried to keep the stallion’s attention on the barrier, telling him that the narrow alleyway before them was no different from the passageways on Azul Island.

Flame suddenly stopped, fearful, Steve thought, of the wire-mesh door at the front of the stall. He pawed at the criss-crossed shadow it made on the track in back of the gate. Steve let him alone, glad that it was the mesh door that held Flame’s interest and
not
the other horses. If he could only get him into the starting gate and then come out running …

A heavy silence had descended upon the stands and the track.

“It’s only a shadow, Flame. See how that man walks right through it. But he won’t come close to you. He won’t lead you into the stall as he’s done with the
others. Don’t look at him, Flame. Look only at the shadow, then at the stall. That’s it. Go ahead now.”

Flame chose to jump over the criss-crossed pattern rather than walk through it. His leap took him into the stall, and he stopped abruptly, startled by the wire-mesh door in front of him.

Steve comforted Flame as best he could, but actually he welcomed the close confines of the cage for, like the shadow, it alone now held the stallion’s attention. And that was better than Flame’s becoming aware of the horses in the stalls to his left.

He urged Flame a little closer to the wire door, and the stallion took a step forward, his head extended toward the screen, his nostrils flared and sniffing.

Suddenly from directly behind them came the heavy thump of the cage’s back door being closed. Flame panicked at the loud noise. He reared and flung himself sideways against the padded stall. As he came down his forelegs struck the front door which gave easily as it was supposed to do in such emergencies. Startled by his easily won freedom, Flame reared again just as the starting bell rang and the other stall doors sprang open. From their cages emerged the famed horses of the world! The International had begun!

Steve’s every reflex was committed to keeping his seat as Flame twisted in midair, turning toward the sudden uproar on his left. When the stallion came down, Steve had urgent need for the bitless bridle. He pulled the reins hard, trying to straighten Flame’s head and divert his attention from the onrushing field.

The horses swept past in the shape of a flying wedge, those late in breaking from the gate to the rear and jamming against each other while their jockeys screamed for racing room.

For a fraction of a second Flame stood flat-footed, his startled eyes following the tumultuous scene. He was aware of the pressure of hands and legs upon his body asking him to turn away, but above everything else he felt a mounting eagerness to do battle with those of his kind. He bolted after them, his shrill clarion call rising above the pound of many hoofs.

He did not rush headlong down the track. Instead his strides, while swift, were light and cautious. He continued
screaming while waiting for one of the horses beyond to turn and accept his challenge. But they drew farther and farther away from him and he had to lengthen his strides. This caused his fury to mount still more, for he would have preferred that the fight be brought to him.

Steve knew that Flame had singled out the trailing gray horse to run down. He exerted more pressure, seeking to control his horse again. But Flame’s ears remained flat against his head, and there was no change in the direction his long strides were taking him.

The stands began to slip by on their far right, but Steve was not aware of the roaring crowd. Only the trailing gray horse held his attention as he sought to prevent Flame’s terrible onslaught of hoofs and teeth. His hands moved along the lines, constantly asking Flame to turn away. But the red stallion only leveled out still more.

The gray horse did not drop back as quickly as Steve had thought he would. In Blue Valley there was no horse to equal Flame’s swiftness, but here it was different. For generations these horses had been bred for speed alone.

Steve sat back, not wanting to help Flame in his chase to run down the gray. They swept beneath the finish wire for the first time, with a mile of the race to go. Steve’s hands and legs exerted more pressure on Flame, demanding now rather than asking. He had to get Flame to the middle of the track. Perhaps with no horse directly before him he would race!

But Flame knew no command but the one that came most inherently to him … to fight with teeth and
hoofs, to kill or be killed! His strides came swifter and now he could almost reach his chosen opponent.

Steve mentally urged the gray on, at the same time trying desperately, with hands and legs, to break down the barrier of savagery that kept him from reaching Flame with his commands. He felt that if he were given just one slight opening he’d be able to control his horse again. He was certain that the bedlam at the start had so alarmed Flame that his horse wasn’t even aware that he, Steve, was on his back!