Tight Rein (12 page)

“L
AST ONE DRESSED
is a rotten egg!” Stevie challenged the cabin full of girls. She yanked her T-shirt over her head. The sun was streaming through the windows and screen door, and the wooden floor was smooth and cold under her feet. Their first full day at Moose Hill Riding Camp had dawned.

“Too late,” said Elsa, one of the six other girls sharing their cabin. “I’m already dressed!” She pulled the top of her sleeping bag over the pillow on her bunk.

“I didn’t say the first one dressed won a prize,” Stevie objected. “I said the last one—besides, you’ve got the
alarm clock, Elsa. Of course you’re the first one ready.” She grinned, remembering how, during their first trip to Moose Hill, she and the rest of had all disliked Elsa. Now the other girl was a good friend.

“I’ve got the alarm clock, and I’m naturally efficient and organized,” Elsa retorted with a friendly grin.

Carole was pulling her hair into a ponytail. “No one ever called Stevie efficient,” she said.

“I don’t know about that,” Stevie began to argue, but stopped when she saw how fast the others were dressing. She pulled on her socks. “Where’re my tennis shoes? I can’t find them.”

“Didn’t you wear them yesterday?” Lisa asked. “They should be under your bunk.”

A loud, clear bell rang across the camp. “Breakfast!” cried one of the other girls. Elsa and the others left the cabin. “Looks like you’re the rotten egg, Stevie!” one of them called back over her shoulder.

Stevie laughed. “I guess I should have known better than to issue that kind of challenge before I found all my clothes.”

Carole and Lisa helped Stevie look under the bunks. Lisa looked under Stevie’s sleeping bag, too, and Carole checked behind the door.

“I didn’t wear them yesterday. I had my cowboy boots
on all day,” Stevie said. “After all, we were unloading the horses and putting them in the stable.”

Lisa nodded. It was important to wear sturdy shoes around horses, in case they stepped on your feet.

“Just put your boots on now,” Carole suggested.

“But I really wanted my tennis shoes for breakfast,” Stevie said. She rummaged through her duffel bag. “Here they are! In the outside pocket. I don’t remember putting them there.”

Lisa sat down on her bunk to wait for Stevie. “After all that happened last week, I still can hardly believe we’re here,” she said. “I’m excited about everything Prancer and I can learn this week—with your help, of course,” she added thoughtfully. “One of the things I learned last week is how much like sisters the three of us are—and how lucky I am to have two such good friends.”

“Just tell us if we get out of hand,” Carole said softly. “We want the good parts of being sisters, but not the bad parts.”

Lisa nodded. She was glad she wasn’t feeling jealous of Carole anymore. She was even gladder that Carole understood. “I feel so lucky,” she repeated.

Stevie tied her right shoe in a double knot and reached for her left. “I feel even luckier,” she said,
thrusting her foot into the shoe. “Without you two I’d—
Ayahhhh!
” She yanked her foot back out. “Ayahh!
Jelly!
That creep put jelly in my shoe!” She waved her foot in the air. Purple glop dripped from her toes. “I’ll kill him!”

Lisa and Carole fell over on the bunks, laughing.

“It’s not funny,” Stevie said. “It’s completely disgusting. I am so totally grossed out.” She stomped out to the porch and shook her shoe over the railing.

“Stevie,” Lisa called after her, “you left purple footprints.”

“Foodprints,” Carole said, and they howled.

A big blob of jelly fell out of Stevie’s shoe onto the weeds in front of the cabin. Stevie lifted the tongue of her shoe and peered inside. “There’s something jammed in the toe,” she announced, coming back to the door. When she saw the purple prints on the floor she started to laugh, too. She removed her jelly-smeared sock and came inside.

“So disgusting,” she said, shaking her head. She sat down next to Lisa and pulled the object out of the toe.

“It’s a Baggie,” Lisa said.

“With jelly all over it, and a note inside,” Stevie said, nodding. “This better be good.” She gingerly opened the little plastic bag and pulled out a piece of paper.

“It’s from Chad,” she announced.

Carole sat up. “What a surprise.”

Stevie smoothed the paper out and read, “ ‘Dear Stevie, I know your horse wasn’t sick. Your friends were faking all the way. Tell Carole I know garden dirt when I see it. But you shouldn’t have had to miss camp, and anyway, I wanted to have a week without you bugging me. I promise not to use Super Glue again. What do you think of the jelly?’ ”

Lisa peeked over Stevie’s shoulder. “It’s signed ‘Love, Chad.’ ”

“Oh, gag,” Stevie said. “As soon as I get home, I’m going to kill him.”

“He knew!” Carole shrieked. “He knew we were faking!” She couldn’t believe it.

“What does he mean by garden dirt?” Stevie asked.

Carole and Lisa looked at each other. “Oh,” Lisa said. “We smeared some into Belle’s coat, to make it look dull.”

“Unhealthy,” Carole added. She looked guiltily at Stevie. “It brushed right out.”

Stevie buried her head in her hands. “I can’t believe he knew.”

“If he knew, then why did he confess?” Lisa asked.

“It says right in the note,” Carole answered. “He wanted Stevie to be able to go to camp. He’s grounded now. He took a punishment for Stevie.”

They looked at one another in silence. “That’s really noble,” Lisa said.

“Oh, double gag, it is not,” Stevie said as she swiped at her jelly-covered foot with a tissue. “He’s got a whole week now to sneak through my room. I bet he finds my diary and has it published in
The Willow Creek Gazette
. Plus, it’s not like he didn’t deserve to be punished. And he put jelly in my shoes!”

Lisa looked at the note again. “He really cares about you,” she said. “I bet you really care about him, too.”

“Yuck,” Stevie said. She threw her tennis shoe on the floor in disgust and searched through her bag for a clean sock. She found one and put it on.

“So who really believed our plan?” Carole asked. They thought for a moment.

“No one,” Stevie said at last. “I didn’t, Mrs. Reg didn’t, my parents didn’t, and Chad didn’t.”

“But everyone pretended they did.”

Stevie grinned. “Slick, wasn’t it? And so it worked, and here I am, at Moose Hill, with Belle and the two of you!”

“And Phil,” Lisa added. “And if we’re going to get any breakfast at all, we’ve got to run.”

“Phil! I forgot all about him!” Stevie tore her other shoe off and yanked her cowboy boots on. “Let’s go!” She ran out the door. The others followed, laughing.

“I bet you do care about Chad,” Lisa persisted as they jogged up the hill toward the dining hall. “I bet you do.”

Stevie looked at her in amazement. “Of course I do! He’s my brother!”

Carole laughed and shook her head. “I can’t believe he knew all along,” she said. “I guess I don’t understand this sibling stuff at all.”

B
ONNIE
B
RYANT
is the author of more than a hundred books about horses, including The Saddle Club series, Saddle Club Super Editions, the Pony Tails series, and Pine Hollow, which follows the Saddle Club girls into their teens. She has also written novels and movie novelizations under her married name, B. B. Hiller.

Ms. Bryant began writing The Saddle Club in 1986. Although she had done some riding before that, she intensified her studies then and found herself learning right along with her characters Stevie, Carole, and Lisa. She claims that they are all much better riders than she is.

Ms. Bryant was born and raised in New York City. She still lives there, in Greenwich Village, with her two sons.