Chapter 14
“So, basically, you ran off in a strop without asking Tory anything about Cloud?” demanded Scarlett the next afternoon. Poppy was sitting, cross-legged, on the red and royal blue rug on her bedroom floor. Scarlett was sprawled on her bed, leafing through old editions of Poppy’s pony magazines. Charlie, who had been allowed in under the strict conditions that he only spoke when spoken to and didn’t breathe a word of their conversation to Caroline, was sitting on the wicker chair by the window playing on his DS. Magpie lay curled in a ball on the carpet, his substantial stomach illuminated by a shaft of sunlight.
“I know. I was an idiot, you don’t have to tell me,” groaned Poppy, who had felt slightly out of kilter since she’d woken up, the previous night’s dream refusing to fade from her mind’s eye. “The trouble is I’m not sure when I’ll next get a chance to talk to Tory. She probably won’t even want to see me after the way I stormed off yesterday. We’re never going to find out how she managed to catch Cloud.”
Scarlett had stopped listening. Her eye had been caught by an article in one of the magazines. “Look at this! How to be a Horse Whisperer,” she read. “It’s a whole feature on gaining the confidence of even the most nervous of horses.” Poppy jumped up and joined her on the bed and they pored over the article.
“What does it say then?” asked Charlie, glancing up from his DS. Magpie lifted his black and white face and looked at the two girls with interest.
“That a horse won’t trust you until he has confidence in you. That you’ve got to think about how he feels and the things he fears. Look, there are lots of tips...don’t make eye contact, turn your back to him so he gets curious and seeks your attention, talk or sing to him so he gets used to your voice. If he heard me singing he’d run for the hills. Mum says I’m tone deaf,” said Scarlett gloomily.
“What you need is some direct action. You’re not going to get Cloud to trust you by sitting in your bedroom talking about it,” said Charlie, ever the pragmatist.
“But we go to Granny’s tomorrow! We won’t be back until the day before term starts,” moaned Scarlett, who was not looking forward to the family’s annual pilgrimage to her grandparents’ draughty farmhouse in Wiltshire.
“Sorry Scarlett, but for once Charlie is right. I need to start if we stand any chance of catching Cloud before the drift. I’ll text you to let you know how we’re getting on. You’ll be back before you know it.”
Scarlett had been summoned home for tea and Poppy and Charlie walked with her back to the farm, taking a handful of carrots with them for Flynn and Blaze. Scarlett was subdued and for once it was down to Poppy to keep the conversation going.
“You know Scar, you won’t miss anything. It’s probably going to take weeks to get anywhere near Cloud, let alone catch him,” she told her glum-faced friend.
“I know. It’s just that I hate going to Granny’s. I miss Blaze heaps when we’re away and now I won’t be able to help you with Cloud. It’s so unfair!”
Poppy nodded sympathetically and gave Scarlett a brief hug. “I’ll text, I promise,” she said. “Come on, Charlie. We’d better get going.”
“You’ll need someone to go with you though, won’t you?” said her brother, his blue eyes turned hopefully towards hers as they walked across the sheep field to Riverdale.
Poppy sighed. “I suppose so. But you know the rules, little brother.”
“Yes, the rules. No talking, no moving, no making any noise, no breathing. I know, I’ll play dead, then I’m bound to stay out of trouble.”
“Ha ha, very funny. Shall we go tonight?” She paused. “What should we tell Caroline?”
“Leave that to me,” replied Charlie, who had the satisfied look of a man with a plan.
“Mum?” he said, tracking Caroline down in the kitchen where she was standing by the sink looking blankly out of the window. Poppy found her utter stillness unnerving but as Caroline turned to face them her face cleared and she smiled.
“Oh, there you are, you two. What have you been doing?”
“That’s what I wanted to tell you. We’ve been reading about badgers,” Charlie said, producing a book on British wildlife from behind his back with a flourish. “We’ve been looking at their habitat and how to spot signs that they have a sett nearby. What badger poo looks like and stuff like that,” he explained earnestly, his blue eyes fixed on Caroline’s. “We were wondering if we could go out into the woods after tea and see if we can find any. Badgers, that is, not badger poo. Although, of course, if you find the poo you’ll find the badgers.”
“Yes, I get the picture,” laughed Caroline. She thought for a moment. “Yes, I don’t see why not, as long as you take your phone Poppy, you don’t go too far and you’re back before it gets dark.”
Poppy looked at her brother with a mixture of astonishment and admiration. Six years old and totally unfazed at fabricating stories. How did he manage it?
They set off just after six o’clock, armed with binoculars, phone, camera and Charlie’s wildlife book.
“Hold on, I’ve just remembered something,” said Poppy. She darted into the tackroom next to Chester’s stable, emerging seconds later with a scoop of pony nuts in a bucket. “I’m sure Chester won’t mind. They are for his friend, after all,” she whispered.
“Shall we go to the little beach where we saw him before?” asked Charlie, who was bouncing along beside his sister. There was nothing Charlie loved more than direct action.
“Yes, I think that’s probably as good a place as any,” Poppy answered and they crossed the field in front of the house, climbed the fence and disappeared into the wood.
Twenty minutes later they arrived at the clearing. Recent rain had turned the meandering stream into a fast-flowing river, which whooshed noisily past them.
“Let’s put the bucket of nuts on the beach, go and hide behind that tree again and see if he comes,” said Poppy, feeling sick with nerves.
They crouched down behind the tree and waited. It was a windy evening and the branches sighed and creaked around them. The light was beginning to fade and as the sun set to the west it cast long shadows that rippled and danced across the woodland floor. Charlie grew fidgety. Poppy nudged him to be still.
“Sorry,” he whispered. “But I need the toilet.”
She sighed loudly and stood up. “Great. Look, go over there behind that bush. And try and be quiet about it, will you?”
When Charlie returned, a leaf sticking out of his hair, he sat down and started silently flicking through his book on wildlife. Every now and then he stopped, licked the pad of his index finger and held it up to the wind, nodding sagely. Poppy didn’t know whether to hug him or throttle him. Instead she fixed her eyes on the line of trees in front of them and stared so hard that the leaves dissolved into a blur of green. She checked the time on the glowing face of her phone.
It was just as she was beginning to lose hope of Cloud ever turning up when there was a crackle in the branches and a sliver of silver through the leaves. Poppy felt her heart pounding. Even Charlie had let his book fall to his lap and was staring intently ahead.
They both watched breathlessly as Cloud poked his nose out of the trees. He sniffed the air, looking this way and that. Satisfied there was nothing to harm him he stepped slowly out into the clearing. Poppy and Charlie looked at each other and smiled. Poppy held her finger to her lips and Charlie nodded. He was determined not to do anything that might scare the pony this time.
Cloud was thinner than Poppy remembered and his coat looked dull. As he walked forwards, stopping every few paces to sniff the air, she saw he wasn’t putting his full weight on his near hind leg. He hobbled over to the bucket, his neck stretched and his nostrils flared as he sniffed it. He was poised for flight and Poppy’s heart was racing. Perhaps the smell of the pony nuts was too much to bear, perhaps he smelt the lingering scent of his old friend Chester, but after a few moments he began to eat noisily until the last nut had gone before taking another few uneven steps for
ward and drinking from the river.
The branches behind the two watching children rustled and Cloud looked up. He gave a start when he saw two pairs of eyes staring back at him from the other side of the river and Poppy immediately lowered her eyes, motioning Charlie to do the same. She held her breath, expecting him to turn on a sixpence and flee, but the pony stood watching them warily for a minute or two before limping slowly back off into the woods.
“I’m worried about him. He was lame, did you notice? And did you see how thin he looked?” Poppy asked her brother as they trudged back home through the dusk.
“At least he didn’t run away as soon as he saw us, like he did before. So that’s good, isn’t it?” countered Charlie.
It was a start, thought Poppy as she settled down to sleep that night, the dead weight of a gently snoring Magpie pinning her feet down. But they still had a long way to go.