That made Ned look happier. “True. Do you think you can figure it out that quickly?”
“So far the most obvious theory is that this might be a straightforward case of envy-based petty sabotage.” I shrugged. “How tricky could it be?”
I yawned as I pulled my car into the show’s parking lot. It was early—so early that I found a parking spot pretty close to the gate. Spotting a familiar car a few spots down, I pulled out my cell phone and called Ned.
“Are you here?” his cheerful voice asked after just a couple of rings. He’s definitely a morning person.
“Just got here,” I replied as I climbed out of my car. “Where are you?”
“At the barn with Payton. Mom and Dad insisted I drive her over and not let her out of my sight. They’re still pretty freaked out about the whole situation.”
“I know.” I pocketed my keys. “That’s another good reason to solve this mystery as quickly as possible.”
“Yeah. Are Bess and George with you?”
“They’re meeting us here later. They didn’t see the point of getting up quite this early.” I glanced around again at the nearly empty parking lot. “They figured nobody would be around to question at the crack of dawn. And I didn’t want to tell them why I was in such a hurry.”
He chuckled. “Got it. So what’s the plan?”
“You stick with Payton,” I said. “I talk to some other people, start figuring out a suspect list. I’ll call or text if I find anything interesting.”
After we hung up, I headed for the entrance gate. Halfway there, I heard someone calling my name. It was Annie Molina, the local activist. She was rushing toward me, her full, flowing skirt billowing out around her legs and her round face cracked into a broad smile. Her PAN cohorts from yesterday were nowhere in sight. Maybe they were sleeping in, just like Bess and George.
“Nancy Drew!” she exclaimed. “It is Nancy Drew, right? Carson Drew’s daughter, the one who’s always getting written up in the papers for solving crimes and such?” She tittered, pushing aside a lock of curly brown hair as the breeze tossed it into her face.
“Yes, that’s me. It’s Annie, right?”
“Yes!” Annie looked thrilled that I’d recognized her. “I just wanted to say hello, and to tell you a few things you might not know about horse shows like this one.”
Uh-oh. Here it came.
“I’m sorry,” I said quickly. “I really need to—”
“These horses are nothing but slaves!” Annie exclaimed dramatically. She paused and waited for my reaction.
“I see,” I answered quickly and dodged around her, heading for the entrance. “Well, thanks for the info. We’ll catch up later.”
“Wait!” she cried.
But I didn’t. I made a break for the gate, easily leaving her behind.
Once inside, I headed toward the barn where Payton’s horses were stabled. Halfway there, I spotted Dana. She was riding a large chestnut gelding with four white stockings. I leaned on the rail to watch.
This was the first time I’d seen Dana on a horse, and I was impressed. She might come across as tense and abrupt on the ground. But all that disappeared in the saddle. She looked like a fluid part of her mount. There was a jump set up in the middle of the ring, consisting of some bright-yellow-striped rails with a planter full of flowers underneath. The horse was eyeing the obstacle nervously. Every time he got near it he spooked, jumping to the side and speeding up.
Dana didn’t react except to bring the horse back around. Again and again, until the horse was barely flicking an ear at the jump. Finally she turned him and trotted directly toward the obstacle. The horse’s ears pricked forward with alarm, and I held my breath, certain that he was going to put on the brakes.
“Get up,” Dana urged, her voice stern but calm. At the same time, she gave the horse a tap behind her leg with the crop she was holding.
The horse lurched forward, speeding up and zigzagging a bit. But Dana kept him straight with her legs and the reins. With one last kick, she sent him leaping over the jump. He cleared it by about two feet and landed snorting and with his head straight up in the air. But Dana calmly circled around and came again. By the fifth or sixth time, the horse was jumping calmly.
As she brought the gelding to a walk and gave him a pat, Dana noticed me standing there. “Hello,” she said, riding over. “You’re Payton’s friend. Uh, Lucy, right?”
“Nancy,” I corrected. I smiled and nodded at the horse. “Looks like you were making him face his fears.”
Dana chuckled and stroked the gelding’s sweaty neck. “He’s a good jumper, but a huge chicken about certain types of things. All he needs is a little patience and he gets over it. I just wanted to make sure it was now, with me, and not in the show ring with his twelve-year-old owner.”
I nodded, a little surprised. The Dana sitting in front of me right now seemed like a whole different kind of person from the one I’d seen with Payton yesterday. But I pushed the thought aside.
“Listen, I know you’re probably really busy,” I said, “but I was hoping to talk to you about something. Do you have a second?”
“Just barely.” Dana checked her watch. Then she dismounted and led the horse out through the gate nearby. “I need to get this guy back to the barn, then meet a student at a different ring for a lesson. What did you want to talk about?”
I hesitated, not sure what to say. My usual method was to treat everyone as a suspect until the evidence indicated I should do otherwise. Dana was Payton’s longtime trusted trainer. But did that mean she was innocent?
“It’s about Payton,” I said, deciding to keep it vague—just in case. “I’m, um, worried about her.”
Dana stopped fiddling with the horse’s stirrups and turned to face me. “Oh?” She peered into my face. “That’s funny. I’m pretty worried about Payton myself.”
“Really? How so?”
Dana unsnapped her riding helmet and pulled it off, running a hand through her short hair. “She’s not herself lately. I’m afraid she’s losing her competitive edge.”
“You mean because of what happened yesterday?” I asked. “The accusation that she drugs her horses?”
Dana blinked. “Actually, I almost forgot about that. No, this has been going on since way before yesterday. At least a month, maybe longer. It’s like somewhere along the way, she just lost it.”
“What do you mean?”
Dana shrugged, some of that impatience I’d seen yesterday creeping back into her expression. “Hard to describe. Just that these past few shows, it’s like she’s not that into it anymore.” The horse shifted his weight, and Dana glanced over at him.
“Okay.” I could tell the trainer was getting antsy. “So is there any chance this drug thing isn’t the first time someone tried to psych her out, started a rumor or whatever? Could there be other incidents she didn’t tell you about?”
“I suppose it’s possible. Payton’s a teenager, after all, and everyone knows they aren’t always super forthcoming.” Dana glanced at me, then grimaced as she belatedly remembered—or noticed—my age. “No offense.”
“None taken. Do you know if Payton has any enemies? Like competitors who might want to throw her off her game or something?”
“Funny you should ask.” Dana frowned. “For such a sweet, hardworking girl, Payton has managed to make a couple of enemies.”
I held my breath. Now we were getting somewhere! I wondered if one of the enemies Dana was alluding to could be Lenny Hood. The more I thought about the comments he’d made yesterday, the more troubling they seemed.
“Who are—,” I began.
The shrill buzz of Dana’s phone cut me off. She whipped the phone to her ear. “Dana here,” she said.
She listened to whoever was on the other end for a moment. Her expression went grim. When she hung up, she didn’t keep me in suspense about why.
“Well, that does it,” she said. “Midnight just flunked his drug test!”
CHAPTER FIVE
Test Case
“WHAT?” I EXCLAIMED. “WHAT DO YOU MEAN, he flunked?”
Dana dropped her phone into her pocket. “What do you think I mean?” she snapped. “They found a forbidden substance when they tested his urine. Theobromine, to be specific.”
“Theobromine? What’s that?”
“What do I look like, a chemist?” Dana said. “All I know is it’s an ingredient in chocolate, and tea, and maybe some other stuff like that.”
I wrinkled my nose in confusion. “I don’t get it. Who would give chocolate or tea to a horse, and why? And even if they did, who would even know something like that was against the rules?”
Dana’s frown deepened. “Anyone who shows seriously on the A circuit, that’s who. Or they should, anyway. I know for a fact that Payton knew. Someone she knows at another barn got in big trouble for letting her horse drink cola at shows. Similar kind of thing.”
I almost smiled at the image of a horse drinking cola. But this wasn’t the time.
“How does the testing work?” I asked. “I mean, did someone just go grab Midnight out of his stall just now and—”
“Not just now.” Dana stared at me as if I were the stupidest person on the face of the earth. Or at least at this horse show. “He was chosen for testing at a show a few weeks back. Takes a while to get the results, and if it’s negative you never hear anything. But if it’s positive . . .”
“I see.” This put a new spin on the case. If Payton was being framed or psyched out, it clearly hadn’t started at this particular show. “Could someone have slipped him something with theobromine in it, then set him up to be tested that day?” I asked. “Like the same person who gave the stewards that anonymous tip, for instance?”
“It doesn’t work that way.” Dana shook her head. “The testing is totally random. There’s no way to tell which horses will be pulled at any given show.”
I could feel my theories deflating in the face of the facts Dana was telling me. “All right, then who does the actual testing? Any chance there was some hanky-panky there?”
“No,” Dana replied flatly. “The testers are mostly vets or other outside people, and they send the samples to an independent lab. Everything’s carefully monitored by the USEF—that’s the national governing body of these shows. There’s about a one in a zillion chance of hanky-panky in the process.”
“So you’re saying it’s got to be true,” I said. “Midnight really did have theobromine in his system. How did it get there?”
“That’s what I’d like to know.” Dana sounded testy. “Apparently the level of theobromine they found is borderline, so there’s going to have to be some kind of official ruling made about whether a suspension is warranted. Luckily, our records are clean, but . . .”
“You mean yours and Payton’s?”
“And Midnight’s, too.” Dana yanked her phone out of her pocket. “I need to talk to Payton about this. Now. Here, take him back to the barn.”
She tossed the chestnut gelding’s reins at me. I gulped. “Wait, I—”
It was too late. Dana was already stomping away, madly texting as she went. A moment later she disappeared around the corner of the nearest building.
I stared up at the horse, who suddenly seemed a lot taller than he had a second ago. Definitely a lot taller than those ponies from my long-ago lessons.
“Nice horsie?” I said uncertainly. “Um, good boy?”
I gave an experimental tug on the reins. The horse yanked his head up, almost ripping the reins out of my hands. He regarded me suspiciously, then took a step backward.
“Wait,” I said. “Don’t do that. Um . . .”
“Hi,” a friendly voice said behind me. “You’re Payton’s friend, right? Are you okay?”
It was one of the teens who had filled us in about Lenny Hood the day before. “Oh, hi,” I greeted her with relief. “Listen, Dana just left me with this horse, and I’m not sure what to do with it.”
The girl reached out to take the reins from me. “That’s Dana,” she said with a touch of fondness in her voice. “When she gets hyped up about something, she tends to forget that not everyone is there to be her servant.” She giggled. “One time my grandma came to one of my shows, and Dana wanted her to jog a horse so Dana could see if it was lame. My grandma’s seventy-six, uses a cane, and never touched an animal bigger than her Pekingese!”
I smiled. “So is Dana your trainer too?” That explained how the girl knew so much about Payton.
“Uh-huh. I’m Rachel, by the way.”
“Nancy. Thanks for rescuing me.” I gestured at the horse, who now stood placidly at the other end of the reins. “I think he was about to take off for the hills.”
Rachel giggled again. “No problem. See you later.”
She headed off with the horse in tow. My smile faded as my mind returned to what Dana had just told me. As if Ned’s parents and my anniversary plans weren’t enough, now I had an even more important reason to want to solve this case quickly. If I didn’t, and the horse show officials decided against Midnight, Payton could lose her chance to ride in front of the Olympic chef d’équipe tomorrow!
I pulled out my phone and called Ned. “Sorry, it looks like I might need a rain check on those anniversary plans after all.” I filled him in on the news about the drug test.
“Wow,” Ned said. “That’s serious business.”
“I know. So did Dana find Payton and tell her? What does she think?”
“I don’t know.” Ned sounded worried. “I was actually about to call you for two reasons. The first is that I lost track of Payton a few minutes ago.”
“What? But you promised your parents you’d stick with her.” I wasn’t really that worried about Payton’s physical safety while she was on the busy horse show grounds. But still, we’d promised.
“I know, but it’s really their fault,” Ned said. “My mom called me a little while ago, and I guess Payton must have wandered off while I was on the phone.”
I leaned against a handy fence post. “Okay. What’s the second reason you were going to call me?”
“Like I said, my mom called.” Ned sounded grim. “I guess she was feeling guilty about keeping all this from Payton’s parents. So she called them a little while ago.”
“Oh.” I couldn’t say I was surprised. Mrs. Nickerson wasn’t the type of person to be comfortable keeping secrets. Especially from one of her best friends. “How’d they take it? Were they freaked out?”
“Not exactly. They said it wasn’t the first time something like this has happened.”
“What?” I pressed the phone closer to my ear as several preteens wandered past me, chatting and laughing loudly. “What do you mean?”
“A similar note turned up at a show Payton rode in a couple of weeks ago,” Ned said. “It was tucked under the windshield wiper of her parents’ car after the show. Sounds like Payton’s dad was convinced it was just sour grapes from some competitor. He insisted everyone ignore it. Wouldn’t even let Payton tell Dana or anyone else at the barn.”
“Wow.” I took that in, adding it to the growing case file taking shape in my head. “So whoever’s trying to scare Payton either knows her well enough to know which car belongs to her family . . .”
“Or is a stalker type who follows her around so he or she can leave those notes in weird locations,” Ned finished. “Creepy.”
“Definitely. Which means this case just got a lot more serious.” I bit my lip. “We’d better get back to work. I want to find Dana again—she was about to tell me about Payton’s enemies when she rushed off.”
“Sounds like a plan. I’ll try to find Payton and let her know what’s going on.”
As I hung up the phone, it buzzed again. Checking the readout, I saw a text from Bess reading WE’RE HERE.
I texted back, and soon we met up near the entrance. “Those PAN freaks are back again today,” George said before I could say a word. “They practically acc
osted us on our way past.”
“Uh-huh.” I wasn’t interested in the protesters just then. “But listen, you guys will never believe what’s been happening around here. . . .”
Their eyes widened as I filled them in. When I finished, George let out a low whistle. “Do you really think someone could be stalking Payton?” she said. “But why?”
“And is it connected with Midnight’s drug results?” Bess added.
“That’s what we need to find out. I’m hoping Dana can help.” I sighed. “She started to tell me about how Payton has a few enemies, but that phone call interrupted and then she rushed off.”
“I can tell you one enemy,” George said. “That girl Jessica. If looks could kill, we would’ve witnessed a murder at least twice over just yesterday.”
“Yeah.” I agreed. “Jessica really seemed to have it out for Payton. But she’s even younger than Payton herself. I could see her leaving nasty notes, maybe. But would she really follow Payton back to Ned’s house to do it? And what about that drug test?”
“I don’t know,” Bess said. “But I know who else should be on the suspect list—that rude trainer we heard insulting Payton yesterday.”
“Lenny Hood.” I nodded. “I was thinking about him too. I definitely want to ask Dana about him.”
“So let’s find her and ask,” George said. “Where do you think she could be?”
“Last time I saw her, she was looking for Payton.” I shrugged. “Guess we should start by checking at the barn.”
We hurried across the show grounds, pausing at each riding ring we passed just long enough to ascertain that Payton wasn’t in any of them. She wasn’t at any of her horse’s stalls, either, or hanging out on the benches out front with the other kids from her barn.
The day before, Payton had shown us around the stabling area and pointed out the tack stall where all the saddles and other equipment were kept. When I glanced in, the place was deserted except for Rachel and a younger girl in riding clothes. They were huddled around one of the saddle racks in the corner, their voices loud and excited.