THROUGHOUT THE HOLIDAYS, Jess woke each morning with Diamond, Wally and the ancestral spirits on her mind. She couldn’t help it; the idea of them being spiritually linked somehow made Diamond’s death easier to accept.
When the sun rose she would slip on her old runners, toss some hay to Dodger and jog to Harry’s place. She loved helping out around the stables and eating Annie’s camp breakfasts. Annie was thrilled with the fresh asparagus. She steamed it gently, and served it on a plate of its own, deeming it too delicious to be chopped and stirred into an omelette. ‘Here, have some. It’s good for you,’ she said to Harry as she piled it onto his plate.
The day’s activities were always planned around the breakfast table. At one end Rosie, Grace and Jess would talk about their favourite horses and riding plans for the rest of the holidays. At the other end Harry would sneak his asparagus onto Luke’s plate when he thought Jess wasn’t looking. He discussed breeding programs, worming schedules and the price of hay with Luke and Tom.
Jess was happiest when she was down at the mares’ paddock playing with Wally. Sometimes, while the others were out trail-riding or schooling young horses, Jess would sit under the trees just watching Walkabout. When the little filly fell asleep, spread out in the sun, Jess would lie back and look at the sky through the canopy of the trees, thinking about spirits and listening to the earth.
At other times, Wally would badger her mother to play. And occasionally there were magical moments when curiosity got the better of her, and she would cautiously approach Jess with her nose outstretched and ears twitching. If Jess made eye contact with her, she would skitter away. But if Jess kept her eyes on the ground, the filly would come closer, sniffing the top of her head and nibbling at her ears.
Over the days and weeks, the two of them developed a friendship. Jess watched how the foals played with each other and tried to imitate them. She would walk past the filly, inviting her to follow. Initially Walkabout kept her distance, but gradually she came closer. Jess would change direction every now and then to make sure she had her attention.
This became a game, and eventually Jess could run around the paddock, ducking left and right with Wally trotting merrily behind her. As she grew bolder, the filly would initiate play, giving Jess a playful nip and looking at her with mischief in her eyes. She would shake her head up and down as though laughing, and gallop away.
Hours melted into days, and time in the mares’ paddock took on a dreamlike quality. There was never any sense of an afternoon passing but for the gnawing in Jess’s stomach when it was time to eat.
A few days before Christmas, Jess heard the ute bumping its way down the laneway. It was late in the afternoon, well after the usual feed time. She could see Lawson in the driver’s seat, but the passenger she did not know. She made herself busy, scrubbing at a water trough.
‘This lot are the best Biyanga has ever put on the ground,’ she heard Lawson say as he got out of the ute. The passenger side door opened and another man got out. They walked out into the paddock to inspect the foals.
‘I wasn’t expecting that mare to throw a coloured foal,’ the stranger said, as they approached Walkabout.
Wally’s owner?
The two men began to circle Walkabout and her mother, pushing them towards the corner of the paddock. As Walkabout skittered past, the man tossed a lasso around her neck. She reared against the rope, shook her head and fell heavily on her side. Lawson pounced on her and held her down, while the other man tightened the rope around her throat until her panicky squeals faded. The mare whinnied and paced nervously.
Jess wanted to run and scream at them, ‘She can’t breathe, you idiots.’ She stood helplessly at the trough, watching the filly’s eyes roll wildly in terror. Lawson knelt on Walkabout’s neck and the stranger ran his hands over her legs, laughing as she kicked out in protest.
‘She’s a feisty one, I’ll give her that,’ she heard Lawson say. He pulled something from his pocket and passed it to the other man.
Jess felt sick. What were they doing to her? She moved her head about, but all she could see was Walkabout’s legs kicking.
‘A bit of the right schooling will soon knock that out of her,’ the stranger replied. Then he removed the rope and let the filly struggle to her feet and race back to her frantic mother. The men stood there, hands on hips, talking and watching Walkabout as she whinnied and nuzzled at the mare.
Jess thought they would never leave. She could see a strip of raw skin swelling painfully around Wally’s neck where the rope had burned through her fur. There was skin off her shoulder too, where she had crashed so heavily to the ground. Jess longed to touch her, to soothe her and run some cool water over her burn, to let her know not all people were like that.
When the men finally got back in the ute and left the paddock, she quietly approached Walkabout. But the filly and her mother, still shell-shocked, put their ears back and walked away.
It wasn’t until later that day, when Jess caught a ride home with Harry, that she heard the terrible news. Lawson wanted to buy Walkabout.
‘He what? ’ Jess blurted out, unable to hide her horror.
‘Not much I can do about it, Jess,’ Harry said as he shifted gear. ‘She’s not my filly.’
‘Who is the owner, then?’
‘That was the owner you saw today. He sent the mare up here for stud. Now he doesn’t want the foal because it’s coloured.’
‘What’s wrong with her colour?’
‘He reckons she doesn’t look like a real stockhorse, being Appaloosa,’ said Harry dismissively. ‘Probably more to do with the mare’s papers, though,’ he mumbled. ‘If she was bred the way he reckons, she would never have thrown a coloured foal. Something amiss there.’ He put on the blinker and turned right down Jessica’s street. ‘That’s none of my business, though.’
‘What does Lawson want to do with her?’
‘He wants to train her for campdrafting. She has enormous athletic ability.’
Jess seethed. It was all wrong. Walkabout was such a free-spirited filly – she would clash awfully with someone like Lawson.
‘Why doesn’t he buy Billabong? He’s going to be a much bigger horse and he’d be much better suited.’
‘It doesn’t matter about the size,’ said Harry. ‘Some small horses are much quicker on their feet. The big ones can be a bit clumsy.’ He looked across at her. ‘You could probably buy her yourself if you could come up with the money.’
‘How much is he selling her for?’ asked Jess, running a quick calculation through her mind. She had two hundred and forty-six dollars in her savings account and she might get some money for Christmas.
‘Two grand. She’s got some impressive bloodlines – that’s if they’re for real.’ He pulled over outside Jess’s house.
‘What? Two thousand dollars?’ Jess’s heart sank. There was no way she could come up with that much money. ‘Why does it have to be Walkabout, Harry? There are seven other foals Lawson could choose from.’
Harry gave her a cuff on the head. ‘He can’t buy her until she’s six months old and can be weaned from her mother. So you’ll still have a few months before she goes.’
‘Thanks for the lift, Harry,’ she said glumly, stepping out and grabbing her bike off the back of his ute.
As Jess crawled into bed that night, she felt all the fresh new light that Walkabout had brought into her heart begin to fade. She stared out the open window at the stars that twinkled above the coachwood trees.
What can I do, Diamond?
I’m going to lose Walkabout too.