WE ENTERED A LARGE CHAMBER where sunlight filtered through a vent in the ceiling.
A grizzled old gopher faced us. His huge front teeth made him look ferocious, but he spoke kindly, in short, clipped sentences.
“Howdy! I’d know you two anywhere. Detective Basil, Doc Dawson. I’m a professional digger. Dug those fancy tunnels myself. Straight, slanty, up, down, any which way. Reckon you aim to stop the stampede. Awful racket up there. I peeked. Ponies in trouble. Longfellow’s worried about Verdi, right?”
“Right. And I need help in a hurry.”
“You bet. Feel the ground shake? Means the ponies are near. Must find place for you to surface. Time’s a-wastin’. My name’s Augustus. To save time, call me Gus. C’mon!”
He burrowed along at fantastic speed. Dirt flew all around us, but not one speck touched us. His front teeth picked at the earth, his front claws shovelled it, his hind claws cast it behind him. At each vent he’d throw loose soil up to the surface to clear the tunnel.
The good-hearted gopher halted. “This is it, chums. On your own now. Best of luck!”
As Gus descended, we ascended, surfacing fifty yards to the left of the panting ponies.
They were pressed so closely together that their bodies formed a solid wall.
Racing toward them, we scurried up a pony’s flank, then skipped ahead on other ponies’ backs to reach Verdi, front row center.
“Dawson, stand at his left ear. I’ll take his right. We’re about to become opera stars. Pony Verdi loves opera written by Man Verdi. If music hath charms to soothe the savage breast, it should certainly soothe a stampeding pony.”
“Basil, you’re a genius! What a perfect rescue plan! Verdi’s sure to respond, to slow his steps, little by little. The rest, opera-lovers all, will do the same. Shall we begin with the aria La Donna Mobile, from the opera Rigoletto? Downbeat, Maestro, please!”
So commenced one of my strangest experiences, one I shall never forget.
Singing one’s heart out while clinging to a galloping pony’s ear is far from easy. It’s downright dangerous, especially when one reaches for high notes. (I happen to be a tenor.) We rocked and rolled like sailors in a stormy sea!
But the Rescue Riders, Brave Basil and Daring Dawson, sang gallantly on! Magical melodies from Aida, La Traviata, Il Trovatore, and other operas composed by Verdi. The musician, then in his eighties, lived in Milan, Italy. Had he heard us singing his works that day, he would have been proud.
Our reward came when someone began singing along with us. It was the pony Verdi, singing softly so as not to drown us out. We patted his mane to encourage him. Soon his friends Rossini and Bellini joined in, then Puccini and Spontini and Cherubini, and then all the rest of the ponies.
The more they sang, the more slowly they moved, going from a gallop to a canter to a trot to a jog to a standstill.
The stampede was over!