CHAPTER EIGHT

STOGIE IS FREE.

Lily is standing right in front of him. He could hurt her if he wanted. He could run away.

But Stogie just stands there. His head is down, level with his back. His ears go out to the sides, and he has worried wrinkles around his eyes. After a second he shakes himself.

That’s good, Lily thinks. Horses shake themselves after rolling, or when the saddle is taken off, to settle back into their skins. It’s a sign of good health.

But Stogie shakes carefully, as if it hurts, and then he hangs his head again.

“Poor guy!” Lily says. “How long were you stuck here?” A long time. The path under Stogie’s feet is black and beaten with hoof marks. “Your neck must hurt,” Lily says. “Let’s get you home.”

She pushes back through the saplings and trips on the fallen whip. When she bends to pick it up, she sees a huge horse track, the size of a dinner plate. “Oh!” The Girls came this way, and now Lily sees other tracks. All the horses must have come this way, and Stogie followed them, until his halter caught on the branch.

Beware wants to smell Lily’s hands. She stops Lily from untying the lead rope, and she sniffs, sniffs, sniffs. All the while she gazes down the path at Stogie. Her eyes are wide and soft.

What is Beware thinking? What can she tell about Stogie by sniffing Lily’s hands? Can she smell his fear? Can she smell his sore neck?

“Let’s go,” Lily says finally. The sun is behind the hill now, and the shadows are long. Gran will be worried.

Stogie has started down the path. His steps seem loose and weak. Lily rides up behind him, not too close. She remembers now that she was supposed to get off Beware if Stogie was around. That way she wouldn’t get caught in a horse fight.

But Stogie pays no attention to Beware. He just shambles down the path. Lily passes under the halter, hanging on the branch. She reaches up for it. It’s still warm from Stogie’s head. She slings it over her shoulder, and the snap clinks in time to Beware’s steps.

Stogie shakes again. His matted mane flaps against his neck. Could anyone make Stogie’s mane look nice? Lily doesn’t think so. He’ll have to be shaved—

“But nobody can catch him!” Lily says out loud. It’s surprising to remember that, because she just touched Stogie. She just took his halter off, as if he were any other horse.

Now he is free again. He doesn’t even have a halter on. What will Gramp think about that? Lily wonders.

Stogie’s steps get quicker and stronger. He’s walking the stiffness out of his legs. He dips and raises his neck, stretching the stiffness out of that, too.

“Feel better?” Lily asks.

Stogie stops. He cranes his neck and looks over his shoulder at Lily and Beware. His eye seems brighter now. He looks more like himself.

“Hey, walk on!” Lily says. She holds the whip up to show Stogie. He just looks at her. Then he groans. He stretches his neck down, and up, and starts walking again.

Soon he’ll reach the bottom of the hill. The path crosses a brook there and widens out through a weedy meadow. When he gets there, Stogie will have plenty of room to turn and sniff Beware. Then the squealing and striking will begin. Before then, when she sees the brook, is when Lily should get off.

But Stogie sees the brook before Lily does. He swishes his long tail and starts trotting. Beware trots after him.

“No,” Lily says. “Whoa!” But Beware wants to be with Stogie. She pulls against the bit. The pony did that all the time, but Beware hardly ever does.

“Beware!” Lily says sternly. She sits firmly in the saddle, and she makes Beware stop. “That’s better,” she says, and she gets off.

Is this the right thing to do? It feels strange to take Beware’s bridle off while her saddle is still on, while she’s still a half mile from home. Lily looks ahead to Stogie, drinking from the brook. Now she’ll have two loose horses.

But that’s what Gramp said to do. “All right,” Lily mutters, and she slides the bridle over Beware’s ears.

Beware shakes herself, so hard the stirrups thump against her sides. She trots to the brook and pushes in beside Stogie. He lifts his head, and they touch noses.

Lily waits for the squeal, the strike, the kick. But Stogie just sighs. He pushes his head into the curve of Beware’s neck and rubs his face gently up and down, the way Beware sometimes rubs against Lily.

Beware lets Stogie rub for a minute. She mumbles her lips along his neck. Then she pulls away and puts her head down to drink.

Stogie starts to drink again, too. With every big swallow his ears twitch back and his throat makes a sound—gunk! gunk! gunk!

But Stogie can’t drink any more! He’s too hot, and he hasn’t drunk for a long time. Too much cold water will make him sick.

Lily hurries down to where Beware stands drinking. She reaches across Beware’s neck. Stogie is so close Lily can push him with her hand. “Stop!”

Stogie looks at her. He steps farther into the brook and puts his head down again.

Lily looks at the whip and the bridle in her hands. She could hit Stogie or throw the bridle at him. She could scare him out of the brook, and that would save him from getting sick.

But it seems wrong to scare Stogie now. Lily just touched him. Twice.

Stogie swallows again, and Lily lets the whip fall. She steps into the brook, straight to Stogie’s head, and loops the rope around his neck. “No, Stogie,” she says, and she pulls his head up.

Water drips from Stogie’s muzzle. Water flows around Lily’s feet, so cold she can feel it through her boots. Stogie looks at her. He doesn’t pull. He doesn’t try to bite. He just waits for what will happen next.

Lily hardly dares to breathe. Very gently she lets the halter slide down her shoulder. She works it along her arm until her hand can reach it, moving slowly so she doesn’t frighten Stogie. When she has the halter in her hands, Lily spreads it wide, and lifts it toward Stogie’s nose.

Stogie tosses his head.

“No!” Lily says firmly. She reaches up more quickly this time. Stogie tosses his head again, but Lily gets the halter on his nose. She slides it up over his ears, just as if he were any other horse. She snaps the throat strap shut, and she clips the lead rope into the ring.

Stogie bobs his head toward the water. He bumps against the rope in Lily’s hand. “No,” she tells him. “You can have more later.”

Now what? The last time anybody led Stogie was when Gramp took him off the truck. Lily can remember how beautiful he looked, and how he pranced beside Gramp. He wasn’t hard to lead, and when he was let loose, he didn’t kick up his heels until he was far away from Gramp. But he never let Gramp close enough to touch him again.

Now Lily is standing in the middle of a brook, holding a rope that’s clipped to Stogie’s halter. She’s half a mile from home. One of her boots has a leak, and cold water trickles under her toes. She’d like to get out, but when she takes the first step, what will Stogie do?

Behind Lily, Beware shakes herself. The saddle leather squeaks. Beware walks calmly past Stogie and Lily, splashing through the brook and up the bank on the other side. At the top of the bank she starts to trot. In a second she’s out of sight.