“Really I don’t see why I shouldn’t,” Jacky thought. “Miss Henderson rode her a few times last summer and she behaved perfectly. And she’s got shoes on.”
Jacky had just finished grooming Flicka. She didn’t have a dandy brush but her own hairbrush had done quite well instead and now Flicka was standing sleek and shining in the spring sunlight, her mane and tail hanging as smooth as silk.
“If I ride you would you be good?” Jacky asked her pony, and Flicka tossed her head up and down.
“Right,” said Jacky, laughing. “That’s it settled. Maybe you’ll behave yourself tonight if you do some work just now.”
Stupidly, Jacky had locked herself out of the house last night and she had had to ring the bell and wake up her parents. Even now she didn’t like to think of all the things her father had said. He had even said that if such a thing happened again Flicka would have to go.
“If only I had some tack,” Jacky thought. “A saddle doesn’t really matter but I do need a bridle.” Her father had insisted that the two hundred pounds left from her winnings was to go straight into the bank, so Jacky was pretty sure he wouldn’t let her use it for tack.
Very gently she jumped up on to Flicka’s back and sat very still, talking to her and patting her neck, but the pony wasn’t in the least upset.
Jacky closed her legs against Flicka’s sides.
“There’s a good pony,” she said encouragingly. “Walk on then.”
At first Flicka walked raggedly, starting and stopping, unused to the strange weight on her back. But soon she accepted it and, remembering the schooling Miss Henderson had given her last year, she walked obediently round the field.
“That’s a clever pony,” Jacky praised her as they stopped by the field gate.
“Shall we go for a ride?” she asked Flicka. “Just a little ride. We could go down the bridle path. It’s very quiet.”
Once out on the road, Flicka walked along with quick bouncy steps, her ears pricked. her head held high. Jacky grinned to herself with sheer happiness. Ever since she had started riding she had dreamed of this moment when she would be riding her own pony for the first time.
They reached the bridle path and turned down into it. Birds sang in the high hedges and bluebells burned like flames in the spring green of the grass.
“I’d love to gallop,” Jacky thought, looking longingly up the track that stretched in front of her. “If only I had a bridle!” She had often galloped the school ponies with only a halter on them but she knew it would be stupid to try it with a young pony.
Almost as if Flicka knew what her rider was thinking, she broke into a trot.
“You’d love a gallop too, wouldn’t you?” Jacky laughed, pulling on the halter rope to steady her.
Suddenly Jacky heard the sound of hoofbeats coming down the lane behind them. Flicka heard them too and stood rooted to the spot. She neighed with a thunderous blast of sound and from somewhere behind them a pony whinnied in reply. Flicka danced with excitement.
“Behave yourself,” Jacky said crossly. “Every time we meet another pony you don’t have to behave like a lunatic. What are they going to think, seeing me sitting here like a sack of potatoes while you do just what you like?” And forgetting it was Flicka she was riding, Jacky kicked her hard. Flicka plunged forward, then swung round to face the opposite direction.
As Celia, riding Prince, came into sight, Jacky was lying along Flicka’s neck, her mouth full of mane. “Oh, it would have to be you!” Jacky thought furiously as she pushed herself upright again. “Out of the whole Pony Club it would have to be you,” and she scowled as Celia rode up and stopped beside her.
“Having trouble?” Celia asked nastily.
“We weren’t until you arrived,” Jacky said, tugging at Flicka’s rope and hoping that she would think of the garage patch as home now and be willing to go back to it. But Flicka, having at last found another pony, had not the least intention of leaving him. “Get on with you,” Jacky muttered.
“Can’t you manage her? We saw her making a fool of you yesterday when we passed in the box.”
“If a policeman had seen you, your mother would be in jail for dangerous driving.”
“Did we give you a fright? I expect it’s your nervous nature. Mum’s jolly glad now we didn’t buy Flicka at the sale because she says in a week or two you’ll be so afraid of her that you’ll be glad to give her away.”
Flicka, who despite all Jacky’s efforts had been getting closer and closer to Prince, gave a high-pitched squeal and lashed out at Prince with a foreleg.
“Flicka!” Jacky shouted.
“You see, she’s out of control already. I’m not staying here to have Prince kicked,” and Celia gathered up her reins and urged Prince into a canter.
Flicka plunged forward and galloped at his side. Desperately, Jacky tugged at the rope.
“Get your pony away,” shouted Celia. “I’ve told you I don’t want Prince kicked.”
“I can’t stop her,” Jacky snapped, furious at having to admit it to Celia.
“Get her away from Prince.”
“I can’t!”
“Then I’ll do it for you.”
Jacky caught a glimpse of Celia’s whip as it flickered through the air.
“Don’t,” she screamed, then heard the whack as it caught Flicka across the quarters.
Flicka had been galloping before but now her speed was doubled. Her legs struck into the ground like pistons, her eyes started from her head in terror. Lying along her neck Jacky hardly knew what was happening.
Flicka burst from the bridle path like a bullet from a gun. She swerved to the right and stormed down the road. On the metalled surface her hoofs sounded like a hundred drums. Somehow Jacky managed to stay on top. She clung round her pony’s neck with both arms and clasped her legs as tight as she could into Flicka’s hairy sides. She caught vivid glimpses of people staring in amazement as they stormed past.
Jacky tried to speak to Flicka to calm her but their speed tore the words from her lips. She felt Flicka’s coat grow sticky with sweat and her sides heave like bellows.
“She can’t go on much longer,” Jacky thought. “She must stop soon. She must!”
Suddenly two blackbirds fluttered up out of a hawthorn hedge. Flicka shied violently and Jacky was thrown over her head. For a second she was dragged along by the halter rope until it was torn from her grasp. Then she lay curled in a ball at the roadside, while Flicka galloped madly on, the halter rope dangling dangerously about her legs.