You want to sleep late, don’t camp out at no rodeos, because there’s folks there who wake up the roosters.

I know because all of a sudden Rick is dragging me out of the cot in the middle of the night and going, “Come on, lazybones, time’s a-wasting. Another hour and you’ll miss the sunrise.”

I go, “I seen it before,” and try to put my head under the pillow, only he won’t let me.

“You’ve got to take your pony to the beauty salon,” he says. “Give her a new hairdo.”

That don’t make no sense at any time of day, but you can’t ignore Rick when he’s got a bee in his bonnet, so I get myself dressed and somehow get my boots on the right feet, and next thing you know he’s shoving a mug of coffee in my hands and he goes, “I put three sugars in it, because you’ll need the energy. Now you get over there and wake up your pony. Give her some sugar, too, if she wants it. I guess she don’t drink coffee, does she?”

“Not so far,” I say.

“Give her time,” he says, and then he nose-laughs into his coffee mug like he does.

Lady is kind of fussy backing out of the trailer, and I got to calm her down some by sweet-talking her, but probably that’s all the noise and commotion going on. Why, the sun ain’t up yet and the whole place is going crazy! There’s folks exercising their horses, and rat-eyed rodeo riders wandering around looking sick to their stomachs, and this Brahma bull bellowing from the stockade like he wants to stomp those cowboys into the ground, and RV generators that sound like jet-fired vacuum cleaners, and a bunch of dogs barking, and mosquitoes whining, and babies crying, and every other noise you can think of, all mixed together before you’ve had breakfast.

It turns out Rick ain’t kidding about the beauty parlor for horses. They got this stall set up where you bring your horse and they take care of the brushing and grooming and shampooing, and trim the mane and tail, and do most everything, Rick says, except dab it with French perfume.

They get done with Lady and she looks brand-new pretty, and the funny part is, she knows it. She flicks her tail so high and mighty I go, “Yes, your highness. Is it okay if we go back to the trailer — excuse me, your castle?” She snorts and stamps her foot and makes up for it by nuzzling me with her nose as if she wants to say: See, it’s really me.

They can’t do nothing about covering up her scar, though. A scar like that is forever, Mr. Jessup says, only he calls it a badge of honor.

“It proves she has heart,” he says. “A lot of other ponies would have just up and died, but I guess you know that.”

“Yes, sir, that’s what I figured, too.”

I don’t see Mr. Jessup around while Rick is busy getting breakfast ready. He’s taken Pit Stop out to the roping ring, letting him get used to the place. Only Rick says it’s as much Mr. Jessup getting used to it as the horse.

“That man looks like he don’t have a nerve in his body, but he does. He must, right? He didn’t, he wouldn’t be human.”

“I guess,” I say.

That’s when Mr. Jessup sneaks up on us. “What are you all guessing at?” he asks.

“Oh, nothin’,” says Rick. “You ready for sausage and scrambled eggs?”

Mr. Jessup says he don’t have much of an appetite, and when he hears that, Rick looks at me and winks. I guess there must be something wrong with me, because race or no race, I’m so hungry I end up eating Mr. Jessup’s share, which he don’t mind at all.

“I’m feeling poorly,” he says to Rick.

Rick says, “You always feel poorly before an event, Nick. You’ll be okay once you get the horse under you and the rope in your hands.”

“I suppose,” says Mr. Jessup, like he don’t believe it for a minute.

They got enough stuff going on at this rodeo to fill up three whole days, but wouldn’t you know, the calf-roping event is the very first morning, which means we can’t mess around, we got to get Pit Stop ready to go.

“Tell you what,” Rick says to Mr. Jessup. “You go on into town and get a haircut.”

“I don’t need a haircut,” says Mr. Jessup.

“I know that,” Rick says. “But do it anyway. Just so you don’t think about roping for a few minutes. When you get back, all you got to do is climb on your horse and go.”

When Mr. Jessup is gone, Rick makes a show of mopping his brow and goes, “Whew! Okay, you want to go watch the show, go ahead.”

“But I thought we had a lot of work to do,” I say. “Getting his horse ready.”

“The horse is ready. I just wanted to keep Nick moving. He stands around, he’ll think himself into doing something wrong. Some ways there ain’t much difference between a man and a horse.”

Well, what happens is this. I’m right there hanging on the rail when the show starts. First thing they have this parade. All these duded-up folks come riding through the ring on horseback. They got pretty girls in sparkly costumes holding these big flags that whip in the wind, and a lot of ornery-looking cowboys with their chests all puffed out like they’re going to get a medal, and they got a sheriff with a big white Stetson hat, and a rock ’n’ roll singer who can’t remember all the words to the National Anthem, but what I notice most is the clowns.

I seen rodeo clowns on TV, of course, but it looks different when you’re close up and in person. What they got to do is look funny, act stupid, and save people’s lives — all at the same time. The way it happens, say this bronco comes busting out of the chute, and before you can blink your eyes the rider comes flying off and he’s down in the dirt with the horse trying to stomp him into a thousand pieces. Well, that clown in the baggy pants, he’s got to get the horse away from the rider it wants to kill. And he’s got about two seconds to do it or there’ll be blood in the dirt. It’s like magic, how they keep on going and how they trick them kill-crazy animals.

If you think the broncos are scary, though, you should see the bulls! And these ain’t just normal bulls, which are bad enough, these are the meanest Brahma bulls they can find. Them bulls are made of pure steam. If a bull don’t want to turn a rider into hamburger, it don’t get into the rodeo. And all you get to hold on to is a little bitty piece of rope, with one hand. No saddle, no stirrups or nothing. Just you and a thousand pounds of muscle and horn.

Rick says bull riders are as crazy as the bulls. Why else would a man get up on an animal that hates him, and then try to make the thing mad enough to turn itself upside down and inside out before it tries to kill you?

This one bull, he comes flying out of the chute, trying to climb straight up into the air, and the rider, he’s getting shook so bad his brains turn to jelly and he forgets how to let go of the rope. They got to rescue him by horseback, and then the bull really gets mad and charges this padded barrel where the clown is hiding, and butts that barrel so hard it smacks up against the side of the ring and the poor clown crawls out rubbing his head.

Rick says people working in the rodeo call ’em bullfighters, not clowns, which makes sense.

I seen one jump over the horns and get his pants torn up, right where it hurts! This stuff ain’t fake like the movies or wrestling, it really happens. Most of them riders and bullfighters ain’t got a bone they haven’t busted, and they got this funny look in their eyes, like they been to the moon or something.

The next thing happens is what they call the bull-dogging event. There ain’t any Brahma bulls, though, they’re regular steers. What happens is the dogger, he chases the steer, jumps down from his horse while it’s still running hell-bent for leather. Then he grabs the steer by the horns and wrestles it to the ground. They time him with a stopwatch and the fastest man wins. I heard he might win as much as five hundred dollars — I don’t know what they give the steer, but he seems to get the worst of it.

Anyhow, I’m having so much fun I clean forget about Mr. Jessup and his roping horse. Then I see him across the ring, all duded up in a black Stetson hat and a fancy shirt, and he’s moping along beside Pit Stop like he forgot to do his homework or something. You’d think he’s on his way to the dentist to get all his teeth pulled, that’s how long his face is.

I run under the stands and catch up to him just as he and Rick and the horse get to the gate behind the roping chute.

“I can see you’re all tense and nervous in anticipation of your race,” Rick says to me.

“What?” I say. “Oh, that race.”

“Let that be a lesson,” Rick says to Mr. Jessup. “The wisdom of the innocent.”

“Shut up,” Mr. Jessup says, real quiet.

I never heard him say that before, so I know he’s nervous. Rick keeps making jokes, but Mr. Jessup, he don’t crack a smile. He don’t look at nobody, just at his hands, like he’s never seen ’em before.

I can’t see what’s going on past the roping chute, but the crowd is cheering, so the other ropers must be doing okay. Rick is fussing around with Pit Stop, checking to see the saddle cinches are tight, and the stirrups are right, and then he hands the lariat rope to Mr. Jessup and says, “You’re up.”

Mr. Jessup, he gets up on his horse like he figures he’ll be shot any second now. Then Rick fixes this shorter piece of rope in his belt and slaps him on the back. “Go get ’em,” he says. “Don’t think about it, just do it.”

The whole idea about roping is, you got to keep as close as you can to the calf. There’s this open stall for the roping horse and right next to it is this gate for the calf, and the horse gets up right next to where this calf is waiting, bawling and nervous and wanting to run. Then when the rider is ready to go, he nods to the gate man and they spring loose that calf and a good roping horse is right on top of it as it comes out of the chute.

Pit Stop, he sticks so close to the calf you’d think he was more cow than horse. Before you know it, Mr. Jessup has dropped a loop over the calf’s head and then Pit Stop, he puts on the brakes so hard you can almost hear the screech. The rope tightens up and the calf goes down and Mr. Jessup comes flying out of the saddle with the other rope in his teeth and he’s down in the dirt whipping that rope around the calf’s legs so fast his hands are blurred. A machine couldn’t have done it quicker.

Why, the whole thing is over so fast I ain’t had time to take a breath or swallow, and Rick is leaning beside me at the gate, chuckling the way he does and nodding his head.

Mr. Jessup comes back out of the ring dusting his chaps with his hat and that old regular smile is back on his face. “You see that horse work that calf?” he says.

Rick says, “I guess you didn’t do nothing, huh? Just along for the ride?”

“That’s about the size of it,” he says.

Then they’re both looking at me, kind of staring.

“What?” I say. “What?”

“Better get the saddle on Lady Luck,” Mr. Jessup says. “You’re next.”