Shelby huffed as she climbed into the car. 'That's the last time I come to you for advice! You said that Mrs Edel was a grown-up. Now there's been a barney, and it's my fault!'
They drove for a while in silence. Shelby had her arms folded and glared out the window.
Her mother took a deep breath. 'Your um friend rang. He told me what happened.'
'Great,' Shelby grumbled.
Questions tumbled around in her head. Did Chad ring because he had seen her hiding in the bushes? Had her mother told Chad that Shelby was the one who informed the Edels where Diablo was? Most of all, why was she feeling guilty when the circus people were the ones in the wrong?
'This will blow over, Shelby. I know it seems like a big deal now, but by next week everyone will have calmed down and will be able to see the situation with a different perspective.'
'Yeah, right,' Shelby scoffed.
Her mother went on. 'What you need to under-stand is that when people are emotional – when they are afraid – they will lash out. They're not able to listen to anything else even when it's logical and reasonable. They're so busy being emotional about their own thing that they don't want to hear someone else's point of view.'
It made sense to Shelby. On occasions she had jumped to conclusions herself.
'Brenda has her horse back now,' her mother added. 'I'm sure in a few days' time, when she has calmed down, she will drop the charges against Chad and his friends. She might even be a big enough person to apologise.'
Shelby stared at her mother. 'Chad has been arrested?'
Shelby's mum frowned. 'I assumed you knew. When Chad rang he'd just come home from the police station. Brenda Edel has pressed charges against them all.'
By now the car was in their street. Shelby's mother pulled the car into their driveway and turned off the ignition.
'But Chad only just met those people! He's got nothing to do with them stealing Diablo,' Shelby protested.
Her mother blinked. 'According to Chad, they didn't steal him.'
'But Erin said . . . I don't get it,' Shelby said.
'He left a phone number for you.'
Shelby opened the car door.
Her mother stopped her. 'Shelby, he sounds like a nice boy – very straightforward and sensible. Lots of boys his age don't talk to adults. They just grunt. Chad's parents must have brought him up well. I'm looking forward to meeting him. Perhaps you could invite him around for a barbecue some time?'
Shelby smiled. Her mother approved of sensibleness above all other virtues. It was odd, though. Her mother didn't usually encourage her to bring friends home. Erin had slept over a few times, but mostly Shelby went to other people's houses.
'Now you're jumping to conclusions, Mum. It really was just hot chips.'
Her mother arched an eyebrow at her. 'Hot chips in a skirt.'
Inside the house, Shelby took a deep breath and dialled the number her mother had written down. When he answered she felt a surge of adren-aline in her belly like when she was approaching a big jump.
'Hello, is this Chad? This is Shelby.'
'Hi.' Chad sounded dejected.
'Mum told me what happened.' Shelby waited. In the background she could hear the hum of conversa-tion. When Chad didn't say anything Shelby felt stupid, wishing she hadn't rung after all. 'So what happened at the police station? Who did you have to talk to there?'
'It was a woman. A sergeant,' Chad replied.
'Sergeant Everard? Was she mean to you? She must find her job stressful or something. She's always frowning.'
Chad asked. 'You know her?'
Shelby sighed. 'Yeah. She's yelled at me a few times. Actually, one of the times was the day you gave me a lift home from the Gully. Remember that day? My parents thought I'd been kidnapped, and when Sergeant Everard found out I wasn't, she told me off for wasting police time.'
Chad sighed. 'I've never been in trouble with the police before. I can't really afford to. My whole family has big plans for me. Mum wants me to go into politics. Dad wants me to be a professional footballer. My sister wants me to be a vet.'
'What do you want to do?' Shelby asked.
'I'd like to be a PE teacher,' he answered. 'I don't think you can be a teacher if you have a police record.'
'You're a juvenile. It doesn't count.'
Chad was quiet again for a while and then he spoke. 'Everything was going well for me, you know? I was doing OK at school and in sport. Now this. These things stay with you forever. They always do.'
Shelby remembered how Sergeant Everard behaved when Diablo first went missing – how she spoke to Shelby as though she had done something wrong. Sergeant Everard had formed an opinion about Shelby that would always follow her; no matter what good things Shelby did afterwards.
'My mum says it will all blow over,' Shelby assured him. 'She said Mrs Edel will calm down now she has Diablo back.'
'Man, that lady is a complete fruit loop! She drives in like a mad woman and starts screaming and threat-ening people. I was sure she was going to deck someone. She attacked us! She was trespassing, verbally assaulting, and about half a dozen other illegal things. She should be the one arrested.'
These were the same details but a different emphasis to the version that Erin had given. Shelby wondered who was telling the truth, or whether the real story was somewhere in the middle.
'So I guess you made friends with the circus people without me,' Shelby joked, trying to lighten the mood.
'You should see what they do! They stand up on the horse's back and do spins and hang off the side. It's amazing! I reckon you and Keisha would get on really well. She's about our age,' Chad said. 'Zeb is cool too. He's Keisha's grandfather. Zeb has been training horses since he was about ten years old. All they do is talk about horses all the time. You would fit in perfectly.'
Shelby bit her lip. Her first instinct had been that she would get along well with the circus people too, but now there was 'the barney'. She had been friends with Erin and Lindsey for a long time and she'd only just met Chad. She didn't know whom to believe, and now she felt as though they were both asking her to choose a side.
'They didn't steal the horse, Shelby,' Chad said.
'How did Diablo get there then?' she asked.
'I don't know, but they say they didn't steal him and I believe them. Why would they? They have a trillion other horses that are better looking and can do way more cool stuff than Diablo. He's nice, but he's just a horse.'
Shelby hadn't thought about Diablo that way before. She had always seen Diablo the way that Lindsey and her mum did – as the best and most valuable horse on their property.
She supposed people would look at Blue differently to the way she did as well. People who didn't know Blue would wonder why she kept him when he was kind of ugly and too small for her, and not good at anything except galloping around in the bush. But Shelby loved him. Blue was her best friend.
'You should come and meet them,' Chad told her. 'They are much more interesting than Lindsey Edel and her mum – trust me.'
Shelby flushed. 'Lindsey is my friend, Chad. The Edels have been really good to me. They keep Blue for me, and they arranged for me to have lessons with a proper instructor.'
Chad snorted. 'If they're such good friends then maybe you could make them stop ruining my life.'