Out of earshot of Rosie, I whisper to Gill, “I wonder what this one does? Headstands? Somersaults? Do you think I ought to’ve brought a motorcycling helmet or just taken some hefty tranquillizers with a bottle of gin?”
“It’ll be fine!” she croons, patting my arm. “I thought you said you’d told Rosie what happened?”
“I did. I swore her to secrecy. It’s probably why she agreed to come along so readily and isn’t whingeing now.”
We pile into Gill’s Alfa Romeo at ten-thirty.
“Now, girls, here we go. These people are called the van Rooyens. I don’t know them at all although Tammy says some branch of the family was involved in racing many years ago. Seems they’ve bred this horse from one of their old racing stock.”
Mr van Rooyen’s son, Piet, meets us at the entrance to the main yard.
He’s a bear. A massive, hairy, friendly bear. A semi-tamed ginger beard and moustache cover most of his freckled face and the hirsute arms and legs that protrude from the sleeves of his T-shirt and his shorts are solid with muscle. The T-shirt is tight fitting over his wide shoulders and chest but loose where it hangs over his flat belly. No typical Rhodie farmer beer gut in sight here.
His sockless feet are jammed into a pair of veldskoens. He walks directly up to me, smiling out at me with sharp green eyes and a wide mouth from under the brim of a battered leather bush hat, and when he speaks he does so with an accent that is refined, with only a hint of Afrikaans.
“You must be the lady come to try the horse, since you’re the only one wearing jodhpurs. Are you Gill? You sounded so lovely… Um… We spoke on the phone.”
I tear my gaze away from that beard and stare at the hairy paw he’s offered. If he decides to give me a bear hug in those arms I’ll be lucky to walk away from it.
“Well guessed. But I’m Tessa Harmand. This here is my friend and mentor when it comes to horses, Gill Owen, and my sister Rosie.”
“Three pretty young ladies. How delightful!”
From any number of men this may’ve come across as chauvinistic and even lecherous, but not from Piet van Rooyen. All three of us blossom coyly. My hand, having been completely enveloped in his, is still in one piece.
“Stables over there.” He points towards a lop-sided iron gate, beyond which are some low timber buildings with asbestos-cement sheet roofs. Then he adds, “But would you like some coffee first? Tea?”
We decline in unison and he leads the way. My innards are churning with anticipation as I follow in the tracks of Piet’s swinging veldskoens.
There’s a reputedly infallible phenomenon known as the ‘gut reaction’ and now, looking at Encore, I know he is the horse Gill and I will end up owning. He’s an iron grey gelding of about sixteen hands, built along Thoroughbred lines but with the typically dished face and gracefully arched neck of the Arabian. He’s good looking all right, but in a strangely ordinary way. Not flashy. But I like his eyes. They’re large, inquisitive, warm, generous and sensitive.
Piet is gentle with him, slipping a snaffle bridle over his head and scratching the slim grey ears while Gill runs her hand down each of the gelding’s legs and over his back.
“Try him out, Tess. I like him.”
“I can assure you he’s never bucked with any rider or done anything else dirty,” Piet tells me and I believe him. No good reason – I just do.
Piet trots him up in hand first and he’s totally sound, and calm. With me up on board, he feels a little green but he moves well. He has a tendency to lean onto his forehand as most young, unschooled horses will, but there’s no resistance to my aids and when I direct him at the small, makeshift jumps of rough poles balanced on motor car tyres, he takes them fluently and quietly, steady and focussed.
Glancing towards the paddock gate I see Gill and Piet deep in conversation while Rosie is gazing at the thickly vegetated ridge of the Hunyani range, beyond which lies Lake McIlwaine. The paddock is probably ten acres or so of good dairy grazing land; smooth and slightly sloping up away from the gate. I feel so in tune with this horse that I can’t help myself. I squeeze him into a trot, then a swift canter, then lean forward and move my hands to either side of his neck, inviting him to increase speed. At the same time, I click with my tongue and push my calves into his sides. He bounds on eagerly up the incline. We pass the farmhouse – a bungalow clad in creeping plants, its peaceful prettiness marred by the glinting diamond mesh of the three-metre security fence and the lighting columns – and sweep around in a wide arc across the far end of the field. When I ask him to slow, calling “Ooo-ooo” in a low tone, he’s surprised, but responds. By the time I turn to head back towards the gate, he’s in a walk, although he jogs a few steps now and then.
“Did he run away with you?”
I laugh, because Piet sounds so incredulous.
“Oh no. No, not at all. I asked him for that. He’s great! What does he look like, Gill?”
“Good. Good.” She’s grinning broadly, her eyes sparkling in the sunlight, and I conclude that she must be particularly impressed. I’m about to suggest that we take him, when she forestalls me with, “Yes, we’ll go away and think about it, thanks, and I’ll get back to you. Eight hundred dollars, you want?”
Piet shrugs and rocks his right hand back and forth, palm down, fingers and thumb outstretched. Gill is bubbling like a child that’s just been promised all the chocolate cake and Rosie is… well… frankly, smirking. Furtive. I’m suspecting I’ve been left out of some conspiracy.
We turn Encore out into a smaller paddock behind the barn at about one-fifteen.
*
“Look at that,” Gill says as she starts the car. “It’s just after four-fifteen. Will you be in trouble, ladies?”
“Nah,” Rosie drawls from the back seat. “The folks said they’d only be back home six-ish. I’m so glad I didn’t have to go with them. Vic and Mary talk boring stuff a lot.”
I could say, “Uncle Vic and Aunty Mary, Rosie,” but I don’t.
“Pot, kettle, black, my dear! For the past two and three-quarter hours you’ve been gassing away with us and Piet and his parents through all those rounds of biscuits and fruit cake with not an inkling of your grumpy teenage persona or any gripes that you missed Lyons Maid Hits of the Week. What did Mrs van Rooyen do to you?”
She giggles. “Yeah, well, it was just one of those conversations wasn’t it? Morphs from one topic into another each time you say, ‘Well we really must go now…’ She’s so sweet. They all are. And then it goes on another half an hour. I was having fun watching anyway.”
Watching?
I shrug it off and enthuse about Encore for a bit. Not getting much in the way of a response from either of them, I shut up and drift off into a world in which I invent the conversation that will take place when I inform Dad we’ve been able to procure the new horse for less than he’d anticipated. He’ll be pleased as punch.
Gill startles me out of it by apparently reading my thoughts.
“Leave all the price negotiations to me, Tess. Don’t you worry about it. I think I can get us a good deal. Do you like the horse? Do you want him?”
The pleading tone is odd.
“Oh ja. Yes, that’s fine,” and I whip round at what sounds like a stifled giggle from behind me. My sister is gazing out of the side window at the scenery with uncharacteristic interest.
*
“Coffee?” Gill tosses her car keys onto the kitchen table.
“We’d better get home. Mum’ll freak out if we’re not there when they get back. Besides, I’ve had so much tea this afternoon I’ll spend all evening on the loo. I’ll come and ride Indie tomorrow.”
“Okay. I’ll have some though.” Gill snatches up the jug kettle from its stand and goes to the sink to fill it. Her hand slips on the tap handle as she tries to close it, so that she opens it further instead and a powerful torrent of water gushes over the top of the kettle.
“Ooops.” She’s staring out into the garden, eyes vacant. She dances her feet back a step from the splash and says, “’Byee! I’ll call Piet, don’t worry.”
Ahead of Rosie, I free-wheel down the driveway and start to swing left out into the road without checking for any traffic. There’s a squeal and I swerve in an instinctive reaction to the appearance of the metallic blue Mercedes Benz on my right. It slides to a halt and I’m off, hopping to keep my balance on one leg, and to keep the bike upright.
Oh God. I’m such an idiot. A lucky idiot. Thank God it’s Charles. The car’s left-hand indicator lights are flashing the driver’s intention to turn into the gateway. If it had been someone else, carrying straight on…
As I approach, pushing the bike, the tinted driver’s window slides down to reveal not Charles, but Nathan. I blink at him, aware of Rosie by my side by this time, but I can’t gauge just how angry he is. His eyes are hidden behind a pair of aviator sunglasses.
“Got a death wish? Was this horse even worse than the last one?”
I latch onto the trace of amusement in his voice and make a supreme effort to pretend my heart isn’t doing a dying bird impression. I swallow, shrug.
“You do realise that if you manage to hit me while I’m moving you get twenty points instead of ten? Besides, I thought you might want to test your brakes.”
He pats the top of the dashboard. “Well, lucky for you they work well, and I wouldn’t dream of trying to score points at your expense. Gill would skin me alive.”
He waves and is gone, the Mercedes accelerating smoothly into the long driveway.
“I do like that car.”
I stand in the middle of the road and watch it with longing. I’ve never really longed for any particular car before.
“Who was that? Watch out!” Rosie gasps and grabs my arm, trying to tug me and my bicycle towards the immaculate verge.
Another car is rolling down the hill towards us. Its driver gives us a wide berth and it’s time to get home. It’s clearly not my day for being out on the roads.
“Well, who was it?”
“What? Oh, Nathan. He’s home on RNR now for a few weeks.”
“Mmm. O-kay!” Rosie swivels back towards the Makuti Park gates but there’s no longer any sign of the Mercedes. “The one who got himself shot up? So he’s back in the sticks now?”
Back in the sticks. Like the song.
“He is. Charles knows a lot of the right people and he’s now an instructor in the Grey’s Scouts. Spends his days giving new recruits, and some not so new ones, crash courses in riding. Literally. Well come on. Let’s get home.”
“I fear your friend Gill has utterly flipped. Don’t you think?”
I’m well used to jumping sideways to catch up with her and keep track of the conversation, but right now I’m defeated. I remount and start pedalling. I’m starving. Trying to remember what Mum said she would make us for dinner.
“What are you talking about? There’s nothing wrong with Gill.”
“No, I know there’s nothing wrong with her. Didn’t you notice? I can’t believe you didn’t notice!”
“Notice what? Rosie, these endless questions are getting us nowhere.”
I push on ahead, tired of the game.
“That guy, Piet,” she insists, standing up on her pedals and drawing level with me again. “She’s completely fallen for him. You know, you really are so wrapped up in your horses you don’t see anything else.”
Curious little things, inconsistent things, from the day line up before me. I see Gill being vague, indecisive, devoid of concentration on my assessment of Encore, insistent that she must haggle for the horse and that she must contact the van Rooyens again, over-keen to get me to consent to buying the horse. I see her splashing water all over herself, the sink and the floor and hear her cheery “Ooops” as if she’d dropped a pen.
“See? So sweet! Don’t you think it’s like Beauty and the Beast?”
The great hairy bear and the coquettish and pretty Beauty.
“You’re being fanciful. Gill wouldn’t lose her head just like that, Rosie. Love at first sight only happens in movies and Mills and Boon novels. Maybe she thinks he’s nice – well, he is nice. I like him. But she hasn’t fallen in love with him. She’s not like that. You’re the romantic.”
“You wait and see.”
She overtakes me as we turn into our road.
*
After I’ve described the day’s events and my new horse, omitting irrelevant references to any strange behaviour by Gill, I spot Rosie wringing her hands and making kissing noises from the end of the hallway. I ignore her.
“So what did you do this morning, Dan?”
He sighs and still doesn’t speak immediately.
“Oh, this and that. I went into town with Mike Carney and his girlfriend. You know, the one from Queen Elizabeth School? Sally, is it? Or Sandy? Anyway, it was okay. We bought some LPs and looked at the stereos in Radio City then we had coffee at Barbour’s and some of those little chocolate cakes you like.”
Ah yes. Barbour’s tearoom. A throwback to elegant colonial establishments, where discreet white-jacketed waiters serve tea, coffee and cream in tall silvered pots and lay trays of scones, pastries and dainty cakes on starched white linen tablecloths.
“Oh, they’re bad for the hips and thighs. I’ll have to give them up!”
“You don’t need to,” he laughs. “You’re really slim.”
Then, “I missed you.”
I open my mouth for the obligatory “I missed you too,” but he hasn’t finished talking, so I’m not given time to ask myself if I’d really rather’ve spent the morning looking at stereo equipment.
“Do you want to come over tomorrow afternoon? I’ve taped those Troopie Songs for you.”
“Well… I’ve got to find out whether Encore has been bought and I must ride Induna because I didn’t today. Why don’t you come to the stables? You can have a ride on him if you like.”
There’s a kind of a slightly wrong pause. I change tack.
“Oh no. That’s all right. Don’t worry. I’ll ride him in the morning quickly and come over to your place for the afternoon. Can you help me with that Standard Deviation stuff again? Oh, and those stupid Laws of Indices?”
“Oh ja, fine. Yes, of course I’d love to. Come as soon after lunch as you can.”
As I put the phone down, I’m as relieved as he sounds.