Season of Ponies (3 page)

During the rest of the meal Aunt Sarah had a great deal to say about the wisdom of Pamela’s decision. But Aunt Elsie was quieter than ever, and Pamela could feel her worried glance. Aunt Elsie had known and understood just how she felt. It was no wonder she didn’t understand now.

Pamela longed to say something, to tell Aunt Elsie why. But she knew she couldn’t possibly explain, not to anyone, not yet. How could she make anyone understand that a necklace was more than a necklace, and a riddle more than a riddle, and right outside her window there had been something that was more, much, much more, than a strange white fog.

T
HE NEXT MORNING PAMELA
reported to the library for her lessons earlier than usual. Once the day’s assignments were finished, she would be free. Free to go outside to—she wasn’t sure just what. But she was sure, with complete certainty, that somewhere outside there would be waiting for her the strangely beautiful ponies and the boy with the silver flute.

She arrived so early that Aunt Elsie was still busy in the kitchen. Pamela wandered restlessly up and down the library. Now and then she reached up to touch the stiff leather binding of a familiar book—greeting an old friend. Aunt Elsie had helped Pamela discover that many of the dull-looking old books held fantastic adventures. Together they had spent hours reading and talking about the stories until Pamela had been able to substitute for real playmates, dozens of friends from history and fiction. Her favorites were the legends and myths of ancient times, full of marvelous heroes, terrifying dangers, and magical events.

The library at Oak Farm was a dim and dusty room with long thin windows and stiff scratchy furniture. The air was heavy with the smell of dust and aging leather, and the huge old globe on its carved wooden frame showed countries and territories with bygone names and boundaries. Here, even more than in the rest of the house, everything seemed asleep and dreaming of the past.

Near the big desk, on a low shelf, were Pamela’s schoolbooks. This corner of the library was the only schoolroom she had ever known, and Aunt Elsie had been her only teacher. Furthermore, Aunt Elsie, who was a trained and qualified teacher, had never had another pupil. Aunt Sarah had allowed Aunt Elsie to go away to college; but afterwards, as Aunt Elsie explained it to Pamela, “I just couldn’t go away and leave your Aunt Sarah here all alone. I did think about teaching at the Valley School, but Sarah was sure I wouldn’t like it there.” Pamela never said so, but she was quite sure that Aunt Elsie would have liked it fine.

Aunt Elsie finally arrived, and Pamela fairly flew through her lessons. She had always been good at schoolwork and it never took her long, but today she even amazed herself. She rushed through arithmetic, history, and spelling in record time.

As she worked, she wondered if Aunt Elsie would ask her why she had changed her mind about going to Valley School. What could she possibly say? But all during the lessons, Aunt Elsie talked only about fractions and adjectives and the rivers of South America. Then, just as Pamela was gathering up her books to put them away on the shelf, the dreaded question came.

“Pamela, I’ve been trying to understand your decision about going to a real school. I’ve been worried about it.” Aunt Elsie put her hand on Pamela’s shoulder, and her mild blue eyes were full of concern. “It’s not right for people your age not to have friends and things to do. I know you’re feeling sad because you wanted to go with your father, but...”

“Oh, it’s not that,” Pamela stammered. “I—I—can’t quite explain it, Aunt Elsie. But I just don’t want to go away every day just now. I—I—wouldn’t have much time to play outdoors,” she finished lamely.

Aunt Elsie didn’t look a bit less worried. Pamela hastily put away her books and started from the room, knowing that she hadn’t been very convincing. Halfway to the door she stopped and came back. “But I do thank you for talking to Aunt Sarah about it.” She kissed Aunt Elsie’s pale cheek and turned to go.

“Wait, dear!” Pamela turned to see Aunt Elsie touching the spot on her cheek where Pamela had kissed it. “Wait,” she said. “I want to tell you something.”

Pamela came back, but for quite a while Aunt Elsie only arranged some pencils neatly at the edge of the leather frame that held the desk blotter. She seemed to be arranging something in her mind, too. Suddenly she said, “Someday you must leave Oak Farm. If your Father doesn’t take you, you must leave by yourself, as soon as you are old enough. For your own sake, mostly, but for your father’s, too.”

“For my father’s sake?” Pamela repeated falteringly.

“Yes, dear.” Aunt Elsie paused, but looked as if she might go on.

Sharp firm footsteps interrupted. Aunt Sarah was walking down the hall past the library door. Aunt Elsie jumped up. “Well, run along and play, dear. We’re all through for the day.” She hurried from the room.

Left alone in the library, Pamela traced the carving on the huge old desk with her finger as she thought about what Aunt Elsie had said. She almost understood. It had something to do with why her father was so different when he was at Oak Farm.

The more she thought about it, the more confused and unhappy she felt. Suddenly she shook her head firmly as if to shake all of it from her mind, and ran from the room quite forgetting how Aunt Sarah felt about running in the house.

A
S THE HEAVY OLD
front door with its great bronze knocker closed behind Pamela, she breathed a sigh of relief. It was always nicer to be outdoors at Oak Farm. The huge old house with its great dark rooms, so empty of people, seemed sad to Pamela, as though it were remembering a happier time. Outdoors, things were better. Of course, the barn and stable and storerooms were all empty, too, and even the pastures and meadows grew untouched. But at least the sun shone brightly, birds sang, and the wind was alive in the oak trees.

And on this day there was the wonderful hope that somewhere there might be the ponies and the boy.

Since she had seen the ponies on the road beyond the creek, that seemed a good place to watch and wait. She could sit on the railing of the old bridge that led from Oak Farm to the Valley Road.

On one side of the bridge the road wound away for miles and miles to the mouth of the valley. But on the other it ended just a little way above Oak Farm, and the mountains and forest began. The road was little used these days. The nearby farms were mostly abandoned, and the people down the valley seldom came up so far. Aunt Elsie said that when the Old Families still owned the valley land, the road had been kept in good repair; but now it was dusty and full of potholes. Pamela sometimes tried to imagine those days when many cars and carriages came up the long road and turned in at Oak Farm. It was not hard; Aunt Sarah had told so many stories about it.

Pamela sat on the railing and swung her feet. The sun was bright, and the water of the creek murmured companionably beneath the bridge. She could see minnows and tadpoles in the quiet eddies. It had been fun to catch them for pets until she had slipped one day and gotten her dress muddy. Then Aunt Sarah had forbidden her playing in the creek. But today Pamela no longer regretted the loss of the tadpoles.

It seemed the kind of day for something to happen, but the hours passed and nothing did. Once or twice Pamela thought she heard the wild clear notes of the boy’s flute, but each time the sound faded into silence or lilted into the song of a bird. Shadows lengthened across the old road, and still nothing stirred. Dinner time came without a sign, and Pamela finally decided that the road must be the wrong place to look, especially on a bright clear day. It was different, perhaps, on strange silent evenings when white mists rode the damp air.

That night after Pamela was ready for bed she couldn’t go to sleep. She slipped out of bed in her long white nightdress and stood looking at the glass ponies on their green silk pasture. When she almost closed her eyes, she could imagine that a white mist was beginning to form around the tiny ponies. If she closed her eyes even tighter, she seemed to see them begin to grow. As they grew, the cold clear glass clouded into warm and living velvet, and the gracefully frozen poses melted into lovely flowing motion. She opened her eyes and the ponies were again tiny, cold, and lifeless.

She sighed and took out the amulet, studying it carefully, as if its strange symbols could tell her what she wanted to know. But the bronze eye stared back at her silently.

In the days that followed, Pamela looked in many places. She looked in the fruit orchard among the neglected old apple trees. She looked at the edge of the woods, where it came down the hill close to the barn. She looked in the deserted farm buildings: the barn, the stable, the blacksmith shop and the granary. Perhaps she would have been discouraged sooner, but she found two strange things that made her keep looking.

The first she wasn’t sure of: a mark on the soft ground behind the barn, a mark that might have been a small hoofprint. But it was rather indistinct and she couldn’t be quite sure. There was no doubt about the other, however.

She found it on the third day, when she was looking in the farm buildings and had just been in the granary. It was almost empty. Pamela saw nothing but some dusty grain sacks and a few empty barrels, until she started to leave. Then she noticed something caught on the rough wood of the door frame. It was a long strand of hair. The hair was long and silken soft, and when Pamela held it up to the sunlight, it gleamed—palely pink!

She stayed near the granary that afternoon until she was nearly late to dinner again, but she saw nothing more. Finally she had to run for home. She coiled the pink strand into the palm of her hand before she opened the kitchen door. Fortunately, Aunt Elsie was still in the kitchen. “Thank goodness,” she said as Pamela came in. “I was afraid you were going to be late again. Run upstairs and wash up.”

As Pamela hurried up the stairs, she met Brother in his usual spot on the landing. He wasn’t the kind of cat to give up easily. She knew he was just hoping she would try to pet him so that he could lash his tail and stalk off in cold and haughty dignity.

Pamela laughed. “You might as well give up,” she said. “I’m not going to waste any more time trying to make friends with you. I have other things to think about now. See!” She shook out the lovely pink strand and trailed it teasingly across his smug cat face. She didn’t at all expect his reaction. With a yowl, Brother shot straight up in the air, every hair on end and his tail like a bottle brush. His usual grandeur was completely missing as he shot down the stairs and scrabbled around the corner.

Pamela watched in amazement. What on earth had gotten into Brother? She ran the long pink hair thoughtfully through her fingers as she went on up the stairs.

But the days went on, and. nothing more happened. It began to be hard to remember why she had felt so sure she would see the ponies and the boy again. At times she would have believed it was all a dream, except for the coil of pale pink hair in the handkerchief box on her dresser. Of course, she wore the amulet constantly, but as the days passed by she began to wonder if it were not just any old necklace after all.

Once in a while she thought about the summer classes that were meeting everyday at Valley School. How could she have given it up? She wondered if she would ever have another chance like that.

One warm June afternoon, she was just too discouraged to go on looking. She was tired of hoping and hoping and always being disappointed. It seemed best to forget the whole thing, at least for a while.

She decided to spend the afternoon reading. In the library she picked out a book about Greek gods and goddesses. She tiptoed to the door and stopped to look and listen for a moment before she ventured out into the hall. Aunt Sarah had not said that books could not be removed from the library, but Pamela had a feeling she might if she thought of it. And there were many much more cheerful places to read.

On her way through the kitchen, she found that Aunt Elsie had left out a plate of freshly baked cookies. So she filled up her pockets.

The old barn was one of Pamela’s favorite places. Of course, no animals lived there any more, but the loft with its piles of hay was a lovely place for reading. The quiet shadowy spaces and the faint and friendly smell of animals who had once lived there made it almost cozy.

She closed the heavy door behind her and started towards the ladder that led to the loft. She was not even thinking of the ponies and the boy, when a slight sound made her jump and whirl towards a dim corner.

T
HERE IN THE SHADOWS
stood—a pony! One slender silken pony with a milk-white coat that shaded to softest gray on its face and legs and tail. It stood watching her with its great gazelle eyes, its neck sharply arched and its hooves close together, as though ready to spring away.

Pamela stood frozen with wonder. Surprise and delight tumbled over each other in her mind. For a long, long moment Pamela and the pony gazed at each other in silence. Then the pony moved towards her. Pamela watched, breathless, fascinated by the beauty of its motion. The pony advanced until it was able to touch her gently on the shoulder with its velvet nose. Then slowly, gracefully, it tucked in a dainty hoof and sank down on one bent foreleg.

Like one in a dream, Pamela climbed onto the pony’s back. It turned its head and looked at her, as if to be sure she was ready, and then gently stood up.

Out through the open corral door at the back of the barn and up the hill, the pony went. Pamela had ridden horses before, but she had felt nothing like the lovely flowing motion of this gray-white pony. The coarseness of other horses’ manes were nothing like the clouds of smoky gray that blew back against her arms and face.

At the crest of the hill, the pony began to gallop. Pamela had no saddle or bridle, but she wound her hands in the soft gray mane and rode the gallop easily.

It was such a marvelous feeling to gallop so swiftly and smoothly along the top of the hill, that Pamela was too happy even to wonder where they were going.