The Black Stallion Revolts (21 page)

Larom allowed Allen this indulgence by never admitting Hot Feet was going all out when the black stallion passed them. But Larom knew, as did McGregor, that Hot Feet could not stay within the stallion’s shadow at
any
distance.

Today was no exception. The boy gave the stallion his head at the start of the mile course. He felt the sudden release of powerful muscles. He heard the stallion’s furious snorts at just the sight of Hot Feet running far
ahead of him. McGregor bent low against the straining neck and called repeatedly, knowing that only the sound of his voice would remind the stallion of the boy who was riding him.

The black horse was in full stride now, and he closed the distance to Hot Feet in electrifying seconds. Reaching Hot Feet’s hindquarters, his strides shortened. The boy spoke to him, and he went on, leaving Hot Feet behind as if the small bay horse had come to a sudden, full stop.

McGregor rode him out for another mile, and then trotted him back to where Larom was standing. The ranch foreman watched every movement of the stallion, and finally he said, “Nothing could have beaten him today.”

“If he runs that way tomorrow,” McGregor began, “we’ll …”

“
When
he runs that way tomorrow, y’mean,” Larom interrupted. “It ain’t goin’ to be any other way ever, not as long as you’re up on him. He
wants
to run for you. Ain’t no doubt about that. He’s a killer, an outlaw.… Everything he does shows that. But he’ll do what you want, because you ask him to do it. Jus’ look how you got him under saddle the other day. Never a fight, nothin’. He jus’ took it ’cause you asked him. I’ve seen horses take a likin’ to certain people before, but nothin’ ever like this.”

McGregor touched his horse, and the stallion moved in quick, springy strides to the front of Hot Feet. How could he tell Larom that this was no outlaw horse he rode? How could he explain to him that this stallion
had worn saddle and bridle before, and that he had ridden him before?

From behind him came the man’s voice again. “I wouldn’t miss tomorrow’s race for the whole state of Arizona. Ain’t goin’ to be nothin’ like it again, not once they see what you and him do to that track. I guess I’d give up anything, if I had to, jus’ to see it.”

McGregor said nothing. He felt the same way. He knew it was more than Allen’s orders that were taking him to Preston to ride. He
wanted
to race the stallion. He was excited about it. He was a fool. He might be giving up everything, including his freedom.

Late that same afternoon, Allen drove the van to the corral where the boy and stallion awaited him. It was a large van with room for six horses. Allen had bought it when he had purchased his broodmares a year ago. Now it was to carry the black stallion to Preston.

Only a few riders had been able to come off the range to watch the loading. The others would start for Preston later that night. Larom waved the riders back from the barred gate. He waited until Allen had the van’s side door opposite the gate, and then took down the bars.

In the center of the corral, McGregor held his horse. He waited for them to lower the van’s ramp, to adjust the heavy fiber matting, and then he led his horse toward it. He knew he wasn’t going to have any trouble loading him. He knew Allen and Larom would shake their heads at the wonder of it all, just as they had done when he’d thrown Allen’s maroon racing
blanket over the stallion without any trouble, without a restless movement from the horse. They should have known then that there was no magic about it, that he’d done all this many times before to the same horse … somewhere, long ago.

Larom was standing on one side of the ramp, and Allen on the other. Neither wanted to allow the stallion to get through the openings there. They expected trouble. Seeing them, the stallion shied, moving with marvelous ease and swiftness.

“Move away from the ramp,” McGregor told them.

Reluctantly, and afraid of what might happen, they moved to the sides of the corral. The boy went forward then, the stallion following on a slack lead rope. McGregor walked up the ramp without turning around, but he knew his horse was right behind him. He heard the light hoofs come down on the matting calmly and deliberately, as he had expected. Yet the sound of them, and the closeness of the stallion’s blanketed body once they were inside the van, caused his head to pound. He raised a hand to his forehead.
Where
had this all happened before? He was so close to remembering!

As he turned his horse around and backed him into the straight stall at the front of the van, his head pounded even more.
A narrow, straight stall. A stallion cross-tied. A great roar, a drone of engines
. All these he could remember. Not so long ago. He closed his eyes. He waited. He prayed for it all to come back to him.

“Set, Mac?”

He opened his eyes. Larom was standing in the
doorway. The starter ground. The engine caught, steadied, idled.

Larom said, “I’d better ride up with the boss. He’s so jittery I ain’t trustin’ his drivin’ over the mountains.”

The door closed. He was alone again. He could wait. He had time. It would be five hours before they reached Preston. So much could happen to him in five hours. He might be able to remember
everything
in five hours. He turned to the stallion, wanting his help more than ever before.

The van moved down the dirt road toward Leesburg and the mountain range beyond.

That evening Gordon sat down and reached again for the stack of
Thoroughbred Records
on the table beside him. He wasn’t looking for a picture of McGregor. He was trying to forget McGregor and was being more successful than he’d hoped. He’d found the contents of the magazine more interesting than he’d remembered. He made a mental note to subscribe to the
Thoroughbred Record
. It wouldn’t disrupt his quiet life to keep up with what was going on in the racing world.

He hadn’t riffled the pages of all the issues looking for a picture of McGregor. He had convinced himself that it wouldn’t matter much if he
did
find McGregor’s picture in the magazine. So the kid had been a jockey. A jockey turned thief and murder accomplice. Finding his picture would mean only that he would know McGregor’s real name. So he had decided to proceed in his usual, orderly way, and begin at the beginning. He had spent the first night reading every word of the January 1st issue, and the second night the following
week’s issue. Tonight the issue of January 15th lay on his lap.

This procedure, he thought, would give him a complete picture of what had happened in racing this year. He would go along with the Thoroughbreds from week to week, coming to the big races in their proper sequence. It would be almost as good as though he had attended them. He would never cheat by skipping issues to learn who had won the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness, the Belmont and other classics.

This way, too, he told himself, would help him to forget McGregor and what he’d done to the kid. But tomorrow, he realized, would be the worst time of all for him. Tomorrow the kid would race, and his running from the police would come to an end.

He picked up the magazine from his lap. He studied the cover, driving his disciplined mind to note every muscle of the Thoroughbred horse pictured there. It was a dark stallion, wearing racing bridle but no saddle. He was solid, good-looking. He seemed to be a big horse, standing perhaps over sixteen hands. The bridle reins hung loosely over his thick neck and crest. He had good eyes and a wide, intelligent head. A white stripe ran from forehead to muzzle, and there was white on all four legs, adding emphasis to his dark body. He had sloping shoulders, powerful hind muscles and low-set hocks. He was a very racy type. He was all Thoroughbred.

It was not until Gordon read the print at the bottom of the cover that he realized he was looking at a picture of Night Wind. The caption read, “Night Wind—He’ll Be Back.”

Gordon’s long, thin fingers pressed deeply into the magazine until the whites of his nails showed. Finally he turned over the cover. It was no time to be reminded of Night Wind. Yet when he came to the story inside regarding
The Cover Horse
he read it quickly as though to get it over with and then forget about it.

Gordon turned the page. He had had enough of Night Wind for tonight,
tonight of all nights!
A large advertisement caught his attention, and his sun-bleached, heavy eyebrows came up quickly as he read the headline: “His Daughter Won the Kentucky Derby BUT His Fee Still Remains at $500!” Beneath it was a picture of a black horse,
the black horse he had seen at Allen’s ranch!

Still holding the magazine, Gordon got to his feet, trying to control the trembling of his hands. He told himself that the resemblance between the two stallions was remarkable, but it didn’t necessarily mean they were one and the same horse! This picture was of the Black, one of the foremost sires in the country—sire of Black Minx, the filly who had won the Kentucky Derby, and sire of Satan, a world’s champion before his retirement!

He looked again at the picture, his bright eyes missing nothing. He remembered the black horse at Allen’s, and compared the two stallions. The heads were surely the same … small, noble and arrogant. Yes, and the eyes, too … very large and set wide apart. Ears were the very same. And their bodies were alike in every detail.

He couldn’t sit down. He tried to remember clearly the black stallion he had seen McGregor riding. He saw him again, coming toward him, his body low, and head held high.… That long and slender neck arched even at full gallop.… The long mane so heavy yet windblown in his great speed.

He turned again to the photograph. One horse was a famous sire and the other a wild stallion. Yet they were so much alike in every respect!

Gordon’s face, weathered by years spent in the sun, turned somewhat pale. They
could
be one and the same horse,
but they weren’t, of course
. He was crazy even to consider it. One horse was at the famous stock farm operated by Alec Ramsay and Henry Dailey. It said so right in the advertisement. The Black was in New York State, close to three thousand miles away. The other horse was in Preston, awaiting tomorrow’s race with Night Wind.

Gordon sat down in his chair again, and gradually the color came back to his face. He even smiled a little. He was trying to laugh at himself. Finally he was able to turn the page. He began reading an article written by a veterinarian on the proper care of foaling mares.

His eyes followed the type, but his mind refused to concentrate on the article. He remembered Allen
telling him about the strange, almost uncanny relationship between the outlaw stallion and McGregor. The kid had been able to handle the horse from the very beginning, putting a halter on him, leading him back to the ranch, and shortly thereafter riding him. Gordon remembered replying to Allen that this was all very hard for him to believe. He had gone to the ranch to see for himself. He had found everything just as Allen had said he would. He, too, had accepted the strange relationship between the boy and the stallion. There had been no alternative.
But now?

His lean body shifted uneasily in the deep chair. Now, if he looked at it this way, if he told himself that the horse was no wild stallion, that he had been broken and ridden before, could the horse then be … It was hard for him to say
the Black
. It was too ridiculous!

Nevertheless, Gordon found himself turning back again and again to the picture of the famous black sire. At last he got to his feet, angrily throwing the magazine to the floor. He went to the other issues on the table, the issues so neatly arranged in their proper weekly sequence. He riffled the pages of each one, his eyes scanning only the headlines. He did not really expect to find anything, yet he couldn’t stop looking.

When he came to the issue for the third week of June he grabbed it, but didn’t throw it on the floor with the others. Nor did he open the magazine. It wasn’t necessary. On the cover was a picture of
McGregor
standing beside his “
wild
”
stallion!
Only the caption didn’t say this. Instead it read: “Alec Ramsay and the Black—Lost in Wyoming Wilderness.”

Gordon’s knees buckled, and he caught himself on
the arm of his chair. He lowered himself to the seat, and turned to the story inside. He learned of the plane’s forced landing, and the vigorous search the first few days for the Black and Alec Ramsay. He picked up the following week’s issue, and read of more days of constant search through miles of desolate wilderness. He read one issue after another, the stories of the search becoming shorter, and telling of gradually diminishing hope. The last issue stated that the search had ended and that all hope of finding Alec Ramsay and the Black, dead or alive, had ended as well.

Gordon staggered to his feet. He went to the closet, and got his jacket and hat. By starting now he’d be in Leesburg early tomorrow morning. He’d borrow a car, and get to Preston shortly after noon. He must tell McGregor who he was, and that he had nothing to fear from the police.
McGregor was Alec Ramsay!

Gordon went out the door, shouting excitedly, “Goldie! Goldie!” He was running through the darkness when the thought came to him that Alec Ramsay didn’t realize he was riding the Black! No one knew this but himself! Maybe he wouldn’t be able to get there before the match race.
The Black racing Night Wind
. The Black coming back to the races
in Preston
. He couldn’t miss it! No one who liked to see a horse run would want to miss it. Yet there would be only a small number of people watching, and none would know they were witnessing a sight many thousands of others throughout the world would have given anything to see … Alec Ramsay and the Black racing again!