The Black Stallion Revolts (24 page)

“Ready, kid?” Allen was standing close, his hands hot and shaking on McGregor’s leg in the drawn-up stirrup.

The boy nodded, and took his eyes off Allen. He didn’t want to look at him, knowing what he was about to do to him. The sheriff was on the other side, and far enough away. Now, if Allen would just step back a few feet, he wouldn’t hurt him when he whirled the stallion. He didn’t want to hurt anyone. He just wanted to get away. Allen removed his hand from McGregor’s leg.
Now
, the boy thought,
now!

But Allen didn’t step away from the black stallion. Instead he reached for the bridle. He’d never before taken hold of the stallion, but in his great excitement he didn’t think of this now. For the moment he’d forgotten all caution. He was thinking only of the race to come, the race that a few minutes ago had been hopelessly lost to him. Now he was taking
his entry
to the post. The crowd was waiting for them. After the race he’d do all he could for McGregor. But he needn’t think of that now. He turned to the sheriff. “Tom,” he said, “you’ll find a racing whip in the tack trunk. Please get it for me.” He began walking.

The boy hardly breathed, his head reeled, when his horse stepped forward obediently beneath Allen’s hand. This wasn’t as he’d planned. The stallion was eager to go along with Allen. McGregor sat back in the saddle, his spine stiff. He could do nothing but await an opportunity to be free of Allen. He rose in his stirrups and leaned forward again, talking to the stallion, reminding him
that he was there. But the small head never tossed or turned in understanding of his sounds and touches. There was no flicking back of pricked ears to listen to him. The stallion’s senses were keyed to what lay ahead.

Allen kept walking, taking them ever closer to the track. The boy saw the faces of the crowd beginning to turn in their direction, and he knew he had to get away at once, regardless of what happened to Allen. He drew back on the reins. Allen turned to him quickly, his gaze startled and searching. McGregor was ready to pull his horse around when the sheriff’s towering figure came up beside them. Again McGregor had to wait. He watched the sheriff pass the whip to Allen.

Suddenly the short leather whip was in his own hand, and Allen was leading the stallion again. McGregor didn’t remember relinquishing his tight hold of the reins. He was looking at the whip, his nails pressed deep into its leather. He was aware of nothing but the feel of it in his hand. He didn’t want the whip, yet he couldn’t drop it. He stared at it. Why did he know he should never touch the stallion with it?
Why?

They were on the track. The stands were a sea of swarming, indistinct faces, strangely quiet while the stallion moved in front of them. Then came a mounting hum of excited voices until suddenly the air was shattered by a continuous roar.

Allen smiled, knowing the crowd was for him and his entry. Night Wind was a Texas Thoroughbred, an outsider, while he and his horse
belonged
.

The track announcer said over the public address system, “Coming on the track is Range Boss, owned by the Allen Ranch of Leesburg, Arizona.”

The boy felt his blood run hot while the shouts of the crowd rang in his ears. The stallion sidestepped across the track, pulling Allen into a run. McGregor heard himself say to Allen, “Better let go of him now. I’ll take him up.”

Allen turned the stallion loose, but he remained on the track, sharing his entry’s glory. His eyes stayed on the stallion, but his ears were tuned to the voices from the stands, taking in the great acclamation while the black horse moved past. Allen loved every moment of it. Last year it had been this way with Hot Feet. But that had been
after
the race, he reminded himself, when Hot Feet had won the three-year-old crown. This was much too early to feel as he did. His face sobered, and he hurried to catch up to the black stallion.

Going past the stands, the boy held a tight rein. He tried to close his ears to the
familiar
, clamoring cries. He wanted to listen only to the lone beat of hoofs that told him he was free of Allen. Nothing could keep him from leaving now. All he had to do was to take the stallion to the far side of the track and go over the low fence. He’d be on his way before the sheriff or Allen realized what he was doing.

Go now
, he told himself savagely.
What are you waiting for?

The whip was clenched in his hand. He felt his flesh crawl at the touch of it. How long had he been staring at the whip? He turned his eyes away. The stallion snorted and moved faster, hating the tight rein that held him to a slow walk. McGregor rose higher in his stirrups, looking over the small head. He saw the starting gate, stretched halfway across the track. The
wire-mesh doors in front were closed. To the right of the gate was a high platform, and standing there was the official starter.

“Hurry that horse!” The starter tried to keep the impatience out of his voice.

All this was so familiar, to McGregor and to the stallion. Couldn’t Allen and all the others see that this was no outlaw horse he rode, that he and the stallion had gone to the post before? Even so, what did it matter
now?

He’d had no intention of going so far, but now he found himself taking his horse around the gate. He felt the mounting tension within him. The stallion shook his head savagely, trying to get more rein. McGregor kept him near the rail and away from the horse who stood just in back of the gate. He turned the stallion’s head toward the far turn, yet his own eyes remained on the dark brown horse with white markings on face and legs. He had seen Night Wind before. He was certain of this, too.

He let the stallion lengthen out going away from the gate. He felt reassured of his means of escape in those swift, easy strides. Finally he rose high in his stirrups, and brought the stallion down to a prancing walk. Then he turned him around. He was going back to the gate, even going inside to come out on the break. All the way down the track, he asked himself,
Why?
His only answer was that it didn’t matter how they reached the backstretch, just as long as they got there. One way around the oval was as good as another. Yet he knew he was lying, that something over which he had no control was taking him and his horse to the starting gate.

The stallion’s eyes were on Night Wind. He screamed once and his loud challenge silenced the stands. For a moment every gaze was on him. He came close to the gate, his great black body glistening in the sun, and there was a savage wildness to his action.

One of the starter’s assistants walked toward him, and the man’s movement broke the stillness of the stands. There came the drone of excited whisperings, for the spectators had caught a glimpse of what they had been told to expect, yet hadn’t believed. The Allen Ranch was racing a stallion that had run wild only two weeks ago!

McGregor watched the assistant starter come toward them. He saw the fright in the man’s eyes when he reached for the bridle. The stallion reared.

“Get back,” McGregor said, bringing his horse down. “I’ll take him in alone.”

As he moved away, the man said, “Hurry him up, then. You got a whip. Use it on him, if you have to!”

Use it on him, if you have to!

The words seemed to tear McGregor’s ears apart. He raised the whip before his eyes, staring at it for many seconds. He felt the tears come suddenly, burning his eyelids. Why was he crying? The tears came faster, blinding him. He brushed his hand over them, angrily sweeping them away. He looked toward the stands, searching for the person who had called those very same words to him an eternity ago. The sea of faces swarmed before him. He looked harder, finding Allen, and Larom, and the sheriff on the rail … the only faces he knew. He saw a figure suddenly appear behind them, and for a flickering second hope rose
within him. Then he recognized Gordon, and turned his attention back to the gate.

At his command, the stallion moved quickly into his starting stall, and the gate closed behind them. There was only one way out now. When the door in front opened there’d be no turning back,
ever
.

He didn’t look at the horse and rider in the next stall. His eyes were focused straight ahead and he was looking through the wire mesh at the track that lay before him, so golden in the sun. Suddenly he gasped. And as the air rushed out of his lungs, he knew that here was the true road back that had evaded him for so long, the road that would have told him everything he wanted to know, if he’d found it yesterday or any of the long days before it. Now it wasn’t important. Now it was just a means of escape!

The track announcer said, “The horses are at the post.” The spectators were quiet, awaiting the start. Their eyes were on the front door of the gate. They didn’t want to miss a thing. They knew that a world of horsepower was ready to explode in a single race. This was to be no usual sprint of three hundred or four hundred yards, but a long mile, twice around the track. This was to be a very special race, and they awaited it in hushed silence.

At the rail near the starting gate, Ralph Herbert removed his horn-rimmed glasses, and quickly wiped the sweat from his eyes. “I don’t like this,” he told his trainer, a man with a frame as solid and big as his own. “Allen has put something over on us. That black horse isn’t fresh off the range. Did you see how he walked into his stall?”

“Yeah, I saw.” The trainer worked his jutting square jaw. “But he’s wild enough to fight at the drop of a rein. If anything should happen to Night Wind …”

“Nothing will happen to him,” Herbert said. “But that kid sure can handle that black horse. Look how he’s quieting him down, after all his twisting.”

“Who is the kid, anyway?”

“Allen said his name’s McGregor. Works at the ranch.”

“He looks familiar to me,” the trainer said, “as I mentioned before.”

“Yeah, I know. I’d like to see him without that hat. He’s got it pulled far enough down to pretty near cover his eyes.”

“And that horse is like something we’ve seen before, too. He’s no mustang, that’s for sure. He’s bigger than Night Wind and hot-blooded, Ralph.”

Herbert said, “I know it. I’m worried. Allen’s sprung a racehorse on us.”

“Maybe so. But there’s no doubt that horse has run wild, and done a lot of fighting, Ralph. He’s been cut up plenty. Look at his scars.”

“I’m still worried.”

The trainer smiled. “What for, Ralph? So he’s a racehorse, and that’s why Allen agreed so readily to the mile distance. You think anything here is going to beat Night Wind? Our horse is better than he was last year. You know that as well as I do. If you’re going to worry, save it for Santa Anita, when we’ll be up against the best again. Even then I won’t be worrying, not if Night Wind keeps running the way he’s been going.”

Herbert nodded. “I suppose you’re right. But just
the same I’m glad I have Eddie Malone up on him. I’ve got ten of my best quarter mares at stake in this race.”

“I know that, all right,” his trainer answered. “Just don’t worry, Ralph.”

A short distance down the rail Allen felt a hand from behind grab his arm. He didn’t turn. He couldn’t take his eyes from the horses in the gate. Any second they’d be off. But Larom and the sheriff turned to the man behind, and Larom said, “Hello, Slim. I didn’t think anything would get you this far from Leesburg!”

Allen felt Gordon’s fingers digging deeper into his arm, and then Gordon said, “That kid is
Alec Ramsay
and the horse is
the Black
. Alec Ramsay and the Black! Did you hear what I said, Allen?” His voice was shrill.

Without turning to him, Allen asked, “You mean McGregor?”

“McGregor, nothing. That’s not his name.
It’s Alec Ramsay!
”

Allen shrugged his shoulders. The kid had the stallion quiet. The break was coming. “What’s the difference what his name is, Slim? He’s wanted by the police in Salt Lake City. Tom’s here to pick him up.”

“You’re all crazy!” Gordon shouted. “He hasn’t done anything! He’s Alec Ramsay and the horse is the Black. They’re famous, I tell you! Their plane crashed in Wyoming and …” The roar of the crowd droned out his words.

“
THEY’RE OFF!
”

With the opening of the doors, the stallion broke from the boy’s restraining hands, and came out of the gate in front of Night Wind. McGregor caught a glimpse of the white blaze at his horse’s flanks, and
then it fell behind quickly as the black stallion’s strides steadied and began to lengthen. He drew back on the reins. He called to his horse. He didn’t want him running all out. Their race wasn’t here, but across the plain! The stretch was short. They’d be at the first turn before he’d be able to pull down the stallion.

Allen’s eyes were moist as he pounded Larom on the back. “He’ll hold that lead! He’s got the race, Hank!” His foreman nodded his head vigorously in complete agreement.

Among the thousands who watched, only Herbert and his trainer were silent. They were unimpressed by flying starts from the gate. They knew their champion was built to go a distance, and that his speed would mount steadily until he’d run over anything before him. This was a mile race, and what happened in the first few hundred yards was for fanciers of the quarter horse, and not the Thoroughbred. Herbert’s clenched hand began pounding the rail, for even now with the horses approaching the first turn Night Wind was gaining!

McGregor slowed the stallion’s strides still more. He drew back on the reins, and kept talking to his horse. He heard the fading roar of the crowd as his mount swept into the turn. The stallion’s resentment at the tight rein was felt by McGregor in the terrible pull on his arms. The stallion wanted to run, and was telling him so forcefully.

“
Soon,
” he called, “
but not now!
”

He saw the straining, nut-brown body of Night Wind come up on the outside. His jockey was sitting still in the saddle, not asking Night Wind for more
speed, but getting it. Their eyes met for a second. The black stallion lowered his head, pulled harder and picked up speed. The horses reached the middle of the turn, racing stride for stride, stirrup to stirrup.