Free Horse Guest by Bonnie Bryant

Stevie’s going to do about the gymkhana,” she said. On her way out a few minutes earlier, Stevie had huddled with her friends long enough to tell them about her grandmother’s plan to attend Saturday’s event.
    “I don’t know,” Carole said. “If she needs to avoid excitement, the gymkhana is the last place she should be. I hope Stevie can change her mind. And speaking ofchanging people’s minds,” she added, “have you changed your mind about Coconut yet? He and Britt got along great in class today, didn’t they?”
    Lisa had to admit that they had. “Still,” she argued, “Britt gets along great with every horse she meets.” She gestured to Magoo. “Even this one seems to like her. She’s totally horse-crazy. Isn’t that one reason we’re thinking about asking her to join The Saddle Club?”
    “Does that mean you haven’t given up on Applesauce yet?” Carole asked with a grin.
    “No way,” Lisa replied. “By the way, what do you think of Stevie’s candidate?”
    “You mean Romeo’s half brother?” Carole asked. Stevie had also filled them in on her plan to send Britt with Polly. “Actually, I’ve seen him. Judy is his vet.” Carole volunteered as a part-time assistant with the vet and sometimes accompanied her on her rounds. “He’s no Coconut, but he is a really nice horse. He reminds me a lot of Romeo.”
    Magoo coughed. Lisa gave him a dirty look. “Stop that,” she scolded the horse. “You know your cold is getting better. Judy said so this morning. Now you’re just faking it to get attention.”
    “That’s the least of his problems,” Carole said. She gestured toward the wooden door of the stall. When the girls had entered that day, they had immediately noticed signs that Magoo had been cribbing—gnawing on the wood of the stall out of boredom. It was a bad habit, andone that the girls wanted to discourage immediately before Magoo started doing it all the time.
    “I think he’s just mad because he thinks we haven’t been fussing over him enough,” Lisa said. She shrugged. “Although yesterday we were in here for ages with Britt.”
    “Whatever the reason, we’ve got to nip this new cribbing habit in the bud,” Carole said, giving Magoo a thoughtful look.
    The horse stared back. Then, as if defying Carole to stop him, he reached over her shoulder and started to nibble on the stall door.
    Lisa couldn’t help laughing at the annoyed look on her friend’s face. She stood up and gave Magoo a pat. “At least you admit you have a problem, right boy?”
    “I think his main problem is that he’s bored,” Carole said. She patted Magoo, too. “He seems to need a lot more attention than the average horse. And I’m sure being cooped up in this stall and hardly getting any exercise while his injuries are healing isn’t helping his state of mind.”
    “So what should we do?” Lisa asked.
    Carole shrugged. “Obviously, the best thing would be to spend lots more time with him,” she said. “But we can’t do that without neglecting our own horses.”
    “Not to mention our families,” Lisa agreed with a laugh. “And our homework, once school starts next week. And our sleep.” She rubbed Magoo’s nose. “He needs a
lot
of attention.” Suddenly she had an idea. “Hey, doesn’tMax have one of those cribbing straps? I saw it in the tack room the other day.”
    Carole nodded. “He used it to break that boarder of the habit last year,” she said. “But that horse was a die-hard cribber. Magoo doesn’t have that big a problem yet, so the strap seems kind of extreme to me.”
    The cribbing strap Lisa was talking about was a leather device that prevented a horse’s neck from expanding, stopping the intake of air that accompanied cribbing. As far as Carole knew, Max had used it only once, on a horse with a very serious problem. She didn’t think he would approve of its use on Magoo. But what else could they try, short of moving cots into his stall and holding his