Free A Good Horse by Jane Smiley Page B

pony classes in the spring, and nothing would have changed, including me, because I was actually amazed when I tried on my show clothes the night before we were to take Black George over to the show and discovered that the sleeves of my jacket were too short, and Mom had to stand in front of where I was sitting in a chair and pull and pull on the bottoms of my jodhpurs to get them down over the tops of my jodhpur boots. As for the waist snap, well, we didn’t even try to make that stick together—I just put a safety pin at the top of the zipper and covered the whole thing with a belt. At least my hard hat fit, but I knew that, because I had worn it when I schooled Black George, and myboots fit, because they were new. But I could feel the fronts of them if I spread my toes—they weren’t going to fit for long. When I moved around in the front seat of the truck as we were driving Black George over there, I could feel my shirt popping out in back, too. I felt truly stupid.
    And, of course, the first person I saw when I got there was Sophia Rosebury. Sophia Rosebury was exactly my age, and she was a big star around that barn—her instructor was not Miss Slater but Colonel Hawkins himself. Colonel Hawkins ran the whole barn (Miss Slater worked for him), and he had been on an Olympic team sometime, though I could never remember which team or when.
    Sophia Rosebury was built like a pencil—maybe an inch or two taller than I was and about half as big around. She wore very large braces on her teeth—bigger than any I had seen in school—and she had blond braids down to the middle of her back. She was not what Stella would have called “so attractive!” but Sophia Rosebury was a good rider—anyone could see that—and her horses were nice, though not especially nicer than Gallant Man and Black George. What Sophia Rosebury had was perfect equipment. Her saddle was still tan—almost new, but rosy and supple. Her bridle matched her saddle. Her jacket fit as though it had been made for her, and she wore high boots—shining black ones. Nothing Sophia Rosebury was wearing was poking out where it shouldn’t be. Her stock sat neatly underneath her jacket collar; her breeches went smoothly into the tops of her high boots. Her sleeves met her gloves and covered their edges. The same could not be said about me.
    We were at the show grounds for about fifteen minutesbefore Daddy managed to find Miss Slater—long enough for me to unload Black George and tie him to the trailer and watch Sophia Rosebury be given a leg up onto her perfectly cleaned and braided horse, then have her boots wiped by someone who must have been the groom. When she was absolutely clean in every possible way, Colonel Hawkins looked her over, and they walked toward the warm-up ring.
    When Miss Slater saw me, I could see that she agreed with my feelings about my outfit, because she took one look at me and said, “Oh dear.”
    I looked down. The cuffs of my jodhpurs had ridden up and were about halfway up my legs. Well, that’s what it seemed like. They were not that short, but they were too short.
    Black George looked good, though. Between us, Daddy, Mom, and I had spent all day the day before trimming him and bathing him and combing out his tail hair by hair. His tail, in fact, looked spectacular—black and shiny and almost brushing the ground, so full at the bottom that it seemed to float. And, of course, the saddle and bridle were clean. Daddy knew how to get things clean.
    Miss Slater looked at her watch, then she said, “We have twenty minutes before we have to warm up. Abby, come with me. I’ll take you to the storeroom.”
    I followed her into the regular barn, where she crossed the courtyard to a door without a window, painted green with white trim. She pulled out a bunch of keys and unlocked the door. Inside it was dark. She pulled the string on an overhead light. The shelves were stacked with all sorts of things—not only clothes but bits and spurs