Sidesaddle by Bonnie Bryant Page B

demonstrated how she made patterns on her pony’s flank when she groomed him. It was a horse show trick, and it was a neat one. May Grover showed that she’d trained her pony, Macaroni, to respond to visual signals—to come when called, sometimes; to change gaits in the field; and to come over for a treat. That last signal was one he never failed to respond to. Veronica diAngelo, having abandoned her report onpolo because it required too much work, showed how she’d learned to make her horse stand in absolutely proper form for conformation classes at horse shows.
    “Not much of a trick there,” Stevie whispered to Phil. He nodded. They both knew that Veronica’s horse had been trained to do that long before she ever bought him. Nevertheless, the class applauded politely.
    Two students had worked on driving. Corey had her pony, Samurai, hitched to the pony cart. He trotted around the ring a couple of times, and Corey showed how he could change gaits and directions. She’d done a good job and deserved the applause she got.
    Josh had studied driving, too, but he was using the small carriage. He did just fine, but his pony was in a fussy mood. A fussy pony and a carriage made a bad combination, and Max told Josh to drive him out of the ring, promising to let him show what he’d learned on a day when his pony was in a better mood. People clapped anyway.
    Then, when Tiffani brought out Diamond with his sidesaddle on, the six students she’d been working with all had their turns going around the ring sidesaddle. None of them was very good, but they all stayed on, and Diamond responded to their aids just right.
    There was more applause.
    “Well done, class,” Max said. “So well done, in fact, that I think I’ll have you do this more often!”
    The range of things that people had decided to learnwas amazing, Max said. “I am truly impressed with your determination and your success. Every single one—No, there’s someone missing.” He turned his head until his gaze rested on Stevie.
    “Ms. Lake?”
    “Yes?”
    “Did you learn something new for today?”
    This was not a moment Stevie had been looking forward to. She’d learned something new, all right, but she wasn’t eager to share it with the class.
    “It’s kind of rough,” she said.
    “Very few things worth learning can be learned quickly,” Max said. “Nobody expects expertise. Just show us what you’ve done so far.”
    There was no getting out of it. She was going to have to do it, just the way everybody else had. And, after all, it was pretty special, and she had done it all by herself, even if she hadn’t done it very well.
    “I’ll be back,” she said. She was hoping it would take her hours to tack up Belle and that everybody would have given up on her by then, but when she returned with the sidesaddle on Belle, they were all waiting, exactly as she had left them.
    “Why Stevie, you could have used Diamond!” Tiffani said.
    “I wanted to use Belle,” Stevie said. “She’s my horse.”
    She led Belle to the mounting block and began whatshe later considered the most humiliating ten minutes of her life. She and Belle were exactly as good in front of the whole class as they had been by themselves. The only thing that went right was that she didn’t fall out of the saddle while she was mounting. After that, there was no good news.
    Belle took her usual rightward step when Stevie tried to get her to walk. She finally began moving at a walk and refused to trot. She moved forward, but when Stevie signaled for a left turn, she turned right. She backed up when Stevie tried to stop her, and she trotted when Stevie tried to back her up. Every single attempt at giving Belle an aid backfired, side-fired or front-fired. It was a disaster. Finally, trying to get Belle back to where she could honorably dismount and signal the end of her pitiful demonstration, Stevie kicked her too vigorously. Belle did the only natural thing she could in response. She