Blind Beauty Read online

  True, but Tessa didn’t answer.

  “Even if the horse is a no-no, the owner pays for it to be treated like a star. You’ll have to get that into your thick head.”

  In spite of herself, Tessa felt a faint interest in “her” horse. The next day she waited impatiently for the horsebox to arrive. Gilly made her put a straw bed down in one of the empty, disinfected looseboxes, and put hay ready and a water bucket. Three other horses had already come back from grass. They were impressive glossy animals. Gilly and Arthur took charge of them. Apparently they were ready to start work again, to get fit over two or three months and start running in November. This meant lots of slow exercise to get their muscles hard, until they were ready to canter, and then run for their lives. Tessa leaned over the half-doors studying them, admiring their impressive appearance. Even if they weren’t Gold Cup winners, they looked like it.

  “Pity you can’t ride,” Gilly remarked. “There’s a lot of riding to be done between us, this time of year.”

  Tessa would not let on that she wished she could. She tossed her head impatiently to indicate riding was for the mentally impaired. Gilly sighed. There was a limit to her patience.

  “Sweep the yard,” she snapped.

  It was big yard with uneven concrete, and a pig to sweep. All Tessa was fit for, Gilly decided.

  Tessa’s horse arrived in the early afternoon.

  With the other three, Tessa stared in dismay at the dismal animal that stumbled down the ramp. Peter and Jimmy frowned, then laughed.

  “The Grand National, he said,” Peter snorted. “God save us!”

  “You have to laugh, or you’d cry,” Jimmy said.

  The horse was very tall, long-backed, gaunt and ribby with a dull hide the colour of faded conkers. It had an amiable face, an ugly white blaze, and long, wagging ears. Its pale-coloured mane and tail looked as if goats had been at them. It was as unlike the three other arrivals as a horse could possibly be.

  “No wonder no one bid for it,” Peter said.

  To cap it all, following on its heels, unhaltered, came a small piebald Shetland.

  The driver said, “That one’s free. They won’t go anywhere without each other, so I was told. Put it in the same box they said.”

  “Cripes, I don’t believe this,” Peter said.

  Jimmy grinned. “Just the job for our Tessa.”

  They gave her the head-collar rope.

  Tessa felt humiliated beyond words. It was all a great joke, with them enjoying taking it out on her. They were all laughing.

  “The man’s a maniac. It’ll never see a racecourse, this one, let alone Aintree.”

  “You’ll have to tell him,” Jimmy said. “It’s not fair to take his money.”

  “Put him in his box, Tessa,” Peter said. “We’ll have to let the old man down gently. I told you – he’s an idiot.”

  “Mind the horse doesn’t tread on you. You’ll never walk again,” Jimmy said.

  The horse followed Tessa through the open door. The piebald pony trotted in behind.

  The driver said, “The pony’s called Lucky.”

  “Got the horse’s passport?” Peter asked.

  “They never gave it me. Horse is called Buffoon, that’s all I know.”

  “We want the passport. Tell ’em when you get back. Or I’ll give them a ring.”

  The driver closed up the ramp and departed and the others peered in over the door, still unbelieving.

  “I’ll tell you one thing,” Jimmy said, “this one will do nothing for our reputation.”

  “No. But meanwhile, he’s paid the first month in advance. That’s rare enough. We feed the brute and treat him nicely. After that…” Peter shrugged, laughed. “I thought I’d seen everything! Just goes to show…”

  They all wandered away, chortling. Tessa took off the horse’s headcollar, choking back tears of disappointment, now there was no one to see. They’d made a fool of her, and so had the horse.

  “You pig,” she said viciously.

  The horse turned its ugly head and regarded her kindly. Then it went to the haynet and snatched a mouthful. What it dropped on the floor the little pony hoovered up. What a pair! The pony seemed to underline the ridiculousness of her charge.

  Tessa tried to tell herself that nothing was any different, but she could not fool herself into believing that she hadn’t cared tuppence about what stupid horse she was getting. A little part of her had felt interested, keen even. It had thought she might get – by chance – the best one in the stable. Then she remembered she wanted to get the sack. Or did she? She didn’t know what she wanted. She laid her head against the great gaunt flank and cried. Nobody would see. Nobody cared. Not even the stupid horse. It turned its ugly head to look at her. With hay sticking out of its mouth it looked more like a yokel than ever. Whoever christened it Buffoon had the right idea.

  “I hate you!” Tessa cried and thumped its belly.

  It gave a surprised snort and a sad look, and shifted away slightly.

  “You make me sick!”

  Tessa cried and was ashamed. It was getting to be a habit. She hated this place and she hated home and she longed for the sin-bin which was too full of other sinners to take her in. There were other people like her out there – if only she could be with them!

  Jimmy’s lurcher Walter came trotting across the yard. Tessa opened the loosebox door and called him in. He came in his friendly way – he was only a year old. He cheered Tessa up. She stopped crying. She would have loved to have a dog but Maurice wouldn’t let her. Not even a cat. Too many hairs on the carpet. Walter covered her wet face with wetter licks, and actually made her laugh. Then Gilly looked over the door and bawled her out.

  “For God’s sake, get the dog out of there! He’s not allowed in the boxes! You wait till Sarah comes back – I’m warning you, we’ve been easy on you, the way things are. But she won’t be – Mr Mucky Morrison’s daughter or not – you’ll get stick if you don’t mend your ways.”

  “I’m not his daughter!” But Tessa liked the name – Mucky Morrison. It suited him.

  “Whose daughter are you then, if it’s not a rude question?”

  “Declan Blackthorn’s.”

  “And who’s he when he’s at home?”

  Tessa didn’t answer. What could she say? A feckless Irishman who fathered her when he was hardly out of school, who disappeared when needed?

  Gilly’s face softened a fraction. She couldn’t fathom Tessa, who went out of her way to be so obnoxious, but Gilly thought of her in the same way as she was used to considering a problem horse. There was a key to Tessa’s behaviour, somewhere. Problem horses were nearly always the fault of somebody, somewhere along the line. Gilly thought the same was true of Tessa. Having Mucky Morrison for a stepfather was a fairly obvious reason for her hate-everybody attitude, for starters. And who knew what had happened before that? Gilly knew that Tessa would never confide her troubles, even if she recognized them herself. Gilly didn’t mind playing her along, but Sarah was another matter.

  “You’ll have to mind Sarah. Just a friendly warning.”

  “Huh!” grunted Tessa. “Why’s she any different?

  “You’ll see. Meanwhile, get to work – your new horse could do with a bath. And then you can learn to groom – properly. I’ll show you. It’s hard work, to do it properly.”

  Buffoon was tied up in the yard by the drain. Gilly unreeled the hose.

  “His mate can have a spruce-up too. Tie the pony up.”

  It was hot and Buffoon enjoyed the cold hose. His friend Lucky kicked and reared against his head-collar, but Gilly only laughed and smothered him with soap bubbles. He positively sparkled when she had finished, and Buffoon’s dusty coat was much improved.

  “He can look his best, however modest his best might be,” Gilly said.

  She
squirted a jet at Walter, who fled.

  “I bet I’ll be the mug that has to ride this one. Jimmy and Sarah won’t be seen dead on him. Unless you learn…”

  “I don’t want to!”

  One of the smart ones, perhaps… Tessa had her pride.

  When she got home that evening she had to listen to Maurice and Greevy gloating over a new horse, Crowsnest, bought that same day out of a flat-racing yard at Newmarket. It was a winning stayer, and Maurice had “snapped it up”, outbidding a well-known owner who also kept his horses with Raleigh. Raleigh was “over the moon” to get it in his yard. Greevy was assured of his job, however inadequate an assistant trainer he was turning out to be. Listening to them, Tessa had no inclination to mention her yard’s forlorn new horse. She sat in stubborn silence.

  Myra was wittering on about her lack of success in finding Tessa a school place.

  “It looks as if you’ll have to be taught at home. They send someone.”

  “Poor bloody teacher, stuck with her,” Greevy said.

  “Why don’t you grow up, Greevy?” Tessa enquired. “For an adult you sound like someone out of primary school.”

  Greevy glowered. With a boil on his neck, he got worse by the day.

  “Oh, you two, stop it,” Myra sighed. She was scared of telling Maurice that the education department said he would have to pay for Tessa’s private tutor. If he could afford boarding school he could afford the tutoring, they had informed her. They weren’t to know that he had been happy to pay boarding school fees to get Tessa out of his way, not for anything to do with education. He would be less than happy to pay out if she were still to be underfoot.

  “I don’t want an education anyway,” Tessa said. “I know all I need to know.”

  “Now who’s talking rubbish?” Geevy jeered. “Peabrain. You wouldn’t last a minute at Raleigh’s.”

  “Nor you at Mr Fellowes’.”

  “Well, we all know why you’re still there.”

  “And the same applies to you.”

  With this unedifying gridlock the conversation came to an end.

  Tessa went up to her room and turned on the television. It was a relief from the real world.

  The next day, when she was sweeping the yard, the lorry-driver who had brought Buffoon drove in in a Land Rover and handed her a slim, stiff-backed book.

  “That horse’s passport. Buffoon. Your guv’nor will want it. OK?”

  “Yeah, I’ll give it him.”

  The man drove off. Tessa idly leafed through the papers. It was headed “Document of description for the identification of foals, yearlings, racehorses, broodmares and stallions”. After several pages of boring rules in both English and French she came to a drawing. Under the drawing was a box headed, “Name of Dam”. And in the box was written in ink “Shiner”.

  It was no good pretending any more that she didn’t care. Knowing that Buffoon was Shiner’s child changed Tessa’s life.

  She told nobody, not even Myra.

  It was August, dry and dusty, and as she hurried to the stables in the morning she knew that, for the first time in her life, there was something she desperately wanted – to stay at the stable and look after Buffoon, the despised, useless new horse. He was a sin-bin candidate, like herself. Not wanted. They belonged together. Fate had delivered him to her. It was more than coincidence. She would die for him. To her, now, he was beautiful.

  As she hurried along, leaving a trail of dew through the downland grass, she knew she was being ridiculous. Hysterical even. But she couldn’t help it. She had never in her life had anything to look forward to, never had an ambition, save the perennial wish to get away from her situation. Now her burning wish was to stay where she was. But she was only supposed to work at the stables until the end of the month, when – somehow – she was bound for an education. Even now Myra was trying yet another school, an ill-thought-of comprehensive, the last resort. Tessa knew they didn’t want her at Sparrows Wyck, she had made herself too grouchy and unwilling. Gilly had already told her that Sarah would give her short shrift … Her mind tumbled over all the obstacles to her new, burning wish.

  She prayed aloud, “I will be good! I will be good! If only I can stay…”

  But how could she become a real stable girl, when she was only twelve?

  Desperate anxiety hastened her steps. For the first time she arrived early, while they were still at breakfast. The horses were still finishing their small early morning feeds. Tessa went in to Buffoon and threw her arms round his neck. He turned to her with gentle surprise. Lucky butted her for a titbit, too small to reach Buffoon’s feed in the manger. This is where I belong, Tessa knew, against all logic. She buried her face in Buffoon’s moth-eaten mane.

  “You are mine,” she said. “My beauty. I shall never be parted from you.”

  Even as she said it, she knew she was crazy. It wasn’t true and never could be but she would die first before she changed her mind.

  When Gilly came out Buffoon was mucked out and Tessa was grooming with her sleeves rolled up.

  “Hey, what’s bitten you?” she said.

  Tessa did not deign to reply.

  In the tack-room, Buffoon’s gear was polished and shining, standing out from the rest of the grubby tack. Soon his grooming brushes were washed and laid out in the sun to dry. Nobody said anything, but they all noticed.

  When the horses went out on exercise, Gilly rode Buffoon, and Tessa watched them go with light in her eyes. She turned Lucky out into the small paddock behind the stables and he settled to grazing, knowing that his friend would be back in a couple of hours. Tessa tidied the loosebox, swept the yard, and went to the manège when Jimmy was just coming out with a young horse. Jimmy was the only one Tessa liked.

  She hung around while he untacked the horse, and took the gear back to the tack-room for him. When she returned, he was washing the horse down with the hose. Walter leapt around, dodging the jet of water. Tessa knew that when Jimmy had finished he would put the horse away, sit on the hay bales and roll a cigarette. Over his head was an ancient notice that said “No Smoking”. Tessa sat on a hay bale, waiting.

  “Hi,” he said, quite amicably.

  He sat down and got out the cigarette papers, pulled one out.

  “I want to learn to ride,” Tessa said.

  Jimmy got out the tobacco and picked out a meagre ration of shreds.

  “I want to ride Buffoon.”

  Jimmy didn’t say anything. Tessa then remembered Gilly saying once that Jimmy never gave lessons. Well, what else could she do but ask? No one else would teach her. She sat staring at the ground, waiting.

  Jimmy lit his cigarette and took a pull. He had a weather-beaten face and hair that grew close and curling to his head. His eyes were very blue and direct. Tessa supposed she liked him best because he never criticized, never said much at all, just did his own thing. He had a kind way of looking, with a slight smile. Peter his brother was much more excitable and short-tempered, and had made his dislike of Tessa quite plain. Unlike Jimmy.

  At last Jimmy said, “Change of heart, eh?”

  “Yes.”

  Jimmy stared into space for a bit, inhaled on his scrappy cigarette and eventually said, “This afternoon, if you like. Half an hour. See how you go.”

  Tessa bit her lip, holding back an impulse to leap up and hug him.

  “Yes,” she said.

  The stables were quiet in the afternoon after the midday feed. Gilly went home for a couple of hours, Peter went off to his office, or the cows, old Arthur went to sleep. Tessa was there waiting long before Jimmy came. She thought he had forgotten, her heart was pounding. But he came soundlessly round the corner of the barn, saw her and smiled.

  He used one of his young horses, a thoroughbred, but put it on a lunge-rein in the manège. When Tessa got up, it all came back to her, the sight of t
he long neck ahead and the perky ears, the slab of shoulder working smoothly, the gleaming coat sliding over bone and muscle. Declan had thrown her up on lots of horses once, old ones and young ones, and the familiarity soothed her. She knew she would be good.

  “You’re a natural,” Jimmy said.

  By the end of the half-hour she was rising to the trot with only a few misses.

  “I can’t teach anyway,” Jimmy said. “It’s up to you. But I’ll give you half an hour in the afternoons until you’re safe to be let out. Buffoon’s no trouble, only getting him to move. You won’t have to know much to ride him.”

  “I love him.” She didn’t know why she said it.

  Jimmy said, “I’ve noticed.” He didn’t smile. “Don’t make it hard for yourself. I doubt he’ll stay long.”

  Tessa thought, if he goes I’ll follow him. Wherever. She didn’t care. Jimmy saw her sharp chin lift. What an odd girl she was!

  A woman came round the corner of the barn, lean as the lurcher, a mass of dark red hair knotted roughly back, purple-blue eyes like lasers taking in the scene.

  “Blooming riding-school is it now?” she jeered at Jimmy. “I thought you never gave lessons?”

  Jimmy just smiled. He introduced her. “This is Sarah, Tessa. Our head lad. Not ‘lass’ – more than our lives are worth if you call her that.”

  Sarah gave a bark of a laugh.

  “Hullo, Tessa. Pleased to meet you. You’re honoured, being taught by this one. He never teaches.”

  “Yes.” Tessa did not disagree. She slipped to the ground.

  “You’re Mucky Morrison’s daughter, I understand?”

  “No, I’m not! I’m Declan Blackthorn’s daughter.”

  “Oh, Declan’s? I never knew he had one.”

  Tessa looked up, stricken. “You know him?”

  “I met him at Goresbridge once. Last year, I think it was. He tried to sell me a useless horse.”

  She turned to Jimmy and started to talk to him, and Tessa was left to take the horse she had been riding back to its box. She felt as if someone had hit her, hard. But why was it such a surprise? Ireland wasn’t a large country and all the horse people milled around meeting each other all over the place. If she really wanted to, she could no doubt trace her father. But why on earth would he be glad to see her? Tessa shrugged unhappily. He certainly had never tried to trace her. Even so the mention of him, so casually from Sarah, was a shock.