In Lonnie's Shadow Read Online Free PDF Page B

precious horses, here in the dark at breakneck speed. Not that Crick or his cantankerous father would ever know. Lonnie was too clever by half. But he checked his temper, for riding without permission meant he could very well be given his marching orders. He measured his words carefully. ‘Why’s that?’
    ‘Well, you’re going to today. Saddle up Trident. Be back here in ten minutes sharp.’
    With no further word Crick turned his horse in the direction of the office, leaving Lonnie with little choice but to lead the bay over to the stables, where he unsaddled. He stroked the horse affectionately.
    ‘I’ll see you a bit later.’
    The nervous chestnut stallion he brought over as pacemaker was sixteen hands high and a beauty. All around said that if only Trident could race as well as he looked he would be unbeatable, but the horse was already marked as a bit of a loafer, shy and stubborn. Lonnie spent several minutes whispering encouragement and stroking his mane. ‘Go easy, you beaut, remember I always ride you well. There’s no need to fear me, no need at all.’

    Meanwhile Crick had hitched up Lightning outside the Golden Acres office. He threw open the door and bawled across to the head foreman who was warming himself by the potbelly stove, which, stoked with red gum, spat and spluttered its heat through the building. ‘That bloody jockey of yours hasn’t turned up again. I’m getting McGuinness to ride this morning.’
    ‘That’s a bit impulsive, Mr Thomas,’ the foreman replied.
    Crick brushed off the hint of rebuke. ‘Every stableboy wants to do track work, try his hand at being a jockey. McGuinness is no different.’
    ‘What if he falls? He’s only ever exercised horses, never ridden one at full pace. Don’t you go forgetting that death we had. You’ll put out your father’s temper if anything goes amiss again.’
    ‘If anything happens I’ll just replace him. My father wouldn’t recognise one ginger-haired nut from another.’
    The foreman, who’d been employed there before Thomas had even been born, and was known to be a hard man himself, looked shocked at the callous indifference of the comment.
    ‘You know what I mean,’ Crick said dismissively.
    ‘And as for the horse, no harm will come to it either. Even if it did we both know it wouldn’t be such a great loss. It’s not as if Trident is set for future glory. And I don’t expect my father to hear anything about this. Understand?’ At eighteen, Thomas wasn’t quite man enough to face his father. And he certainly wasn’t going to risk being disinherited. He grabbed a brace of whips from the rack and strode out.

    Lonnie mounted Trident and arrived at the practice track only seconds before Crick came riding hard towards him. He thrust a whip at Lonnie who looked back at him with a slap-down question written all over his face.
    Crick eyed him like he was a moron. ‘Take the whip. You do know what it’s for?’
    ‘We don’t need ’em in work out.’
    ‘Says who? I don’t want any slacking. I want Lightning to see you on his tail. He won’t race properly unless he’s pressured. Use the whip. Follow my lead. Do as I do. Canter most of the way around the track. On my signal, gallop hard for the last quarter. Try to keep up. Don’t fall off ! And whip the horse hard if you have to, do you hear?’
    As Crick rode off ahead, Lonnie muttered under his breath, ‘I hear you well and good, you oafish mullock.’

HORSESHOE PIN

    Item No. 6248
     
    Gold pin fashioned in the shape of a horseshoe. Elaborately decorated with jewels set in flecks of gold from the diggings.

    After the track work, still fuming over Crick’s constant talking down, Lonnie dropped by number four, set on picking up the watch and pin he had left with Pearl for safekeeping.
    As she handed them over, he told her all his woes; how he had been hit on the back of the head and then been saved by a ghost from Uncle Dick’s cesspit, who turned out to be the