The Winter Pony Read Online Free PDF Page A

so much unlike a fighting man that he was only
Mister
Oates.
    He didn’t stay long that day. After a little pet and a rub on the cheek, he went away with Mr. Meares, strolling together toward the ship. From then on, I watched for him all the time, standing whenever I could at the same spot along the fence. But it was three or four days before I saw him coming toward me again.
    It took me by surprise. I was watching for him around the ship, but he appeared instead on the roadway, in a happy group of people.
    It was a fine day, the clouds like froth on a river. Honeybees were buzzing around the clovers, and the people came slowly in the sunshine, chattering away like crows.
    In the middle of the group was a man with a walking stick, wearing a cap with a gleaming badge, and a coat with rows of buttons that flashed in the sun in rounds of gold. The others swarmed around him—now in front, now behind—like a flock of little birds. He had Mr. Oates close behind him, and a woman at his side, the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. Her white clothes reached right to the ground, and I had to wonder if she had any legs, because she seemed to float like a cloud across the grass. At the back of the group, the Russian jockey carried lead ropes draped across his shoulders.
    The man in the middle was Captain Scott. He swung his walking stick in his hand, jaunty as a wooden tail. Ten yards away, he stopped and stared at me and the other ponies. He pushed up the brim of his cap.
    The whole group stopped along with him. Mr. Meares came up to his side, beaming proudly. Mr. Oates lingered, though I longed for him to come up and pet me.
    Captain Scott studied us carefully. For once, all of us were quiet, no one fighting another. Even Hackenschmidt was doing nothing more than eating grass, though he was wary as he did it. We must have made a splendid sight: nineteen white ponies in a field of grass and clover.
    “Splendid,” said Captain Scott. He looked very pleased. “A bit of all right. Don’t you agree, Titus?”
    “They seem so,” said Mr. Oates. “I haven’t had a proper look yet.”
    “No time like the present,” said Captain Scott.
    The whole group came through the gate and into the field. The Russian jockey ran ahead and gathered four ponies, including me. He attached our lead ropes and held us in a bunch as Captain Scott and the others came toward us. The lady kept her distance, making sure there was a man between herself and any pony. But Mr. Meares and Captain Scott came right among us, and then Mr. Oates—with his pipe in his teeth—smiled right at me. “There’s my lad,” he said.
    I was thrilled that Mr. Oates remembered me. I greeted him with a snort and a nicker and a toss of my head. It made the men laugh for some reason, and the lady cried out, “What a darling!”
    I was the first to be examined. Captain Scott held my rope while Mr. Oates looked me over. He lifted my feet and poked my hooves; he felt my belly and my chest. He wasn’t smiling anymore; he was frowning instead. He moved on to the next pony, and the next after that, until he’d looked at all four of us.
    Captain Scott seemed impatient. “Well?” he said.
    “They’ve had a hard life,” said Mr. Oates with a sigh. “A long one too.”
    “Do you mean they’re old?” asked the captain.
    “As the hills,” said Mr. Oates. “They’re worn out. A lot of crocks, most of them.”
    Crocks. It was the first time I’d heard that word. But I could tell it wasn’t a good thing to be a crock. The ponies beside me
were
old; it was true. Their coats were ragged, their backs bent, their teeth badly worn. I wondered if Hackenschmidt was a crock because he was so wild. Or Christopher because he was stubborn and mean.
    Mr. Meares looked disappointed. And Captain Scottseemed almost angry. “You’re being a bit hard on them, don’t you think?” he said.
    Mr. Oates shook his head. “Not at all.”
    “Well, I believe they’ll do very well,”