Chloe and Cracker (6 page)

Joelle got the giggles about that. “That’s silly, birds don’t swim!” she said.

“Ducks do,” said Bella, smiling and pointing at the map.

There was a village with a duck pond marked on it about a mile away, and no sooner had she pointed it out than we were off. The path took us up a hill, then down a valley and up another hill, just as the clue said. We trotted as much as we could and had another canter when we came to a nice wide bit of path. Jody even let
Bella and I jump a couple of low scrubby bushes, and it was so cool just doing it for fun and not worrying about knocked poles or clear rounds or anything.

We got to the village quite quickly and saw Johnny’s team so we knew the treasure was nearby. On a post by the duck pond was our team’s final clue. It said:

We didn’t know what the end bit meant, but we looked on the map and there was a red telephone box marked in the centre of the village. Bella and I started heading for it straight
away, but Jody called us back and made us calm down and get in a line with us girls in front of her. She said that there would be a few cars in the village and we had to be sensible. So we were careful, even though we could see Johnny’s team trotting on towards the phone box and all I wanted to do was to break into a canter and get there first. Then we saw Sally’s team come round the corner and trot towards the church, so we knew they were on their second to last clue, and would find the final one at the church somewhere.

When we got to the phone box, Mai was holding Twinkle for Suki. I felt disappointed that we’d lost, but then Suki came out empty handed! “There’s nothing in there,” she said. “Sally’s team must have got here first.”

But we told her that we’d seen them by the church, so they weren’t even on this clue yet, and we were all really puzzled. Jody and Johnny just looked at each other, grinning. I knew by now they weren’t going to give anything away even if we begged and pleaded. We all looked at the clue again. “It’s warning us not to rush, but we all rushed to the phone box,” said Mai. “Maybe we need to think again.”

“How can you miss what’s missing?” Bella wondered aloud.

I was confused for a moment too, but then I got it. “We mustn’t miss that there’s a word missing,” I said. “It must be the end of the last line, because it doesn’t make sense as it is. What rhymes with ‘rush’?”

“Mush? Gush? Nothing!” cried Bella, getting frustrated.

I was busy trying to think of more things that rhymed with ‘rush’ but Cracker had other ideas.
He started wandering over to the hedge and I gathered up my reins and tried to steer him back to the group. “No, Cracker!” I told him. “Stop ignoring me! We’re supposed to be a team, remember?”

But he just stuck his head in the hedge and when I finally managed to pull him up, he was chomping on a carrot! Well, it only took me about five seconds to realize that carrots don’t grow on hedges, and I laughed out loud. “Over here!” I called out. “Cracker’s found the treasure!” I leaped down and pulled a red box out of the bush, as everyone trotted up to see. There was a carrot or apple for every pony in a tray on top of the box and I had to quickly hand it up to Jody to stop Cracker from scoffing the lot!

“The missing word was ‘bush!”’ I told them.

“The phone box was a
red
herring, get it?” said Johnny.

“We would have got it sooner if the rhymes were better!” Mai replied, and we all giggled.

“Stop knocking the rhymes, they took me ages!” cried Jody, but she was laughing too.

“Well done, Cracker!” I said, giving him a big pat and a stroke. “You found the treasure. Clever boy!” He nuzzled my arm, so I knew he was happy too!

Sally’s group caught up with us then and she asked who found the treasure. “Chloe did,” said Bella, with a smile. I glanced nervously at Georgia, but she smiled at me too. She was obviously happy to forget about the falling out if Bella was – what a relief!

“Actually, Cracker found it,” I said.

“It sounds like a case of excellent teamwork to me,” said Sally, and I just couldn’t stop grinning.

Inside the red box were three cool pony notelet and envelope sets for the winning team. We let Joelle have first choice because she’s the youngest, then I picked the one with the bay Welsh Section B on, because he looked a bit like Cracker – well, not the colour but the same cheeky eyes. There were mini chocolate bars in there too, one for everyone. We all got off to stretch our legs and ate them while feeding our ponies their prizes (except Cracker, of course, who’d already scoffed his. I made a big fuss of him though, in case he felt left out). Jody put our writing sets in her saddle-bag until we got back to the yard. Then off we went, one long string of happy riders and ponies with no falling-outs.

When we got back and untacked, I had to give Cracker’s carrotty bit a good scrub under the tap. But instead of thinking
urgh what a horrible job
it felt like one of my happiest moments ever – it was so fantastic just being on the yard in the sunshine with my friends, caring for my lovely pony. I wish I could stay here for ever and never go home!

Oh, the shower’s free. Bye for now!

I was going to write more last night but I fell asleep. I worked out that altogether we did two hours and twenty minutes of riding on the treasure hunt – no wonder I was tired out!

I woke up early, thinking about the jumping comp. Then I crept round getting dressed, but it still wasn’t time to get up so I’ve got back into bed in my clothes!

Me and Bella shared out our notelets between the three of us so we all have the same, because we didn’t want Georgia to feel left out. Then we had a fab idea – we’re going to write thank yous to the Sunnyside staff for our brilliant week at Pony Camp. I can hardly bear to think that it’s our last day, it’s all just gone so fast! It’s the jumping comp today – I can’t believe it’s come
so quickly. Luckily we’ve got another lesson to work on it this morning. I just hope there’s still time to turn things round with Cracker before the this afternoon. Dad’s expecting to see me get a clear round and it will be awful if I get dumped in the water tray instead!

But whatever happens, I’m really looking forward to having a good time with my friends and my fab pony. I can’t wait to fetch Cracker in from the field and get going.

Oh, cool, the alarm’s just gone off. I know – I’ll lie down and pretend to have just woken up, then Bella and Georgia will be amazed to see me in my clothes – ha ha!

Hurrah! We finally made it over the water jump! My gorgeous Cracker is such a star!

After we’d warmed up, we went over all eight jumps at a lowish height, to get into the swing of things. Georgia got muddled up and she and Prince went the wrong way at first, and we all had poles down – so at least I didn’t feel like the only one getting in a mess.

At first Cracker wouldn’t go over the water jump, but I didn’t get annoyed, because I could see everyone was having their own problems. And I knew he was trying – it wasn’t his fault he didn’t like the look of it.

After a few goes, with him running out every time, I was getting a bit downhearted. That’s when Bella offered me a lead. Of course this time I said yes please! I followed a few paces behind Charm as we went round the corner
and towards the water jump. Charm popped it easily, and Cracker just followed him over, almost before he realized what he was doing! I gave him a big pat and thanked Bella loads. Sally told me to take him straight over again on my own and sure enough he jumped like a dream! I still had the gate down though, so no clear round yet. We’ll just have to try really, really hard this afternoon and hope for the best.

Oh, gotta go, we’re all going to tie our ponies up in the yard and make them look extra smart for the comp!