Diamond Spirit (21 page)

Jess legged Dodger from side to side, wondering how to get the animal’s head out of the metal bars. She trotted Dodger up and gave it a nudge. ‘
Hah!
’

It turned and eyeballed her without pulling its head out of the gate, then gazed longingly across the arena. It wailed again. A cow bellowed back.

‘Hah!’ Jess yelled, reining Dodger back and forth. ‘
HAH!
’

The steer ignored her. It continued to exchange wails with its lovesick friend. Jess pushed Dodger up closer and gave it another nudge. It kicked out with a hind leg but didn’t move. A muffled giggle went through the crowd.

She tried whistling at it. The steer clamped its tail between its legs and closed its eyes.

She couldn’t believe it. It was in love!

She rode up and gave it another nudge, harder this time. ‘Move it, Romeo!’

A roar of laughter went through the crowd. There were whistles and yells.

She came around and gave the steer a good shove on the other side. It pushed its head deeper into the gate. The clock was ticking. She had no choice. ‘
Gate!
’

The stockman released the gates and the cow wrestled its head out from between the panels. As she followed it into the main arena she could just hear the judge above the laughter of the crowd. He called a cut-out score of thirteen.

Jess would have to complete the course in breakneck speed to make up the points. She set out after the steer, which trotted in a dead straight line towards the herd at the other end of the arena.

Dodger leaned heavily against its shoulder, pushing with all his power to get the beast to turn. But it was single-minded, slowly bulldozing forward. Dodger set his ears back and gnashed his teeth. He tossed his head.

Jess yelled, ‘
HAH!
’

She heard the crack of the judge’s whip.

Eliminated?

She brought Dodger back. He pranced around, not yet ready to let the beast go.

She couldn’t believe it.

Neither she nor Dodger had done anything particularly wrong, but the beast was just a dud. A total dud. Jess gave Dodger a pat on the neck and dropped the reins.

The crowd were on their feet, clapping, but that was it. Her attempt to save Walkabout was over.

Finished.

26

JESS HEADED FOR
the horse wash, Dodger puffing behind her. The announcer’s rambling monologue followed them, and Jess wished he would just shut up.

Dodger took long cool gulps of water from his bucket, and Jess watched them travel up and along his gullet. She looked at his robotic hoof. It was ridiculous. How could she have believed that Diamond was speaking to her?

Me, win a campdraft?
She laughed out loud.

‘What’s funny?’

Jess spun around and saw Luke, holding Legsy by the halter. He took the hose and began filling a bucket.

‘Everything,’ said Jess. ‘Those lights. I thought they were spirits. I thought it was Diamond.’

‘I can’t stop thinking about them,’ said Luke.

‘They were probably just balls of gas.’

‘Yeah, probably.’ Luke still sounded uneasy.

They both stood there, letting their horses drink. In the distance Tegan Broadhead picked out Chelpie’s hooves while Katrina sat on a fold-out chair and sipped from a can of lemonade. ‘I’m going to win the Best in Show trophy, I know it,’ Jess heard Katrina say. ‘Chelpie is by far the best horse here.’

‘Chelpie is by far the biggest troublemaker here,’ Jess muttered to Luke.

‘Lawson wants to put a bullet in her,’ said Luke.

Jess thought about Lawson and Dusty. It had never occurred to her that someone like him could have gone through the same thing as her, losing their first horse. She thought about the anger Lawson carried around inside.

‘Shara is on in the finals soon,’ said Luke.

‘Yeah, I know,’ said Jess. She ran her hand over Dodger’s back. There was one thing she needed to do before she packed up to go home. ‘I have to go and talk to her.’ She pulled Dodger’s head up out of the bucket. ‘Come on, Dodge.’

She led him to the side of the nearby horse float, where Shara was brushing Rocko’s rump.

‘I found out how Diamond got out, Shara.’

Shara continued brushing Rocko and didn’t look up. ‘How?’

‘It wasn’t Rocko’s fault.’

Shara stopped brushing for a moment. ‘No kidding.’

‘Lawson Blake—’

‘I knew it was him!’ Shara brushed Rocko with hard, sharp strokes.

‘No, listen to me, Shara. Lawson’s been seeing Katrina’s horse loose down by the river. You know, Chelpie. The other horses hate her. She gets them so worked up. I don’t know what it is about her.’

‘I wouldn’t believe anything that Lawson says.’ Shara slung the brush into a bag by the float. ‘Reality check, Jessica. Look what he did to your face when he let off that gunshot!’ She threw her saddle over Rocko’s back and yanked the saddlecloth up through the gullet.

‘He thought we’d been stirring up his cattle. Don’t you see?’ said Jess. ‘He knew something was bothering his stock, but he didn’t know what. When he saw us down there, he just assumed it was us. But it was
Chelpie
. Chelpie must have chased the cattle straight through the electric fence. That’s how the horses got out.’

Shara was silent as she tightened her girth.

‘I should have talked to you. I’m really sorry, Shara.’

‘I bet you anything Chelpie chased Diamond through that grid, not Rocko,’ said Shara.

‘But didn’t you see Rocko do it?’

Shara shook her head. ‘No, I didn’t. No one saw it happen. I just assumed it was him because he had been chasing her that morning. But what was chasing
him
, Jess? Why was he so stirred up? He knew Diamond, they travelled together every weekend. He wouldn’t chase her that far, not for a whole mile down the river. Diamond would’ve just turned around and kicked at him.’

Shara was right, Diamond had never been frightened of Rocko. Only people were frightened of Rocko.

‘Katrina knew,’ said Jess slowly. ‘She set us up against each other. I bet she even saw it happen. She started the rumours about Rocko.’

‘Greasy low-life,’ said Shara, putting on her helmet. ‘I have to go warm up.’ As she rode away, she turned back to Jess. ‘This one’s for Diamond, Jessy.’

Jess walked over to the arena and joined Tom and Rosie on the top rail of the fence. There were only two riders left to go before Shara, who sat with her long legs relaxed against the fenders of the saddle. She wore a pale blue shirt and her hair was neatly plaited. Rocko gleamed, looking powerful and fit.

Questions hammered in Jess’s brain. Who did Shara ride with these days? Who taught her to draft? Did she have new friends now? From her new school?

Jess felt she didn’t know anything about Shara anymore. But she wanted to. She wanted to know everything, the way she used to. If it wasn’t her destiny to win the draft, then it would be awesome if Shara did.

‘Come on, Jessy,’ said Rosie, shifting her bum along to let Jess in. Jess wrestled a leg over the fence and tried to make room for Grace, who squeezed in beside her and linked elbows.

The rails were full of people watching the finals. In the camp, cattle bellowed while stockmen whistled and yelled and slapped their rumps as gates opened and closed. The announcer still prattled on, organising competitors, announcing scores and thanking sponsors.

Luke appeared suddenly under Jess’s armpit. Jess tried to move along a bit. But Grace quickly moved to fill the space. ‘There’s no room,’ she said. Luke scowled, hopped down and resurfaced under Tom’s elbow further down.

‘No need to fight, guys,’ said Rosie.

‘Your friend’s going to be rich if she wins this, Jess,’ said Tom. ‘Reckon she’d buy Wally for you?’

‘I wouldn’t ask her to,’ Jess said.

Shara guided Rocko through the gate. Inside the camp, she faced up to the cattle and ducked back and forth a few times. The mob huddled at the back of the yard and eyed her nervously, while she studied each beast. She spun Rocko away from them and stopped abruptly to face the judge. They exchanged nods and she spun back to the cattle.

Shara approached the mob, and cleanly and precisely cut out a lanky black steer. It frolicked playfully to the front of the yard, then tried to dart back to the other cattle. Shara spun Rocko and galloped two quick strides to block it. The steer skidded to a halt, mooed loudly and tried to duck around in the other direction. Rocko pivoted neatly on his hocks and galloped ahead to thwart it. The steer darted back and forth, desperately trying to find a gap, but Rocko had it covered, block by block pushing him closer to the front of the yard. Shara yelled for the gates.

The yard men swung them open and a cheer erupted from the stands. Rosie clamped a hand on Jess’s leg and squeezed it tight. ‘Wow! What a cut-out!’ she squealed.

The steer burst out and Rocko exploded after it. Shara gave him his head, reining him out wide and driving the beast in a big loop around the first peg. She galloped up on its shoulder as it headed towards the cattle that remained in the yards, yelling at it to keep moving. As it bleated to the herd behind the gates, Rocko gave it a shove with his shoulder and herded it towards the next peg. It took off again, swishing its tail and kicking out with its hind legs. Shara raced after it, bringing it around the second peg in another big, tidy loop.

The crowd stood up in the stands. Jess jumped to her feet and screamed. ‘
Go, Shara!
’

Shara threw the reins at Rocko and he shifted into overdrive, thundering up behind the beast, forcing it into a U-turn back up and between the two finish pegs. As it ducked through the pegs, Rocko’s legs skidded madly to make the turn behind it. Shara’s balance shifted suddenly and her stirrup flew out from the saddle, landing metres behind her. But she didn’t miss a beat. She sat deep in the saddle and swerved with Rocko as they scrambled through the two white finishing poles.

The grandstand went silent. All eyes shifted to the man on the ageing grey stockhorse, as they waited for him to call the score. Jess didn’t breathe. The judge lifted his head.

‘Twenty-two for cut-out,’ he called, then paused to let the scorers jot that down, ‘and sixty for horse work.’ He paused again. ‘Four for the course.’

The grandstand began to murmur, people calculated out loud. The announcer finally called it: ‘That’s our last competitor in the Junior Draft and it’s also our winner, folks. Shara Wilson has it with a score of eighty-six on top of a score yesterday of eighty-two. That’s an impressive total of
one hundred and sixty-eight!
’

Jessica jumped off the fence and into the camp with the cattle. ‘
HAH!
’ she yelled at them, sending them to the back of the yard. She squeezed through the gate panels, into the arena and ran out to the finish poles.

She spotted the stirrup, grabbed it and dusted it off on her jeans. In front of her, Shara loosened the reins and walked Rocko towards her. Both horse and rider blew heavily.

Jess held out the stirrup. ‘That was amazing, Sharsy!’

A smile spread across Shara’s lovely moon-face; a smile that could light up a midnight sky. ‘Thanks, Sis,’ she said, breathlessly.

My buddy, my bestie – you’re back!

Shara took the stirrup and fumbled around under her leg, clipping it back onto the saddle. Rocko fidgeted around, flicking his ears back and forth and chewing at the bit. He almost looked happy.

Jess reached out and gave him a couple of slaps on his neck. He was hot and damp with sweat. ‘You’re a good boy, Rocko,’ she said, then took a step back as he flattened his ears and screwed up his nose at her.

Shara laughed and threw her arms around his neck. ‘I knew you could do it, Rocko. You’re a good horse. I don’t care what anyone says.’

‘Are you two going to do a lap of honour or are you gonna stand there smooching all day?’ Jess asked.

‘You bet,’ said Shara. She lifted her reins and gave Rocko a kick. ‘Watch this!’

Jess stood alone in the arena. She smiled as Shara cantered past the crowd and waved to them.

Oh, she’s not . . .

Shara turned Rocko in a big circle and brought him past the crowd again. As she approached the grandstand, she dropped her reins and waved to the crowd with both hands. Then as she passed them, she swung one leg over the front of the saddle and sat sideways to face them, both arms in the air, waving. As she departed, she swung her leg over Rocko’s rump to face backwards, still facing the crowd, waving as Rocko cantered away from them. The crowd roared with laughter and gave her a standing ovation.

Jess shook her head and rolled her eyes. Shara always did love to show off.

Shara swung her legs around and sat forward in the saddle. Then she made a beeline for Jess, leaned out of her saddle and held out an arm.

Jess laughed and put her arm up ready for the grab. Their arms collided and locked in a tight grip. She took a quick step forward and swung up behind Shara onto Rocko’s rump. Jess felt Shara’s legs kicking and Rocko burst into a gallop. She put both arms in the air and screamed out loud, ‘Woohoo!’

‘Riders, please be aware that juniors are not permitted to ride without helmets. Please dismount immediately or you will be disqualified. I repeat, please dismount immediately or you will be disqualified.’

‘That announcer just never shuts up!’

‘Don’t worry about it, you’re disqualified anyway,’ laughed Shara as she pulled Rocko back to a walk.

‘Yeah, but you’re not,’ said Jess. ‘Better let me off or you’ll lose fifteen hundred bucks!’

‘Will that rider please dismount,’ called the announcer again. ‘I repeat, will that rider please dismount and leave the arena.’

‘Yeah, yeah, give us a chance,’ said Shara as she pulled Rocko to a halt. ‘Some people just have no sense of humour.’

As Jess slipped off Rocko’s rump, she said, ‘I’m so glad you’re here, Sharsy.’

Shara brought Rocko around to face her. She grinned. ‘You wanna know the funniest thing?’

‘What?’

‘I took up campdrafting so I wouldn’t have to run into you!’

‘
Heyyy!
’

‘Riders, will you please leave the arena,’ called the announcer again.