Whispering Back (36 page)

It was only when I reached the gate that I noticed Sky was standing oddly. He hadn’t moved from where he had been several minutes before. He met my gaze and then looked deliberately down at his foreleg. I unclipped my two horses and went to look closer, an uneasy feeling creeping up my stomach as I noticed that the grey horse that was in with him and Amber wasn’t the right grey.

It wasn’t until I got round on the other side of him that I could see the hole in his leg. It was only about half an inch across, but it was clearly serious. A thick dark rope of blood oozed out. Somehow I managed not to recoil, but touched his neck softly and quietly asked him, ‘What’s happened, old boy?’

He looked down very carefully at his leg again, and as he moved a huge spurt of blood erupted from the wound, and he smarted from the pain. My heart plunged and I got back to the house as fast as I could, turning and talking to him as I went, in a desperate effort to reassure him that I wasn’t just abandoning him.

I was on the phone to the vet when Nicole arrived back from work. Her bewilderment at the fact that the horses had obviously not been brought in yet, although it was by now almost dark, soon turned to horror when I told her Sky was injured. Gathering an armful of first aid stuff, I ran down to Sky while she found a torch and some headcollars.

I fumbled open a wound dressing and thought about whether I should try to put it on. Quite a lot of blood had come out but the flow seemed to be slower. Then he tried to put a bit of weight on it, and I knew with a shudder as I saw the leg bend limply that it was irretrievably broken.

The whole scene was a grim repeat of what had happened to Joe the year before. So alike in their lives, the details of their stories had echoed each other so much. Their physical resemblance was so strong that several times both Nicole and I had called Sky ‘Joe’ by mistake. And here was his exact reincarnation, a second chance, a horse just on the cusp of the really good life he deserved, waiting to die not 40 metres from the spot Joe had lain down for the last time only a year before. Every time I thought of what was happening my heart welled up. In the closing light I fed Sky fresh herbs from the other side of the fence, and a huge bowl of the most delicious mix of treats Nicole could rustle up, which he generously shared with Amber, who stood with us very quietly. He ate until he didn’t want any more, although Amber seemed happy enough to keep going until she’d have colic. I talked quietly to him, supporting his body or head as best I could, while I gently massaged his beautiful face. We stood together for about half an hour and I held him until Greg, the vet we had met that night with Joe, appeared. He confirmed what Sky had been trying to tell me from the moment he managed to attract my attention.

By now we knew all too well what the procedure would be. Greg had arrived just in time. Having shown no great signs of distress until that point, Sky was growing weaker and had begun to slip into a state of shock. It just seemed like his time was up, that he had enjoyed himself as much as possible but that his sand had run out, and he had known it instantly, the moment he was injured, what had happened and what the vet would do. The last hour or more had been almost pleasant for him, as Nicole and I and Amber took care of his every whim, but now he had reached the end of the time he could enjoy. He made not the slightest effort to resist as Greg slowly pressed the needle into his neck and found a vein. For a moment he looked up past the woods, up towards the great sequoias, rising together like an obelisk into the sky. Then he sank back onto his quarters, and silently rolled onto his side.

Joe, like Sky had come to Moor Wood, his damaged body concealing a heart of gold. When Joe had returned to Moor Wood on loan to Julia, and Muggins found himself with an extra horse to bring in and out of stables, a horse too regal to be rushed, Muggins had at times overlooked what an amazing and dignified character he really was. It was not until he died, with such grace and dignity, that I really began to appreciate how privileged I was to be able to meet and learn from such a refined equine aristocrat. I was thankful I hadn’t made the same mistake with Sky. I hadn’t wasted any precious time in seeing what a noble horse he was. He made a real difference to my life; I hope I made a difference to his.

It was a perfect English summer’s day, and we had been keeping our fingers crossed for weeks in the hope that the weather would be just so. It was the last Saturday in June 2002, and the most important day in the year for us. We were holding another Open Day in aid of the Brooke Hospital for Animals, and we were expecting over a hundred visitors.

As usual, it was also the most important day in High Flyer’s year. Having sorted out his extraordinarily wayward behaviour on the first Open Day, Adam had introduced him to his first roller and long-lines on the second. Now a three-year-old, we were planning to back him for his third star appearance.

Now that we were sufficiently well known to ensure that more people would turn up than we could fit around the round pen, we were going to have to use the school to back a youngster for the first time since we’d surfaced the pen. We both felt a twinge of apprehension at the potential difficulty of the job. For although he had shown very little of his previous behaviour since that first day Adam worked with him, we had recently seen Kelly dealing with another bottle-reared horse at a demonstration. It had been the most difficult horse she had ever worked with, and we’ll never forget the sight of that big horse calmly rearing up and then leaping forward, neatly depositing the saddle on the floor every time Kelly managed to get it on her back. To finally secure the saddle, and then put up her brilliant rider, Grant, was a feat of consummate skill. We just hoped High Flyer hadn’t heard about it and wasn’t planning to put on his own impressive display.

It all went brilliantly. Although he had been in the school only a couple of times in the previous months, Fly showed neither concern nor surprise at seeing the bank of the school lined with people. He was a perfect gentleman when Nicole mounted him, and we felt so confident that nothing could go wrong that we even stopped for a photo! He was a little reticent to move forward on his own, so Finn saved the day, stepping out confidently to provide him with a steady lead.

High Flyer turned out to be the easiest starter we have ever backed. On the third occasion he was ridden, we took him out alone, with Nicole on board and Adam on the ground, and he didn’t put a foot wrong. Instead of being shot, he has a bright future to look forward to. When Lynette, who hadn’t been able to come to the Open Day, saw him a couple of months later, she could hardly believe it was the same horse. She watched three friends ride him around like he was an old schoolmaster, and it was immensely gratifying when, in spite of her old misgivings, she rode him too. It was the first time she’d been on a horse in over two years.

Finn has now started helping Adam to give lessons, and seems highly amused by the whole concept of working ‘on the bit’. He clearly can’t understand why the other horses should bother to use their bodies in such an energetic way. ‘Don’t bend your knees, and make sure you stretch your nose out horizontally,’ seems to be his motto. When he has to come in from the field to look after horses that are in for training, he wanders loose around the estate and does a fantastic job mowing the lawns, although his rose pruning may be a little over-zealous.

Misty maintains her role as chief hug-giver, and is getting confident to the point of naughtiness. She gets whiter, and wiser, every year.

Karma has developed into a lovely three-year-old, ready to be backed at four, perhaps at the next Open Day. We’re tremendously proud of her, especially as she is our first homebred youngster and is so well adjusted. We attribute this mostly to Sensi’s brilliant parenting, and the education given to her by the rest of the herd. Having her integrated into the group meant she didn’t have to be forcibly weaned, saving her and Sensi from what can be a very traumatic experience.

Sensi has recovered brilliantly from all her misadventures, and at fifteen seems to be in the prime of her life. This year, Nicole achieved a long-standing ambition to take her on a Mary Wanless course, where Sensi proceeded to show us up by being the naughtiest horse there.

Amber goes from strength to strength. She’s changed shape so radically that her saddle has had to go back to Kay Humphries four times to be made wider, and instead of being tense and hard and wiry, she’s round and soft and relaxed. She was visited recently by a healer, named Margrit Coates, who seemed to help her come to terms with the events of her past, enabling us to revisit areas of her training that we had abandoned, for fear we might set her back. Adam has now successfully long-lined her, something neither of us ever really expected to see. This confirms our impression that no horse is untrainable if you have the right attitude and resources.

Jo and Julia have, however, moved on. Jo left us recently when her boyfriend went back to live in New Zealand. Having passed her Preliminary Certificate in 2001, and retrained a very difficult remedial starter, we have every confidence she will go on to be a successful trainer.

Julia became pregnant, and she and Danny moved back to Hertfordshire to live near their families, having decided that the annexe simply wasn’t big enough to raise a baby. Seeing her apply the same high standards to nappy fit that she had to saddles was an eye-opening experience for Nicole. Emma Rose was born in 2001 and has already backed a young horse! Although we miss Julia and Danny terribly, it has meant the annexe is now unoccupied, and can be used by clients wishing to come and learn at Moor Wood, which is probably our favourite and most satisfying way of working.

The most unusual and challenging venture of 2002 has to be the coaching day we put on for the Oxford Boat Club. Stifling our natural sense of loyalty to Cambridge, this day was designed to be a motivational, inspirational workshop. Using sports psychology techniques, we tried to demonstrate to the rowers the importance of being willing to change in order to achieve greater success. We showed them join-up, and Karma duly obliged by being a recalcitrant teenager, kicking out at Nicole and charging around the school like a wild horse. We’ll have to wait for the result of the race to see how successful the day was, but the rowers reported having enjoyed themselves, the coaches were pleased, and it was a rare treat for Nicole to be surrounded by so many young men, making up for our predominantly female clientele the rest of the time. We hope to do similar events in the future.

2003 is the centenary of Moor Wood Stables, and we often wonder what happened to the people and horses who lived here before us. They must have had many stories to tell, with triumphs and disasters, just like us. It’s funny to think how different the world was a hundred years ago, but they would have looked out across the same valley and seen the same trees, and lost boots in the same mud. Every May we commemorate our arrival here, and every September we celebrate with Henry our holding the lease at Moor Wood. Each time, we’re just a little bit astonished that we’ve been lucky enough to spend another year here. And as our finances have become that little bit more secure, the quality of the bubbly has steadily improved from that first bottle we shared in the annexe with Henry.

There have been so many stories we’ve had to miss out, so many horses that have moved us and changed us, and we’ve learnt from them all. The riding clinics and Kelly’s courses continue to go from strength to strength, and we’re looking forward to meeting new people, new horses, new challenges, and doing what we can to help.

If you wish to contact us, you can do so through our website,
www.whisperingback.co.uk
or by post at Moor Wood Stables, Woodmancote, Cirencester, Glos GL7 7EB.

For details of the other practitioners in this book, or to find out more about the Intelligent Horsemanship Association, contact Kelly Marks’s office. The office can be contacted on 01488 71300, or through the website,
www.intelligenthorsemanship.co.uk
, which also has details of all the demonstrations and courses available.

For some quality feedback, visit SCSI on-line at
www.scsi-official.co.uk