Bradshaw’S Horses

Copyright © 2015 Naomi Lehrer.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

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ISBN: 978-1-4908-3672-0 (e)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-3671-3 (sc)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014908327

WestBow Press rev. date: 11/2/2015

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Epilogue

Chapter One

Tighten up your reins and hang on. The horses are going to jump. Kiersti heard her friend’s voice getting higher pitched with each word. Be careful!

Twelve year old Kiersti had only sat on a horse three times in her life and now she felt herself slipping off as Amanda danced in a circle. What if she fell and got hurt just like that boy who used to be in her class last year? She didn’t have time to think about Rick other than a flash of memory of the sixth grader wearing a cast on his arm.

To make matters worse, Amanda belonged to Mr. Bradshaw who was gone to Albuquerque for three days. He’d given Kiersti permission to ride Amanda, his bay Morgan Horse mare, in the pasture. He had not actually said it would be all right to go out on the paved road a half mile away from the house. Dorothea had come by with her Quarter Horse mare, Rhonda. The neighbor girl assured Kiersti that it would be all right for them both to go out riding. Because she was fourteen and in high school, Kiersti was sure she was obviously wiser than a twelve year old like herself who was only in junior high.

It’s that house. The horses hear Janet moaning and they’re scared.

Now that both Amanda and Rhonda were tossing their heads, dancing sideways, and breaking into sweat, Kiersti was scared. Not only would she probably come out with a broken arm but then her parents would know she’d taken Amanda out of the pasture. The thought flashed. You bet we’re all going to get in big trouble now.

Sit up straighter. Dorothea ordered. Get a good hold on Amanda’s mane.

Now that Kiersti had the reins in the palms of her hands while clutching the thick long black mane of the Morgan Horse mare, it looked like she could pull herself back toward the center of Amanda’s back and get a better balanced seat.

Rhonda reared up. Her front feet were off the ground which made her spine slope like a sliding board on a children’s playground. Dorothea leaned forward into the neck of the yellow mare so far that the snow white mane curled around the teenager’s head. In the same moment, Dorothea lost track of the reins which fell to the dirt below. A second later, Rhonda’s front feet were back on the ground and she was galloping along the shoulder of the road. The reins were flying in the air.

The reddish brown horse Kiersti was on snorted because she wanted to go along with her friend, the golden palomino that was now a runaway. The only thing Kiersti could think of at the moment was to give a jerk on the lines to the bridle to stop Amanda. Faster than anybody knew what happened, Kiersti was on the ground lying on her right shoulder. What she hadn’t thought of was that her own body weight was less than Amanda’s neck mass so Kiersti had simply pulled herself off the broad Morgan’s back. Amanda lowered her nose as if examining her former rider. As much as she wanted to run to the other mare, Amanda had a strong motherly character and had always been careful of humans, especially people she thought of as vulnerable. Amanda lifted her head and looked in the direction where Rhonda was still running with her head high. The palomino’s tail was held high.

Amanda just stood quietly next to where Kiersti was starting to get back to her feet.

The good thing was that when Kiersti had fallen, she’d landed in the sand beyond the shoulder of the asphalt street in front of the haunted house. Other than a pain in the shoulder and an abrasion on her knee, Kiersti was fine.

Rhonda was still running alongside the paved road although she’d slowed down Soon the yellow mare had hunkered down low to the ground and her tail had a kink in it. She was shaking her head so her mane was flying in all directions. Experienced rider that Dorothea was, the fourteen year old girl was in serious danger of injury. That’s how people end up in the hospital for the rest of their lives. If Dorothea had not lost both the reins when the corn colored mare had reared up, she could have pulled one rein around to do an emergency stop by turning Rhonda’s head back toward the girl’s knee. But, then, with no reins at all, Dorothea could not reach the bridle with her hands.

Now that Rhonda had put enough distance between herself and that terrifying house, she was slowing from a flat dead run down to a rocking chair lope. She was thinking about her friend, the bay mare she’d left behind, so she turned around and was now trotting back toward where Kiersti and Amanda were still standing in front of that house.

With no saddle, Kiersti could not think of a way to climb back onto the reddish brown mare’s fat back, so she decided to just stay on the ground and start walking. Amanda wanted to be with Rhonda, so the bay Morgan mare was walking quickly almost pulling the girl who was trying to keep up.

Dorothea’s hair which her mom always put up into a bun with a turquoise scarf and bobby pins holding it was falling down around her shoulders. The chiffon scarf was on the ground with a trail of hair pins.

When they met, Dorothea showed Kiersti how to lead Amanda up to the fence of the pasture where somebody kept a few cows. Kiersti was able to climb up the fence post then leap across to land on Amanda’s back face down, then work her legs around over the mare’s broad croup, pull herself forward then sit upright directly behind the withers where the mane ends. For a bareback rider, most horses have a sweet spot a few inches beyond the base of the neck. Once a person sits in that little depression, if the person relaxes the legs and body, it is fairly easy to become almost like part of the horse.

What did you mean about that house moaning? Kiersti asked.

Long time ago a woman with a tall thin dun lived there. When I was small I used to see her riding him over to the irrigation ditch to get water. Something real bad happened at that house because they disappeared.

Both of them? Kiersti felt a cold flash race through her bones.

Yes Ma’am Dorothea enjoyed knowing more than everybody else. "That woman and her cow pony were murdered. That’s why ours always spook when we go past there. Humans can’t hear it, but you know horses have real sensitive ears.

Serious? Kiersti was getting really nervous. Do you think that ghost calls out to our horses when we are on the road in front of the house?

Yes. Our animals hear the girl moaning and that line-back dun cries out to Amanda and Rhonda pleading for them to rescue him.

Now that things had calmed down, Dorothea on Rhonda led Kiersti on Amanda northward along Mountain View Road until they got all the way to the parade ground where Mr. Moran let his horse club members practice military drills every Saturday morning. Dorothea stopped Rhonda at the gate to Mr. Moran’s property.

Amanda stepped up alongside the yellow mare. Amanda knew very well that this twelve year old girl was a beginner rider fumbling around to give commands to a horse. Fortunately, Amanda had been through this before with other youngsters, so the reddish brown mare with the black mane and tail knew that it was her responsibility to take care of novice riders.

Just then they saw a dark blue Ford pickup truck coming toward them on Mountain View. It had a stock rack all around the bed, a type of fence made of pipes welded together and mounted to the truck so a person could haul livestock.

That’s Mr. Moran. We need to get out of the way because he’ll be pulling into this driveway The older girl began moving her golden palomino horse.

A man with light brown hair slowly swung open the driver’s door of the vehicle. He had a square face with high cheekbones. His expression was sober. His green eyes set on the bay mare, then turned to the smaller girl that he’d never seen before.

Mr. Moran. I want you to meet Kiersti McKenzie. Dorothea was always polite.

Turning her head and shoulders sideways, Dorothea continued. This is Mr. Moran, the leader of the horse club.

Kiersti replied. I am pleased to meet you Mr. Moran. As long as she could remember, Kiersti had spoken as clearly as possible, pronounced words carefully, and used correct grammar. Kiersti’s mom had studied to become a high school English teacher but then the war had broken out, so she’d never finished college. Kiersti had grown up with the admonition that if a person mumbles or speaks incomplete sentences, you can mark that as a backward individual.

The gentleman was studying this new girl to appraise whether she’d be a person that would be placed on the waiting list for The Moran Horse Club. He and his wife limited membership to 30 participants but there were always several that wanted into the group.

The piercing hazel eye glanced at the skinny girl who looked to be about nine sitting astride the bay mare. He was a believer in saddles, a bit annoyed to see both of these girls riding bareback. The horseman’s eye followed the silhouette of the horse she was on. The heavy neck was well muscled but not fat. He studied the long sloping shoulder with the mane and withers hair extending into the back which was wide and strong. With the well sprung ribs and the way her poll was held high, this bay mare had a crest that is usually found with stallions. The head was wide between the eyes which were large and round. He saw a glint of white sclera next to the eyelid. Her widely spaced ears were small and tapered with a bit of point at the ends. When he whistled, Amanda turned her face directly to him with her ears pointed forward. As he’d expected, the tips of the ears showed a hint of turning toward each other. No doubt this was a Morgan Horse, a well bred one at that.

Glancing again toward the child with long braids and ragged clothing, his eye turned again to the Morgan mare, bay with black points. This good looking mare did not have any brands. He guessed she was about twelve years old.

What’s your last name, Missy? He wondered who she was, where did she live, and how did she have a horse like this.

Dorothea quickly answered. The last name is McKenzie. She lives two houses this side of that place where Mountain View crosses Elm Street. Dorothea was describing an area on the south edge of Alkaline Acres, an area that was outside to the east of the city of Rogue Valley. Most of the properties in this country east of the developed part of town had been divided into two acre pieces of land. Nobody seemed to care about building codes or taking out permits to put up a barn. For longer than anybody could remember, folks just did what they wanted. Half of the people in Alkaline Acres kept pigs in pens in back yards. Others had blue tick hounds tied on chains attached to sheds. In among the two acre properties with houses, a few twenty acre peach and apple orchards had remained for fifty years or so. That’s how The Morans were able to buy a very large property for just a smidge of money many years earlier. It was now twenty acres kept level with a road grader where he and