Montana Red. Genell Dellin

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СКАЧАТЬ best and nervous from being closed up in a stall, although it was getting used to people. But the last thing he and the old guys needed was for Clea to get the filly all agitated right before feeding time.

      “It’s not good to overhandle a motherless young one,” she said.

      Like he’d asked her. Who did she think she was, anyhow?

      “So what are you doing in there?”

      She didn’t answer.

      He walked up to the door and looked into the stall. The foal wasn’t running around all over, looking to jump over the wall the way she sometimes did or trying to hide in the corner. She was getting to trust people enough to be curious about them. First thing, Buck and Teddy had put a little halter with a sawed-off rope on it so they could catch her.

      “I hope y’all are being as firm with her as her mama would be,” Clea said, holding out her hand to be sniffed as the foal approached her. “It’ll ruin her if you treat her like a puppy dog and let her be disrespectful. Even now. As little as she is.”

      “What’re you talking about? Are you a veterinarian or something?”

      Of course not. Her type of woman wasn’t tough enough to get through veterinary school.

      The baby snuffed up Clea’s scent, then turned away. With the next breath, she slapped her ears flat against her head, whirled like a rocket and kicked out behind. Clea was quick but not quick enough and the filly hit her a glancing blow with both feet.

      Clea squealed and lunged like a maniac for that little scrap of rope. She grabbed it in one hand and proceeded to hold the little thing while she spanked the tar out of her with the other hand.

      The foal tried to get away but Clea wouldn’t let her. She spanked her all over the butt and sides.

      “Hey, now, wait a minute here,” Jake said, diving for the door to stop the fight before blood flew. “What’s the matter with you? Good God, woman, this filly’s barely alive and—”

      “And you’d better…get a companion…for her before she grows into a…little monster,” Clea said, between slaps.

      Jake jerked the latch open and stepped in, reaching for the rope.

      “You can leave now,” he said. “I’m sorry she kicked you. Are you hurt?”

      Clea stopped spanking but she held on to the rope. The filly looked at her and Clea returned the look, both of them breathing hard.

      “You’ve probably…been spending…too much time with her,” she said. “Handling her too much.”

      “Well, then, we can thank our lucky stars that you’ve come to set us straight,” he said.

      Sarcasm didn’t faze her.

      “Have y’all been trying to pet her and play with her? She’s got to learn that people have to be the boss.”

      Her calm, superior tone made his blood boil. “You some kind of expert?” he asked.

      “You know all about orphan foals? Wild-horse orphan foals?”

      “Horses are horses,” she said. “The wildness is in her bones and, if you think about it, it’s in the domesticated ones, too. They’re all born knowing that they’re prey, so we have to earn their trust.”

      “And so you do it by slapping her around?”

      “And their respect,” she said. “Her mother or any other horse would’ve been a lot rougher on her. She has to learn her manners.

      “Come on,” Clea said and marched out of the stall, motioning for him to follow.

      That surprised him. And irritated him even more. But he went, so the filly could think about her lesson.

      And so he wouldn’t be trapped in there for Clea to stand in the hall blocking the door while she gave him more lectures on the nature of horses.

      He walked past her and went into Sugar’s stall, which was next to the foal’s, and started saddling.

      Clea said, “You were shocked at what I did, but you would’ve done the same to a bigger horse.”

      “You said it yourself—a bigger horse,” he snapped. “I’m not one to beat up on something smaller than me.”

      “Her mother would’ve bitten a chunk out of her. You all can halterbreak this baby, teach her to lead, maybe brush on her a little, but after that let her alone.”

      This woman made him so mad he could hardly see straight.

      “Get another foal in here for her to grow up with,” she said. “More than one if you can. It’ll make all the difference for her for the rest of her life, because then she’ll know how to fit in.”

      He’d planned to ignore her until she gave up and went away. He’d decided not to argue with her. But he couldn’t keep his mouth shut.

      “One orphan baby is all we can handle around here.”

      “She needs to be with other horses so she can learn how the world works and how to find her place in the pecking order.”

      “When she’s a little bigger I’ll put her out with the using horses.”

      “She needs something her own size. So she can see when her companion’s getting ready to kick or bite. So she can learn the body language that she’ll need to read her whole life.”

      He rolled his eyes. “Anything else, professor?”

      “Yes. So she’ll be more athletic, quicker, more prepared to get out of danger or avoid it. Older, bigger horses tend to be too indulgent with a foal. Even stud horses.”

      He started pulling up the latigo on his saddle.

      “When you do put her out, don’t put her with a whole herd all at once. Just do it one horse at a time.”

      “Sounds like you know everything there is to know about this deal,” he said dryly.

      She shrugged. “You just have to let them learn to be real horses. They’re social animals.”

      He could not talk to her. He would ignore her. As long as he talked to her, she’d stay here aggravating him.

      But curiosity got the best of him. All this confidence and knowledge was such a contradiction to the way she looked and acted about everything else.

      “How’d you come to know so much about orphans?”

      “I’ve raised three of them since I was a kid,” she said, leaning back against the stall wall and crossing her arms beneath her gorgeous breasts as if settling in to tell him her life’s story. “The first one I did all wrong, but the other two turned out great.”

      So maybe she wasn’t a total incompetent, after all.

      But СКАЧАТЬ