"I've Got the Horse right here, his name is Paul Revere, and a guy right here says if the weather is clear... can do... can do... this guy says the horse can do."
- From Guys & Dolls

Once again, I'll take back seat to the writing. This is a second part to Feather's Story. It's a heartwrenching tale about one of her closest companions. Her tale in purple

October 26th, 2002

Despite turning the socially-conscious age of sixteen years in 1979, I became involved with a 4-H horse club an older cousin was starting up. At the time, I had a gelding that hadn't proven very suitable; my father and I had already agreed that the best thing to do was sell the goofy creature before he'd been around long enough for me to get truly fond of him. I definitely would need a better horse for the activities planned, and so settled myself to tell "Blue" a firm farewell.

When in due course we sold him, a seemingly endless search was begun for the all-important replacement. Dad drove us deep into rural areas, asking here and there, trying various horses, going to auctions.. .whatever we could think of, whenever we could. We even... carefully... visited the local horse-traders' facilities. No luck. I began to despair, and dear old Dad began to show unmistakable signs of irritation. Obviously, he thought I was just being picky... and I was.

Then one evening I was still in the car with Dad when he went to pick up Mom after work. The route we were on wasn't the usual one; this road into town passed through an area of low fields undeveloped due to periodic flooding. As I gazed glumly off into the distances of the field on my right, I saw.. .a shimmer of gold against the rich green. Realizing that it had to be a horse, I perked up: even at that distance, it appeared to be a buckskin, one of my favorite horse-colors. I
remember promising to myself that day, yet again, that someday I'd get one, a good horse, colored like that.

After I pointed out to my father what I saw, it wasn't too surprising, considering he had also grown up in the same county, to find that he knew the owner of the property. Dad said he thought the same man owned the horse, too. One thing led to another, and we found that Mr. Hoy Childers did indeed own both property and mare.. .and yes, she was for sale. Sound, she was, broke to ride and drive. He'd bought her at age two from his father, and found a note in the old family Bible where she born a June foal... in 1963. I was born in August of the same year. My heart sank as I realized that this horse was about two months older than I was. Whoa! However, Mr. Childers was only asking $300.00 for his mare, and since it could do no harm. Dad asked if we could get a closer look.

When that old mare stood before me, I began to change my mind some. I began to examine her while in a sort of shock. This was no awkward two-year-old or scrawny, malformed scrub like so many we'd seen. This horse was 14.2 hands of neat muscle, a cleanly arched neck, and a color (on closer view) that I'd never seen before. Evenstanding still under a shade tree, her body had a rare vibrancy, an intensity, shown off to advantage by the golden body with its dark red mane, tail, and legs. There was pride in every line other, light brown eyes sparkling, and her red-tipped ears working
constantly. She didn't really have what could be called a pretty head; it was rather plain, its lines filled with e character rather than elegance. The mare's mane was streaked with honey-cream from the sun, and she tossed her head with impatience, snorting and pawing at the inactivity.

Old? Uh-huh!

Right.

Coming back to the rest of the world, I realized that I had certainly missed a few things! The up-shot of it was that the two men had arranged for Dad and I to return at a more convenient time for Mr. Childers to allow me to try the "old mare", Bess ... under saddle. That would be fine, I quickly agreed.

Strangely, when we arrived we found that Mr. Childers had apparently forgotten, and was busily plowing his tobacco patch.. .with Bess! Red-faced (from the sun?), he told us that she was too tired for me to ride her that day. Despite the man's words, the horse's appearance argued otherwise to me. Lightly slick with sweat under the old harness, a tracery of delicate veins shown clearly visible on her neck and shoulders as the mare bowed against the checkreins, one
very shapely and dusty fore-hoof restlessly pawing at the dusty soil.

No problem at all, Dad told him, we would come back another day.

When next we returned, Mr. Childers brought out Bess and slowly helped tack her up. My personal suspicions warmed up again when he started telling an involved tale about a neighbor girl who had tried to ride "ol' Bess" a couple of times.. .ending apparently in the mare coming in alone, looking satisfied, with the saddle hanging off to one side. And the girl nowhere in sight, of course. By paying attention, I had begun to figure out that, Mr. Childers' second thoughts aside, the mare had learned a few tricks from her many years of experience. How to evade the bit, for one. (Tuck the chin to the chest,and go!) Possibly how to quickly shed the unwary or inexperienced...?

Dad kept flashing me signifigant looks as the old man talked. He finally gave the girthstrap another pull or two—bloating against a tight girth joined the bag-of-tricks list—and gave me a boost up as he held her bit firmly. One last telling look to me, and he let go, saying, "I think they'll be alright, Hoy."

"Give it a try now". Dad told me quietly.

The next hour or so was spent in mutual give and take, with Dad offering a little gentle coaching from time to time. Mr. Childers suddenly had very little to say as he watched us. It wasn't easy.. .1 found in her a bundle of contradictions. Tough, sassy, independent, but also practical, sensible, and without viciousness, she just wouldn't tolerate any foolishness. Bess demanded the best of me and I tried hard to return the favor. She was definitely hard-mouthed,
but also naturally five-gaited. It wasn't very long before I was sure that this was only the very beginning for us.

Sadly, Mr. Childers showed the extent of his loss when Dad went to pay him his undisputed price for Bess. The old farmer just sat there on the floor of his living room unable to look up as he took the money. His voice was rough as he spoke; it was an ending for him, and he knew it, I think. I tacked her up quickly, and we set off to travel the three miles across town and through the hilly woods to Bess' new home with us. I promised to bring her back to visit sometimes, and kept
that promise.

My brother kept Appaloosas, and I'd taken up a few western-style methods by imitation, which turned out to be a good thing for us. Since nobody told me she was "too old to learn", I proceeded to break Bess to neck-rein, thereby rendering her hard-mouthed behavior ineffective. To signal for her special gaits, the running-walk and the rack, I had only to adjust seat and reins. I have to say, she never did get too old to learn. Eventually, Bess learned not to try evading the bit with me up, though she never quit using that trick on other riders.

The old girl used her "bag-of-tricks" generously to produce an often hair-raising ride for the incapable without actually harming them. The over-bossy riders she just sort of shed, immediately and hard. For example, my much-older brother once got on her, not knowing she was already tired from an earlier long ride with me. She didn't act as sassy as usual, so he thought he would just "perk her up". He then made two mistakes: he broke off a switch, and he hit her on the rump with it. He had planned to ride with a friend, who witnessed the whole thing. That young man said he had never, ever seen anyone get thrown that hard or that fast in his life, and as a result, he planned never to plant his own posterior on that particular mare. He also reported my startled brother as having cried, "I don't understand it; my little sister rides her everywhere!"

In one single, violent heave, she had tossed him onto his rump directly in front of her, with the reins still in his hand. He literally ate off the mantle-piece for quite a while. The thing was, Bess would give you all she had, and try to give more if you asked.. .but she would not tolerate a whip or spurs. She would just plain hurt you if you tried to use them on her. I never blamed her for that, and honestly took a great deal of pride in her unusual intelligence, and in the obvious sense of humor she sometimes displayed.

We developed quite a working relationship over the years. Parades, shows, trail rides, cross-town jaunts, and bareback trips to the creek or woods. Sun, ice—it didn't matter to us. Her hard brown (and safely borium-shod) hooves ticked off the miles year after year. Bess taught me a lot, and I refused to sell her even after getting married in 1981. It got to the point that all I had to do was shift my weight minutely, and she was practically already doing whatever I had asked for. It was a rare partnership, and I will always treasure the memory of it, even as I appreciated it at the time.

Many times we tried to get her bred, and finally at twenty-two years old she bore a live colt to an accidental breeding with my brother's very young Appaloosa stallion. We didn't regret the cross due to the quality of the foal. (He was born a solid buckskin, with a single round star; we later gelded him, and he has a home for life with us.) By the time "Eagle" was born, Bess was beginning to show some signs of age, but was still strong and filled with her own special brand of character. Of course, we called Hoy Childers' family, inviting then to bring him to see the favored pair, which they did gladly. The old mare was a good mother, and many people enjoyed visiting them.

Eventually her health finally did begin to go; as her hips weakened with age, the cow-hocks so often inherent in her type (now registered as Kentucky Mountain Pleasure Horse, Rocky Mountain, or similar... some registries seem to just come and go) complicated that. Rides—even with a light rider—got rarer and shorter, but Bess still ran the fence-line, crying her protest at being left behind whenever pasture-mates were ridden away. She always did love to travel... long trail-rides always being her favorite activity. She bounced happily along the trail, grabbing mischievously for maple-leaves whenever they came within her reach. In my memory, I can still see the arc of her neck, with the veins popping up beneath her golden hide from the sheer excitement of heading into the woods.

Old Bess took sick a few years back, and two or three days before she went down and couldn't be gotten back up, she came to the fence where I was throwing hay over into the field. Surprised by this rather unusual action of hers, I politely offered her a handful. Although what was in my hand was no different than that already in the pasture, and the other horses weren't crowding or greedy, she took it from me, somehow solemn, and then took more. Always enjoying her company, I stayed with her until she wandered away, just remembering, patting her neck and back.. .offering
more hay. The old mare was then over thirty, and shaggier than any year before. Although she showed no apparent symptoms of illness then, I believe in my heart that she knew her time was very near, and so said goodbye in her own way.

We tried calling vets, but none of them could make it, already overworked due to forecasts for the worst winter storm in many years. My brother went, with my husband, to put her mercifully down even as he had promised to do years before. It broke his heart to have to do it, even as it broke mine to have to ask. They wrapped her in a brand-new tarp, and brought her to our family home-place. Dad had agreed that we could bury her there.

That night, the foretold storm hit. Bess' body lay frozen for about three weeks, guarded against stray dogs and the occasional coyote by a tied dog and family visits on foot, until the weather broke. It was a rough time, almost all transportation locked down by snow and ice. When it finally became possible, kind volunteers brought a backhoe, dug a proper grave, and respectfully placed her in it there on the hill beside the pasture gate.

At that time, I knew exactly how Mr. Childers had felt when he sold her to us, because I couldn't bear to go and say goodbye to her again, either. She and I had our goodbyes at the fenceline,in the pristine snow, alone together as we'd been so many times. It seemed fitting. Maybe I'll never know why horses don't live as long as people, but I do know this: that old mare was honest, tough, cranky, and had more logic and sense of humor than anybody would believe. I've seen her walk right over a harmless blacksnake, careful but unconcerned, only to refuse absolutely to go near the cucumber-like smell often evident near poisonous copperheads. Bess would do anything to keep from harming a child underfoot, yet she was deadly accurate with her heels against any dog that got too close.

What more can I say ... once there was a grand old horse I called "Bessie-Belle", who was my friend, and I mourn her still.

—THE END—