Hot Potato Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1 A Bargain

  Chapter 2 Back to the Stables

  Chapter 3 A Distraction

  Chapter 4 Arabetha Bella or Bess

  Chapter 5 Experts

  Chapter 6 Bareback

  Chapter 7 A Levy

  Chapter 8 Sensible

  Chapter 9 Gwen's Pony

  Chapter 10 Talking Too Much

  Chapter 11 Broken Tree

  Chapter 12 Saddle Sores

  Chapter 13 The Worst Part

  Chapter 14 Candour

  Chapter 15 Investing

  Chapter 16 Erin's Longest Friend

  Chapter 17 Bad Accent

  Chapter 18 Saved and Indebted

  Chapter 19 The Chiropractor

  Chapter 20 Another Try

  Chapter 21 Hotty's Personal Best

  Chapter 22 Cheek

  Chapter 23 Self-pity

  Chapter 24 Night Ride

  Chapter 25 Cornered

  Chapter 26 Busted like Custard

  Chapter 27 Annual Barbecue

  Chapter 28 Hanging Out with Hayley

  Chapter 29 A Confession

  Chapter 30 A Perfect Match

  About the Author

  Hot

  Potato

  ALYSSA

  BRUGMAN

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity, including internet search engines or retailers, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including printing, photocopying (except under the statutory exceptions provisions of the Australian Copyright Act 1968), recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of Random House Australia. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author's and publisher's rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Hot Potato

  ePub ISBN 9781864715545

  Kindle ISBN 9781864717198

  Random House Australia Pty Ltd

  20 Alfred Street, Milsons Point NSW 2061

  http://www.randomhouse.com.au

  Sydney New York Toronto

  London Auckland Johannesburg

  First published by Random House Australia 2006

  Copyright © Alyssa Brugman 2006

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  National Library of Australia

  Cataloguing-in-Publication Entry

  Brugman, Alyssa, 1974–.

  Hot Potato.

  For children aged 8–12 years.

  ISBN 1 74166 035 1.

  1. Horses – Juvenile fiction. I. Title.

  A823.4

  Cover photograph copyright © Trudy Nicholson Equine Photography, www.nicholsonphotography.co.nz

  Cover and internal design by Sandra Nobes

  Typeset in Sabon 11/15.5 pt by Midland Typesetters, Australia

  Printed and bound by Griffin Press, Netley, South Australia

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  I saw a horse for sale in a magazine once. I liked the look of her, so I sent a cheque and told the seller to put her on a truck. When she turned up she had a 'big personality'. She's too small and she needs constant work, or she bucks like a bronco. Nobody likes her except me, and I love her to pieces. Her name is Greenbrook Elizabeth. I call her ILU (Independent Little Unit). This book is for her.

  Many thanks to a real 'Miss Anita', Nicole Chipperfield, who rides her horses like she stole them.

  1 A Bargain

  'Do I hear two three?' asked the auctioneer from his perch high on the metal bridge spanning the horse yards.

  'There's Clint,' whispered Lindsey, standing very still with her hands in her pockets. 'Down the front, near the fence.'

  Shelby leaned forward scanning the crowd. There were so many leather-skinned men in jeans, boots and Akubras that she found it hard to pick out Clint amongst them.

  They were even sucking their teeth and chewing paspalum. Shelby hadn't believed anyone really did that outside of ads for Woolworths fresh produce or Holden utes.

  Clint was standing with his arms crossed at the yard of the horse being sold. It wasn't until he turned his face towards the girls that she recognised him. He's checking up on us, she thought.

  The farrier had been at the stables every day the previous week to trim the riding school ponies. Shelby and Erin had their horses' hooves done too. Clint told them that he was going to the horse auctions and the girls had begged to come along. He had been trepidacious about bringing them, but finally he had relented.

  'Oh yeah, I see him now.' Erin held her hand up next to her chin and waggled her fingers.

  Shelby gasped. Clint had instructed them not to move. His exact words were, 'Don't move, don't sneeze, don't lean forward, and don't scratch. Especially you, Erin.'

  'Two three it is,' said the auctioneer. 'Do I hear two four?'

  'I think you just bid on a horse,' murmured Lindsey through scarcely parted lips.

  'Really? For how much?' asked Erin.

  'Two thousand three hundred dollars,' Lindsey replied.

  'Omigod!' Erin slapped her hands across her mouth.

  'Two four to the young lady,' called the auctioneer, pointing to her. 'She thinks the horse is so great she's bidding against herself.'

  Muffled laughter rippled through the crowd. Shelby saw Clint close his eyes and shake his head.

  'I didn't mean to!' Erin cried in a shrill voice. Shelby blushed.

  'Very good. Do I hear a real two three? Yes, madam in the green shirt.' The auctioneer turned his attention to an older woman standing at the edge of the yard.

  'Phew, that was close!' Erin put her hand on her chest.

  'Erin! Stop moving!' Lindsey hissed through the side of her mouth.

  'Oops!' Erin giggled.

  'You're so hopeless,' Shelby sighed.

  The horse on which Erin had bid was sold and then the whole crowd shuffled sidewards to the next yard and the next horse being sold.

  Shelby looked along the line of yards with their metal fences and cement floors. She thought it was clever how the gates to each of the yards were the same width as the aisles, so that when the gate was open, it blocked off the aisle perfectly.

  At the end of each of the lanes there were loading ramps. Earlier in the day she had watched the trucks pull up to unload. The handlers coordinated the gates so that each of the horses would run down the loading ramps and then, by having some gates open and some closed, move straight into their individual yards.

  Most of the horses looked so thin and frightened that she wanted to take them home and give them a good feed. Many of them had bites, bumps and scratches all over from the rough trip to the sale yards. The younger ones in particular had such fragile, twig-like legs they looked as though they could snap in a strong breeze. She had overheard two of the older stockmen saying that most of the horses came from studs out west that couldn't afford to feed them in the drought.

  Shelby was amazed how cheaply they were selling. The one on which Erin had bid was the most expensive so far. Some of them had been sold for less than a hundred dollars. Shelby wished she had ten thousand dollars in her pocket. She would buy them all.

  Clint wended his way through the crowd until he reached them.

  'The next ones are the Dog Man's horses. I'm going to get a coffee from the canteen. I won't be long. Are you happy to stay here?'

  The girls nodded. 'We'll be OK here,' said Li
ndsey. 'Thanks, Clint.'

  'Don't bid on any horses while I'm away, Erin.'

  Erin giggled. 'I won't.'

  After he had gone Shelby turned to Lindsey. 'What does he mean the "Dog Man"?'

  'The Dog Man buys horses by the kilo,' she explained.

  Erin put her hand over her mouth. 'That's awful!'

  Lindsey shrugged. 'If a horse has a broken leg, or an incurable illness, then he will take it away. We dogged a horse last year. Do you remember Swift? He went blind. He kept hurting himself and he was frightened all the time.' She shook her head. 'That's not a good life. We could have paid the vet to put him down, but then you need to hire a backhoe to bury him. You have to bury them deep otherwise it's unhygienic. The Dog Man will pay you and take it away. I know it sounds mean, but it works out for everyone.'

  Lindsey was a farm girl, used to the practicalities of death.

  'So why are they here?' Shelby asked.

  'Sometimes when the Dog Man gets the horse back to his yards he'll find that its illness isn't incurable after all, or that, with a bit of retraining, a mad horse is useful again. For whatever reason, if he thinks he can get more money for it alive than he can as meat then he will bring it here.'

  'Why isn't Clint interested?' asked Erin.

  'Maybe he thinks it's too risky?' Lindsey suggested. 'Someone thought that these horses were too crazy or too sick to bother with.'

  'Not everyone knows what they're doing, though,' Shelby observed.

  'Yes, and that's why all these other people are bidding on them,' Lindsey added.

  At the end of the row there was a chestnut pony with four white stockings and a blaze. Despite the mud that matted its coat, it was the prettiest pony in the whole place. Shelby tugged at her friends' sleeves and they followed her to the edge of the yard.

  'This can't be one of the Dog Man's horses. It must be the beginning of the next lot.'

  'Cute!' squealed Erin. The pony turned its head at the sound of her voice. She reached out a hand and the pony sniffed it cautiously.

  'Tiny,' observed Lindsey. 'It's not even thirteen hands. And look at all those white hooves! You never buy a horse with four socks.'

  'I think it's beautiful. If it is a Dog Man's horse then whoever sold it to him was an idiot,' said Shelby.

  She wondered if the owner had thought the pony was sick when it just needed worming. Maybe it had been bought for a beginner who didn't know how to handle it, or lost interest?

  Shelby could picture it in a show ring with its mane in rosettes, doing what the magazines called 'an extravagant extension', which meant it flicked its toes out when it trotted.

  She imagined that she was riding it, wearing a dark grey, pinstriped hacking jacket and top-boots. She would be so proud and confident, and not even a little bit nervous, because they would have practised together. They would win Supreme Champion. The judge wouldn't even look at the other horses. He would wave them away before they got into the ring.

  Adults at the shows would offer her ten thousand dollars for the horse, and she would shake her head, smiling to herself, knowing that, not so long ago, everyone thought the horse was worthless. It happened to Phar Lap and Seabiscuit. It probably happened all the time.

  The pony's forelock was so long that it had to peek out at Shelby from under the weight of it. It had long eyelashes and large brown eyes. It nibbled at her fingers, and Shelby knew she couldn't go home without it.

  She'd never been to the sales before – she'd never even thought about it until Clint mentioned it that week. This horse was obviously of a higher quality than any other pony here. What were the chances of them being at the same place at the same time? It couldn't be a coincidence.

  The auctioneer had reached the yard and the little pony snorted suspiciously as the crowd closed around them.

  'It's OK, little one,' Shelby crooned to it.

  'What do we know about this one, Phil?' the auctioneer asked one of the fellows in the crowd.

  The man shrugged. 'I dunno, mate. I only picked her up yes'dee.'

  'It's a mare, isn't it?' He waited for a nod of confirmation from the man in the crowd. 'We'll start the bids at two hundred dollars. Anyone? One eighty dollars. She's a steal at one eighty.'

  The auctioneer looked at the spectators with his eyebrows raised. 'One hundred and eighty dollars. She's a pretty little filly.'

  People scuffed their feet and looked at the ground, or chatted amongst themselves.

  'Why isn't anyone bidding?' Shelby asked her friend.

  'Haven't you been watching?' replied Lindsey. 'This is a toy horse. All these blokes are looking for stock horses or quarter horses – working horses.'

  'One seventy-five,' said the auctioneer. 'A nice pony, gents. Buy it for your granddaughters.'

  'We should buy it,' whispered Erin. Her eyes were bright. 'Shelby, you got fifty dollars for your birthday and I've been saving.'

  Shelby had received a lovely crisp fifty-dollar note from her Aunt Jenny for her birthday, but she had spent it already. She was sure she could get some more money, though. She would do extra chores, offer to mow the neighbours' lawns, or wash their cars. Fifty dollars was a cinch.

  'How much do you have, Lindsey?' Shelby asked.

  She had an idea that Lindsey would have money squirrelled away. Lindsey was sensible and frugal, with no interest in make-up, clothes, ring-tones and magazines, which was where most of Erin's money went.

  'I'm not buying a horse! Why would I want another one?'

  Lindsey's mother owned the stables where Erin and Shelby kept their horses. When Lindsey felt like riding she had all the riding school ponies to choose from.

  'Look at it, Lin, it's gorgeous,' said Shelby. 'Even if we had to pay five hundred, we could sell it tomorrow for twice that much.'

  'Five hundred! We don't have five hundred. Where are you going to keep it, anyway?' Lindsey whispered.

  'One fifty?' said the auctioneer overhead. 'She has to be sold.'

  Shelby looked around. Still nobody was bidding. She raised her hand, catching the auctioneer's eye. It was impulsive, but she couldn't help it. It didn't feel real, but at the same time it was exhilarating. Her skin pricked all over with goose flesh.

  'We have one fifty. One sixty? Anyone?'

  'Shel!' Lindsey tugged on her sleeve. 'How are we going to get it home?'

  'Clint will put her on his truck,' Erin said. 'This is so exciting!' She wriggled. 'I hope someone else bids!'

  'One fifty-five?' The auctioneer searched the crowd.

  'You're a fruit-loop, Erin, you know that?' Lindsey said, shaking her head.

  'One hundred and fifty it is. Last chance, folks,' said the auctioneer.

  Erin grabbed Shelby's hand.

  'I can't believe you bid on a horse, Shelby. Your parents are going to go bananas!' Lindsey said.

  Shelby couldn't believe it either. Her heart was beating fast, but she shrugged. 'I'll tell them it's your horse.'

  'And what do I tell my mum?' said Lindsey.

  'Tell her it's my horse,' suggested Erin.

  Lindsey said, 'And you're going to tell your mum that it's Shelby's, just like a hot potato.'

  'No more bids,' said the auctioneer.

  Erin grinned. 'My mum won't believe that Shelby's parents let her have another horse. I'm going to tell them it's yours too.'