were. It was finally happening!
“Mum?” Issie asked. “Do you really mean it?”
Mrs Brown nodded. “I think it’s time to buy you a pony.”
Issie squealed with delight and threw her arms around her mum’s neck, giving her the biggest hug ever. When she had stopped hugging her mum, she began to pogo about the kitchen, jumping up and down with excitement. “Can we look for a pony now? Please? I can go get the paper!”
“You seem to have conveniently forgotten the little matter of going to school!” Mrs Brown laughed. She picked up Issie’s schoolbag off the chair and stuffed a lunchbox in it along with a drink bottle and a book bag before passing it to her daughter. “There’ll be plenty of time for horse-hunting when you get home. Why don’t we find a few ponies worth looking at and we can go out and see them this weekend?”
“Thanks, Mum!” Issie’s voice was a high-pitched squeak. “I don’t believe it. I’m really getting a pony!”
“Go on!” said Mrs Brown. “Canter off or you’ll be late for school.”
Stella almost burst with excitement when Issie told her the news. “Ohmygod, Issie! This is so cool!” she squealed. “I bet you get your new horse in time for pony-club camp!”
“Shhh!” Issie muttered at Stella. Their teacher, Miss Willis, was giving them a stern look. They were supposed to be doing silent reading with their library books-not talking about ponies.
As far as Issie was concerned, there were only two kinds of kids at Chevalier Point Primary School. There were the ones who were totally horse-mad (like her, Stella and Kate) and then there was the rest of them. Issie couldn’t understand how anyone could not like horses. Especially when you lived in a place like Chevalier Point. The town was horse heaven, surrounded by rolling green fields, perfect for grazing your pony. The pony club was within hacking distance and there were beaches and forests to ride in.
At lunchtimes at school the “horsey girls” all got together to play horsey games-cantering back and forth over skipping ropes, finding acorns and pretending they were mixing them up for hard feed for their imaginary horses.
Issie, Stella and Kate had always been friends, but this was the first year that they were all in the same class. Their teacher, Miss Willis, was widely considered to be one of the nicest teachers in the whole school, but even Miss Willis sometimes lost her patience with the whole horsey business. All the girls ever wanted to do was write stories about horses or draw horse pictures for their art projects. The three of them had been warned loads of times that they would be made to sit at separate desks if Miss Willis caught them chatting about ponies again when they were supposed to be working.
Looking up at their teacher now to check that she wasn’t watching them, Kate lowered her voice to a whisper. “It might take you ages to find a pony!” she said. “We looked at loads before we finally bought Toby. It took months! There’s no way you’ll have a pony in time for camp.”
Issie’s smile evaporated. Kate was always so sensible, which could be really annoying sometimes. But she was right. It could take ages to find the perfect pony.
“Mum says we’re going to start looking this weekend so you never know. It’s only the first of December-that gives us a whole month,” Issie said, trying not to sound deflated.
“You’ll find one straightaway!” Stella said breezily. “And then we can all go to pony camp together!”
The Chevalier Point Pony Club camp was coming up in the first week of the Christmas holidays and it was all Stella and Kate could talk about. They were going on a trek for three days, carrying their lunch in their backpacks and having picnics by streams. They would ride all day and then set up camp at night. Their parents would meet them at the camp grounds with their sleeping bags and stuff so that they didn’t have to carry it all on their horses.
Stella and Kate had both joined the Chevalier Point Pony Club earlier in the term. They both had their own horses, a fact that made Issie insanely jealous, even though her friends tried not to rub it in.
“You can’t be jealous of Coco!” Stella would giggle. “She’s a total hand-me-down!” Coco used to belong to Stella’s big sister Penny, but Penny had lost interest in riding lately. “All she cares about is her stupid boyfriend!” scoffed Stella. And so Stella had been given Coco. The thirteen-two chocolate brown mare could be a bit lazy sometimes, but she was great at games and jumping and Stella loved her to pieces.
It hadn’t been so bad when it was just Stella who had her own horse, but then last month Kate got Toby, a big bay Thoroughbred, and now all the two girls ever talked about was pony club, and how much fun it was. Issie felt left out. It wasn’t Stella and Kate’s fault. They were really nice about it. They let Issie have rides on Coco and Toby and help groom them and stuff. But it wasn’t the same as having her own pony.
Issie was desperate to go to the camp. But she knew Kate was right. The chances of finding a pony to buy in time were pretty slim. Issie’s Aunty Hess, who had just bought her own horse farm and knew loads about ponies, had told her that good learner’s ponies were as scarce as hen’s teeth. Issie wasn’t quite sure what she meant by that, but apparently it had something to do with being hard to find.
“Maybe you’ll get a pony for Christmas!” Stella whispered far too loudly. She had never really mastered the whole whispering thing.
“Yeah,” said Kate. “It’ll be gift-wrapped under the tree with a big bow tied around its tummy!”
Stella glared at Kate. “It might happen!” she insisted. “You never know. Like Issie said, she might find the perfect pony this weekend.”
“I hope so,” Issie said. “How cool would that be?”
“Muummm, I’m home!” Issie came into the kitchen to find her mother at the table with a cup of tea and the paper.
“Look at this!” Mrs Brown said, passing Issie the newspaper which was folded over neatly to the Horse and Ponies for Sale section. She must have already been through the ads because one of them was circled in blue pen. The ad was headed up in bold black type:
For sale-genuine learner’s pony
14 hh grey gelding. Six years old. Loves to jump and has no vices. Sadly for sale as owner overcommitted. A great pony for a beginner. $1000. Hurry! At this price he will be sold quickly!
Issie read the ad back to herself twice. “What does ‘no vices’ mean?” she asked.
“I asked your aunt about that,” said Mrs Brown. “It means they don’t do anything naughty like buck or kick or bite.”
Issie nodded. She looked back at the ad again. Fourteen hands was quite a big pony, but Issie was tall for a ten-year-old. And a grey? She didn’t want to jinx it by telling her mum that grey was her absolutely favourite horse colour right now.
“Mum!” Issie was so excited the newspaper was trembling in her hand. “He sounds perfect!”
“He does, doesn’t he?” Mrs Brown smiled. “Hen’s teeth? My foot! It looks like we just found you a pony.”
