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  Maria returned the hug eagerly. “I’m so glad to be back with you guys.”

  Her carry-on bags were jammed drum-tight. Her hanging bag resembled a half inflated life raft.

  “I see you carried everything on the plane,” Kent said. “No need to stop at the baggage claim, right? You really didn’t have to pack your saddle, Maria. We have extras, you know.”

  “This is just my makeup. I hope you brought a van.”

  Emily stuck her tongue out at her father.

  “Oh, so that’s how it’s going to be this summer. Two against one.”

  At the baggage claim, Kent began to wish he had brought a van as he hauled several more laden bags off the rotating platform. Emily heaved each onto the courtesy cart, laughing at her father’s dismay.

  The three of them chattered and reminisced for the forty-five minute drive from Syracuse to Pine Holt. Margaret fixed brunch and joined them for more stories, updates, and planning for the summer, as they devoured omelets and fresh melon. The only somber moment was when they told Maria about Simpatico.

  The second the last fork was laid to rest on its plate, Emily stood up and began clearing the table.

  “What’s the big hurry?” Kent asked, surprised by his daughter’s sudden eagerness to do cleanup.

  “I want to take Maria out to see the horses.”

  Kent winked at Margaret. “You ladies go ahead. I can help here.”

  He waited till the girls were gone, then asked his housekeeper, “What do you think?”

  “About what?”

  “About Maria staying here for the summer?”

  “I love it! She’s a wonderful girl, and welcome anytime, as far as I’m concerned.”

  “It’ll be fun having her around again.”

  Margaret stopped organizing dishes. “Young girls should have someone to giggle with and tell secrets to. You know, Kent, Emily is growing up fast. She needs a girlfriend she can talk to. Someone to go shopping with, teach her about makeup — and boys.”

  Kent’s face crumpled into a mock look of total lost. “I thought you covered the girlie stuff.”

  Margaret’s eyes rolled. “You don’t get it. I help with the motherly advice.”

  “Whew. I was worried there for a second.”

  “What I’m talking about is different.”

  “A big sister?”

  “Right. Maria is perfect.”

  “She’s a good role model,” Kent said, as he carted an armful of dishes into the kitchen and returned with a soapy sponge. “Why do you think Maria came back to Jefferson? Doesn’t it seem odd that she’d come back for the summer after accepting one of the best jobs offered to anyone in her graduating class?”

  “Probably because she doesn’t have to work at all,” Margaret said. “She’s a rich, gorgeous young woman. She can do whatever she wants, whenever she wants.”

  Kent wiped off the table. “Uh-huh.”

  Then Margaret added, “She said her father expects her to run the family horse farm in Ecuador. She probably wants to bounce around a little before she goes back home.”

  “Makes sense. Anyway, like you say, having her around will be good for Emily. Me too, for that matter. She’s always a willing hand on farm calls.” He shook some soap into the chambers on the door panel and closed the dishwasher. “Done. You need me anymore?”

  “I’m fine. You go see what the girls are up to.”

  Kent caught up with Maria and Emily as they crossed the lawn headed toward the barn. He noticed that both had changed into riding clothes.

  “Flame and I have taken up dressage,” Emily said to Maria. “He’s an amazing pony. I mean he’s always been cool about doing whatever I asked, but he’s getting old now and I thought he might not like the discipline. Turns out, he loves it.” Pride shown in her eyes. “I taught him to do pretty good half passes, and sort of a piaffe.”

  “That’s great, Em,” Maria said. “I want you to show me.” She scanned the birds by the pond and the cattle loafing near the fence. “This is a wonderfully safe place,” she said, with a peculiar sadness in her voice.

  Kent was about to question the remark when Emily said, “There’s my boy!”

  Flame’s chestnut face appeared over his Dutch door in response to the approaching voices.

  “As handsome as ever,” Maria said.

  Then she was startled by a second head, darker, with a splash of white on the forehead that emerged out of the adjacent door.

  “Who’s that?”

  “Oh, man,” Emily said. “That’s Neapolitan. He was supposed to be a surprise. Remember him from over at Mrs. Hanover’s? She and her husband decided to move to Florida, so we bought him — for you. So that you would have something to ride this summer.”

  Maria stepped to Neapolitan. She stroked his muzzle as he nuzzled her, registering her scent. Then she touched her cheek to his. “Thank you, guys. He’s fantastic!”

  Kent said, “He moves well. And he’s well-schooled. He’ll be a good ride for you this summer. I’ll vouch for his soundness, too. But he’s no plug. You pay attention to what you’re doing when you’re up on him.”

  Emily looked over from her place at Flame’s head. “I’ll watch out for her, Doc.”

  “How’s ol’ Flame this morning?” Doc stroked the Welch pony’s neck at arm’s length as his trained eye gave him the quick once-over.

  Emily eased Flame out to the cross ties. “He’s ready to go.”

  Kent stood back as the girls tacked their horses and led them outside. Maria swung herself up onto Neapolitan with one smooth motion. Emily guided Flame to a mounting block that he had built for her, then by folding herself across the saddle and pivoting on her stomach, she forced her arms and shoulders forward, and her legs down into the stirrups. It was a Herculean effort. Kent noticed Maria watching too, and her expression told him that she was experiencing the same angst that he felt. He quickly forced it out of his head.

  Once she was up, Emily gathered the reins with surprising dexterity, and then glanced back at Maria. Satisfied that her companion was ready, she tapped her heels against Flame’s flanks and headed him away, unaware that she had aroused even the least emotional response in her observers.

  “We’ll be back in a couple hours,” she said, over her shoulder.

  “Okay. Remember, Neapolitan isn’t familiar with the trails yet.”

  “Yep. We’ve got it covered.”

  Kent watched the tandem sashay of the horses’ rumps as the girls guided them across a field and into the woods.

  Why had Maria come back to Jefferson? She could go anywhere in the world. Even from a distance her loveliness shone. She was as suited to lounge on the French Riviera in a string bikini as ride horses in upstate New York.

  Neapolitan proved to be a perfect trail horse. He proceeded unfazed past the myriad of obstacles and distractions found in the woods. Before long, the horses were at the periphery of the girls’ consciousness as they lapsed into a mix of silly chatter and meaningful conversation.

  “You seem stronger now,” Maria said.

  Emily struck her thigh with a firm fist. “I’ve been working on these legs of mine.”

  “You’re riding with more confidence, too.”

  “You think so? Aubrey says I’m a natural. She says I have the hands of an Olympic rider.”

  “Aubrey is a good teacher. If she says it, you can believe it.”

  “If the stupid doctors would let me get an operation now, instead of after I quit growing, I think I’d have a chance of getting really good.” Emily’s voice took on a dreamy tone. “Can you imagine — me at the Olympics?” She glanced at Maria, searching for signs of doubt.

  “Easily,” Maria said. “But, you’ve got to listen to the doctors. If they say it’s too risky to operate now, then it’s too risky.”

&n
bsp; “But when I’m eighteen it will be too late.” After a pause, Emily said, “Let’s talk about something that’s not such a bummer. Tell me what it was like in Kentucky.”

  “Hot this time of year. Really hot.”

  “I don’t mean the weather. I mean the horses, the people, the farms, you know, the cool stuff.”

  Maria was quiet for a moment. “Well, you wouldn’t believe the farms. They’re all spectacular — awesome barns, huge pastures, and lots of white fence. Everywhere you look there are amazing horses.”

  “The horse capital of the world. Right?”

  “Yep. You know all those really famous Thoroughbreds that won the Kentucky Derby and stuff? There’re a lot of them around.”

  “What about the farm where you worked? Criadero Del Jugador? Is that how you say it?”

  Maria chuckled at her friend’s Spanish. “Yes. Criadero Del Jugador. It means High Roller Farm.”

  “Like a gambler?”

  “Exactly. It’s awesome, too. Big, but more modern than most of the others. It’s only been in business for maybe ten years, compared to some of the old farms down there that have been around since horses had four toes on each foot. Even so, Criadero Del Jugador has managed to get some top horses. They bought a lot of them, but they’ve bred a lot of them, too.”

  Emily squirmed in the saddle at the very thought of working with such amazing horses.

  “Did you learn a lot?”

  “Definitely. It’s hard not to when you’re there. I learned more about breeding, training, and racing Thoroughbreds last year than I did my whole time at college.”

  They rode in silence for a while. Finally, Maria said, “I learned a lot about people, too.”

  “You mean horse people?”

  “People in general.”

  Emily twisted to face her friend. “Sounds like there’s a story you’re not telling me.”

  Maria didn’t answer for several strides of the horses. When she did, there was a forced levity in her voiced.

  “Never mind. It’s too nice a day to ruin with bad thoughts.”

  CHAPTER 9

  Louise Stanford said her stallion looked bad when she called, but now, studying the dismal beast, Kent knew that was an understatement. Charter Oak was extremely sick — possibly dying.

  Kent did not even try to approach the horse. Instead he set his grip down in the alleyway, propped himself against the stall bars, and signaled Emily and Maria to keep a safe distance.

  “He was this bad when you found him?” Kent asked, trying to conceal his astonishment at the severity of the horse’s illness.

  Louise’s usually confident voice trembled. “Yes. I called you the second I saw him.”

  “How was he yesterday?”

  “Like I said on the phone, he didn’t clean up all of his grain last night. He ate maybe half his normal ration. So I took his temperature. It was up a little — a hundred two and a half — but he wasn’t colicky or anything, so I figured, since you were already scheduled for today to palpate some mares, I’d just have you check him out when you got here.”

  “Did you take his temperature this morning?”

  “It’s a hundred six.”

  Kent hoped Louise didn’t see him wince.

  “What about his legs? Did you notice any swelling in his legs last night?”

  “No, Doc, I didn’t. We groomed him early afternoon, as usual, and he seemed fine. And, like I said, he was a little off feed last night, but I didn’t notice any swelling.”

  “They look like stovepipes now. That’s an unbelievable amount of edema to occur overnight. See that swelling under his belly? That’s edema, too. Same with his eyes lids and lips.”

  Of all Kent’s equine patients, Charter Oak was the one he least liked to deal with. The stallion was extremely wary, and when provoked or overly restrained, he became defensive. With no warning he’d been known to transform into twelve hundred pounds of kicking, striking fury. But now he was totally subdued, slumped in the corner, hip resting against the wall, swollen face hanging to within inches of the straw. As they watched, a string of saliva drizzled from his lower lip.

  Kent toyed with the stethoscope that hung around his neck. This was no ordinary sickness. Kent had been Cedar Cut’s veterinarian since the farm started, and he knew their way of doing things. He knew they considered each horse to be family, and cared for each like a child. Nothing came to mind that would explain the horrible symptoms he was looking at. But, he did know one thing — if he didn’t do something, and do it fast, the Stanfords were going to lose their prize stallion.

  “What’s happened different in his life within the last few days?”

  “Absolutely nothing.”

  “Any exposure to toxins? Fly spray? Dewormers? Coat conditioners? Anything?”

  Louise shook her head, “No medicines. Same old grooming stuff. Nothing new.”

  Kent rattled through his usual list of questions. He asked the same question in different ways, hoping to jog Louise’s memory, probing for any information that could shed light on the nature of Charter Oak’s ailment. When he was convinced that he knew all that Louise could tell him, which wasn’t much, he stepped cautiously across the straw and took Charter Oak’s halter. He got no resistance, which worried Kent even more. When Kent coaxed him, it was all the stallion could do to step away from the wall so that Kent could examine him.

  Louise watched quietly as Kent poked and prodded, shined his penlight, and listened with his stethoscope. He swabbed over Charter Oak’s jugular vein with a cotton ball soaked in alcohol, inserted a needle, and collected several vials of blood which he passed through the stall bars to the Emily and Maria. The whole time, Charter Oak stood motionless, seemingly unaware of any of it, except to lift his head slightly when the alcohol fumes aroused him from his stupor.

  When he finished, Kent released the halter and resumed his position against the wall. Silent, biting his upper lip, he stared at the pitiful horse. This one could go either way.

  Finally, Louise broke the silence. “What’s happening to him, Doc?” Her voice begged for an answer.

  Kent continued to watch Charter Oak without a word.

  Tears filled Louise’s eyes. Embarrassed at her own lack of self-control, she wiped them away with the back of her hand. The matriarch of Cedar Cut Farm straightened herself, sighed, and resolved not to interrupt the doctor’s train of thought again.

  She and her husband, Walt, had dealt with countless setbacks in their fifteen years with Thoroughbreds. As charter members of the New York State Thoroughbred Breeding and Racing Program, the Stanfords had been among the trailblazers.

  In the beginning, the whole venture had been a risk — even more so than now. Adversity was expected and accepted, met head on with the vitality engendered by the challenge. Horses had been Walt’s escape from the stress of his automobile business. For thirtytwo years he had built an empire of car dealerships until he finally decided he needed a change. He convinced Louise that they should put up a couple of barns and plunge into the world of Thoroughbreds. She had never regretted their decision. Charter Oak had been their ultimate gambit. Walt and Louise had taken a whole winter to convince themselves that they could afford such a stallion.

  Louise looked at the suffering animal.

  “It’s hard to believe he holds a record at San Anita. He so sick.”

  “Louise, I’ll tell you outright, I don’t know what’s happened to him.” Kent stepped over and put his arm around her shoulder. “Yet,” he added, with more confidence than he felt.

  “How do we find out?”

  Kent waved a hand toward the girls.

  “Hopefully, those blood samples will tell us. In the meantime, I think you better have Kevin bring a trailer around. Charter Oak is going to need to be at the CVC.”

  “Right.”

>   Kevin, Cedar Cut’s foreman, Kent, and the girls pulled, pushed, and cajoled until they had Charter Oak loaded — one slow step at a time. When he was secure, Kent gave Kevin a final warning about driving slowly, and then headed for his mobile unit. As they climbed in, the girls opened fire.

  “Holy schmoly, Doc. He looks like he could kick off at any second!” Emily said.

  “Yep. That’s why we’re bringing him to the CVC.”

  “Don’t you have any idea what’s wrong?”

  “You heard what I told Mrs. Stanford.”

  Maria pushed Lucinda’s muzzle away from her ear. “First Simpatico, now Charter Oak.”

  “Yeah. Not good.”

  “If we lose the good stallions, we don’t get the bookings for the best mares, then we don’t get a super foal crop, and then the program goes down the tube.”

  Kent’s voice took on an edge. “We haven’t lost Charter Oak, and we’ll do our damnedest to see that we don’t. We’re not going to let anything happen to the New York Bred Program either. That’s a promise.”

  CHAPTER 10

  Kent rotated slowly back and forth in his desk chair at the CVC, telephone to his ear. Throughout their entire phone conversation, Dr. Holmes had sounded totally confident. It twisted Kent’s intestine into a curling mass of snakes. How could Ed be that sure, making such an outrageous diagnosis? Equine Viral Arteritis! You gotta be kidding.

  “But now you want to double check?” Kent said.

  “It’s pretty bizarre.”

  “You can say that again.”

  “We need to get this right.”

  “You’ve had two days.”

  Dr. Holmes’s voice took on an edge. “A couple more won’t hurt. It’s my reputation, too. You know what I’m saying? It’s too weird, and has too many repercussions, to say we’re dealing with EVA based on one set of tests.”

  Kent could see he wasn’t going to win this battle.

  Dr. Holmes veered the subject. “How is Charter Oak doing now, anyway?”

  “He’s no great ball of fire, but compared to the way he looked two days ago, I’d say he’s doing great. I’ll tell you one thing for sure. In light of what you’ve just told me, I’m glad we put him in isolation.”