The Eighty-Dollar Champion - Elizabeth Letts [116]
The children looked crestfallen, but Harry tried to reassure them. It was a long show and there’d be many more chances. He went about his barn tasks with the same degree of vigor as usual that night, not telling anyone of the places all over his back where the fall had left bruises. He spent an extra minute in Snowman’s stall, whispering encouragement to the big gray. Okay, it was a slow start, but they weren’t licked yet. Over the course of the show, there would be many more classes, culminating in the biggest challenge of all, the jumper stakes on the show’s final night. The horse with the highest number of cumulative points by the end of the show would be champion.
The next day, suddenly, Snowman hit his stride. He flew around the course with an effortless clean round—securing a spot in the jump-off against First Chance. First Chance’s rider, Adolph Mogavero, a former jockey and steeplechase rider, had been winning on the show circuit for ten years. Mogavero knew the ins and outs of Garden courses and he was coaxing outstanding performances from the mare. But Harry felt good about Snowman. First Chance had an advantage: only seven years old, she had spent her entire life as a pampered show horse. Snowman looked like a grizzled veteran in comparison—even though this was the older horse’s first outing at the National.
Mogavero and Harry waited side by side in the narrow alley adjacent to the in-gate. Behind the big white gate, the crew was raising the jumps.
First Chance would be up first. From their vantage point at the in-gate, neither rider could see the fences. As the in-gate swung open, bringing with it the musty smell of the dirt surface of the ring, Harry caught a glance of the shortened, raised course of the jump-off. The gate man ushered Mogavero and First Chance into the ring, then closed the gate behind them. Harry could not watch Mogavero’s ride, but he followed the progress from the sounds: the galloping strides, the brief moment of silence over the fences, the applause that followed each clean fence. A moment later, the gate swung open again. First Chance had put in a clean round.
It was Snowman’s turn. Harry turned to acknowledge the crowd, allowing his horse to do the same, then got down to business. He steadied Snowman on the approach to the first fence; after that, he dissolved into the teamwork of a ride that is working well: his body became his horse’s body; his soul became his horse’s soul.
In a flash, the round was over. Snowman was clean. Another round of fence raising for a second jump-off. The crowd exploded in applause.
The crew raised the jumps again, and Harry and Adolph Mogavero waited in the wings. The two horses and riders could not have looked more different. First Chance, naturally high-strung and now more keyed up than ever, jigged in place, then paced in the narrow space. Snowman stood on a loose rein, one leg cocked in a horse’s typical resting pose, his ears relaxed to the sides. Harry held the rein on the buckle and waited. When the gate swung open, First Chance bolted into the ring, leaving a small eddy of wind behind her. Again, Harry listened. This time, he heard the wooden thump of a pole hitting the ground, followed by a small groan from the crowd. The gate swung open, and Adolph nodded with a friendly camaraderie.
Harry had an opening. A clean round would bring them the blue ribbon. How many clean rounds had Snowman put in over the last few months? Too many to count. But this was the Garden—not a time to count on anything. As Harry trotted Snowman into the arena, and as the horse turned to look at the stands, the crowd erupted in applause. But this was no time to pay attention to the sights and sounds. Horse and rider had to muster every ounce of concentration, every bit of training and skill, courage and heart. Twelve challenging fences, twelve chances to fault—from something as simple as a hoof rubbing against an obstacle to something as catastrophic