The Eighty-Dollar Champion - Elizabeth Letts [36]
The boss didn’t even pause long enough to give the impression that he was thinking it over. He said no—he was already paying the going rate.
“But—”
Harry did not get a chance to finish his sentence. His boss held up his hand. “There are a million more guys like you out there—guys who want to spend their days fooling around on a horse. Not my problem you’ve got mouths to feed. I got my hay and grain, vet bills and horseshoes … all that stuff just goes up, up, up. I can find somebody who will be happy to work for sixty dollars a month.”
No use in arguing. Harry was disappointed, but the year spent in the horse business had convinced him that he could make a living at it. Harry called Mickey again and asked him for advice.
Mickey might be living the high life now, but he had not forgotten the people who had given him an early break when he was just a horse boy in Central Park.
“I think I’ve got something for you,” Mickey said. “Big farm in Virginia—the wife’s Dutch. The man is older and he likes to ride out early in the mornings. A daredevil. She worries he’ll get hurt. She wants someone to ride with him.”
Virginia. Harry had heard enough about America now to know that Virginia was horse country. Harry and Johanna loaded up their station wagon. With Joseph tucked into the back seat, they headed off to their new home, a place called Homewood Farms.
Nothing could have prepared Harry and Johanna for the beauty of David Hugh Dillard’s grand estate. The countryside around Amherst, in Virginia’s renowned Shenandoah Valley, was storybook beautiful: huge rolling farms, lined with dark post-and-rail fences. From the long, tree-lined lane leading down to the house, to the prize-winning peacocks that strutted across the grounds, Homewood Farms was a showplace. Set on hundreds of manicured acres, the farm was a world unto itself: rough log smokehouses produced twenty-five Virginia hams every year, cured and smoked to perfection; acres of kitchen gardens yielded abundant fresh produce for eating and preserving; in the dairy farm Jersey cows produced rich milk and butter; and at the private racetrack at his adjacent Oak Park Farms, Mr. Dillard ran his thoroughbreds. All in all, it was the essence of a Virginia gentleman’s plantation.
David Hugh Dillard strutted across the land like one of his prize-winning peacocks, making up in bravado what he lacked in height. Only two or three inches over five feet with his boots on, he was known for his devotion to his family, and for his high, exacting standards.
It came as no surprise that Harry was expected to do a lot more on the farm than just accompany Mr. Dillard on his morning rides. His boss fancied thoroughbreds and had his own racetrack, and now he wanted to start training some of the horses in the glamorous sport of show jumping.
When Mr. Dillard was off the farm, he told Harry, he should drive his Cadillac, “just to keep the battery charged,” and he invited Harry and Johanna to stay in the big house to house-sit.
After Harry bought and sold a few horses for Mr. Dillard at a profit, the businessman, ever the entrepreneur, had an idea. He suggested that Harry might be able to start up a horse business, buying and selling horses.
“But I have no money,” Harry said. Mr. Dillard loaned him some seed money, and Harry started buying a few horses and attracting students from the local high school for lessons.
Homewood Farms was only a few miles from Sweet Briar College, renowned for its equestrian school. One of the most famous horsemen in America, Captain Vladimir S. Littauer, often put on clinics there. At Captain Littauer’s request, Harry started bringing his horses over to Sweet Briar so that the students could ride them—and Littauer also encouraged Harry to obtain a riding instructor’s certificate by attending one of his clinics. Littauer, an old White Russian who had served in the Imperial Cavalry of Czar Nicholas II, lived on a large estate in Syosset, Long Island, and was well regarded throughout the horse community.