The Eighty-Dollar Champion - Elizabeth Letts [60]
That fall, life was as busy as ever—the family was still growing, with five children now. Every morning, Johanna put breakfast on the table, the family gathered to say grace, and after the meal, everyone set to work. The older boys were able to help out in the barn. Harriet handled some of the grooming. As soon as a child was old enough, he was given a job to do.
It was a good life, more than Harry might have expected, enough that he knew he should be grateful for what he had. Look what he and Johanna had built in just seven short years: a steady job, a growing family, a home of their own. They had worked hard and they had been lucky. Harry could look around and see that where he was, he could probably settle down for a long time, teaching the girls and then saying good-bye to them, watching his children grow, giving lessons in the summertime.
Harry and Snowman had not made much of an impression at the North Shore show. Getting a green sixth-place ribbon was not enough to make anyone pay any mind to the horse. But Harry kept thinking about that third-place ribbon in the knock-down-and-out class.
Harry knew what Cappy Smith had seen in Snowman, that special quality that nobody else had noticed. Snowy had a gift. No matter where it came from, it was a gift that no one could take away.
Sure, it was a good life, but Harry was only twenty-nine years old. He was far from ready to start marching toward the placid benefits of a routine existence.
Harry de Leyer imagined climbing aboard his plow horse and the two of them together soaring—not content with the ordinary, but buoyed along by the desire to take flight.
13
Sinjon
St. James, Long Island, 1957
People who bet on thoroughbred racehorses often quote the adage “Blood will tell.” Great champion racehorses—Man o’ War, Seabiscuit, and Secretariat—all come from bloodlines that for generations have been bred for one goal: speed. But this adage is not as foolproof in jumping. The mystical component that separates a lackluster jumper from a great one is not so easy to pinpoint. Good natural balance is helpful, but it is not the most important characteristic. There is an elusive quality—personality or presence—that separates a good jumper from a great one. The well-known equestrian writer M. A. Stoneridge, the sister of the equestrian Olympic gold medal winner William Steinkraus, notes that even an ordinary horse is “a generous soul, good-natured, honest, anxious to please, endowed with a special brand of courage and a simple sense of justice.” On their own, those admirable qualities are not enough to make a champion. In The Complete Book of Show Jumping, Judy Crago remarks, “If twenty of the world’s leading show jumpers were turned out into a field with twenty hacks and hunters it would be impossible for anyone to pick the superior jumpers out.” Most horses can jump, and a few can jump high, but only a very few have the courage, trust, and stamina to carry a rider over a course designed to test those very qualities.
By the end of September 1957, the outdoor show season was drawing to a close. That summer had been a good season for Harry—he had won a few ribbons, even though people still sometimes stared at him as though he had stumbled into their party without an invitation. Finding the right horse to show in the grueling, adrenaline-fueled open jumper classes was like looking for a needle in a haystack—that was why the riders on the United States Equestrian Team had strings of horses. For every ten horses with scope, only one would have the heart to match. This was the elusive quality that everyone was looking for—and that people with plenty of money at their disposal were more likely to find.
Among the horses in Harry’s barn, Sinjon was definitely the best prospect to become a jumper champion. Ever since Harry had solved his weaving problem, he had lost his scrawny look and had filled out nicely. Harry had studied the horse and had figured out a way to help him relax in his stall by rigging up a system of hanging weights that the horse bumped