Pony Club Cup (Woodbury Pony Club Book 1) Read online

  Pony Club Cup

  Josephine Pullein-Thompson

  Contents

  Josephine Pullein-Thompson (1923–2014)

  The Woodbury map

  Members and Officials of the Woodbury Branch of the Pony Club

  1. “What's he like?”

  2. A Disgrace to David

  3. We Need Advice

  4. Coppice Hill

  5. We'll Never Do It

  6. Fainthearts and Lionhearts

  7. Clear The Course

  8. Dress Rehearsal

  9. We'll Persuade Them Somehow

  The Woodbury Pony Club series

  Chapter 1: Pony Club Challenge

  Jane Badger Books

  Josephine Pullein-Thompson (1923–2014)

  Josephine Pullein-Thompson was born in 1923 into a bohemian family, with a mother and siblings who all wrote. When they were teenagers, she and her sisters, twins Christine and Diana Pullein-Thompson, started a successful riding school.

  Josephine was connected with the Pony Club all her life, and was the district commissioner for the Woodland Pony Club in Oxfordshire. She wrote over 30 books, and it’s perhaps no coincidence that her two most popular series feature pony clubs: the West Barsetshire, who feature in the Noel and Henry series, and the Woodbury Pony Club. The pony club, with its wide variety of characters, gave her plenty of scope for the sort of character-driven story she most enjoyed, allied to solid and effective instruction on how to ride well.

  There is a good 40 years between the series. Six Ponies, the first Noel and Henry book, was written during World War II and portrays an arcadia that Josephine herself said had never really existed.

  The Woodbury series reflects the very different world of the 1980s in which it was written. There are children with difficult family backgrounds, and there is Hanif, who is of Pakistani heritage. And there are parents who are very much more involved with the Pony Club, and the ponies, than the more hands-off variety of the earlier series.

  With the Woodbury series, Josephine Pullein-Thompson displayed what is arguably some of her finest writing, and I am delighted to be able to bring the series back into print.

  Jane Badger, 2020

  Members and Officials of the Woodbury Branch of the Pony Club

  DAVID LUMLEY, ex steeplechase jockey. Lives at Garland Farm.

  MRS. ROOKE, Hon. Secretary. Lives at 20, The Heights, Woodbury.

  LESLEY ROOKE, her eldest daughter. Owns Stardust, 14-hands chestnut mare.

  SARAH ROOKE, owns Chess, 13-hands piebald gelding.

  MR. & MRS. ROBERTS run Garland Farm for David Lumley. They live at Garland Farm Cottage.

  LYNNE ROBERTS owns Berry, 13.1 red roan mare.

  PAUL ROBERTS owns Banjo, 12.2 black gelding.

  ALICE DRUMMOND hires Saffron, 14.1 dun gelding. Lives with her uncle and aunt at Shawbury, Darkwood Lane.

  MARGARET AND PETER HUTCHINSON, Alice’s aunt and uncle.

  CLARE HUTCHINSON, one of Alice’s four cousins.

  HANIF (HARRY) FRANKLIN owns Jupiter. 14.2 liver chestnut gelding. Lives at Barn Cottage, Great Coxwell.

  JAMES MORGAN shares Ferdinand, dark-brown gelding, with his mother. Lives at Four Cross Fruit Farm.

  RUPERT WHEELER, the eldest of the family, owns Rosie, 14.1 light bay mare. Lives at The Old Rectory, Kidlake.

  ELIZABETH WHEELER owns Rajah, 14.1½ chestnut gelding.

  ANNETTE WHEELER owns Tristram, 13.2 grey Welsh gelding.

  OLIVER WHEELER owns Hobbit, 12.2 dark-brown Dartmoor gelding.

  JENNIFER BLACKER owns Sea King, 14.2 bright bay gelding. Lives at Stonecroft on the Waterford road.

  TINA SPENCER. No pony. Helps at the riding school and lives at 5 Mill Cottages, Woodbury.

  JULIA CARTWRIGHT AND JANET GREEN. Pony Club instructors.

  1

  “What's he like?”

  “I shouldn’t think it could get worse. I mean fewer and people are turning up, and you can’t blame them the instruction’s so useless,” said James Morgan gloomily, as he rode dark-brown Ferdinand along the lane, walking stride for stride with Jennifer Blacker’s Sea King. “Rallies weren’t much fun when Mrs Smythe was D.C., but at least you learned a bit.”

  “Yes, and she always got really good people to instruct the top ride, but now we’re in the top ride we still have Janet or Julia or Mr Foster’s working pupils taking us. And those working pupils are pathetic, all theory. They don’t ride as well as we do,” complained Jennifer in a voice of deep disgust.

  “We’re only in the top ride because all the older members have stopped coming,” James pointed out. “I do hope this new bloke fizzes things up a bit.”

  “But I don’t see how an ex-jockey for D.C. can improve things. They only know how to ride in races.”

  “He’s an ex-jump jockey, so with any luck he’ll have us belting over steeplechase fences,” said James, his solid face brightening.

  “Well I’m not going to risk spoiling King just as he’s begun to win,” Jennifer spoke decidedly, as she patted her pony’s bright bay neck. “I’m going to have another go at Mummy about transferring to the Cranford Vale. They’re a decent pony club, much the best round here. They had a team in practically all the finals last year. The trouble is that their rallies are such miles away. It’s too far to hack and Mummy says that with petrol the price it is, she can’t afford to use the trailer for rallies as well as shows.”

  “Hadn’t you better hang on for a bit and see if things improve?” suggested James.

  “No, I’m not going to bother with it any more. If Mummy won’t let me transfer I’ll just give up the pony club,” said Jennifer, her pale, flat face set in obstinate lines. “How can a smashed-up jockey know anything about proper riding?”

  “David Lumley knows a lot.”

  James and Jennifer turned in their saddles to see Paul Roberts jogging along behind them on his little black pony, Banjo. Paul was small for his age, which was eleven, had a small neat face which matched the rest of him, and serious grey eyes. He had listened to their conversation and now forced himself to speak up.

  “David was in the pony club when he was young. He did a lot of ordinary riding and then he took to breaking and schooling and riding in horse trials before he became a National Hunt jockey. He was top class, and all set to be Champion Jockey when he had his smash.”

  “You know this Lumley bloke?” asked James in surprise.

  “Yes, you see my sister Lynne and I live at Garland Farm. Well, David Lumley lives in the farmhouse and we live in the cottages and my father runs the farm for him,” explained Paul, wishing that Lynne, who was a year older, would stop giggling with Netti Wheeler and Sarah Rooke and help him stand up for David.

  “All the rallies are going to be held over at our place, at Garland Farm, in future,” he told them.

  “Yes, we know that, Mrs Rooke announced it. But what’s he like?”

  “My mother knows all about him,” Lesley Rooke, who’d been riding alone as usual—no one really liked her—pulled up when she heard James’s question. “He wasn’t all that keen to be D.C.,” she went on, the sun glinting on her thick-lensed glasses as she kicked her pretty chestnut pony, Stardust, closer to the group. “Someone on the pony club committee heard that Mr Lumley had shut himself up and was moping, because he can’t ride any more, so they decided he needed something to occupy him and talked him into it.”

  “He’s not going to be much good if he’s not really interested,” said James gloomily.

  “Well, there isn’t anyone else. People round here won’t take on thankless tasks like the pony club. My mother doesn’t really want t
o be secretary—it’s a lot of work—but no one else will do it.” Lesley’s wide, slightly cow-like face, with its broad nose and thick lips, looked pleased at this proof of meanness in local people.

  “I think David is quite interested now that he’s made up his mind to it,” objected Paul. “He and Dad have been talking over which fields they’ll use and things like that. But it’s how he’s going to manage, being so lame and having an arm that doesn’t work at all; he can’t lift a jump or buckle a bridle ... “.

  “He sounds a bit of a wreck to me,” grumbled James.

  The four Wheelers, who had had to go back to the field where the rally was held to find Rupert’s forgotten head­collar, clattered in pursuit of the other pony club members. Long-legged Rupert, the eldest of the four, was riding Rosie, a light bay mare with a mealy nose, a strong-looking pony of fourteen-two. Lizzie, who was next to Rupert in age, owned Rajah, a lean, sober, chestnut gelding, darker in colour and more solidly-built than Lesley Rooke’s Stardust. You could tell that Rupert and Lizzie were brother and sister: they had the same pink and white faces, blue eyes and pale, straw-coloured hair, but Rupert’s face was longer, his blue eyes dreamy, his hair short and curly. Lizzie had an anxious face, as though she expected things to go wrong, and she wore her hair in one long, thick, flaxen plait.

  Behind, came the two younger Wheelers. Annette, who was always called Netti, had short curly hair like Rupert, but her face was heart-shaped and her eyes weren’t dreamy or anxious; they had a sparkle which suggested that she enjoyed life and excitement and adventures. Netti was riding Tristram, a little grey Welsh pony who had been outgrown by Rupert. Beside her, Oliver, the youngest of the Wheelers, bounced about on Hobbit, a dark-brown Dartmoor who had once been Lizzie’s pony.

  “If he’s a jockey perhaps he’ll let us race instead of all this awful, boring schooling,” shouted Oliver, who rode very badly but hated being taught.

  “Mrs Rookery didn’t really tell us anything about him,” complained Rupert. “Lynne,” he shouted, “wait for us, we want to know what this new guy is like.”

  Lynne Roberts was quite different from her younger brother Paul. She had wavy, light-brown hair which stuck out from her plump, cheerful face, and when she laughed, which was most of the time, her hazel-coloured eyes disappeared into the plumpness and became slits. She wasn’t a very good rider, but she loved Berry, her red roan pony, and didn’t mind that she wasn’t very well-schooled and couldn’t jump.

  “What’s he like, really, this David Lumley?” Rupert asked again as he caught up.

  “He used to be very nice, always full of jokes,” answered Lynne, “but the accident’s changed him. Mum says it’ll pass off, that it’s only the pain and frustration that’s making him irritable, but the doctors don’t think he’ll ever recover completely. They said he’d probably never ride again.”

  “What exactly happened to him?” asked Oliver, who enjoyed gruesome details.

  “It was in some big race, not the Grand National. He’s ridden in that lots of times. The Gold Cup, I think. The horse in front fell and brought his horse down and then a third one landed on top of him. It was terribly sad, two of the horses had to be shot and David was unconscious for over a week. Then, when he came round, he was partly paralysed: he couldn’t walk or use his left hand, and, on top of that he had lots of broken bones.”

  “Poor him, how awful,” said Lizzie, her voice full of concern.

  “Is anyone going to the Brunstock show?” Sarah Rooke changed the subject. She was much prettier than her elder sister, Lesley, and didn’t have to wear glasses. Her face was narrow and she wore her dark hair in a fringe. But it wasn’t a friendly face, and her rather thin-lipped mouth gave her a determined look, as though she always got her own way. Chess, her pony, was a stout little piebald of about thirteen hands.

  “No shows for us these holidays,” answered Lizzie. “Mummy’s gone on strike over entry fees and anyway we never win anything.”

  “I’m going in for the gymkhana, there are masses of events for twelve and unders. You ought to come, Netti.”

  “I don’t really want to, not without the others. It’s no fun hacking miles on your own. And with the Cranford Vale Prince Philip-ers there I wouldn’t stand a chance. Even their B team is absolutely brilliant.”

  “The Great Sarah thinks she’s good enough to beat them,” sneered Lesley Rooke in a very spiteful voice, as they caught up with the group ahead.

  “I didn’t say anything of the sort,” Sarah snapped back.

  “Well, Mummy thinks you are. She’s paying your entry fees.”

  “She’d have paid yours, only she knows you haven’t a hope in the under sixteen classes.”

  “I can’t help my age ... “

  “Oh, shut up. Little Rookes in their nest should agree and not keep cawing in spiteful voices,” Rupert told them.

  “I do wish there was a jumping class for small ponies,” sighed Paul. “Show-jumping is Banjo’s best thing, but he can’t go in Under 14.2 classes and it’s no fun going in Clear Round Jumping, show after show. You haven’t really won the rosette and anyway I want to jump off against the clock.”

  “Daddy says we’re wet and that we should run our own gymkhanas and get as good as the Cranford Vale,” Netti Wheeler told Paul. “But Rupert and Lizzie have gone off competitions now that they’ve got new and bigger ponies which aren’t much good at anything, and Ollie and I aren’t exactly brilliant at organization.”

  When the lane brought them to a road, the Rookes turned the opposite way to the rest of the riders, and trotted, in silent single file, towards Woodbury Heights, the Victorian part of the old market town of Woodbury, where they lived in a tall, red-brick house.

  At the next crossroads Jennifer Blacker rode on alone. She lived in a modern house called Stonecroft on the Waterford road. The remaining seven riders turned right and took the narrow, winding uphill road which led deep into the country. James Morgan was next to go. Calling that he would see them on Wednesday, he turned in at his white gate, beside a huge notice announcing Four Cross Fruit Farm.

  The Robertses and the Wheelers jogged on together as the road meandered between fields, ploughed and sown. Smooth green, friendly-looking hills encircled them and far away on the horizon, they could see the blue line of the Downs.

  “It’s going to be gorgeous having the rallies right on our doorstep,” Lizzie told Lynne. “We won’t be late any more and Rajah will be much livelier when he hasn’t had to hack miles. This morning he was worn out before the schooling started.”

  “I wonder what David means to do about schools and jumps.” Paul sounded worried. “We’ve got a few poles and drums, but they’re not up to much, and James is expecting steeplechase fences.”

  “He’ll have to do something,” said Netti. “A rally without jumps would be unbelievably dreary.”

  “Well, that girl Angela who took the D ride this morning would only let us trot over the poles,” said Oliver Wheeler indignantly. “And we spent simply hours touching our toes and going round the world. Not one single race. If this pony club doesn’t improve soon I’m going to give up.”

  “I expect Dad will sort something out,” said Lynne comfortably. “He always says he’s David’s left-hand man and now he’s finished with the spring planting and the cattle are out on the hills, the hard work is over until the hay-making starts.”

  “You’d better tell him that the pony club members will riot,” suggested Rupert. “They’ll all start chanting and throwing things if they come to a rally and find no jumps. Not that I mind much. Rosie’s so completely clueless. l don’t think her mother ever told her how to take off.”

  “Do ponies’ mothers tell them things?” asked Netti, as the Robertses turned up the Garland Farm lane, leaving Wheelers to ride on to Kidlake, where they lived in a tumbledown old house that had once been a rectory.

  I suppose you may as well join the pony club if that’s what you really want,” said Mrs Hutchinson gru
dgingly as she drove out of Darkwood Lane and took the road to Woodbury. “The subscription’s gone up and up since my children were members, and everyone says that the Woodbury Branch is pretty useless. Since Mrs Smythe gave up they haven’t done a thing in any of the inter-branch competitions.”

  “I thought I might make some friends,” said Alice Drummond, trying not to be cast down by her Aunt Margaret’s perpetual pessimism.

  “There aren’t many girls of your age round here. The Rookes live on the other side of Woodbury and the Wheelers right out at Kidlake. With petrol so expensive I couldn’t possibly keep driving you over there.”

  “But once we’ve collected Saffron I won’t need driving. I’ll be able to ride everywhere,” Alice pointed out.

  “I can’t see the pony tied up outside the dentist’s,” said Aunt Margaret as the lights changed and they were able to cross the river Vole by the narrow, ancient bridge. “I do hope it’s quiet in traffic and easy to catch,” she went on, driving past the boat builders and the brewery and the furniture factory, which made up Woodbury’s light industries. “Mr Crankshaw has only the one pony and his terms are quite reasonable. I tried Neville Foster at the riding school first, but he charges the earth. And the price of riding lessons nowadays, you wouldn’t believe it!”

  As they left the town Alice tried to visualise Saffron. A dun Connemara pony, her aunt had told her, fourteen hands one. She had never had a pony of her own. Well, no pets at all. Not a dog or a cat or even a hamster, because her parents had always been on the move. Her father had worked for a multi-national company and they had travelled the world, never spending more than two or three years in the same place: Washington, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro. She’d ridden a lot at riding schools and then, a year ago, when her parents had sent her back to an English boarding school, she had spent several weekends with pony-owning friends. She had loved catching up the pony and grooming it, having time to talk to it after the ride. It had all been much more fun than an hour’s ride at some grand riding school. Now the thought of having a pony for the holidays and looking after it herself seemed the best thing that had happened to her since that cold winter morning when they’d broken the terrible news to her. She remembered the horrified faces and hushed voices of the matron and housemistress as they told her the plane had crashed.