Grandpa roughed his hand up the back of Paul’s head. ‘Who you want it fer, lad? Plan to sleep in it yourself?”
Paul’s face turned red. “I,” he hesitated. “That is, Maureen and I are going to . . .”
“Wa-al?”
“We’re going to buy—we’re going to buy the Phantom on Pony Penning Day.”
There! The news was out!
Grandpa threw back his head. He opened wide his mouth, ready to break out in laughter, but when he saw the grave look in Paul’s eyes, he did not laugh at all. Instead, he let out a shrill “Wee-dee-dee-dee, wee-dee-dee-dee,” as he pulled a handful of corn out of his pocket and spattered the golden kernels about his feet.
From all over the barnyard came wild geese and tame geese, big ducks and little ducks, marsh hens and chicks. The air was wild with the clatter they made.
“Can’t no one catch the Phantom,” Grandpa yelled above the noise. “For two years she’s give the horse laugh to the best roundup men we got on Chincoteague. What makes ye think she’s going to ask to be caught?”
“Because,” Paul shouted through the din, “because the Fire Chief promised I could go along this year.”
Grandpa Beebe stepped back a pace and studied his grandson. His clear eyes twinkled with merriment. Then a look of pity crossed his face.
“Lad,” he said, “the Phantom don’t wear that white map on her withers for nothing. It stands for Liberty, and ain’t no human being going to take her liberty away from her.”
“She wants to come to us,” Paul said, trying to keep his voice steady. “Ever since that day on Assateague, Maureen and I knew.”
A white striker bird flew up from the ground and perched on Grandpa’s gnarled forefinger. Grandpa directed his remarks to the bird. “Can’t fer the life of me see why those two want another pony Why, the corral’s full of ’em. They’re as much Paul’s and Maureen’s as anybody’s.”
Paul’s lips tightened. “It’s not the same,” he said. “Owning a pony you never have to sell . . .”
The striker bird flew away. Paul and Grandpa watched in silence as it dipped and rose to the sky.
Grandpa stood in thought. “Paul boy,” he said slowly, “hark to my words. The Phantom ain’t a hoss. She ain’t even a lady. She’s just a piece of wind and sky.”
Paul tried to speak, swallowed, and tried once more. “We got our hearts set on her,” he faltered.
Grandpa pushed his battered hat to one side and scratched his head. “All right, boy,” he sighed. “The stall is yours.”
A moment later Paul was telling Maureen the good news. “Owning a stall is next best to owning a pony,” she laughed, as they both went to work in a fever of excitement.
With long brooms and steaming pails of water, they washed the walls and the ceiling of Phantom’s stall. They scraped inches of sand from the hard-packed floor, dumped it in the woods, and brought in fresh, clean sand. They built a manger, spending long moments deciding just how high it should be placed. They scrubbed a rain barrel to be used for a watering trough. They even dug a “wickie”—the long, tough root of a brier that trails along under the ground.
“Phantom won’t be frightened when she smells and feels a wickie halter,” Maureen said. “It’ll be much softer than rope.”
Chapter 6
PONY PENNING DAY
PONY PENNING DAY always comes on the last Thursday in July. For weeks before, every member of the Volunteer Fire Department is busy getting the grounds in readiness, and the boys are allowed to help.
“I’ll do your chores at home, Paul,” offered Maureen, “so’s you can see that the pony pens are good and stout.”
Paul spent long days at the pony penning grounds. Yet he could not have told how or by whom the tents were rigged up. He hardly noticed when the chutes for the bronco busting were built. He did not know who pounded the race track into condition. All he knew was that the pens for the wild ponies must be made fast. Once the Phantom was captured, she must not escape. Nothing else mattered.
The night before the roundup, he and Maureen made last-minute plans in Phantom’s stall. “First thing in the morning,” Paul told Maureen, “you lay a clean bed of dried sea grass. Then fill the manger with plenty of marsh grass to make Phantom feel at home.”
“Oh, I will, Paul. And I’ve got some ear corn and some ’lasses to coax her appetite, and Grandma gave me a bunch of tiny new carrots and some rutabagas, and I’ve been saving up sugar until I have a little sackful.”
In the midst of their talk, Grandpa, looking as if he had a surprise, joined them.
“I hain’t rode on a roundup to Assateague for two year,” he smiled, hiding one hand behind his back, “but I recommember we allus had a chaw and a goody after the ponies was rounded up and afore we swimmed ’em across the channel. Here, Paul,” he said, with a strange huskiness, “here’s a choclit bar fer ye to take along.” And he pressed the slightly squashed candy into Paul’s hand.
• • •
It was dark and still when Paul awoke the next morning. He lay quiet a moment, trying to gather his wits. Suddenly he shot out of bed.
Today was Pony Penning Day!
His clothes lay on the chair beside his bed. Hurriedly he pulled on his shirt and pants and thudded barefoot down to the kitchen where Grandma stood over the stove, frying ham and making coffee for him as if he were man-grown!
He flung out his chest, sniffing the rich smells, bursting with excitement.
Grandma glanced around proudly. “I picked the first ripe figs of the year fer ye,” she exclaimed. “They’re chuckful of goodness. Now sit down, Paul, and eat a breakfast fit for a roundup man!”
Paul sat on the edge of his chair. With one eye on the clock he tried to eat the delicious figs and ham, but the food seemed to lump in his throat. Luckily Grandpa and Maureen came downstairs just then and helped clean his plate when Grandma was busy testing her cornbread in the oven with a long wisp of straw.
“I got to go now,” Paul swallowed, as he ran out the door. He mounted Watch Eyes, a dependable pony that Grandpa had never been able to sell because of his white eyes. Locking his bare feet around the pony’s sides, he jogged out of the yard.
Maureen came running to see him off.
“Whatever happens,” Paul called back over his shoulder, “you be at Old Dominion Point at ten o’clock on a fresh pony.”
“I’ll be there, Paul!”
“And you, Paul!” yelled Grandpa. “Obey yer leader. No matter what!”
Day was breaking. A light golden mist came up out of the sea. It touched the prim white houses and the white picket fences with an unearthly light. Paul loped along slowly to save his mount’s strength. He studied each house with a new interest. Here lived the woman who paid Maureen three dollars for hoeing her potato patch. There lived Kim Horsepepper, the clamdigger they had worked for. Mr. Horsepepper was riding out of his lane now, catching up with Paul. All along the road, men were turning out of their gates.
“Where do you reckon you’ll do most good, Bub?” taunted a lean sapling of a man who, on other days, was an oysterman. He guffawed loudly, then winked at the rest of the group.
Paul’s hand tightened on the reins. “Reckon I’ll do most good where the leader tells me to go,” he said, blushing hotly.
The day promised to be sultry. The marsh grass that usually billowed and waved stood motionless. The water of Assateague Channel glared like quicksilver.
Now the cavalcade was thundering over a small bridge that linked Chincoteague Island to little Piney Island. At the far end of the bridge a scow with a rail fence around it stood at anchor.
In spite of light talk, the faces of the men were drawn tight with excitement as they led their mounts onto the scow. The horses felt the excitement, too. Their nostrils quivered, and their ears swiveled this way and that, listening to the throb of the motor. Now the scow began to nose its way across the narrow channel. Paul watched the White Hills of Assateague loom near. He watched t
he old lighthouse grow sharp and sharper against the sky. In a few minutes the ride was over. The gangway was being lowered. The horses were clattering down, each man taking his own.
All eyes were on Wyle Maddox, the leader.
“Split in three bunches,” Wyle clipped out the directions loud and sharp. “North, south, and east. Me and Kim and the Beebe boy will head east, Wimbrow and Quillen goes north, and Harvey and Rodgers south. We’ll all meet at Tom’s Point.”
At the first sound of Wyle’s steam-whistle voice, the sea birds rose with a wild clatter.
“They’re like scouts,” Paul said to himself. “They’re going to warn the wild ponies that the enemy has landed.”
“Gee-up!” shouted Wyle as he whirled his horse and motioned Kim and Paul to follow.
Paul touched his bare heels into Watch Eye’s side. They were off! The boy’s eyes were fastened on Wyle Maddox. He and Kim Horsepepper were following their leader like the wake of a ship.
As they rode on, Paul could feel the soft sand give way to hard meadowland, then to pine-laden trails. There were no paths to follow, only openings to skin through—openings that led to water holes or to grazing grounds. The three horses thrashed through underbrush, jumped fallen trees, waded brackish pools and narrow, winding streams.
Suddenly Paul saw Wyle Maddox’ horse rear into the air. He heard him neigh loudly as a band of wild ponies darted into an open grazing stretch some twenty yards ahead, then vanished among the black tree trunks.
The woods came alive with thundering hooves and frantic horse calls. Through bush and brier and bog and hard marshland the wild ponies flew. Behind them galloped the three riders, whooping at the top of their lungs. For whole seconds at a time the wild band would be swallowed up by the forest gloom. Then it would reappear far ahead—nothing but a flash of flying tails and manes.
Suddenly Wyle Maddox was waving Paul to ride close. “A straggler!” he shouted, pointing off to the left. “He went that-a-way! Git him!” And with a burst of speed Wyle Maddox and Kim Horsepepper were after the band.
Paul was alone. His face reddened with anger. They wanted to be rid of him. That’s what they wanted. Sent after a straggler! He was not interested in rounding up a straggler that couldn’t even keep up with the herd! He wanted the Phantom. Then Grandpa’s words flashed across his mind. “Obey yer leader. No matter what!”
He wheeled his pony and headed blindly in the direction Wyle had indicated. He rode deeper into the pine thicket, trying to avoid snapping twigs, yet watching ahead for the slightest motion of leaf or bush. He’d show the men, if it took him all day! His thin shirt clung to him damply and his body was wet with sweat. A cobweb veiled itself across his face. With one hand he tried to wipe it off, but suddenly he was almost unseated. Watch Eyes was dancing on his hind legs, his nose high in the air. Paul stared into the sun-dappled forest until his eyes burned in his head. At last, far away and deep in the shadow of the pines, he saw a blur of motion. With the distance that lay between them, it might have been anything. A deer. Or even a squirrel. Whatever it was, he was after it!
Watch Eyes plunged on. There was a kind of glory in pursuit that made Paul and the horse one. They were trailing nothing but swaying bushes. They were giving chase to a mirage. Always it moved on and on, showing itself only in quivering leaves or moving shadows.
What was that? In the clump of myrtle bushes just ahead? Paul reined in. He could scarcely breathe for the wild beating of his heart. There it was again! A silver flash. It looked like mist with the sun on it. And just beyond the mist, he caught sight of a long tail of mingled copper and silver.
He gazed awestruck. “It could be the Phantom’s tail,” he breathed. “It is! It is! It is! And the silver flash—it’s not mist at all, but a brand-new colt, too little to keep up with the band.”
The blood pounded in his ears. No wonder the Phantom was a straggler! No wonder she let herself be caught. “She’s got a baby colt!” he murmured.
He glanced about him helplessly. If only he could think! How could he drive the Phantom and her colt to Tom’s Point?
Warily he approached the myrtle thicket, then stopped as a hot wave of guilt swept over him. Phantom and her colt did not want to be rounded up by men. He could set them
free. No one had brought the Phantom in before. No one need ever know.
Just then the colt let out a high, frightened whinny. In that little second Paul knew that he wanted more than anything in the world to keep the mother and the colt together. Shivers of joy raced up and down his spine. His breath came faster. He made a firm resolution. “I’ll buy you both!” he promised.
But how far had he come? Was it ten miles to Tom’s Point or two? Would it be best to drive them down the beach? Or through the woods? As if in answer a loud bugle rang through the woods. It was the Pied Piper! And unmistakably his voice came from the direction of Tom’s Point.
The Phantom pricked her ears. She wheeled around and almost collided with Watch Eyes in her haste to find the band. She wanted the Pied Piper for protection. Behind her trotted the foal, all shining and clean with its newness.
Paul laughed weakly. He was not driving the Phantom after all! She and her colt were leading him. They were leading him to Tom’s Point!
Chapter 7
SHE CAN’T TURN BACK
TOM’S POINT was a protected piece of land where the marsh was hard and the grass especially sweet. About seventy wild ponies, exhausted by their morning’s run, stood browsing quietly, as if they were in a corral. Only occasionally they looked up at their captors. The good meadow and their own weariness kept them peaceful prisoners.
At a watchful distance the roundup men rested their mounts and relaxed. It was like the lull in the midst of a storm. All was quiet on the surface. Yet there was an undercurrent of tension. You could tell it in the narrowed eyes of the men, their subdued voices and their too easy laughter.
Suddenly the laughter stilled. Mouths gaped in disbelief. Eyes rounded. For a few seconds no one spoke at all. Then a shout that was half wonder and half admiration went up from the men. Paul Beebe was bringing in the Phantom and a colt!
Even the wild herds grew excited. As one horse, they stopped grazing. Every head jerked high, to see and to smell the newcomers. The Pied Piper whirled out and gathered the mare and her colt into his band. He sniffed them all over as if to make sure that nothing had harmed them. Then he snorted at Phantom, as much as to say, “You cause me more trouble than all the rest of my mares put together!”
The roundup men were swarming around Paul, buzzing with questions.
“How’d you do it, Paul?” Wyle Maddox called over the excited hubbub.
“Where’d you find ’em?” shouted Kim Horsepepper.
Paul made no answer. The questions floated around and above him like voices in a dream. He went hot and cold by turns. Did he do the right thing by bringing the Phantom and her foal in? Miserably he watched the Phantom’s head droop. There was no wild sweep to her mane and her tail now. The free wild thing was caught like a butterfly in a net. She was webbed in by men, yelling and laughing.
“Beats all!” he heard someone say. “For two years we been trying to round up the Phantom and along comes a spindling youngster to show us up.”
“’Twas the little colt that hindered her.”
“’Course it was.”
“It’s the newest colt in the bunch; may not stand the swim.”
“If we lose only one colt, it’ll still be a good day’s work.”
“Jumpin’ Jupiter, but it’s hot!”
The men accepted Paul as one of them now—a real roundup man. They were clapping him on the shoulder and offering him candy bars. Suddenly he remembered the bar Grandpa had pressed into his hand. He took off the wrapper and ate—not because he was hungry, but because he wanted to seem one of the men. They were trying to get him to talk. “Ain’t they a shaggy-lookin’ bunch?” Kim Horsepepper asked.
“Except for Misty,” Paul said
, pointing toward the Phantom’s colt. “Her coat is silky.” The mere thought of touching it sent shivers through him. “Misty,” he thought to himself wonderingly. “Why, I’ve named her!”
The little foal was nursing greedily. Paul’s eyes never strayed from the two of them. It was as if they might disappear into the mist of the morning, leaving only the sorrels and the bays and the blacks behind.
Only once he looked out across the water. Two lines of boats were forming a pony-way across the channel. He saw the cluster of people and the mounts waiting on the shores of Chincoteague and he knew that somewhere among them was Maureen. It was like a relay race. Soon she would carry on.
“Could I swim my mount across the channel alongside the Phantom?” Paul asked Wyle Maddox anxiously.
Wyle shook his head. “Watch Eyes is all tuckered out,” he said. “Besides, there’s a kind of tradition in the way things is handled on Pony Penning Day. There’s mounted men for the roundup and there’s boatmen to herd ’em across the channel,” he explained.
“Tide’s out!” he called in clipped tones. “Current is slack. Time for the ponies to be swimmed across. Let’s go!”
Suddenly the beach was wild with commotion. From three sides the roundup men came rushing at the ponies, their hoarse cries whipping the animals into action. They plunged into the water, the stallions leading, the mares following, neighing encouragement to their colts.
“They’re off!” shouted Wyle Maddox, and everyone felt the relief and triumph in his words.
Kim thumped Paul on the back as they boarded the scow for the ride back. “Don’t fret about yer prize,” he said brusquely. “You’ve got the Phantom sure this time. Once in the water she can’t turn back.”
But he was wrong!
Chapter 8
CAUGHT IN THE WHIRLPOOL