“Who are you to tell me what to do?” he asked.
“I am someone who cares for you, and I will not let you meddle where you should not meddle—now come.” She offered her hand to him, and after a moment, he took it.
That night, Petrosky took Sapphire to the Carrington Farms stables and introduced her to his cousin Red. The jolly, red-haired man took an instant liking to Stowe and hired “Sam” immediately. Later, alone in a tack room where she’d been given a pallet to sleep on, Sapphire stood in front of a tiny piece of cracked mirror with a pair of scissors in her hand. Taking a deep breath, she began to cut her hair, and she didn’t stop until it fell just above her shoulders, the length two other teenaged boys around the barn had worn their hair.
She laughed at herself, turning this way and that in the mirror with only the light of a kerosene lamp to see by. Between the linen strips Myra had given her to bind her breasts—which fortunately were not large to begin with—and her short hair and stable boy’s clothing, Sapphire really did look like a young boy.
The next morning, with her newly shorn locks and the cap pulled down over her head, she met Petrosky, who was headed into the city, to say goodbye. “I don’t know how to thank you,” she told him as she stood beside his wagon, knowing she mustn’t cry. Stable boys didn’t cry over old men who w
ere kind to them.
“No need for thanks.” Petrosky settled his straw hat on his head. “An old man did the same for me some fifty years ago, first time I ever took off.” He looked up from under his hat and winked. “Just returnin’ the favor.” He picked up the reins. “You take care of that dog.”
She nodded. “Yes, sir. I’ll do that.”
Petrosky tipped his hat to his cousin and the wagon rolled down the drive.
“You be knowin’ what you doin’, Sam?” Red asked, handing Sapphire a pitchfork as they entered the barn’s center hall.
His Irish brogue was thick and Sapphire had to listen well to follow his orders. It wasn’t so much the dialect that was difficult to understand as the musical lilt with which he spoke.
Sapphire took in her surroundings as Red gave her instructions; the stable was the largest she’d ever seen. There were fourteen stalls on each side of the aisle and behind the barn was another identical to it. She wondered how many horses these people owned.
Sapphire grinned, taking the pitchfork from him. Stowe ran behind her. “Well enough.”
“Good. You’ll be startin’ on the far end, eh?” He pointed. “Most the horses are out on pasture. Any in their stalls, you just move to a clean stall while you fork the dirty one, then put ’em back in the right stall, eh? Mr. Carrington is funny ’bout his horses bein’ in their own stalls, he is. Says they run better, and who am I to say diff’rent?”
“I’ll get started right away, sir.”
“’Round here, we’re pretty relaxed. Take a break to piss when you need it. Grab eats same place we had them biscuits and ham this morning,” he said, referring to the main room in the building where the jockeys, trainers and horse handlers and Red slept. The lowly stable boys put down a pallet wherever they could. “Take time noonday to have a smoke, wink at the dairy lasses, whatever your pleasure.” Red winked himself. “Just don’t let me see you bein’ lazy,” he warned. “And them stalls better be whisper-clean, eh?”
She nodded. “Will do.”
He made to go, but turned back. “One other thing, me boyo. I said you could move horses. All but one. Hisself you daresn’t lay a hand to. Prince Caribbean be his name.” He pointed. “Last stall on the end, eh? Black as the devil’s heart, that stallion. Mean bastard, eh?” He shook his head. “Runs like that Caribbean wind he’s named after, but as foul-tempered as they come is Prince Caribbean. You mind now, boyo. Stay clear of that’n, eh?”
Sapphire nodded. She liked horses, but she was no fool; some were just of bad disposition and a person had to respect that, considering their size and strength. “So I don’t clean his stall?”
“Wait until the trainer takes him out. Cosco’s the only man that’ll get near him. Once hisself goes out into the paddock, then you can go to it, eh?”
“Sure.”
“Now, don’t get cocky with me, Sam,” Red warned, pointing his finger at her. “You new lads always want to show the boss how good you be with horseflesh, eh? Well, I’m tellin’ you that son of Satan horse has broke two legs, three arms and a jaw, not to mention our best jockey’s ribs and knee. You follow?”
“The stallion breaks people’s arms and legs?”
“Sure’s the sun comes up in the east, me boyo. Like’s to dance on ’em once they go down.” Red shrugged his massive shoulders. “Don’t say that I blame ’im. The man Mr. Carrington bought him from, a man down south, is known for havin’ a stable that beats his horses.”
Sapphire cringed. “That’s terrible.”
Red turned away again. “I’ll look in on you later, eh? And don’t forget my words or you’ll come to regret it. You stay clear from that black devil of a horse.”
“You hear that?” Sapphire said to Stowe as the dog walked through the barn beside her. “You stay away from that killer horse, otherwise he’ll trample you, eh?”
Stowe wagged his tail.
“What a good boy,” she said, reaching the last stall and flinging the door open. The smell made her draw back for an instant, but she swallowed against her revulsion and walked in wearing the rubber galoshes Red had dug up for her. Mucking stalls for Red would certainly be better than serving Blake his dinner on silver platters.
Morning came and went and Sapphire continued to fork manure into a wheelbarrow, roll it out to the compost heap along the woods line and then return to the barn to fill it again. Each time she rolled the wheelbarrow out of one of the stalls, she took a different path to the manure pile.