The Lost Pony of Riverdale Read online



  The Lost Pony of Riverdale

  By Amanda Wills

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  https://www.amandawills.co.uk

  For Adrian, Oliver and Thomas

  Chapter 1

  Poppy McKeever hoped with a passion that she was dreaming. Her family was sitting around the kitchen table looking at her, their faces full of smiling expectation, yet she felt nothing. She looked at each of them in turn, willing herself to feel something – anything – so she could join their happy trio. Her dad was treating her to his full-wattage BBC beam, her stepmother’s cerulean blue eyes were appealing for her approval and her brother was fidgeting on his chair, barely able to keep a lid on his excitement. And still she felt nothing. She chewed her bottom lip and wondered how best to break the news.

  “I’m sorry,” she said at last. “I’m not going.”

  Her dad and stepmother exchanged a look and Charlie stood up so quickly his chair rocked back and landed on the tiled floor with a clatter that sent Magpie, their overweight black and white cat, scurrying for cover. Poppy used the diversion to sneak another look at the estate agent’s brochure on the table. The pictures showed a cottage sitting squarely at the end of a long gravel drive. Its walls were built from uncompromising grey stone and two dormer windows jutted out of the heavy slate roof like a pair of bushy eyebrows. The yellow paint on the small front door was flaking.

  “It looks like an old woman’s house. And anyway, it’s too far away,” she muttered crossly, although her dad and Caroline were too busy with Charlie to hear.

  Poppy slid down her chair until she was almost eye-level with the table and regarded her family. It was alright for them, she thought mutinously. They all loved an adventure and couldn’t understand why she clung like a limpet to the status quo. But eleven-year-old Poppy knew from bitter experience how someone’s life could be turned upside down in a heartbeat. It was only natural that she hated change.

  Her dad had dropped the bombshell after dinner. He’d put on his special fake newsreader’s voice. Usually his imitations were so over the top they made Poppy giggle. Not today.

  “Welcome to the six o’clock news. Here are the headlines. It’s all change for the McKeever family -” he began.

  Charlie interrupted the broadcast. “Why? Are you getting divorced?” The question was asked with relish. Half his friends at school had parents who’d split up. To six-year-old Charlie it meant having two bedrooms and a constant supply of guilt-induced presents. But her dad and Caroline couldn’t keep the grins off their faces. They were even holding hands, for goodness’ sake. Whatever the news was, it wasn’t a divorce.

  “No, you ghoulish boy, we are not getting divorced. It’s good news. The McKeever family is leaving leafy Twickenham behind to begin a new life in the country!” her dad announced, squeezing Caroline’s hand and smiling encouragingly at the children.

  “Cool!” whooped Charlie, his fist punching the air.

  “What?” Poppy demanded. Surely they weren’t serious?

  “We’ve bought a cottage in Devon, right on the edge of Dartmoor. I know it’s a surprise but we didn’t want to get your hopes up until everything was signed and sealed,” her dad said.

  Under the table Poppy pinched her thigh. Her worst fears were confirmed. She was definitely awake. “But I like living here. I don’t want to move.”

  “Don’t be silly – you’ll love living on Dartmoor. It’ll be a new start for us all,” her dad added, giving Poppy a meaningful look. She wriggled uncomfortably in her chair. She knew exactly what he was referring to. But moving to the other end of the country wasn’t going to miraculously make things better between her and Caroline. She hid behind her long fringe and said nothing.

  “The cottage is called Riverdale. It’s absolutely beautiful. Look, here are some photos.” Caroline pushed the estate agent’s brochure towards her. “The woman we’re buying from has lived there for years but the house and land were getting too much for her so she decided to sell. We’re so lucky to have found it. It must have been fate.”

  “I don’t care about fate. I don’t want to leave Twickenham. I feel close to mum here,” said Poppy bluntly.

  The smiles faded from the three faces in front of her and she felt a prickle of guilt when she saw Caroline’s wounded expression.

  Then her dad dropped a second bombshell.

  “You might change your mind when you hear the whole story, Poppy. The house has a sitting tenant.”

  Curious in spite of herself, Poppy asked grumpily, “What do you mean?”

  “The owner of the cottage is moving to a warden-assisted flat. She has an ancient pony and as part of the sale we had to agree that he could stay at Riverdale.”

  Poppy had a stubborn streak and had been fully prepared to dig her heels in over the move but suddenly all her objections melted away like frost on a sunny winter’s morning.

  She sat up in her chair. “A pony? What’s his name? How big is he? Is he too old to ride?”

  “I don’t know, sweetheart, the estate agent was a bit vague. And the pony was at the vet’s when we looked around the house so we didn’t get to meet him, quiz him about his age or take his inside leg measurements.”

  Poppy played with a strand of her hair and thought. Their house in Twickenham was the last link with her mum. It was a connection she guarded fiercely. And yet waiting for her at this shabby-looking cottage in the middle of nowhere was the one thing she had dreamed of all her life – her own pony. She took another look at the photos. One showed two fields either side of the drive and a ramshackle crop of outbuildings at the back. On closer inspection she noticed something she hadn’t seen at first. In one of the fields there was a blurry grey blob. The pony was too far away for Poppy to make out any details, but in her imagination he became the 14.2hh dappled grey of her dreams.

  “But you can’t ride, Poppy. You’ve never even sat on a horse!” an incredulous Charlie cried. Some people are born diplomats. Poppy’s blond, blue-eyed half-brother was not one of them. Tact had never been one of his strong points. But as usual he was spot on.

  “It doesn’t matter. I could soon learn. Anyway, I know more about them than you do,” she retorted.

  That was true at least. Poppy had an almost encyclopaedic knowledge of horses. One of her most prized possessions was a dog-eared box-set collection of books about riding and pony care that she’d unearthed at the bottom of a box of junk at a boot fair the previous summer. Inside the shabby green cardboard case were four well-thumbed books that had helped feed her obsession. Thanks to the books Poppy knew exactly how to look after a pony, in theory at least, from worming him to making a poultice. She knew the difference between a snaffle bit and a kimblewick, a running and a standing martingale. She’d memorised the chapters on teaching horses to jump and riding across country. And this was despite the fact that the closest she’d ever been to riding was having a turn on the donkeys at the beach in Broadstairs.

  “I assume that means you’re coming with us?” said her dad cheerfully. With an imperceptible nod of the head Poppy stood up and walked out of the kitchen with as much dignity as she could muster after her complete about-turn.

  Three months later Poppy pulled the final cardboard box towards her, tore off one last strip of brown parcel tape and carefully stuck the lid down. She looked around her bedroom. There was hardly a square foot of carpet that wasn’t covered in boxes. Otherwise the room was bare. All her worldly possessions were packed and ready to go. Her clothes for the morning – a pair of faded jeans and her favourite sweatshirt – were folded neatly on yet another box at the end of the bed. Her dad wanted t
o leave straight after breakfast to avoid the worst of the traffic. Poppy still wasn’t sure she wanted to leave at all, but she hadn’t really had a say in the matter. Her dad and Caroline had decided that life in the country would be much better for the children. Healthier, safer, more like the childhoods they remembered, they kept telling her.

  She picked up the battered Mickey Mouse clock from her bedside table and set the alarm for seven. Her eyes fell on the photo next to the clock. Taken shortly before her fourth birthday, it could have been one of those pictures newspapers use after a tragedy, with the caption ‘In happier times’. It was winter and their small garden was blanketed under a layer of powdery snow. Poppy and her mum had spent the morning building a snowman. His head was slightly wonky and he was wearing the policeman’s helmet from Poppy’s dressing up box at a rakish angle. Poppy and her mum were standing to attention either side of him. They were wrapped up in coats, hats and gloves, their usually pale faces rosy with exertion. They were both laughing into the camera. Her dad must have said something funny at the exact moment he had clicked the shutter but Poppy couldn’t remember what it was. In fact she wasn’t sure if she could even remember her mum with any clarity any more. Photos were a physical reminder of her features but when Poppy tried to visualise Isobel the image was too fleeting to evoke the sound of her voice, the feel of her touch, what she was like. She sighed, picked up the photo, wrapped it in an old scarf and put it in her rucksack, ready for the morning.

  As she climbed into bed Poppy thought about their new life in Devon. Her head was a tangled mess of sadness, trepidation and excitement that she was too tired to unravel tonight. Magpie landed with a soft thump beside her. He circled around on the duvet making himself comfortable before finally settling down. Tomorrow life was going to change forever. It was Poppy’s last thought before she fell into a dreamless sleep to the sound of Magpie purring.