Bucking and Diving

I seem to have unwittingly become a horse dealer which is better, morally than being a crack dealer but not much. It’s probably worse than being a car dealer. Horse dealers make the Arthur Daleys and Frank Butchers of the world’s forecourts look positively benign and angelic.

My grey pony has to go. Two years ago when I bought him he was my children’s grey pony but they don’t want to know him any more so he has become mine. He is a companion for my overgrown pony and looks picturesque enough grazing in the field. He will allow small children to walk about safely near his hind legs and groom him. He is good with the blacksmith and the vet. He has huge black eyes and at this time of year, a coat like a polar bear. He has a fine life and is in rude health, his every need tended to daily by me. But I can’t be in the business of keeping ornamental ponies. Not even one.

Being a horse dealer now, you will have noticed that I didn’t mention in my description of him that he can be tricky to catch and he is a challenging ride. In fact he is a little bucker. He has bucked my son off several times, bucked me off and most embarrassingly bucked off my mother’s oldest friend’s granddaughter. He has galloped victoriously through the village, reins and stirrups flying after dumping children, he has ruined riding lessons and has put both my children off riding for life. (Something for which I am aware I should maybe thank him, but we don't have that kind of relationship.) I did consider giving him a career putting other people’s children off riding – hiring him out a week at a time to frighten and disillusion pony mad children into a sensible, cheap sport. But where to advertise that kind of service?

So I advertised him for sale on a horsey website. I was a bit vague in the advertisement but resolved to be honest with anyone who got in touch about him. I didn’t want anyone else’s child’s dream of Olympic glory or true pony love being trampled beneath Grey Pony’s hard little hooves. I couldn’t have that on my conscience.

I was truthful with the first person who got me to call her back and then hung up on me. The second person said she didn’t mind buying a pony that needed work. I seized on this unguarded revelation and worked at it like a garrulous tinker at Appleby Fair. She wasn’t convinced. I may have told the third person that both my children have hacked him out alone but then I cracked and had to mention the few wee bucks he sometimes puts in. Conscience is not useful for horse dealers. The phone went quiet for weeks.

And then a friend said he had a friend in the horse business who might be interested. When I say in the horse business, she actually, er, runs a riding school. So lots of people’s children would be riding him. I think my friend told her the story of Grey Pony but I didn’t check meticulously. On Friday I loaded him up into the trailer and drove him over to be inspected by the riding school lady. (It wasn’t actually quite as simple as that. He ran away from me after I caught him and had to be apprehended by The Horse Whisperer, and then I loaded him up; hard little hooves, hard little heart, the whole lot.)

Riding school lady looked him over in the trailer and liked him. I was encouraged, so much so that when describing his time with us I’m not sure that I used the exact word ‘buck’. I unloaded him and walked him up. She made a few positive noises. I spoke eloquently about his time in the pony club with his previous owners. She scratched his nose and asked him if he would like to come and live with her. I maintained my impassive expression while my heart leapt at the prospect of possibly selling him before we go on holiday at Christmas. She asked if she could have him on trial for a bit. I managed to look regretful as I left him in her stable.

He has now been there for four days and I haven’t heard anything. Could no news be good news? I have told myself that if she thinks he is a suitable pony for a riding school with all her experience, then who am I to argue? We horse dealers can be so plausible.