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"Damn it to hell anyway, it's been over a year and Ajax can't handle a rider," groans George Beatty with a boot up on the corral fence post. "I want that horse ready for Colgate by spring."
"Don't worry Dad," reasons Buddy in a rare role reversal. "Alice has the knack and will have him saddled up in no time."
"You keep your fat hands off my trainer, mister," spits the father while keeping his eyes on the young woman leading the white stallion in a large circle by a loose leather strap. The young horse pulls and nickers like a gleeful child being swung around by their arms.
"They train quicker with the mare on hand," offers the son, trying to ignore his father's cruel accusation.
"You there, get that ride on the road," commands the father stomping off to his little office behind the barroom and turning at the door to shout back at Buddy "and you get in here!"
__________
The Beattys had been horsemen from time immemorial starting with steppe ponies on the post-glacial British Isles. It was their war stallions decked out with two-person chariots that had held off the Roman armies from Scotland, culminating in Emperor Hadrian building a twenty-foot stone wall across the waist of Anglia to keep the wild Celtic tribes out of the conquered south. This unbroken line of Beatty cavaliers was temporarily diverted by Buddy's grandfather.
His company Laurel Highland Horseless had been the first to provide commuter service in southwestern Pennsylvania until he lost all twelve buses and their depot to the bank after the 1929 stock market crash. Fortunately, he preserved a means of family salvation by taking his bus mechanic skills into the bootlegging business during prohibition. His revved up Fords could outrun the state police on the National Pike by baiting them up Summit Mountain, the westernmost of the Allegheny ridges.
Eventually the cops could identify Speed Beatty and knew where he lived, so he did what clan leaders had done during first the Roman and then the Norman conquests. He headed for the hills, in his case the post-prohibition dry counties of eastern Kentucky where moonshine trickled with every creek flowing out of each backwoods hollow. His garage in Paintsville provided really full service - a tankful, a repair, and a clandestine ride for the family recipe.
"Did I ever tell you why we really came to Jersey?" begins George as he tilts back in his wooden chair.
"Yeah, yeah, I pick up loads at the New York ports and factories along the Raritan, remember?"
"Well dumbass, some Italian guy has been snooping around the ranch. We don't need no mob cutting into our side profits so don't you go spilling your guts."
"Oh dad, why would the mafia want to get into ranching?"
"Good, let's leave it at that. Now what's this about speeding up the training?"
"Alice's father was waiting in the bar to pick her up and said that high strung stallions learn to ride sooner with their mama nearby."
"Tell you what, smartass," George bargains, handing over ten fading thousand dollar bills. "How about you take that converted trailer and bring us back a white mare?"
"I've never been to West Virginia. Is it hard driving across those mountains?"
"Nah, it's a straight shot from Harrisburg down route eleven, then west on sixty at Lexington over to Big Sewell. Just slap on the chains if you meet any snow on those hills."
His company Laurel Highland Horseless had been the first to provide commuter service in southwestern Pennsylvania until he lost all twelve buses and their depot to the bank after the 1929 stock market crash. Fortunately, he preserved a means of family salvation by taking his bus mechanic skills into the bootlegging business during prohibition. His revved up Fords could outrun the state police on the National Pike by baiting them up Summit Mountain, the westernmost of the Allegheny ridges.
Eventually the cops could identify Speed Beatty and knew where he lived, so he did what clan leaders had done during first the Roman and then the Norman conquests. He headed for the hills, in his case the post-prohibition dry counties of eastern Kentucky where moonshine trickled with every creek flowing out of each backwoods hollow. His garage in Paintsville provided really full service - a tankful, a repair, and a clandestine ride for the family recipe.
__________
"Did I ever tell you why we really came to Jersey?" begins George as he tilts back in his wooden chair.
"Yeah, yeah, I pick up loads at the New York ports and factories along the Raritan, remember?"
"Well dumbass, some Italian guy has been snooping around the ranch. We don't need no mob cutting into our side profits so don't you go spilling your guts."
"Oh dad, why would the mafia want to get into ranching?"
"Good, let's leave it at that. Now what's this about speeding up the training?"
"Alice's father was waiting in the bar to pick her up and said that high strung stallions learn to ride sooner with their mama nearby."
"Tell you what, smartass," George bargains, handing over ten fading thousand dollar bills. "How about you take that converted trailer and bring us back a white mare?"
"I've never been to West Virginia. Is it hard driving across those mountains?"
"Nah, it's a straight shot from Harrisburg down route eleven, then west on sixty at Lexington over to Big Sewell. Just slap on the chains if you meet any snow on those hills."
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