Blaze’s Blues

Alberta, Canada, 2013

I’d been working on the Franklin ranch about a month when Blaze arrived. It was June and it was hot and I was standing in the kitchen about to pour myself some coffee when Becky stomped in, grabbed my wrist and forced the pot down onto the stove.

‘We’re getting the horses,’ she said. ‘Before breakfast.’

I complained but followed her to the barn. Without speaking we saddled Hunter and Crescent and rode out for the line of spruce where the colts often took shelter in the dark. Becky kept yelling at me to sit up in the saddle, to keep my goddamn back straight. We rounded up most of them and then the stragglers and the two donkeys and ran the lot across the pasture, down the steep bank of sandy clay, across the creek and up into the feed pen. 

‘Colt coming in today. It gets priority,’ she said, dismounting to get the gate.

‘Why?’

‘Because my Dad says so.’ She stared at me over Hunter’s high withers like she was challenging me to argue with her. 

I climbed down and unfastened Crescent’s cinches and breast strap. I lifted the saddle and the blanket off, then carried them and Becky’s to the barn while she started pouring out feed.

‘Who does it belong to?’ I asked.

‘Ben and Alma.’

‘Do I know them?’

‘I don’t see how. They live all the way down in Tuttle, near Red Deer.’ She sulked as she worked, pushing the horses out of her way with her shoulder to get in at the feed troughs, which were made from used tractor tyres, cut in half. She kicked one of the donkeys in the knee because it didn’t move out of her way on time.

‘Ben’s a friend of my Dad,’ she said. ‘He knows shit-all about horses so we got to start the colt for their granddaughter.’

She told me to separate the colts we’d been working on and tie them in the yard. She brushed each one down as I caught the next. When that was done we headed for the house. A new chrome trailer and a silver Ford were parked in the yard next to the crumbling Dodge I drove.

In the kitchen, Sam, Ben and Alma were in the middle of breakfast. I drank my first cup of coffee and poured a second to sip, then joined them. As we ate, they talked about this horse of theirs, Blaze. Ben wanted to warn us that it was in poor health before we took a look for ourselves.

‘Can’t figure out why he’s losing weight.’

‘What do you expect?’ Sam said, through a mouthful of eggs. ‘Not horse people, are you?’

Alma bent her head and dabbed her eyes with a little embroidered handkerchief. I looked at Becky. She was staring at Alma, a slice of bacon held up to her mouth. I could see the muscles in her jaw clench and relax even though she wasn’t chewing.

Ben ignored his wife and went on to tell us that Blaze had spent his life in the same small field. ‘He’s a special horse,’ he said, ‘we failed him. We should have broke him but time got away from us.’

‘They have a special bond,’ Alma interrupted. ‘Blaze comes running whenever Ben calls his name.’

‘At feeding time, I guess,’ Becky said.

‘Been cut?’ Sam asked.

‘You gelded him, Sam, when he was a yearling.’

Sam scratched his head, a tuft of thick white hair stood up when he took his hand away. He looked a lot like Spencer Tracey.

‘We shot a mare for you, I remember,’ Becky said. ‘It’s her colt?’

Ben nodded. ‘All he does is stand in that field looking up at the house. Whenever we open the door, there he is. Kind of like he expects us to invite him in.’

‘How long since he’s been around other horses?’ Sam asked, sliding his grubby thumb around the rim of his coffee mug.

‘Going on four years.’

‘Likely forgot he is one.’

 ***

After breakfast we all went out to the trailer to look at Blaze.

‘We had some time getting him in there,’ Ben said, sliding back the bolt on the door. ‘Had to bait it with bread and sugar.’

‘Well, I ain’t wasting a whole morning,’ Sam said and reached in through a ventilation grid of the trailer with a hockey stick, jabbing at the horse inside. Becky started slamming her palms against the shining panels, yelling, ‘Hup. Hup. Hup.’

A skinny Camarillo stumbled out into the yard.

I opened my arms out wide to cut off his escape and together we guided the agitated horse into the round pen. Sam worked the gate and we all climbed up on the fence to look at him, except Alma.

‘I thought Camarillo horses were supposed to be white,’ Becky said.

What we were looking at was an unhealthy four-year-old. He was thin, ribs clearly visible beneath a patchy yellowed coat which was dull and dry. His hooves had grown so long they curled at the end and his tail and mane were matted and tangled.

‘Shit, Ben,’ Sam said.

Alma dabbed the hanky to her eye.

Nervous at first, Blaze ran twice around the small corral, then stood pressed against the bars on the far side and stared at us. His ears twitched until he calmed enough to look around and take in his surroundings.

Becky climbed down into the pen.

She approached the horse, talking to him in a low soothing voice. I couldn’t make out her words but Blaze stood for her and she stroked his neck with the backs of her long fingers.

‘He trusts humans,’ Ben said.

She tied a rope shank to the loop on his halter and led him over to the gate.

‘He’s okay, Dad. Let us out, we’ll take him in the barn.’

We had seven colts not far off wild tied to the fence. They became restless as Becky led Blaze through the yard. In the big pen 60 more found shade, nuzzled into each other, bit, kicked and rolled in the dust but their ears flicked in our direction and you could tell they understood it was a new arrival. If Blaze was concerned by their presence, he didn’t show it. Maybe, like Sam said, he didn’t recognise them as horses, though I expect he had enough sense to know what he was.

Sam took the shank from Becky and put his thumb in Blaze’s mouth to force his jaw open. The horse stepped back, the whites of his eyes showing and tried to pull his head free. Then he stood. Sam held onto the halter in such a way that it would hurt if Blaze tried to pull away again. Sam refused to twist a horse’s ear, claiming it was cruel. By doing it this way, he said, if Blaze got hurt, it was his own fault.

‘Make it difficult for them to do anything but what you want them to,’ he said, and turned to Ben. ‘His teeth need doing. Better take him up to the table.’

Alma squeezed her husband’s arm and shook her head.

‘Try down here first, hey?’ Ben answered. ‘I’m sure he’ll stand for you.’

Sam shrugged and led Blaze to the red barn and got him fastened to the cross-ties. He selected a rasp from a bucket of tools. The instrument was about a foot in length, an inch wide, dark and heavy-looking. It was covered in tiny sharp points except for its smooth, worn handle.

Metal grated against tooth. Alma squealed when Blaze halter-pulled. His hooves slipped on the concrete floor. We all stepped back for safety but he abandoned his protest right away. Maybe he realised that he had little option but to stand. I could tell Becky admired this. She saw me looking at her and nodded in approval. I was impressed too. In my short time working there I’d seen horses fight to near exhaustion, throwing themselves for no other reason than an objection to being tied. Some would lie there kicking the post with their head stuck way up in the air until Sam or Becky could get close enough to cut the ropes.

Next Becky pushed her thumb into the corner of Blaze’s mouth as Sam had done. She took hold of his pink-white tongue and pulled it back against his cheek. This kept his mouth open. Then Sam resumed his sawing. Bits of tooth, blood and saliva splatted onto his hand which he wiped on the back of his jeans. Every now and again he paused to catch his breath. He offered me the rasp and I took over. Feeling awkward and unpractised, I worked slowly and without much of a result. Soon Becky traded places with me.

Blaze’s tongue was dry and hot in my hand.

‘Keep it pulled right back,’ Becky said.

When the job was finished Sam rotated Blaze’s jaw to demonstrate that the teeth, which had been catching, were no longer doing so.

‘He couldn’t chew his grain, that’s why he’s been losing weight,’ he said. ‘Couldn’t close his mouth even.’

Becky told me to fill a pail a quarter full with oats which she then offered to Blaze. He lapped up the grain and looked at us, disinterested, as we watched him chew. Alma was openly crying now. She said that they should have known it was his teeth.

‘How?’ Sam asked her without a trace of pity. ‘You’re not horse people.’

 *** 

On Blaze’s second day with us Becky clipped his hooves. They were in such bad shape we had no choice but to use the table. The nerves had grown long inside the horn-like shell. They bled and he hobbled for a week or more, but they healed and he soon got used to walking around again.

He used to stand in the feed pen, oblivious, or so it seemed, to the horses in the enclosure next to him. He wasn’t agitated or nervous but stood watching us as we busied ourselves with the chores. When we came out in the morning to feed him, he’d always be in the same spot, facing the house.

Sam said Blaze thought he was a human too. ‘That’s why he’s here,’ he said, ‘to learn to be a horse.’

Whether Blaze realised he was a horse or not, he got treated like one. Although we did keep him separated from the others because it was clear early on they didn’t like him. Bite marks began to appear on his sides or legs from standing too close to the fence.

We started to tie him in the yard with the other colts and we brushed him down every day. He was gentle and allowed us to take his feet, though he had a tendency to lean. We fed him as much as he could eat without making him sick and soon he began gaining weight. In a week his coat lost its yellow tint and developed a shine.

***

It was three weeks to the day when Ben and Alma arrived back to check on Blaze’s progress. Sam told them he’d been doing well and was ready to start in the round pen.

‘Depending on how it goes, Becky might ride him this afternoon.’

It was a habit of Becky’s to call a horse by a different name while she worked with it. She had taken to calling Blaze ‘Sonic’, because he was a sickly, slow-looking horse.

Alma squeezed Ben’s hand every time this new name was used. I told her not to worry, that she could call him whatever they wanted when they got him home again.

Ben said that Alma was the sentimental type.

It was another hot day and there was no shade down by the corrals. Myself, Ben and Alma sat on the tailgate of the Dodge and settled in for the demonstration. Sam stood beside us sucking on watermelon rind.

Becky untied Sonic and took a few steps back so that she stood almost in the centre of the pen. He followed her. I couldn’t help smiling, he already looked to people for instruction, half her work was done for her. Nevertheless, for Ben and Alma’s benefit, and mine too, she raised a buggy-whip and cracked it. The horse looked at her with no idea what was required of him.

I could see Becky was conscious of working with all of our eyes on her. She sometimes became flustered when Sam watched her work and she had such a short temper, especially if she wasn’t getting results.

‘I do want him to look at me,’ she explained, colour rising on her face, ‘but only when I want him to. First I want him to move out.’

Sonic was confused. He kept trying to walk up to Becky instead of around in a circle and it didn’t take long for her to lose patience. She screamed then and whipped him.

‘Move, cocksucker!’

Alma squeezed my arm.

Becky pulled her red work cap off and threw it at the horse, grazing his hind leg. He leaped forward and started to run in a circle around the corral.

It was sort of a funny sight. Horses are so easily frightened. I tried to hide my grin from Alma. When I looked up Sam was shaking his head at me.

‘Maybe this isn’t a good idea,’ Alma said.

Sam turned to her. ‘What’d you say?’

Ben took his wife’s hand. ‘Becky’s a professional,’ he told her. ‘Hush now and watch.’

When Sonic stopped running, Becky whipped him again and he moved this time. She stepped back and to the side so that she was always level with his inside hip, then she let him have it again and then once more. He learned to stay ahead of her and moved in a nice circle, tight to the rails, watching her all the time.

After that, Becky calmed. She clicked her tongue and stepped into the horse so he’d turn and trot in the other direction. She pushed, turning him when she wanted him to turn. If she cracked the whip she didn’t make contact, only using it as encouragement, to keep pressure on and keep him moving.

She called ‘Whoa!’ when she wanted him to stop.

He caught on.

‘See how he looks to me?’ she asked.

Ben and I nodded.

It took no time for her to get him to a lope. Sam was beaming. He told us how Becky would ride him in less than an hour. Alma shook her head, teary again. She thought they should have been able to do this themselves. Ben comforted her with one arm around her tiny shoulders.

‘It’s all about making it so their only choice is to do what you want them to,’ Sam said. ‘Pressure and reward, till they learn.’

Next Becky used the rope to tie his feet. She looped it around his back left foot and, giving it lots of slack, called ‘Get up!’ and he walked out, then moved up again to a lope. She called ‘Whoa!’ and pulled the rope taut, leaving him standing on three feet. Usually a colt will kick and fight the rope but Sonic behaved as he was supposed to. He patiently waited for Becky to give his foot back.

There was no need to, but she repeated the process and rewarded him each time by rubbing his neck.

Then she flanked him, which involved the horse stepping into a larger loop that is then pulled tight around its middle. Sometimes they buck. Sonic crow-hopped once and resumed a trot as usual.

Sam started to laugh. ‘Some bronc you got there.’

Ben and I joined in. Alma was silent.

‘Get Freddy and see what happens,’ Sam called to Becky.

Freddy Goodyear was an old saddle with a half tyre tied to each stirrup.

‘Gives us an idea of how the horse will react to the weight of the saddle and feeling of a rider’s legs against his sides,’ Sam said and threw a blanket and Freddy over Sonic’s back. Becky tightened the cinch. Sam climbed out of the pen and Becky continued as before. She told Sonic to get up’ and he did. He crow-hopped again once and then walked.

‘You’re certain he never wore a saddle before?’ Sam asked.

Sonic was behaving like a broke horse. Ben and Alma both shook their heads. Alma smiled. When Becky clicked her tongue Sonic changed direction. When she called ‘Woah!’ he stopped.

For Sonic’s sake, to allow him to absorb what he had learned and because the afternoon sun was making us restless, we took a break. We drank iced tea and sat in the shade. Sonic was brought to the creek to drink. Alma got upset over something. Ben said it was the heat and that she had always been emotional. Alma kept saying that they should have been able to do this themselves.

‘For the last time, you’re not horse people,’ Sam said.

I carried Freddy Goodyear back to the barn and Becky put her own saddle on Sonic. He bowed his head as she put a bridle on him. He accepted the rope snaffle. Sam brought his horse, Crescent, a twelve-year-old brown Percheron cross, into the pen. He mounted and reached for Sonic’s shank and wrapped it once around his saddle horn. Then he walked Crescent around and Sonic followed behind them. Sam took his horse to a trot and Sonic matched his pace. They loped around the small pen together. He stopped in the middle of the pen and asked Becky if she was ready. Becky nodded and closed the gate behind her.

Sonic was snubbed to Crescent. Sam had a hold of the shank and kept Sonic’s head secure. Becky took the reins in her left hand and reached for the horn. She held onto the seat of the saddle with her right. She moved it in a circular motion, then leaned her weight on her arms and hopped lightly on the spot a few times. Sonic was watching her but didn’t seem concerned. She stood up very slowly in the stirrup and down again and repeated this process a number of times. Then with a nod to her father she stood and, easing her right leg over, sat down into the seat. Sonic stepped but Sam held him steady. This was the first time Sonic had had someone on his back.

Ben nodded. ‘Wonderful,’ he said.

Sam led Sonic around as before. It had been two-and-a-half hours since Becky started working with him and he was already walking with a rider. Ben was happy but it was too much for Alma so Ben took her home.

They thanked Becky and Sam over and over again.

‘Wait a month or so before you come back,’ Sam said. ‘He’s skinny yet, and today will have tired him out. After a few weeks of feeding and work Sonic will be ready for either one of you to ride him. Or even bring your granddaughter.’

‘His name is Blaze,’ Alma said.

If Sam heard her, he didn’t show it.

 ***

One day a letter arrived. It was from Alma and there was a lot of talk about it.

‘Have you read it?’ everybody asked.

After dinner, before our evening ride, I was sitting out on the porch watching the hummingbirds.

‘Have you seen the letter?’ Sam asked.

I knew he had it folded in his shirt pocket. I didn’t want to read it.

‘Wasn’t it addressed to Becky?’ I asked.

‘She don’t mind.’

‘What about Alma? How would she feel about it?’

He slipped the letter out, unfolded it and passed it to me.

I fanned out the pages. It was all very neatly written on sweet-smelling stationery.

After reading it through once, I sat back.

‘Is that something?’ Sam asked.

I handed the paper to him and watched him refold and tuck it back into his pocket.

‘Isn’t that some letter?’ he asked again.

I told him it was something all right.

Sam was tickled with the letter and for weeks it went everywhere with him. He told people about it when they called on the phone.

‘You know Alma Linder down Red Deer way?’ he said. ‘Know we’re breaking that colt of hers?’

He showed it to anyone who brought a stud to be cut.

‘Sent us this letter, I have it right here.’

He even talked about it with the man who came to collect the canners.

‘Alma and Ben came by and Becky showed them how we do things around here.’

He was proud of it.

‘Bet you didn’t know her daddy used to interfere with them as kids? Chased Alma when she was a girl. Caught her too. It’s all here in her own handwriting.’

He boasted of Becky’s talents and about how it was thanks to their methods that they were able to help Alma. As if that was their intention all along.

‘All her life, she says, she blamed herself. But when she saw Becky handle that colt, she realised that her pop had made it harder for her to fight than give in. She knows it wasn’t her fault now, or something like that. Have a read yourself.’

I watched all of this. Nobody seemed surprised at Sam telling them these kinds of stories but nobody asked for more details, or took the letter to read. Sam didn’t need an excuse to keep talking. I don’t think he ever noticed, or cared about, anyone’s reaction, as long as he got to tell the story.

Not one of the Franklins replied to the letter, as far as I know. They certainly never talked about writing back. But maybe that’s because Alma had also asked about Blaze’s progress and he was not doing so well.

By then, we’d all got used to calling him Sonic. He was in with the other horses, covered with kick and bite marks and could never get at the food. He just stood with his back to them watching us and the house. Then he got sick. He lost the weight he’d gained and Sam said it was because of his immune system. All that time spent alone, he hadn’t built up any resistance to horse diseases and he picked up infections easy. We gave him a shot of penicillin every night for a week or two and it seemed to help. The problem was we couldn’t work with him while he was like that.

We decided to separate him from the other horses during the day. He gained weight right away. We stopped tying him up and let him roam around the yard and he continued to improve. He became like another hand on the ranch, except he didn’t do any work and got in everybody’s way. We had Sonic nearly three months. Despite the setbacks we started taking him out on long rides over the country and I know Sam and Becky were happy with his progress. They were so happy in fact that they got to talking about finding a new owner for him. They said he was too much horse for Ben and Alma.

‘What they really want is an old broke horse,’ Sam said.

At the beginning, Sonic had been rough to ride. He had a hard lope and a tendency to shy away from flowers blowing in the breeze. But then one day I got him to a run and he was smooth and fast, like something clicked for him and he settled right into it. What’s more, it got to be that he liked to go fast. You could open him up and he’d run flat out for a mile without encouragement, fast enough for your hat to fly off and he didn’t shy at that anymore either.

One day Sam saddled Sonic and took him out alone. They were gone for hours and when they came back Sonic was lathered with sweat.

‘He’s a horse, boy. Yessir,’ he called, as he rode back into the yard.

Later at supper, he cleared his throat to make an announcement.

‘I bought that Camarillo,’ Sam declared. ‘He’s far too good for those two now and we can make much more selling him to a kid on the reserve. They go shit crazy for white horses.’

‘Doesn’t Alma mind giving him up?’ I asked.

‘This is a business we’re running here,’ Becky said.

 ***

There was some excitement about the prospect of selling Sonic and we had a few visitors from Frog Lake down to look at him. Sam even managed to get a small bidding war going between two brothers, who each wanted to buy Sonic for the same girl.

Then one day Ben drove his truck and trailer into the yard. Myself and Becky were working a colt in the round pen.

‘Shit,’ she said. ‘He promised me.’

‘Who promised you?’ I asked and waved at Ben.

‘Who do you think?’ she answered. She climbed out of the pen and marched down to the barn, kicking the heavy door closed when she went in.

I opened the gate and stepped out. ‘What brings you here?’ I asked.

‘Come to collect Blaze,’ he said. I must have looked at him like he was senile because he smiled then. ‘I’m buying him back for our granddaughter, but he’ll stay with us like before. It’s Alma. She says she can’t stand the place without him.’ He unbolted the back of the trailer and let the door swing open. ‘All your work won’t go to waste,’ he said. ‘I promise you that.’

‘He’s your horse, Ben,’ I said.

‘Tell that to Bec, or Sam. I’m paying twice what I sold him for. Sam says it’s not the same horse so it’s not the same price.’

‘But you asked them to work on him for you.’

Ben said he wouldn’t argue. ‘Sam’s a businessman. He knew what he was doing all along and I missed it. I learned a lesson and I’m not too proud to pay for that.’

Sam strode out of the house then, pulling on his broad-brimmed cattleman hat. He had a half-eaten ice lolly in one hand.

He mumbled a greeting as he stuffed the rest into his mouth.

‘Thanks for this, Sam,’ Ben said.

Sam threw the stick away and put a hand on Ben’s shoulder. ‘We’re old friends,’ he said, and swallowed. ‘I wouldn’t see you wrong. That’s some animal you’re getting back. Becky did a fine job.’

As usual, Sonic was wandering around the yard of his own accord.

‘Come here, Blaze,’ Ben called.

The horse didn’t look around.

‘He used to come when I called him,’ he said.

‘He’s a horse now,’ Sam said. ‘He’s broke, but he might need some manners put on him.’

Becky came out of the barn and moved behind Sonic.

‘Hup!’ she shouted and waved her arms.

Sonic skipped up the yard.

We guided him to the trailer door. He hesitated and then one hoof at a time, climbed into the dark space. Ben bolted the door behind him.

‘Well, thank you,’ he said to us.

We waved Ben away up the hill. Sam kept his hand on his breast pocket, now stuffed with dollar bills, like he was taking an oath.

‘They’ll ruin that horse,’ Becky said. ‘You promised we’d sell him to horse people.’

Sam started to laugh and clapped his hands together. ‘You gonna go blubbering now, like old Alma?’ he asked her.

‘No.’

‘We made a lot of money on that horse, Bec. More than what we’d a got off any Indian. We’ll go out for our supper tonight to celebrate.’ He turned to me then, waving a swollen, calloused finger in my face. ‘I hope you were paying attention. It’s not everyone gets a lesson like that in horse trading.’

First Published in Profiles, Issue 1, edited by Clare Healy & Sarah Sturzel, Dublin, 2022