Helen Yeadon - When Sophie Met Darcy Day

‘So are we,’ I said. ‘She helped us to settle a highly temperamental racehorse who needed the kind of one-toone attention I didn’t have time to give it. Your daughter is good with horses. She has a knack.’

A few months later, Lucy’s family moved overseas and we lost touch. Still, we felt something rather wonderful had happened. We were feeling particularly pleased with ourselves when we got a sharp reminder not to take anything for granted – the bank foreclosed our account. We couldn’t take out cash or write cheques for anything any more. In order to keep going, we had to sit down and apply for as many credit cards as we could, with the maximum credit limit they would give us. From now on we would be living off the never-never.

Chapter 5

Sophie and Darcy Day

A car pulling a trailer came up the drive and stopped in the yard one morning in late summer. Usually horses start stamping when their trailer comes to a standstill but there was no sound from this one and I worried that its occupant might have got injured on the journey, and might even be down, although I would have thought that the driver would have heard if anything untoward had happened.

Michael let the tailgate down and a desperate sight met my eyes. Darcy was bony, her head hanging low over the bars, and her coat was matted and discoloured. Over the years, I’d seen many horses in poor condition but this one rocked me on my heels. I climbed into the trailer to untie her, talking in a soft, low voice, but she didn’t even raise her head to look at me. This was an animal who had given up on the world.

The woman driver introduced herself and told us that she had rescued Darcy from a place where she was being severely neglected but that she couldn’t afford to keep her herself. Would we be able to help? Of course we would. There was no question. I was just concerned about how I was going to get her to back down the ramp out of the trailer because she was in such weak condition she could have collapsed at any time.

Gently, step by faltering step, Michael guided her down while I helped at the other end, until she stood trembling in the yard in front of us. She was a mess. Her eyes were dull and streaming, her bones protruding through her coat, her hind legs swollen and oozing a yellow discharge, her tail a tangled mass of wet hair and diarrhoea, her hooves long and overgrown. Her temperature was sky high and I knew she needed intravenous medication quickly. I went indoors to ring Adrian, the local vet, while Michael led Darcy slowly to the old sheep barn where she could be nursed in peace. We had a nursery paddock in front of the house where we sometimes put poorly horses because we could listen out for them in the night, but it was clear that Darcy was nowhere near well enough to be outside.

When Adrian arrived, he whistled through his teeth. The strain of the journey had obviously taken its toll on Darcy. She was clearly very distressed and had broken out in a heavy sweat. Her temperature remained way above normal, her hind legs were hot and swollen and the skin had split in several places.

‘It’s a nasty case of lymphangitis,’ Adrian said, ‘started from infected cuts on her legs.’ He injected her with a hefty dose of painkillers, as well as antibiotics and anti-inflammatories to kick-start the healing process.

Michael brought out some buckets of warm water and Adrian cleaned Darcy’s hind legs as best he could, then bandaged them. He bathed her eyes and put in some eyedrops. The only good news to emerge from his head-to-hoof medical check was that she didn’t have lice, which would have meant that we would have been forced to keep her in isolation.

‘She may develop colic,’ Adrian said. ‘I can’t tell yet. You’ll have to keep a close eye on her temperature and watch her like a hawk for the next few days to see if she turns the corner.’

The word ‘if’ hung in the air. What he was saying was that there was a good chance she wouldn’t. This horse seemed to have lost the will to live.

‘She needs company,’ I said to Michael. ‘Maybe if we bring in another horse and they get along together, she’ll perk up a bit.’

He agreed – but which one should it be?

‘Tish!’ we both said together.

Tish was a little Shetland pony, only 28 inches tall, who had come to us after a horrific incident in which several men had attacked him with shovels and beaten him badly, all because he bit a child who was petting him at a show. Who knows what that child was actually doing to him at the time? Those men didn’t wait to hear if there had been any provocation before laying into him. Once he arrived at Greatwood and recovered from his beating, we found Tish to be a cheeky, cheerful, entertaining character with a strong personality, who wouldn’t let any of the much bigger horses take advantage. He’d be the ideal equine companion for Darcy: too small to appear a threat, but perky enough to attract her attention.

I went out to the field to try to catch Tish – no mean feat when he doesn’t want to be caught – and finally managed to lead him to the sheep barn where Darcy was standing alone in the corner. Tish marched straight in and helped himself to a huge mouthful of the fresh meadow hay we had left for Darcy. Darcy looked up, surprised, then edged over to sniff Tish’s bottom. Tish gave a swift warning kick with one of his back feet and carried on munching. Darcy went over to stand beside him, avoiding the back legs, looked cautiously out of the corner of her eye, and then bent down and picked up a wisp of hay in her mouth. They stood side by side eating from the same pile, which meant they were accepting each other. It was a huge step forwards for Darcy.

For the rest of the day Tish and Darcy ignored each other but at the same time continued to be quite happy in each other’s company, so we felt confident enough to leave them overnight in the same barn. Next morning, I hurried outside as soon as I awoke to find Darcy’s temperature had gone down. Her eyes were brightening and she was obviously feeling a lot better, although she still paid no attention to Michael or me. She accepted everything we did for her with a resigned air but without any responsiveness or gratitude.

We had to walk her a few times a day to help the swelling in her legs, and when we led her out of the barn, Tish would call out for her and she would whinny in reply. A relationship was forming. Within three days, they were inseparable and when we wanted to take Darcy out for a walk, Tish had to be taken along as well. Darcy had made a friend.

A few days after Darcy’s arrival, a car pulled into the yard and a woman wound down the window to talk to Michael.

‘We heard that you have children here to help on Saturday mornings and we wondered if you would have our daughter Sophie?’

He glanced into the back seat and saw a dark-haired girl staring at her lap. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘That’s fine.’

The woman started talking, and it was as if the flood-gates opened. ‘Her father and I are very worried. You see, she’s stopped talking – she hasn’t spoken a word for two years. We don’t know what to do but she likes reading books about horses and we heard about you and thought maybe …’

‘That’s fine,’ Michael said again, curious now about this girl who seemingly didn’t talk.

‘We’ll be back in a couple of hours,’ the mother said. ‘We don’t want her to be a burden to you. We’ll just do a bit of shopping and come back. She’s got a mobile phone in her pocket with our number on it and if she rings, we’ll come straight away.’

The car door opened and Sophie stepped out, a sullen look on her face. She was overweight and had made no effort with her appearance, with her baggy, ill-fitting clothes and her lanky, unwashed hair. But more than that, it was her general demeanour that told me she was depressed. She was hunched, as though there were a heavy weight pressing down on her, and she could barely find the energy to lift one foot after the other and walk.