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[RC] Merry Christmas from the herd - Laurie Durgin





reposted here.

The old gray horse sidled up to the pasture fence with little dancing
steps. The place seemed familiar, yet somehow strange. The grass was
greener than any grass he'd ever seen, and when he looked closely at
the white paddock gate it had a kind of pearly sheen. And there was
another funny thing. A big, black cloud hovered just inside the gate.
The cloud wasn't up in the sky where it properly belonged. It was
like a great puff of black smoke rising from the grass.
Suddenly the cloud dissolved and revealed a horse. He was a small
chestnut with a blunt head and one white stocking and brownish hairs
in his tail and mane. The gray horse thought he had a kind of old-
timey look to him.

"Hello, old gray horse," the chestnut from the black cloud said.

"Hey, that's a real good trick!" the gray horse exclaimed. "Where'd
you learn it?"

The chestnut disappeared into the cloud again, but emerged
immediately. "Learned it the day I was born," he replied, with a
whinny that sounded like a chuckle. "You see, I was born on April
Fool's Day and there was a total eclipse of the sun. So they named me
Eclipse. I was always playing tricks on people too. Used to kick my
grooms and try to throw my riders and I bit the auctioneer that sold
me."

"My name is..." the old gray horse started to say politely, but the
tricky chestnut ducked in and out of his cloud and interrupted
rudely.

"Native Dancer," Eclipse said. "I ought to know you. I'm your great-
great-great-great-great - I always lose count of the 'greats' - but
anyway, you're a descendant of mine. Almost everybody is, in fact.
The Thoroughbreds, that is."

"Are you the gatekeeper?" Native Dancer asked.

"Mostly," Eclipse replied. "I'm on duty whenever one of my
descendants is coming up. That's mostly so far as the Thoroughbreds
go. Old Matchem has a few left and he takes over when one's due. And
poor old Herod, he's posted here occasionally, but there's not many
of his male line that aren't here already."

"What is this place?" Native Dancer asked. "I guess I'm kind of
lost."

"The Green Place," Eclipse replied. "That's what it's called. The
Green Place. Most of the horses that get lost, come here. We have to
send some back of course."

"Why?" the Dancer asked.

"Because they don't belong here, that's why. Long before I came up
there was this fellow Bayard, for instance. He was a devil-horse.
Belonged to an old necromancer named Malagigi and he did the devil's
work. Helped that villain Aymon of Dordogne to triumph over
Charlemagne, they say. And a wizard named Michael Scott had a big
black beast who used to stomp his feet and set all the bells of Paris
ringing. He even caused the towers of the palace to fall down one
day. The Big Guy doesn't want that kind here. But we have Jesse
James's horse, and Dick Turpin's, too. The Big Guy says they did
nothing wrong themselves. They were just faithful to their masters,
and The Big Guy thinks that's a virtue."

"Who's the Big Guy?" Native Dancer asked.

"You'll find out!" Eclipse answered airily. He lowered his muzzle and
pushed the gate open.

"You might as well come in. You understand you're on probation
though. The Big Guy makes his decisions about new arrivals every
Christmas. Let's see, it's November 16, the way you figure things
down there. So you won't have long to wait anyway."

"I'll bet The Big Guy is Man O' War," Native Dancer said as he moved
inside and gazed over the emerald green expanses that seemed to
stretch into infinity.

Eclipse snorted. "Don't get smart, boy" he said. Then he added
maliciously, "You'd lose your bet too. The way a lot of people lost
their bets on you at Churchill Downs one day."

Native Dancer felt hurt, for his ancestor had touched a raw nerve.
His lip trembled a bit as he replied defensively, "That Derby was the
only race I ever lost."

"I never lost even one race," Eclipse said unsympathetically. "So
don't get smart up here. The Big Guy doesn't want any smart-alecks in
the Green Place. Remember that."

Native Dancer was a sensitive sort. He felt as if his eyes were teary
and he hoped Eclipse didn't notice. "I won 21 out of 22, and Man O'
War only won 20 out of 21" he declared. "And my son Kauai King won
the Kentucky Derby."

"My sons won three Derbys at Epsom," Eclipse said. "Young Eclipse
took the second running and Saltram won the fourth and Sergeant won
the fifth, and I'd have won the bloomin' race myself, only they
didn't run it in my time. So quit bragging. Somebody's coming and
they might overhear you and tell The Big Guy, and that would be a
mark against you."

A bay horse who seemed even more old-timey than Eclipse ambled
up. "Is it my time now?" he asked eagerly.

"Not yet, Herod," Eclipse answered in a kindly fashion. "Old Fig's on
duty now. One of his is on the way."

"Who's Old Fig?" Native Dancer asked. "I never heard of that one."

"There's a lot of things you never heard of, boy," Eclipse
replied. "His real name is Figure, but down there they called him
Justin Morgan, after his owner. Here he is now."

A very small, dark bay horse with a round barrel, tine feet, and
furry fetlocks came bustling up to the gate. "OK, OK, I'll take
over," he said busily. "Where is that boy? Can't stand tardiness.
I've got things to do. A load to pull, a field to plough, a race to
run, a trot to trot. No time to waste. Where is that boy?"

In the weeks that followed, The Dancer met hundreds, maybe thousands,
of horses. Some of them were famous, and some of them were his
ancestors and a few of them were his own sons and daughters.

He met a snorting white stallion named Bucephalus who had been
approved for the Green Place by The Big Guy even though he was
rumored by some to be cursed by the deadly sin of pride because he
had carried a conqueror named Alexander. He met another gray horse
who limped because he had stepped on a rusty nail back home just
before he became lost forever. His name was Traveler, and he was a
war-horse, too, in the days when a man named General Lee had owned
him. There were other soldier steeds, two of them descendants of the
bustling little stallion they called Old Fig up here. One was Phil
Sheridan's black Rienzi and the other horse called both Fancy and
Little Sorrel who had been the mount of Stonewall Jackson.

Native Dancer found Man O' War an amiable sort despite his proud
aristocratic bearing, and he grew especially fond of a bony old
fellow named Exterminator, who patiently answered all but one of his
questions. He asked the question of everyone: "Who is The Big Guy?"
And the answer was always the same: "Wait 'til Christmas."

He met Messenger and Hambletonian and Hindoo. He met horses that had
dared the dreadful fences of the Grand National. He met a horse who
stared blindly into the emerald darkness. His name was Lexington. He
met horses who had pulled circus wagons and horses who had pulled
brewers' trucks and horses who had drawn man's ploughs over the
fields of earth, and he met others who had been the mounts of kings
and captains.

Always the answer to his question was the same: "Wait 'til
Christmas."

Eclipse fussed over him and kept a watchful eye on his behavior and
said he neighed too much and asked too many questions. Eclipse could
not stand the thought of The Big Guy banishing one of his descendants
from the Green Place.

And Native Dancer did not wish to leave. He doubted he could ever
find his way to Maryland again if The Big Guy disapproved of him. And
the Green Place was very pleasant in all respects. The grass was lush
and he met so many interesting horses. Back home he had sometimes
been troubled by nightmares, for a Dark Star haunted his dreams, but
now he slept peacefully and rarely remembered the Derby he had lost.

He became nervous though, as the weeks went by and the stars grew
brighter.

And finally it was time. On a night when the skies burned with
starlight all the horses gathered as near as possible to a little
hillock of the vast paddock. There were hundreds, thousands, maybe
millions of them, a murmuring and expectant throng that seemed to
stretch over the emerald grass beneath the diamonds in the heavens.

Eclipse was very tense. He hovered over Native Dancer,
whispering, "Look your best now. Be quiet and humble. The Big Guy
will be here any minute."

Suddenly the vast throng was silent as the stars themselves.

The Big Guy stood on the hillock in a blinding blaze of starlight,
and Native Dancer could barely contain himself. He choked back a
whinny of derision and whispered to Eclipse, "Is he The Big Guy? He's
so little! And he's not even a horse! What did he ever do?"

Eclipse whispered, "He's a donkey. He carried a woman heavy with
child to a small town on another night when the stars were bright. It
was a long, long time ago."

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