Coming Up Roses by Alice Duncan Read Free Book Online

as dignified and self-assured as Queen
Victoria herself. Rose sometimes wondered why Annie was so
self-confident and if Rose would ever learn how to be that way. She
doubted it more often than not.
    “ Who trained him?”
    Having become involved in her own glum
musings, Rose had almost forgotten about H.L. May’s presence in the
stable. Her head jerked up, and she stared at him. “Who? I mean
what?” She stamped her foot in frustration, causing Fairy a moment
of uneasiness, which Rose allayed by cooing softly to her.
    H.L. nodded at the horse. “Who trained him?
That horse you’re brushing?”
    Him? Rose stared hard at H.L. May for only a
second, before she transferred her gaze to Fairy. “This,” she said,
trying not to sound as surprised as she felt, “is a mare.” Eyeing
H.L. once more, keenly, she added, “A mare is a female horse.”
    He laughed. He had a loud laugh, and it
seemed to bounce off the wooden stable walls. Several of the horses
that weren’t being used in tonight’s show shuffled and huffed. Rose
knew exactly how they felt. She’d have liked to heave the curry
brush at Mr. H.L. May’s head, but she knew that would probably only
amuse him, too.
    After what seemed like hours, H.L. stopped
laughing and said, “Ah. Well, then, who trained her? Whoever it was
did a darned good job.”
    Rose eyed him for approximately ten
seconds more before she ground out frigidly, “Thank you. For your
information, I trained her.
Whom did you think trains the
horses I’m expected to risk my neck riding?”
    He laughed again. Naturally. Rose might have
predicted as much.
    “ Ah, I see,” he said after another
several hours of his impertinent laughter had disturbed the horses
and Rose’s sensibilities. “I should have known.”
    “ Indeed.” Finished with brushing
Fairy’s glossy coat, Rose replaced the curry brush without doing
anything untoward with it, for which she congratulated herself, and
took up the comb with which she maintained Fairy’s sleek main and
tail.
    Sometimes Rose braided her horse’s tail, but
she didn’t do so unless the weather was particularly windy. Tonight
she hadn’t. The colonel had told her that when an audience
witnessed the free-flowing tail of a fast-moving horse, they went
crazy with excitement, and Rose always tried to please the colonel.
Even for the colonel’s sake, however, she wasn’t going to risk her
neck any more than she had to, and if the wind blew just right,
Fairy’s flying tail interfered with her vision.
    Trying her best to ignore her inquisitor, she
started combing, making sure she whispered soothing noises to
Fairy, in case the horse was as upset as Rose by H.L. May’s
continued presence.
    It wouldn’t be so bad if he weren’t
so—so—obtrusive. But he was. Rose had a suspicion that even if he
were to be polite and keep his mouth shut, she’d still know he was
there. He had a commanding presence. Sort of like the colonel’s,
only nowhere near as restful.
    “ You did a really good job training
her,” H.L. observed.
    As if he knew anything. He couldn’t even tell a mare
from a gelding “Thank you.”
    Although Rose had told herself she wanted
H.L. May to shut up and go away, when he did remain silent, he made
her even more nervous than when he talked. She discovered this
unnerving fact when a space of quiet ensued after her last frigid
thank you.
    Blast the man, what was the matter with him?
For that matter, what was the matter with her. It wasn’t like Rose
Gilhooley to be this anxious around newspaper people. Not any
longer. During the first year or so of her tenure with the Wild
West, she’d been as nervous as a cat on a hot rock every time
anyone connected with the press came around. But that was only
because she’d been so conscious of her shortcomings regarding
language usage and proper grammar. She’d studied hard in the
ensuing years, however, and now she could hold her own around most
of the press buzzards, as she’d come to think