He waited for them to go, then walked over to the gas station and bought a stale turkey sandwich and a six-pack. He spent the night in the bunk at the back of the cab. It was spacious and comfortable enough and he felt a little better after a couple of beers, but he still spent most of the night worrying. And then he woke up to see the snow and discovered he'd been caught out again.
In the balm of a Georgia morning two days earlier, Wayne hadn't thought to check that he had his snow chains. And when he'd looked in the locker this morning, the damn things weren't there. He couldn't believe it. Some dumbfuck must have borrowed or stolen them. Wayne knew the interstate would be okay, they'd have had the snowplows and sanders out hours ago. But the two giant turbines he was carrying had to be delivered to a pulp mill in a little place called Chatham and he would have to leave the turnpike and cut across country. The roads would be winding and narrow and probably as yet uncleared. Wayne cursed himself again, finished his coffee and laid down a five-dollar bill.
Outside the door he stopped to light a cigarette and tugged his Braves baseball cap down hard against the cold. He could hear the drone of trucks already moving out on the interstate. His boots scrunched in the snow as he made his way over the lot toward his truck.
There were forty or fifty trucks there, lined up side by side, all eighteen-wheelers like his, mainly Peterbilts, Freightliners and Kenworths. Wayne's was a black and chrome Kenworth Conventional, 'anteaters' they called them, because of the long, sloping nose. And though it looked better hitched to a standard high-sided reefer trailer than it did now with the two turbines mounted on a flatbed, in the snowy half-light of dawn, he thought it was still the prettiest truck on the lot. He stood there for a moment admiring it, finishing his cigarette. Unlike the younger drivers who didn't give a shit nowadays, he always kept his cab gleaming. He had even cleared all the snow off before going in for breakfast. Unlike him though, he suddenly remembered, they probably hadn't forgotten their goddamn chains. Wayne Tanner squashed his cigarette into the snow and hauled himself up into the cab.
Two sets of footprints converged at the mouth of the long driveway that led up to the stables. With immaculate timing, the two girls had arrived there only moments apart and made their way up the hill together, their laughter carrying down into the valley. Even though the sun had yet to show, the white picket fence, confining their tracks on either side, looked dowdy against the snow, as did the jumps in the fields beyond. The girls' tracks curved to the brow of the hill and disappeared into the group of low buildings that huddled, as if for protection, around the vast red barn where the horses were kept.
As Grace and Judith turned into the stable yard, a cat skittered away from them, spoiling the snow. They stopped and stood there a moment, looking over toward the house. There was no sign of life. Mrs Dyer, the woman who owned the place and had taught them both to ride, would normally be up and about by now.
'Do you think we should tell her we're going out?' Grace whispered.
The two girls had grown up together, seeing each other at weekends up here in the country for as long as either could remember. Both lived on the Upper West Side of town, both went to schools on the East Side and both had fathers who were lawyers. But it occurred to neither of them that they should see each other during the week. The friendship belonged here, with their horses. Just turned fourteen, Judith was nearly a year older than Grace and in decisions as weighty as risking the ever-ready wrath of Mrs Dyer, Grace was happy to defer. Judith sniffed and screwed up her face.
'Nah,' she said. 'She'd only bawl us out for waking her up. Come on.'
The air inside the barn was warm and heavy with the sweet smell of hay and dung. As the girls came in with their saddles and closed the door, a dozen horses watched from their stalls, ears pricked forward, sensing something different about the dawn outside just as Grace had. Judith's horse, a soft-eyed chestnut gelding called Gulliver, whinnied as she came up to the stall, putting his face forward for her to rub.
'Hi baby,' she said.'How are you today, huh?' The horse backed off gently from the gate so Judith would have room to come in with the tack.
Grace walked on. Her horse was in the last stall at the far end of the barn. Grace spoke softly to the others as she passed them, greeting them by name. She could see Pilgrim, his head erect and still, watching her all the way. He was a four-year-old
Morgan, a gelding of a bay so dark that in some lights he looked black. Her parents had bought him for her last summer for her birthday, reluctantly. They had worried he was too big and too young for her, altogether too much of a horse. For Grace, it was love at first sight.
They had flown down to Kentucky to see him and when they were taken out to the field, he came right over to the fence to check her out. He didn't let her touch him, just sniffed her hand, brushing it lightly with his whiskers. Then he tossed his head like some haughty prince and ran off, flagging his long tail, his coat glistening in the sun like polished ebony.
The woman who was selling him let Grace ride him and it was only then that her parents gave each other a look and she knew they would let her have him. Her mother hadn't ridden since she was a child but she could be counted on to recognize class when she saw it. And Pilgrim was class alright. There was no doubting he was also a handful and quite different from any other horse she had ridden. But when Grace was on him and could feel all that life pounding away inside him, she knew that in his heart he was good and not mean and that they would be okay together. They would be a team.
She had wanted to change his name to something prouder, like Cochise or Khan, but her mother, ever the tyrant liberal, said it was up to Grace of course, but in her opinion it was bad luck to change a horse's name. So Pilgrim he remained.
'Hey, gorgeous,' she said as she reached the stall. 'Who's my man?' She reached out for him and he let her touch the velvet of his muzzle, but only briefly, tilting his head up and away from her. 'You are such a flirt. Come on, let's get you fixed here.'
Grace let herself into the stall and took off the horse's blanket. When she swung the saddle over him, he shifted away a little as he always did and she told him firmly to keep still. She told him about the surprise he had waiting for him outside as she lightly fastened the girth and put on the bridle. Then she took a hoof pick from her pocket and methodically cleared the dirt from each of his feet. She could hear Judith already leading Gulliver out of his stall so she hurried to tighten the girth and now they too were ready.
They led the horses out into the yard and let them stand there a few moments appraising the snow while Judith went back to shut the barn door. Gulliver lowered his head and sniffed, concluding quickly it was the same stuff he had seen a hundred times before. Pilgrim however was amazed. He pawed it and was startled when it moved. He tried sniffing it, as he had seen the older horse do. But he sniffed too hard and gave a great sneeze that had the girls rocking with laughter.
'Maybe he's never seen it before,' said Judith.
'He must have. Don't they have snow in Kentucky?'
'I don't know. I guess so.' She looked across at Mrs Dyer's house. 'Hey, come on, let's go or we'll wake the dragon.'
They led the horses out of the yard and into the top meadow and there they mounted up and rode in a slow, climbing traverse toward the gate that led into the woods. Their tracks cut a perfect diagonal across the unblemished square of the field. And as they reached the woods, at last the sun came up over the ridge and filled the valley behind them with tilted shadows.