Wind whips at her, waves break nearer. Clinging, clinging to the wet rock, slipping, she cannot get close to the cliff. Fog grows thick around her. She is slipping, climbing frantically.
Then the fog closes in around her, below her, hiding the sea. The crash of waves is muffled. The fog swirls up around the cliff’s edge. It writhes and dances, white and cold and eerie, like clammy hands, pushing closer, closer to her. She starts to run; but she is running on the great carpet of fog; running, running across it. She runs until she is surrounded by it and cannot see the land. She is lost and alone. She stops and turns, but as she does she begins to sink into the fog—deeper, deeper. She struggles.
Then the fog is gone. She is standing once more in the field of mustard. The day is warm and still. The sea below is blue and very calm. A cricket sings. A bird calls. A small green beetle watches her. She tastes a yellow mustard flower. She looks along the path, down at the empty beach.
But the beach is not empty. Something, someone, is there.
When she wakes she cannot remember. She cannot remember who was there on the beach, looking up at her.
The cellar is lighter now, as if the sun is well up, but Tom still sleeps. Karen gets up and feels her clothes, knowing they will still be wet. She gets her others from her pack and puts them on. There is no water for washing, or for drinking. She is very thirsty. She begins to look around. The cellar is not as small as she first thought. Steps lead down to a darker, larger part below. It is dim, but going carefully, Karen climbs down.
Bags of potatoes and carrots sit in one corner, and shelves of canned food line the walls. Karen reads the labels, written in a small, neat hand, and picks out a jar of peaches. By the time Tom wakes she has the lid off, and has eaten half of them. “We can leave money for it,” she says as he looks at her. She hands him the jar.
As Tom eats they begin to hear little scratching sounds overhead, then clucking; there is a woman’s voice, calling chickens, and a dog barks nearby.
Karen grins. “This one has livestock, all right. We’d better get down where it’s dark.” They move to the farthest corner of the cellar, behind some large barrels.
“We may have to stay here until nighttime,” Tom says. “Unless we decide to ask for a job!”
“Wouldn’t they think it strange if we came out of their cellar?”
“Yes, I guess they would.” He grins.
“Maybe we’ll hear them talking and find out what kind of people they are.”
“Yes, maybe.”
“Tom?”
“Hmmm?”
“What do you think happened to Kippy and Tolly and Ginger and Rex?”
“What made you think of that now?”
“I don’t know; a dream I had, I guess; or maybe it was the ponies last night. I hope they got away safely.”
“So do I.”
“But what do you think, Tom? Do you think our horses are safe, too?”
“No one would pay good money for them, then neglect them. Kippy probably has some little girl to put up with, and maybe Tolly has a boy. They’re all right, Karen. They’re not ownerless and homeless like those ponies.”
“I guess you’re right. But I wish I knew; I do wish I knew. I don’t know what it was about that dream, but it made me so restless; as if something, or someone, were waiting for me—as if something were going to happen. I do wish I knew where Kippy was, and if he’s taken care of.”
Tom squirms around to make himself more comfortable, then both children hush. Overhead, a young boy is shouting, there is the sound of trotting; then the cellar door creaks, and the boy, very close, cries, “Papa, Papa, I saw them!”
“Don’t shout. I’m right here, Jerry.” The voice is so close that the children stare at each other. Has the man been there all the time, perhaps sitting on the cellar door? Has he heard them talking? Tom shakes his head. He couldn’t have heard their whispers. The man continues, “Here, loosen the cinch if you’re going to let him stand. Is he hot?”
“No, Papa.” There is a pause. “Well, a little.”
“Then walk him around while you tell me. What did you see?”
The boy’s voice starts out loudly, but fades as he walks his horse, then comes clearer again, as if he is walking in a circle. “I saw the Sand Ponies, Papa! Down near the west pasture, down by the bog.” Karen and Tom look at each other. “Big as life,” the boy continues. “Big as life I saw them! We’ll have luck for sure, won’t we, Papa? But, Papa, they sure were skinny. They’ve always been so fat—it’s been a good year for feed, too. Why were they so thin?”
“Were they?” There is a pause. “How many, Jerry? Could you count them?”
“Oh, sure. Just five of them. That does seem funny, now you think of it—never seen but the whole band together before, like that time in the ravine—but they sure were Sand Ponies, Papa.”
“Sure?”
“Oh, sure! Four roans, one gray. Sand Ponies, sure. Little and short-coupled, ears back, all of ‘em, when they saw me.”
The man chuckles. “I’ll saddle up old Doc and we’ll go see. Seems mighty funny, just a few like that. And skinny. Could be they’re sick, Jerry. Come on.” The door creaks, and the children hear footsteps going away.
The next voice is a woman’s—the same one that called the chickens. “Breakfast’s ready, Joe, Jerry.”
“Put it on the back of the stove, Nell. We’re off after Sand Ponies,” the man shouts.
“Sand Ponies? My goodness, where?”
“West pasture. Jerry says they look queer. Might be sick.”
“Oh, dear. Best go right away. My! Poor, dear things. I’ll set the breakfast back.”
The children hear horses trotting off. “They must be the same ponies, Tom,” Karen whispers.
“Yes. What did the boy say about bringing luck?”
” ‘We’ll have luck, sure,’ or something like that.”
“I wonder what he meant. Do you suppose they think those ponies are bewitched or something?” Tom says.
“Could be. But those men last night didn’t think so.”
“They were too mean to believe in anything.” Tom is frowning.
“I wonder why they’re called Sand Ponies. Sounds almost like a fairy name.” Karen wriggles farther down behind the barrels. “I wonder where they came from.”
Tom is folding his nearly dry clothes. “Pretty strange, all right. This sure isn’t the kind of country where you’d expect to find wild horses.”
“Yes, it is queer.”
“Maybe they are fairy ponies, Karen!” he says, grinning.
“Maybe!”
A long time later the man and boy return, walking by the cellar and talking softly. The children hear a door close, then the woman’s voice: “Oh, Joe. Oh, poor, poor thing. Whatever is wrong, do you think?”
“It’s the sick one,” Tom whispers.
“Come on, boy,” the man says softly. “Come on there, so, boy, easy now, easy, boy, easy, slowly with the gate, Jerry, there, boy, there, now, close it gently, Jerry. Ah, there now. Go and put some water on for mash, Nell.”
“Shouldn’t he be in a stall, Joe?”
“Don’t think he’d do as well there; wild ones usually don’t. Hurry, now.” They hear the woman shut the door again. Later, when she returns, the children hear the three people talking softly, but cannot make out the words. Finally, after a long time, the man and boy come to sit on the cellar door once more.
“You think that’s all, Papa? Just hungry?”
“Hard to tell for sure, but I think so. Those ponies have been shut up someplace, nasty rope burns like that. Like to catch the dirty coward who did it.”
“Rope burns on all of them, Papa. How could anyone? Fresh burns on those fat ones, like they were just caught.”
“Yes. Sure would like to know why.”
“To sell?”
“No money in those little things.”
“Then why?”
“Meanness, maybe.”
They are silent for a while; then Jerry says, “Look, Papa, he’s starting to eat.”
“Good boy, go to it, boy,” the man says softly.