Horse Magic by Bonnie Bryant

before, Dinah hadn’t said much about her first impression of Lisa, and that was a bad sign. Dinah and Stevie had discussed practically every other person and horse they knew at great length. But by mutual, unspoken agreement, Lisa Atwood’s name had barely come up. Stevie didn’t like that one bit. She was crazy about Lisaand Dinah, and she knew they could be great friends if they both tried a little harder. But she wasn’t sure how to tell either of them that without making them mad at her, too.
    Finally Stevie reached the tack room. “Hmm, that’s funny,” she muttered to herself. “I wonder why the door is closed?”
    Pulling open the door, she stepped forward into the darkened tack room … and felt something move against her leg.
    She let out a piercing shriek, stumbled backward, and fumbled for the light switch. When the bulb came on, Stevie went limp with relief and started to laugh.
    She was still laughing when her friends arrived seconds later, brought running by her scream. Stevie could only gesture into the room. The others looked and saw that it was flooded in a sea of black cats. They were perched on the saddle racks, climbing in and out of trunks and buckets, and generally milling around and getting into things.
    “What’s going on in here?” Carole gasped. “Where did all these cats come from?”
    Stevie stooped down and reached for a small black kitten with a white spot on its nose. “Let’s see—this is Regret, and right next to her is Big Ben.” It was a Pine Hollow tradition to name all the stable cats after famous horses. “And over there, I recognize Merganser and Idle Dice and Scamper—”
    “Why would someone put all these cats in here?” Lisa interrupted.
    “All these
black
cats,” Dinah pointed out. “It must besome kind of pre-Halloween prank. A pretty funny one, too.”
    “Maybe it was that poltergeist Mrs. Reg was talking about,” Carole joked.
    “No, I don’t think so,” Stevie said, narrowing her eyes at Phil and stroking Regret’s head. Phil just shrugged. Stevie glanced around. “The only one missing is Snowball,” she commented, referring to Carole’s own black cat. She clucked her tongue. “Come on, kitties! Back to work. You have mice to catch, you know.” With her friends’ help, she shooed most of the cats out of the tack room.
    “Back to work for us, too?” Carole asked.
    “I don’t think so,” Stevie said. “Dinah and I have to get home. My parents are taking us into Washington for dinner.”
    “Lucky you,” Phil said. “You can tell who has the rest of the week off from school. Before you go, maybe Dinah and I should plan our practice schedule for the show.”
    “Okay,” Stevie said. “While you do that, the rest of us will clean up in the locker room.” Lisa and Carole followed Stevie as she hurried down the hall, dodging cats at every step.
    “B OY , WHO WOULD have guessed the mall would be so crowded?” Stevie complained as she and Dinah walked into the stable the next afternoon. The two girls had spent the morning shopping for costume parts and other Halloween props for Saturday.
    “I guess everyone wanted to get out of the rain,” Dinah said, shaking the water out of her hair.
    “Well, I think every parent in Willow Creek with a pre-school-age kid must have been there,” Stevie said. “If I hadn’t gotten in line at the pizza place while you were finishing up at the bookstore we would have starved to death.”
    Max rounded the corner at that moment and saw the two girls standing there. “What’s this? Two sets of idle hands?” he demanded.
    “We just got here, Max.” Stevie held up the shopping bag she was holding. “And we got lots of great stuff for the party!”
    “That’s nice,” Max replied. “But while you’re doing all this party planning, don’t forget we have horses to take care of. For instance, I just noticed some pretty dirty stalls that could use cleaning …”
    “We can take a hint, Max,” Dinah