Show Jumper Read Online Free Page B

competing in the show. Mrs. Atwood understood clothes better than competition, too.
    Nevertheless, Lisa felt a pang of remorse. After all, her mother was just trying to buy her new clothes for the show. If she wanted Lisa to look nice at the Macrae—even for the wrong reasons—why should Lisa refuse so ungraciously? She hated disappointing her mother, especially when she was trying so hard with Lisa’s favorite activity, riding. Lisa looked at her watch again. Her lesson was due to begin in ten minutes.
Pine Hollow is only five minutes away
, she reminded herself. Then she sighed.
    “Okay, I’ll try on a few,” she said. Mr. Reeds immediately brought over a pile of jackets.
    Lisa began pulling on jackets over the old blue shirt she was wearing. She tried on a dark gray wool jacket, and then a really nice one in hunter green. She was about to choose the green one, but then Mrs. Atwood suddenly brought a third coat over. “How about this red one, honey?” she urged, holding it out.
    The coat was beautiful—bright red, finely woven wool, with black velvet lapels. It was undoubtedly themost impressive jacket Lisa had ever seen, but she felt embarrassed to even try it on. As she and any horseperson knew, red jackets were referred to as pink and were worn by riders who rode with hunt clubs and competed in foxhunting events. Even though most clubs no longer used real foxes in the hunts, hunt club members still adhered to the traditional uniform of the hunt, started in England: the “pink” jacket.
    Before Lisa could explain any of this, Mrs. Atwood slipped the jacket over her shoulders. “Oh, it looks wonderful!” she gasped. “Honey, take off that awful blue shirt—you need a white shirt to really see how it looks.” She quickly hustled Lisa back into the dressing room and started handing her other clothes—a pair of black breeches, a snow-white shirt, a white stock tie. Dazed and increasingly worried about the time, Lisa found herself wearing a whole new outfit, with the red jacket as the centerpiece of the ensemble. She looked at herself in the mirror.
    Not bad, she had to admit. The red coat with its black lapels looked striking with the black breeches. She turned slowly and examined herself from the back. She looked … almost professional.
    Mrs. Atwood stuck her head into the dressing room. “Oh, darling, you look simply gorgeous!” she said, her eyes shining. She pulled Lisa out of the dressing room and made her stand in front of the three-way mirror. “Look at yourself! Just look at yourself. You look likepictures I’ve seen in books. You simply must get this jacket. Think,” she added dramatically, “how incredible this jacket would look with that horse you’re riding. Black lapels, black breeches, black horse. Honey, it’s just the right accent. Thank God you’re not riding a
brown
horse.”
    Despite her anxiety about the jacket, Lisa grinned. Her mother worked in retail clothes, and her most recent hobby was interior decorating. She clearly thought that a riding outfit and a horse could be coordinated like a couch and curtains. But Lisa looked at herself again in the mirror and frowned. Was the red—or rather, pink—jacket too showy? She had never worn such a flashy outfit to a horse show. Would Carole, with all her experience, wear a pink jacket to the show?
    Lisa tried hard to think back on all her riding lessons and Pony Club rallies, but she couldn’t recall a single time when she had seen Carole, or any other rider at Pine Hollow, wear a pink jacket. So few riders had attended horse shows as big and prestigious as the Macrae, and Lisa herself had seen pink jackets worn only by riders on television.
    Suddenly Lisa felt a spurt of annoyance. She was hot from trying on clothes, the dressing room was cramped, Max and the others were waiting, and besides, she really looked great in that jacket. Why was she always looking to Carole for riding and horse advice?
Do I always have to compare