Contents
Cover
About the Book
Title Page
Dedication
1 Two Great Ideas
2 The Black Cat
3 Something Spooks Sam
4 Sarah Listens In
5 Is Midnight Bad Luck?
6 “Well Done, Corey!”
7 The Good-Luck Horseshoe
8 The Garlic Necklace
9 All Aboard the Haunted Hayride
10 Ghost Stories
11 Hank Spooks
12 The Rescue
13 Trick or Treat
Corey’s Tips on Tacking Up Your Pony
About the Author
Also by Bonnie Bryant
Copyright
1. PONY CRAZY
2. MAY’S RIDING LESSON
3. COREY’S PONY IS MISSING
4. JASMINE’S CHRISTMAS RIDE
5. MAY TAKES THE LEAD
6. COREY IN THE SADDLE
7. JASMINE TROTS AHEAD
8. MAY RIDES A NEW PONY
9. COREY AND THE SPOOKY PONY
10. JASMINE HELPS A FOAL
RHCP DIGITAL
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First published Bantam, 1997
This ebook published 2016
Copyright © Bonnie Bryant Hiller, 1996
Illustrations copyright © Kim Harley, 1997
The moral right of the author and illustrator has been asserted
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978–1–448–19796–5
All correspondence to:
RHCP DIGITAL
Penguin Random House Children’s
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL
I would like to express my special thanks to Susan Korman for her help in the writing of this book.
Yeoowwwl!
As Corey Takamura hurried across her back garden to the stables, a howl filled the air.
Yeoowwwl!
The howl came again. Then a big, dark animal raced towards Corey and jumped up on her. She laughed as it began covering her face with kisses.
“I love you, too, Dracula,” Corey told her dog. “But you have to get down. I’m already late for the Pony Tails meeting.”
The big dog let out another of the weird-sounding howls that had given him his name. Dracula might sound spooky, but he was actually a very friendly dog.
After giving Corey a few more kisses, Dracula got down. He followed closely behind Corey as she continued across the yard to meet her two best friends, May Grover and Jasmine James.
Sometimes the Pony Tails got together at May or Jasmine’s house. But today they were meeting inside the Takamuras’ stables. It was the perfect place to meet for three animal lovers who called themselves the Pony Tails. Corey’s mother was a veterinary surgeon. Dr Takamura – whom everybody called Doc Tock – always had an interesting assortment of animals staying in their stable block. This week the patients included an injured ferret, a basset hound named Ollie, and a litter of black kittens. Corey’s pony, Sam, also lived there, and so did her pet goat, Alexander.
As Corey entered the big old stables, a smile spread across her face. She couldn’t wait to tell her friends the news.
Every year one of the younger riders at Pine Hollow Stables gave a Halloween party. Pine Hollow was the stables where the three girls took lessons and went to Pony Club meetings. Corey had decided she would have this year’s party. The best part was, she was going to make it a hayride.
The riders from Pine Hollow would love the idea – and Corey knew her two best friends would love it, too!
May and Jasmine were already sitting in an empty stall, waiting for Corey.
“What do you think Corey will say?” May asked Jasmine nervously. “Do you think she’ll say it’s a good idea?”
Jasmine tucked a strand of blond hair back into her pony-tail. “I’m not sure,” she said. “It sounds fun. But you have to admit that inviting fifteen kids and fifteen ponies to Corey’s house to go trick-or-treating is just a little bit crazy.”
“It would be so much fun,” said May. “Corey’s mum is used to animals, so she won’t mind the commotion. I bet Corey will think—”
“Think what?” a voice cut in.
May and Jasmine jumped as Corey stuck her head over the top of the stall.
“You scared me, Corey!” Jasmine said.
“Me too,” said May.
“Sorry about that, you two,” Corey said. She opened the door of the stall and sat down beside her friends. Dracula bounded in after her. “So what will I think about what?” she asked.
May shot a nervous look at Jasmine.
“Tell her your idea, May,” Jasmine said.
“Uh-oh. Another one of May’s ideas?” Corey couldn’t resist teasing her friend a little. Even May admitted that some of her ideas were crazy.
“You’re going to love this idea, Corey,” May said. “I’ve decided that you should have Pine Hollow’s Halloween party at your house this year.”
Corey stared at her friend, amazed. “I can’t believe it!” she said. “That was my idea, too!”
“What?” Jasmine said. “You thought of that, too?”
Corey nodded. Actually she shouldn’t have been too surprised that she and May had come up with the same idea. With the Pony Tails, that happened all the time.
Shortly after Corey had moved into the house between May’s and Jasmine’s, the three girls had become best friends. One reason they liked each other so much was because they were all pony-crazy. Each girl owned her own pony, and she loved to ride that pony more than anything else in the world.
“Wait till you hear the rest of my idea,” Corey went on. “I’m going to make the party a hayride! Won’t that be fun?”
Corey babbled on for a few more minutes. Finally she realized she was the only one talking. Jasmine seemed interested in the hayride, but May was just sitting there, staring down at the straw.
“What’s the matter, May?” Corey asked. “Did I say something that hurt your feelings?”
“Of course not, Corey,” May said. She smiled, but Corey thought May still looked sad, or maybe disappointed.
“Don’t you like my idea?” Corey asked.
“Having a hayride is a great idea, Corey,” May began. “It’s just that I had a different idea . . .”
“May wanted the party to be a trick-or-treating party,” Jasmine said. “She thought we could invite riders and their ponies, and we could all go trick-or-treating on horseback.”
“Ponyback,” May corrected her friend.
“Oh,” Corey said as the words sank in. So that was why May had been so quiet.
For a few minutes there was an uncomfortable silence. Corey rubbed Dracula’s ears. She didn’t want to say so, but May’s idea would never work. Doc Tock liked ponies almost as much as the Pony Tails did, but she wouldn’t like fifteen of them coming to her house all at once.
Finally Corey knew what to do.
“I’ve got it!” she shouted. “We can have a hayride and go trick-or-treating on ponyback!”
“What?” May stared at Corey. “Do both of them? I don’t think so, Corey.”
“We can have a hayride for the kids from Pine Hollow a couple of nights before Halloween,” Corey explained. “And then on Halloween, the three of us can go trick-or-treating on ponyback ourselves. That would work – wouldn’t it?”
May beamed. “Corey Takamura, you’re a genius,” she declared.