She breathed deeply and took in the smell of mahogany and walnut oil and hundreds of years of tradition. Warm light shined across gentle curves. For a long moment, the only sound in the shop was the gentle jingle of the buckle as the girl rubbed the saddle lovingly. Then she let out a slow sigh.
“Dad?” She looked up at her father imploringly, her eyes wide and searching for the answer she wanted to the question she could not bring herself to ask.
The man reached down and turned the price tag over again. He sucked through his teeth.
“That’s the best one you can buy, that one,” said Melinda from behind the counter. “She’ll be able to pass that on to her kids.”
The man looked up. “She’s nine!”
“Never too early to plan for what’s next, I always say,” offered Melinda by way of explanation. “It’s a bloody good saddle, though.”
The man looked down at his daughter again.
“Bloody hell,” he muttered to himself as he reached for his wallet. “We’ll take it.”
“YAY!” shouted the small girl, and hugged her dad’s legs. “Thank you, daddy!”
“You got to promise to take good care of it,” the man cautioned. “You’ve got to clean it and oil the leather to keep it from drying out. Speaking of which,” he turned back to Melinda, “Do you have any oil or polish or anything for that?”
Melinda pointed over her shoulder at the sign behind the counter.
“Saddle World” it said, in big bold letters.
“You see the sign?” She asked, as she ran the man’s credit card.
“Uh.” The man responded. “Yeah? It says ‘Saddle World’.”
“And below that?” She asked pointedly.
The man squinted at the smaller writing.
“We sell saddles,” he read out loud, “and n–”
“And nothing else!” Melinda said. “You want a saddle lotion, saddle cream, or saddle oil, you’ll have to go across the street to Horse World.”
She gestured out the front window and across Nara’s main road. There was a horse shaped sign hanging in front of a small shop. There were bridles in the window, saddle blankets hanging in the sun, and rows of curry combs arranged on a table out front.
“Horse World” it said in large print on the window and, in smaller type below, “Everything for horses–No saddles!”
***
“Mum?” Said Andrew, when the man and his daughter had left, “it doesn’t make any sense to send them across the street for saddle polish. We’re a saddle shop! We should be selling people saddle polish!”
“Now–” Melinda began.
“And saddle oil, come to think of it!” Andrew added. “It’s oil for bloody saddles!”
“Oil for bloody saddles, you reckon?” Melinda shot back. “Oil for bloody saddles, he says to me.” She said to the world at large. “Like I don’t know what bloody saddle oil is!”
She shook her head.
“You see this?” She asked, and reached for the latest issue of the ‘Saddleogue’ sitting behind the counter. She flipped through the first few pages until she reached the saddle lotions, creams, and oils.
“Which one would you have us carry, my boy?”
Andy paused. He could sense a twisty road ahead.
“Go on then!”
He pointed down at the page.
“Sheehan’s Super Liniment Numb–”
“Sheehan’s Super Liniment Number Six?” Melinda cut in. “A saddle oil for the discerning customer, with extra shine?” She asked.
“Uh, yeah,” said Andrew, cautiously now. “It’s meant to work a treat on the darker leathers.”
“On the darker leathers?” Melinda whistled. “And what else does it work on?”
She pointed down at the page.
“Works a treat on the darker leathers,” Andrew read aloud, “and imparts a lasting shine to . . .”
His voice trailed off.
“To bridles, blinders, and even boots.” Melinda finished. Andrew looked down, glumly.
“Even boots,” Melinda repeated. “Does the sign say Boot World? Does it say Bridles and Blinders World?”
“No mum.”
“No. It says Saddle World, my boy. And because we used to have people who suffered from some confusion at that incredibly obvious sign, your dad and I added the tagline. And what’s the tagline say, my son?”
“And nothing else,” Andrew mumbled.
“Too right,” Melinda said. “And nothing bloody else!”
Andrew reached for the scissors and went to work on the catalogue as his mum explained, not for the first time, about the complex market forces of equestrian economics necessary to sustain all purveyors of horse regalia, equipment, and etc.
“. . . this, of course, was back when we were Saddles and More, and that lot across the street were just Horse Land . . .”
Andrew went through, page by page, cutting out each advertisement for hoof polish, mande conditioner, and equine laryngoscopes. This, too, was part of the delicate balance. They kept a stack of back issues of the Saddelogue and other publications specialising in equestrian goods on the counter for customers to browse through or to pick out a saddle for special order.
Ever since Andrew had been a small lad, he’d gone through each issue as it came in and gazed longingly at the ropes and shoes and sacks of feed, scattered among page after page of saddles THen he’d take out the scissors and remove any mention of such things as not to disturb the balance.
“. . . and after he sold that suppository, that was the last we ever saw of your father,” Melinda said, teary eyed.
“And it all could have been prevented with a little more respect for the delicate balance of nature and equine equipment sales. Is that what you want to go back to?”
“No, mum,” Andrew said, shamefaced. He’d heard the same lecture countless time before, but no matter how many times his mum gave it, and no matter how much he wished that he’d grown up with the benefit of a father, he still couldn’t help but think that things would be so much cleaner, so much more efficient, if they could only complement their impressive stock of saddles with some saddle-related items. Not combs! he thought. Not lead ropes or bits, but just a saddle cream or two. Maybe some of the little bells he sometimes saw in the catalogue to decorate a saddle and make it jingle with every horsey-step.
He sighed. No, it was not to be. The sign said “Saddle World” and, as Mum liked to point out, nothing bloody else.
Melinda patted him on the back.
“You just get back to cutting those catalogues, my boy. And cheer up; I’ll be putting you in charge of the shop for a week while I run down to Murray Bridge for the Saddle Show. That’s a big responsibility for a young man.” She beamed at him.
He smiled weakly and nodded.
“Yes, Mum.”
***
Melinda left bright and early the next day for Murray Bridge to take in the extensive collection of Western, English, show, stock, and hybrid saddles on display. Andrew opened the shop at eight and waved at David, the Stockers’ youngest son, as he opened up Horse World across the street. David was setting out a string of bright coloured ribbons across the front of the shop and a young girl and her father were admiring the pretty colours in the sun.
Inside Saddle World, Andrew dusted the display models, wiped down the saddle-fitting station, and opened the till. There was a pile of catalogues that had come in the mail that morning. Andrew pulled them and a pair of scissors towards him.
An ad caught Andrew’s eye as he cut it from the catalogue.
“SUPERIOR SADDLE CREAM.”
The bright red letters jumped out at him from the scrap of paper, a picture of a pale yellow jar beneath them.
“Moisturises, replenishes, protects, and shines!” the advertisement said. Andrew held it up and studied it more closely. It was the kind of thing he’d always yearned to sell in the store–a pretty glass jar covered in tasteful cursive script, the perfect complement to their extensive collection of saddles. But his mum’s words rang in his ears and his dead dad stared down from the wall, a constant reminder of the dangers of product diversification. Andrew was about to throw it in the bin when he noticed a small disclaimer at the bottom of the ad.
“Not suitable for bridles, blinders, or boots,” it said. “For use on saddles only.”
Andrew’s dead dad stared down disapprovingly as Andrew’s trembling hand reached towards the telephone.
***
Four days later, Melinda returned from Murray Bridge with her truck full of new saddle samples. She parked out front of the store and was pleased to see the footpath swept, the display saddles free of dust, shining in the sun, and a customer exiting the shop with a brand new saddle. She smiled at the man.
“Excellent choice,” she said. “You should stop across the road for some polish to keep the leather shining like that for years!”
“No worries,” the man replied. “I picked up a jar of polish inside.”
***
“WHAT IN THE BLOODY HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU!?” Melinda was holding a jar of Superior Saddle Cream and staring at her son in disbelief.
“How many times have we had the same bloody conversation about this?”
She waved at the sign behind the counter.
“Saddle World,” she yelled. “Saddles! AND NOTHING BLOODY ELSE!”
“MUM!” Andrew yelled back, waving a small piece of paper in front of him like some sort of talisman.
“MUM! Look at the bloody ad! It says right here, ‘For use on saddles only.’ It’s not for bridles, or blinders, or even boots, Mum! It’s for use on saddles, AND NOTHING FUCKING ELSE!”
Melinda glared back at him.
“And do you think that’ll stop ‘em?” She asked. “That lot across the street. You think you’ll be able to show ‘em that ad and make it alright?”
She walked behind the counter and pulled the picture of her dead husband from the wall.
“You’re just like your father, you are, Andrew. He’d have some words of wisdom if he was here today. He’d have the lessons of bloody experience in the dangers of product diversification to offer you if he were still alive. Oh no, my son. Those lessons come hard and now you’re all that’s left. You and me and this bloody shop and now you’re doing your bloody best to ruin that!”
Andrew’s face flushed red with shame and anger. He tried to speak but found his tongue stuck in his throat.
“Gather this lot up, Andrew, and you burn it.”
“But Mum–” Andrew started.
“But bloody nothing!” Melinda said, and waved the picture in Andrew’s face.
“Take a good bloody look at your dead dad and then you gather this lot up, put it in the forty gallon drum out back and you burn it. With any luck, the Stockers haven’t caught wind of this yet. How many jars did you sell.”
“Five, Mum. Five jars in two days! It just came in yesterday and everybody who came in was wanting a jar!”
“Bloody hell,” said Melinda. She was still glaring at her son, but he could sense a bit of curiosity in her eyes.
“No,” she said, after a pause. “Gather it up and bloody burn it.”
***
That seemed to be the end of that. Andrew burnt the polished and crushed the jars.
After a day or two, the argument was largely forgotten and they went back to the peaceful and steady business of saddle sales. The new models Melinda had picked up in Murray Bridge proved quite a hit. The whole affair was but a distant memory two weeks later, when Garth Stocker stopped by, David in tow, one sunny morning.
“Morning Mel,” he said mildly as the door bell jingled.
“Morning Garth,” Melinda said pleasantly from behind the counter.
“Lovely new saddles you’ve got in,” he said, running an expert’s hand over the soft curves of a stock saddle on display next to the door. “We don’t sell any like these.”
Melinda gave him a confused smile.
“You don’t sell any saddles, Garth,” she said with a chuckle.
“Yeah!” Garth said, his own bright smile seeming to hide something more sinister, like a pretty shell on the beach might conceal a tiny octopus, “too right. No saddles over at Horse World. I was just explaining that to young David here.” He clapped his son on the back. “Nah, no saddles. We do sell saddle polish, though, as I was telling him.”
There was an awkward silence as Garth rubbed the display saddle with one hand and gripped his David’s shoulder with the other. Melinda cast a quick look over at Andrew, who was smart enough not to meet her eyes, which burned with accusation.
Garth broken the silence.
“You know why I was telling him this, Mel?”
“I couldn’t imagine, Garth, but I guess it’s always good to have a lesson in econo–”
“I was telling him this, Mel,” Garth cut in, “because he was confused. He was confused because this fella came in with a brand new saddle and when young David here offered him some saddle polish, this fella explains that he already had some and that he’d picked it up over here at Saddle World. Can you imagine?”
Melinda paused.
“I can’t, Garth. I can’t imagine. You know we don’t sell any polish.”
“No. I thought not. And that’s the way it’s meant to be,” Garth said. “You’ve got the saddle trade and we’ve got everything else. So I don’t want to hear about you lot selling polish, right?”
“Now hold on a minute, Garth. You’re not going to come into my shop–” Melinda began.
“I won’t bloody stand for it,” Garth continued. “You’re not to sell anything but saddles, you understand?”
Melinda had turned red in the face and was holding tight to the edge of the counter.
“I’m not to?” She asked. “You won’t bloody stand for it?” She released her white-knuckled grip on the counter and walked from behind it towards the Stockers.
“I’ll sell whatever the bloody hell I want, you hear me? You come into my bloody shop in front of my bloody son and tell me what I can’t bloody sell? You’ve got some bloody nerve.” Melinda was in Garth’s face, now, her finger raised and pressed into his chest.
“Mel–” he began, but she cut him off.
“Oh no,” she began. “If I want to sell saddle polish, saddle cream, saddlebags, saddle shoes, or satellites, I’ll bloody sell ‘em, and I won’t hear one bloody word from you about what you won’t have. You hear me?” She thumped her finger into his chest for emphasis.
“Now look here, Mel,” Garth began again.
“NO! You bloody heard what I’ve got to say. Now you can get the fuck out.”
Garth staggered backwards through the door, dragging young David with him.
Once the door had swung closed, Melinda turned, her eyes blazing, to look at Andrew.
“Mum,” he began, “I’m really sorry–”
“Never mind that,” Melinda said. “Do you still have that ad for the polish?”
***
Two weeks later, Saddle World was freshly stocked with two new brands of saddle polish-in addition to the Superior Saddle that Andrew had ordered–and neither of these disclaimed any application to bridles, blinders, or even boots. In fact, Jean Marquis’ creme de selle even had a picture of a boot right on the label, but the rest of it was in French so they couldn’t tell what else it was good for. Andrew even swore he’d caught his mum looking at ads for curry combs in the catalogue. Neither of them had spoken with the Stockers in the intervening time and it even started to seem like that might be the end of that.
Until that Saturday afternoon when Adrew was out for a ride and caught sight of Shane Shankey in the paddock on Penfolds Grange, the deep red thoroughbred his grandpa had bought him for his seventeenth birthday. Shane was a reasonably accomplished rider, but looked a little unsteady in the saddle as he turned his horse around the barrels positioned at either end of the paddock.
“Oi, Shane!” He cried out.
Shane pulled up and cantered over to the fence. It was a little early in the day, but given Shane’s reputation, there was only one reasonable explanation for the way he wobbled.
“You had a few beers, mate?”
Shane’s appetite for intoxication was well known about town and had caused him to ride unsteadily and, at least once, naked, through town on the odd weekend.
“Nah mate. Just trying out this new rig.”
Shane gestured down at the blanket he sat upon.
“Have a go.” Andrew offered. “You trying bareback, mate? Didn’t know you were that type!”
“Nah, not bareback. It’s the new rig I got down at the Stockers’ shop. It’s a . . . Now what’d they call it?”
***
“They fucking didn’t!”
“They fucking did, Mum. I swear!”
“And what did he call it?”
“A minimalist saddle.”
“And what did it look like?”
“It was pretty simple, really . . .” Andrew looked expectantly at his mum for a laugh that, based on her stern expression, was not readily forthcoming and then pressed on.
“ . . . It was white all over with just a black square in the middle where he was sitting. It didn’t have too much else going on. More or less just some padding and a bit of a cushion thing behind his arse, was all.”
“But he said it was a saddle?”
“A minimalist saddle, Mum. Said he bought it last week off the Stockers.”
Melinda stewed on this for a minute. After what seemed like an interminable internal conversation, she looked up at Andrew.
“you cut the ads out of the catalogues yet, my boy?”
“Not yet, Mum,” Andrew waved the stack of magazines and a pair of scissors at her. “I was just about to get started.”
Melinda looked out the window and across the street. The sun reflected off the windows of Horse World but she swore she could see, in the dark interior, a faint outline of a man behind the counter. Melinda knew she couldn’t make out such details at this distance but . . . was that a smirk?
“Put the scissors down, Andy, and set those magazines out on the counter.”
“Uncut, Mum?”
“Too bloody right.”
***
Things only got worse from there. A day or two later, the bright ribbons hanging out front of Horse World were joined by an unimposing display off to the side. Just a small table with a couple of black and white blankets set on it and a small sign:
THESE JUST IN: NOT JUST A SADDLE BLANKET
Melinda responded by displaying a collection of the new oils and creams on a small table out front with her own sign:
SADDLE CREAMS: MANY USES
She smiled inwardly later that day when she looked out the window and caught Garth staring blackly at the display and, if her lip reading could be trusted, swearing up a storm. She decided to press the advantage and made a call by the local hardware shop.
Early the next morning, Andrew banged through the front door of the shop in quite a tizzy.
Melinda looked up in alarm from the counter. She was hammering the lid back onto a small tin of paint.
“What the bloody hell is wrong with you?” She asked.
“Mum!” Andrew blurted out. “Mum! The sign!”
Melinda smiled innocently. “Yes? What about it?”
“It . . . Mum! Come look at it!”
Andrew ran back outside and Melinda followed slowly after him. He was staring and pointing up at the big sign above the shop. Melinda didn’t bother looking up.
“Saddle World.” She said to him.
“Yeah, but below that, Mum!”
“And nothing else?” She said.
“Exactly, Mum! There’s a bloody question mark up there!”
Sure enough, freshly painted after the tag line on the big sign hanging above the shop was a small, shiny question mark. The sign now read:
SADDLE WORLD: SADDLES, AND NOTHING ELSE?
Melinda grinned at Andrew, wiped some paint off her hand, and clapped him on the back.
“Come on, Andy. I reckon we’ve got some saddles to sell. And who knows what else?”
Andrew spent the rest of that day rather tense. He looked out the front window at one point and saw David pointing up at the sign, Garth by his side, red in the face and shaking his head. He leaned down to talk to his son and pressed some money into his hand. David ran off down the street and Garth, with an angry glance over his shoulder, stormed back inside Horse World.
Andrew couldn’t help but feel that some of this was his fault. The sense of accomplishment he felt when he first had sold a customer a tin of Superior Saddle Cream had been replaced completely by a profound sense of fear that he had started racing around a track without knowing exactly what lay at the finish line. He looked up at the picture of his dad on the wall and realised had had a good idea of what it might be.
***
The following morning, Andrew’s worst fears were confirmed. As he opened Saddle World he could see that young David had been busy the night before with his own can of paint. He’d painted over some things and added some others and now the sign read:
HORSE WORLD: SADDLES?
But that wasn’t the worst part.
Melinda didn’t show up until five that night. She’d spent the day driving down to Gambo, of all places, to buy a selection of ribbons and bells purpose built to decorate saddles. She came in from the back, two large bags stuffed under her arms, jingling with each step.
“This’ll show those bastards, she announced as she made her way behind the counter. “Here,” she said, as she noticed Andrew’s despondent demeanour, “what’s got you so glum?”
Andrew made one last ditch effort to stop the course of history in its tracks. He could feel the danger of this new development and wanted nothing more than to go back to the way things had been.
“Mum,” he started, “maybe we shouldn’t set out these new bells and ribbons. Couldn’t we back to just selling saddles, and nothing else?”
“It’s too late for that, my boy. Let’s set these out on the–” Melinda’s mouth hung open as she looked out the front window.
“The sign,” she gasped. “Those bastards!”
“Look, Mum,” Andrew cut in. “Let’s just go over there and explain–“
“But that’s not even the worst part!” She said. “Look at that fucking display!”
Andrew didn’t need to look. He’d seen it earlier that day. The Stocker’s had procured a small saw horse and placed it in in the window. They’d draped the saddle blanket over it, much in the manner that someone would spread a saddle blanket over a regular horse. And on top of that . . .
“Is that . . . Is that a mannequin?” Melinda asked.
Indeed it was. Sitting on top of the saddle blanket on top of the saw horse, much as a real man would sit on a real saddle on top of a real horse, was a mannequin. He was wearing a pair of jeans and a checked shirt and his plastic face smiled out the window. Behind him, in the darkness of the shop, Melinda knew she could see Garth smiling out at her, too.
“Andrew,” Melinda said, her voice strangely calm. “Did those new catalogues come in?”
“Yes, Mum.”
“Good,” she said nodding to herself. “Grab ‘em.”
Andrew reached for the stack of catalogues and the scissors.
“Nah. Not the scissors,” she said. “You won’t need ‘em. Grab the matches, though.”
***
Andrew tore the catalogues into small strips and piled them around the doors to the Stockers’ barn. He’d already let the horses out and set them on their way with a swift slap on the hindquarters. He looked nervously over his shoulder to make sure no one was watching him. He had told his mum that he’d feel more comfortable doing this with an accomplice, but she’d just brandished a hammer and knife and told him she had some business to take care of over at Horse World.
Luckily, the Stockers seemed to be either not at home or unusually sound sleepers, because no one disturbed Andrew as he lit the scraps of paper and admired his handiwork. All the little pictures of saddles curled in the flame and, along with them, the pictures of saddle creams and oils and lotions that Andrew always had longed to sell. Soon, the wood of the door caught and Andrew stepped back from the heat. It was a shame, he thought, as the fire curled up the door frame. He could see a collection of tack hanging on the far wall. He and his mum had sold the Stockers every single one of the saddles that were about to burn. He shook his head and set out for home.
When he was halfway there, he saw an orange glow on the horizon ahead of him and wondered if he’d gotten turned around on the walk. But, no, there at his back was a matching orange glow from the Stockers’ barn. He quickened his pace.
When he got a little closer to home, he realised that the orange glow was rising from behind his house. He began to run.
He found Melinda standing next to the house, staring up at what was left of their barn. It was, by this time, well ablaze. Tongues of yellow and red licked through the walls. The roof collapsed in a shower of orange sparks. Andrew could see the bridles and reins and saddles still hanging on the walls inside begin to smoulder and char in the intense heat.
“Mum . . .” he managed.
“They let the horses out, first,” she said. “We’ll have to round ‘em up.”
She waved the knife at him.
“I cut the shit out of those blankets, but!” She announced with an air of slightly crazed satisfaction. “Found every single one of ‘em and sliced ‘em right up. There’s not a single thing you could sit and ride in that bloody shop.”
Melinda looked down at Andrew’s hands, slightly blackened from the soot of his adventure, and smiled.
“We got ‘em, I reckon. They’ll know not to mess with Saddle World!”
Andrew looked up at the blazing barn, now crumbling into a heap of twisted timbers burning hot enough to redden his face even from this distance, and thought silently to himself that he wasn’t quite so sure.
“I’ll start looking for the horse, Mum.”
Andrew finally caught up with the horses in the bottom of the gully behind Australian Charles Darwin’s Petting Zoo and Centre for Evolutionary Studies. There were rather a lot of them, he thought at first, until he realised that they had mingled with the Stockers’ herd. He parked the Land Rover with the headlights pointed at the horses and wandered down to calm the skittish herd. Before too long, he saw another pair of headlights tracking down the dirt road and jerked to a halt beside the Land Rover. David stepped out and glared down at him.
“You burnt down my bloody barn, you saddle selling cunt!”
In the light from the parked cars, Andrew could make out sooty smears on David’s hands and what appeared to be some scraps of newspaper still tucked into his back pocket. David saw his enquiring stare and quickly tucked the newspaper in deeper.
“Well . . .” David said, “but . . .” and he trailed off. “You just keep your filthy hands off our fucking horses.”
Andrew shrugged and set off to round up their horses. Their horse trailer had burnt up with the barn and his only hope for getting them all back home was an impromptu equine caravan, which he intended to lead on Primus. He’d stopped by the shop on the way out of town and grabbed a couple of saddles to assist in this project but, as he cinched the saddle down on Primus, realised that he had overlooked a rather glaring hole on his plan. Although there were a variety of saddles to choose from in the shop, the only reason he was forced to choose new saddles was that all the saddles at home had gone up in the blaze and, with them, the rest of his family’s riding tack.
Primus now stood looking rather foolish in a brand spanking new leather saddle without a bridle, a bit, or reins. The rest of the horses milled around with nothing tethering them together. Andrew swore under his breath and glanced over at David. He had had considerably more success: the Stockers’ horses were tied in a neat line and he’d slipped a bridle on one of them. David stared proudly back at Andrew and sneared.
“Looks like you’ll have some trouble leading that lot home without a bridle between ‘em,” he said.
Andrew steamed.
“Yeah” Well good fucking luck riding that nag of yours without a fucking saddle!”
Sure enough, David had brought a fancy collection of bridles, bits, and reins from Horse World, but without the the saddles in the family barn, or even the minimalist saddles that were now just scraps on the shop floor, he would find it hard to ride anywhere.
David glared back at him. They stood like that, Andrew sitting atop Primus, with nowhere to go, and David, standing by his horse, with nowhere to sit.
Finally, Andrew shifted in his useless saddle.
“I’ve got a spare saddle in the truck,” he said.
David bit his lip and spat.
“I reckon I might have a bit o’ rope.”
Andrew stared at him and shifted again, more meaningfully this time.
“And a fucking bridle,” David grunted.
Andrew smiled back at him and dismounted Primus.
“Let’s get to it, then,” he replied.
***
She breathed in deeply. The saddle was scuffed on one side and the girl had to blink back tears as her dad explained.
“I bloody told her to take care of it, didn’t I?” He said. “I told her to clean it and keep it dry and remember to oil the leather to keep it from drying out. And here I tell her all that and she goes and falls off her fucking horse.”
The little girl rubbed her plaster cast and sniffled.
“Anyway,” the man said, “can you fix it?”
Melinda pointed up at the sign behind the counter.
“What’s that say?” She asked.
The man sighed. He’d been through this before.
“And nothing bloody else.”
Melinda scowled at him.
“Nah. Not that one! The bloody one below it!”
“Oh. Right.” The man said, his eyes fixing on a smaller, shiny new sign below the large one.
“‘Saddle repair, maintenance, and polishing, all while you wait’.” The man brightened and looked up at her. “You polish saddles now?”
Melinda looked out the window at Horse World. She could see Garth behind the counter and could swear that he was smiling. She smiled back.
“Yeah,” she said. “We polish saddles. Only in house, mind,” she cautioned. “We don’t sell polish.”
“No worries, the man replied. “Only can you polish the bridle, too?”
Melinda looked up at him with a glint in her eye and tapped some fine print on the shiny new sign.
“Saddles,” she said, “AND NOTHING BLOODY ELSE!”
Welcome to Narangong 