Leroy wondered if it was a deliberate snub, whether they had left him until last because he was black. It was the sort of thing that a black man with a lot of pride would think about. Were they looking at him thinking that this nappy haired nigger had no right to be using this white woman, a beautiful white woman, this way? Well, no matter what they had in mind, she was here with him and he meant to give her a hell of a ride. He sat back in his sulky, whip raised, a feeling of pure pleasure rising inside. “Hey, up!” he shouted and the woman bounded forward. Running among the other naked ponies, Leroy felt less isolated, less obviously different. There was another tall blond running along easily. “Get those knees up,” Arthur shouted. Alicia had been looking at the muscular black man driving his curly haired blond and she gradually relaxed her stride.
They were still several feet away from another pony and rider when the driver brought the young, dark-haired, girl to a complete stop. Reins pulled sharply against her shoulders, the bit jerked suddenly in her mouth, Alicia’s head wrenched backward and she too was still.
“How’re you doing?” a man said casually, looking not at Arthur but letting his eyes range up and down Alicia’s body.
“Great,” Arthur replied, “just great.”
“What’s yours?”
Arthur paused, puzzling at the question. At last he figured out what the other man wanted to know. “School teacher,” he said. “High-school math teacher. And yours?”
“Oh, she’s a college girl. A freshman in college. And that’s her mother. The one over there.” He pointed. He glanced at Arthur before returning to study Alicia’s body. Extending his whip he jabbed it between Alicia’s breasts. Arthur felt offended. That guy had no right to do that. Alicia was his pony. Arthur wondered if he should say something. But he only loosened the brake and prepared to move away.
“When I was in high-school,” the other man said, “there was this art teacher, Miss Wickham or something like that. Boy, I would love to have seen her here. Pretty. Friendly. Called us all by our nicknames instead of the names only teachers used.” He laughed. “Miss Wickham, I think it was. Haven’t thought about her for a long time. I used to think of her all the time. A high- school teacher. You sure?”
“I’m sure,” Arthur replied testily.
“Been here before?” the man asked.
“No, this is my first time.”
“Thought so.” He shook the reins, grunted loudly, tapped the girl with his whip and they started up again. “See you,” he said holding the whip upright in a salute before cracking it across the girl’s back.
Arthur was unnerved by the comment about his being a tyro. Why did he say that? “Giddap!” Arthur snapped and Alicia started walking forward. A sharp, stinging blow on her right side encouraged Alicia into a trot. Moments later came the seemingly contradictory signals, urging her forward while pulling her head backward. Alicia resumed her exaggerated strut as the whip struck her thigh. “Keep your mind on what you’re doing!” he ordered when she stumbled.
Loosening the reins he sent Alicia into a fast walk. They circled around to the left. He wanted another look at that girl and the man who picked him out as a newcomer. Arthur straightened her out, slowed her down and put Alicia back into a strut. A few moments later, Arthur had her trotting off, this time after the dazzlingly pretty blond and the black man driving her.
Arthur eased back on the reins, slowing Alicia to an easy walk, not for her sake but to make time to appreciate the two young girls with their trim, tight bodies and muscular legs. Twins, he thought, identical twins. That’s something. Catching the large, soft, frightened eyes of one of them wakened a protective instinct. They looked to Arthur like a pair of foals, separated from their mother, innocent and orphaned. He longed to rescue them from their leather-clad riders who glanced appraisingly at Alicia while completely ignoring him. An insistent noise broke into his fantasy of keeping the twins in his small apartment.
The thickset black man was shouting at the curly haired blond woman with an incredibly pretty face. “C’mon bitch, keep your ass movin’.” Technically, Andrea was a volunteer rather than a draftee. But this was not at all her choice. It was, she hoped, the last day of her involuntary subjugation. One more day, she told herself, one more day and it would all be over. She could manage that much. She had managed much worse things. Her wealthy, blue-blood husband used to beat the hell out of her when he got drunk, which was very often. A serious alcoholic with a distinct predilection for physical abuse, he had made her life hell until she managed to have him arrested. After his arrest, it came out that he had been stealing from the bank, they prosecuted and he was still in penitentiary. Then came the divorce, leaving her with a seriously disturbed stepdaughter. Had this adventure begun only last week? It seemed so long ago that Hillary had arrived in tears, frantic. That was right, it was one week ago. Her stepdaughter, Hillary, had only lasted a couple of months in college before she quit school. Now she was sharing an apartment with three other girls in a dreadful part of the city. Heaven knows what she was doing to earn money. “Please Mom, you’ve got to help me. Please.”
“What is it baby? Of course I’ll help you. Anything.” Andrea melted at the word mom. She couldn’t remember Hillary ever calling her mom.
There was a man, a dangerous man. Hillary owed him more than $10,000. She couldn’t possibly pay him. What could she do?
How did she come to owe someone so much money? Her stepmother wanted to know.
There had been a big party. Hillary knew a man who dealt drugs. She agreed to supply the drugs for the party and everyone was to pay her back. But no one did. Now she was on the hook for the money. Her supplier, a man named Leroy, was threatening make her become a whore to pay back what she owed.
“Oh, he can’t do that,” her stepmother said.
“Yes, he can. He really can. He told me that unless I came up with what I owe him, he was going to sell me to a pimp who would put me on the street. One way or another he was going to get his money out of me.” She began to wail. “Mama, what am I going to do?”
She took her frightened stepdaughter in her arms. “I’ll go talk to him. It’ll be alright.”
“Oh, Mom. Thank you. I didn’t know what to do. Leroy says the pimp will ship me to another city, a city where I don’t know anyone and I won’t ever be able to get away.”
“How do I get to meet this Leroy?”
“You just go to his house. He doesn’t have any drugs at his house so the cops can’t do anything to him. And he has someone else deliver the drugs. I’ll find out a good time for you to go there? Alright?”
The taxi driver was surprised when she gave him the address but took her there nevertheless. Walking up the stairs to the front door, she had the feeling of being watched, but put it out of her mind. She had never been in a black neighborhood before. It was an odd, unsettling feeling.
“I’m here to see Leroy,” she said to the young man who opened the door.
“Wait in here,” he said and moved away.
She stood uncomfortably for at least 10 minutes before a short, thick, powerfully built, black man in his twenties walked slowly down the stairs. Guessing from his attitude, she decided that she was deliberately made to wait, deliberately made to feel uncomfortable. As he approached her, he looked her over so blatantly and thoroughly that she began to blush. He made no attempt to hide his actions, studying her breasts and legs and face without the slightest embarrassment. “Leroy,” he said smiling and held out his hand.
“Andrea,” she replied. “Hillary’s step-mother.”
“Juran,” he called out. “Go about your business.” The young man who let her in smiled at her as he let himself out.
“Can I get you anything, Andrea? Coffee, something to drink?”
“Thank you. No.”
“Right to business. All right, Andrea. Let’s get to business.”
“I understand my step-daughter owes you a great deal of money and that you have threatened some,” she paused searching for the word, “unpleasant consequences if she doesn’t pay.”
“That’s more or less right.”
“Very well. I’m prepared to make good my step-daughter’s debt to you.”
“How you gonna do that?” he snapped.
“Well, I’ll pay you the money she owes.”
“This ain’t about money, no more.”
“I don’t understand.” Andrea was genuinely confused.
It was odd. Sometimes he spoke with more of a southern accent, a black accent. Other times his speech was that of an educated white easterner. Andrea wondered which was the affectation.
Yes, Hillary owed him between 10 and 15 thousand dollars. When she couldn’t pay up, she offered him a day of service for each thousand she owed him. He was due two weeks of Hillary. When she reneged even on that, he decided to recoup his money another way. This arrangement was publicly known. He couldn’t afford people seeing him be taken in by no little white girl. Sorry, but no. If Hillary didn’t deliver on her promise, he was going to sell her stepdaughter to a friend of his. That was all there was to it. Reputation was important in his business and he couldn’t afford to have his destroyed like this.
They stood facing each other in silence for what seemed like a very long time. “On the other hand,” he said at last, “on the other hand,” he paused, considering. “Do you want to make good your daughter’s debt?”
“Certainly, I do,” Andrea replied. That’s why I’m here.”
“Okay. If that’s what you want, to make good your stepdaughter’s problem, I’ll take you for a week. Only one week. Discount for age and experience. But one week of absolute obedience. You mine. I own you for seven days. You do everything I say. After that your step-daughter’s free of me.”
Andrea was shaken. In other surroundings she might have asked if he was serious. But she had no doubt that he was serious and that he would be offended if she questioned him about that point. What could she say? What could she do? The only possibility was to reject the arrangement. “How can I be sure that you’ll stick to the bargain?”
“I told you my reputation is important. I don’t jive. But I can see your point. Okay. I’ll write a confession to a crime that I committed. We give it to someone you can trust, say your stepdaughter. In a week she comes back here, gets a note saying from me saying we’re even and gives me back the confession. But you got to write a note too. One I get to keep ‘till next week, sayin’ that you doin’ this on your own, nothin’ forced, no coercion. You hangin' around for the excitement. I don’t want to be charged with kidnapping or false imprisonment or white slavery.” This last was spoken with an ironic smile. “We exchange notes next week when it’s over. We all go our own way.”
Leroy wrote a long, detailed confession to a murder committed the previous year. Andrea wrote her note in the form of a letter asking to stay with him for the week and gave it to Leroy. When they were both signed and dated, they phoned Hillary, explained that she was to pick up an envelope. If, at the end of the following week, she hadn’t heard from her stepmother, or if anything didn’t seem right, the sealed envelope was to go to the police. Leroy and Andrea waited on the sidewalk for Hillary, gave her the written confession, Andrea’s letter and went back to the house. Leroy waited at the front door. “Open it for me, Bitch,” he snapped. Andrea held the door and followed him inside.
“Leroy” she said, “before we begin.” She never got to continue. Leroy slapped her hard across her face.
“We already begun. And you ain’t got nothin’ to say about nothin’. Understand, What you say is `Yes.’”
“Yes, Leroy,” she managed through the tears that she couldn’t contain.
“And I don’t think, under the circumstances that you should call me by my first name. It ain’t fitting.”
“I don’t know your other name. Just Leroy.”
“Well, , `Yes, Master’ will be fine.”
She hesitated, unwilling to make the commitment. He looked angrily at her. “You hear me, Bitch.” Frightened of him, of his physical presence and what he promised to do to Hillary, she gave in. “Yes, Master.”
“That’s better. You do just what I tell you and this week be just fine.”
She looked down at the floor. “Yes, Master,” she said quietly.
“Now wanna’ see what I’m getting’ for my money.”
She raised her eyes, looking rather than asking her question.
“Right here, right now. Strip naked.”
He stood no more than a foot away from her in the hallway near the front door of his house as she removed her jacket. She looked around for some place to put it. Finding nothing she dropped it on the floor by her side. Leroy merely looked at her noncommittally. Andrea took a deep breath and began unbuttoning her blouse.
Nervously, hands shaking slightly, she struggled with each of the buttons. After what seemed an inordinately long time she managed to pull it open and take it off. Her skirt was much easier, just a matter of undoing the clasp at the waist and slipping the zipper at the side. The plaid skirt fell to the floor at her feet. She pushed the beige slip on top of the skirt and Andrea stepped to one side. She looked at Leroy to gauge his reaction but he sent out no signals at all, merely stood watching with interested detachment. After removing her shoes she slid her pantyhose from her feet. She leaned against the wall wearing only her bra and panties. He was cool, she thought. Most of the men she had known would have already begun to lose their calm by this point giving her a definite edge. But he appeared quite calm and in control. His twinkly, intelligent eyes looked her over from head to toe, assessing, judging. Andrea began to feel less calm. When he raised his eyebrows, she reached back to unhook her bra. Only his eyes moved as he studied her full round breasts. Slipping her hands inside the elastic she pulled down her panties bent over and finally took them off. Still he said nothing, betrayed no emotion.
“On your back,” he ordered, “and spread your legs. Let’s see if you as good as you look.”
Straddling her, his legs next to her hips, she thought he looked like a ebony statue of a god, but brought to life and moving, taking off his shirt before unfastening his belt.
He was pleased and surprised when she suddenly sat up to deal with his zipper. She removed his pants and underpants. As he lowered himself on to her, she pursed her lips to be kissed. Instead Leroy put a hand behind her head and pressed his left nipple into her mouth. She responded as he had hoped, nibbling and licking that sensitive spot. When he first discovered the immense pleasure of having his nipples stimulated, Leroy wondered whether it was a sign of effeminacy or possible homosexuality. He was greatly relieved to find that he liked to have women take his nipple in their mouths and never fantasized about men at all. He slid forward and slipped inside her without difficulty. A great start, he thought. She was going to work out fine. He held out as long as he could before he let himself go, finally sagging in relief after he exploded inside her.
She lay beneath him feeling his thick, muscular body. He remained almost still, surprisingly light on top of her. Andrea continued kissing the wiry hair on his chest and caressing one or the other of his nipples with her tongue and lips. In a while, he swelled again and found his way back inside her. The coupling lasted much longer this time yet all the while she sucked on his nipple. Leroy sighed his pleasure.
“I got to do some business,” he said as he rose. “You got to get started fixin’ this place up. By the end of the week, it gonna be spotless. Right?”
“Okay,” she said dreamily.
He kicked her with his bare foot. “Yes, Master!”
“Yes, Master,” she echoed.
“Come in the kitchen. I’ll show you where stuff is.” He started down the hallway.
Andrea rose to follow him. “Not like that,” he snapped. “You heel, Bitch.” She lowered herself to all fours and began crawling after him. “What you say?” he called back over his shoulder.
“Yes, Master.”
“Yes, Master,” he repeated, nodding his approval.
When he left, he hadn’t said whether she should put her clothes back on or remain as she was. So Andrea sat at the kitchen table for ten or fifteen minutes before doing anything. She found an apron, put on her panties, folded the rest of her clothing and put it in a drawer, then began cleaning. Most of her day was spent in the kitchen. Every dish and piece of cutlery was run through the dishwasher. Cupboards and drawers were washed. She scrubbed the floor on hands and knees and used an old bottle of floor polish to make
the linoleum shine. When she was finished in the kitchen Andrea began vacuuming, first the hallway, starting where Leroy had so recently taken her, and finally the front room. Andrea, who wasn’t at all used to housework, walked from room to room admiring her work and on the whole was quite pleased with the results. The house was a lot better looking than when she arrived only a few hours ago.
On his return Leroy either didn’t notice the difference, or pretended not to. “I got to go out again soon. Upstairs in my bedroom, the one on the left, press me a pair of pants, a clean shirt and shine me a pair of shoes.” Expecting some acknowledgment of the work already done, Andrea stared at him without moving. He drew back his arm, spanking her very hard. “Damn it, Bitch. You jump when I say jump. Not after awhile, but right away.”
The pain brought tears to her eyes. She rubbed her stinging backside. Andrea looked at the floor. “Yes, Master,” she whispered.
“Go,” he shouted, and she scampered up the stairs.
“That boy, Juran, only seen you once, but he in love with you already. Tellin’ me how beautiful you are.” Leroy was putting on his jacket, getting ready to leave. “Problem is he got no self confidence. I think you just the thing to give that boy some confidence. When he shows up, you gonna make up to him. Take him upstairs. By the time you through with him that boy gonna think he’s the greatest lover since Don Juan. Don Juran. You understand me?”
“Yes, Master,” she said reluctantly.
“And we be able to see how successful you are in the way that boy carries himself after you done with him.” Leroy smiled to himself. You just go along with whatever he wants and make sure he have a good time.”
A few minutes later when Juran came back to the house, Leroy confided to him that the woman was just saying how handsome he was and how much she wanted him. Embarrassed, the boy’s dark face became even darker and he looked away.
Not easy being sexy and seductive wearing just an apron, Andrea thought. On the other hand, it might be just right. “Juran,” she asked in a shy, quiet voice. “Do you really think I’m pretty?”
“Sure do,” he managed at last. So she spent her week with one of the two young black men, Juran who was gentle and soft or Leroy who was demanding and tough. Toward the end of the week, Leroy encouraged Juran to be more assertive, more demanding of the white woman they both commanded. They sometimes used her together, one at her rear and the other in her mouth.
Leroy’s little parties invariably started sometime after midnight. Andrea answered the door dressed in panties and one of Leroy’s old T-shirts. “Good evening, Sir. Good evening, Ma’am,” to the guests, all black. After that, fetching snacks and beer, her only allowable responses “Yes, Ma’am” and “Yes, Sir.” The men seemed to look at her approvingly, the women with dislike and suspicion. Early one evening, Juran invited some of his friends in to show them the white woman who was their new servant.
Then it was the final evening. The last night. Tomorrow her week would be up. Leroy summoned her. “Come, Bitch.” When she didn’t appear at once, he shouted. “When I say `Come ’ I mean now. On the double.”
She opened the bathroom door. “Damn it,” he said to her, “I call, you come running. Understand?”
“Yes,” she inclined her head. “Yes, Master,” she added quickly before he snapped at her again.
He studied the naked white woman framed in the doorway. Undoubtedly his ancestors had bowed and scraped and said `Yes, Master’ to her ancestors. Had some white man made his great-grand stepmother run around naked like this, he wondered, cleaning up after him and answering his every need? If so, it made what he was doing all the better. And if not, what the hell, he was still having a great time with her. Leroy turned slightly on the commode. “On your knees.” He spread his legs, pointing to the bathroom floor at his feet. She opened her mouth to object, thought better of it, and stepped toward him. “Yes, Master,” her shoulders drooped in surrender.
A great looking woman, Leroy thought as she knelt before him. Hard to believe that she’s Hillary’s stepmother. Hillary’s about eighteen, so the stepmother has to be at least five, ten years older. The stepdaughter is a good looker but the stepmother is great stuff. Tall, three or four inches taller than Leroy, long legs, great legs, tawny blond hair and bright blue eyes. Nice big tits. He reached down, grasping one in each hand. Small, tight ass. He liked that. Most of his friends preferred their women with wide hips and big asses. Black guys generally liked black women. It was what they were used to, what they felt comfortable with. Big boobs, big hips, big asses. It was funny that white men so often were afraid that black guys were after their women. Leroy suspected that it was a way of coming to grips with their own preference for black women. Of course, most of the guys he knew would take this rare beauty if she were offered to them, as she was offered to him. But still they would like a plump, round, black, beauty even more. She looked unblinkingly straight ahead as squeezed.
“Cha lookin’ at? Your big, black, friend rising to meet you?” He eased her forward until her face was a few inches from his fully erect member. She extended her pink tongue, grazing the head of his penis. When Leroy was twelve or thirteen, just beginning to feel the powerful sexual urges that were so much a part of his life, he would retreat to the only private place in his crowded house, to sit on the toilet with his girly magazine. Once he started, he masturbated daily, taking great pleasure when his milky fluid smacked against one of the pictures. He fantasized equally about the black women in his neighborhood, the mostly black women teachers in his school and the naked white women in the
magazine. Leroy took both of arms and placed her fingers on his nipples. Dutifully, she twirled them gently between thumb and forefinger. Not only was the feeling physically pleasurable it was deeply satisfying to have her mouth and both of her hands devoted to his pleasure.
Now her eyes were closed as her tongue swept up and down the length of him. With a deep sigh of pleasure, Leroy leaned against the back of the toilet. He rested his hands on her shoulders. They made a nice contrast, his large powerful dark colored hands against her light pink skin. He felt a tingling sensation in his loins. Putting one hand on the back of her head, he guided her down, until most of him was inside her warm, moist mouth. She clamped her lips tight around him and bobbed her head slowly up and down. Leroy cried out in release as he filled her mouth with his warm, salty, gel. Wanting to prolong the sensation, he put one hand on top of her blond head to hold her in place. Even as he softened and relaxed and he felt the tension ease, she maintained the pressure with her lips and kept up the gentle bobbing motion of her head.
Slapping his thigh, he said “Heel, Bitch” She crawled after him down the long hallway to his bedroom. “Not going too fast for you, am I?”
She looked up from the floor. “No, Master.”
“Got something special for you tomorrow. We goin’ to the races. Would you like that?”
“Yes, Master.”
This was the last day, Andrea told herself. After tonight it would all be over. She would have paid off her stepdaughter’s debt and put this awful experience behind her. At the pain of the whip on her back, she began to run. “C’mon bitch,” Leroy shouted. “Get up there,” and she ran even faster.
A few clouds moved lazily across the morning sky as the twelve naked women moved about the open field, each pulling a high-wheeled chariot, each under the control of an attentive driver. The two heavyset women driving two sisters remained close to one another, only rarely concerning themselves with the others.
“Notice the legs on them?” Clara, the one with gray streaks in her hair, was driving Chrissie, the younger sister. “Look at them muscles. Must be runners. Work out a lot.” In fact, Karen had been the star of the school’s cross-country team while Chrissie was a sprinter on the track team.
“It’s a good thing for us they never ran away,” her friend Myra laughed. “We sure wouldn’t have caught them.”
“We should do good today with those legs pulling us. Don’t you think?”
“They’re a couple of sweeties,” Myra said. “Do whatever you want them to. A real pair of sweeties, aren’t they?”
The sisters were indeed adorable with their bangs just peeking out just below the leather straps that circled their foreheads. Small, round, perfectly shaped breasts, breasts that seemed larger because the girls were so slim, barely moved when they walked. The metal shafts across their open mouths blurred subtle facial differences and identical leather rigging made the two young bodies seem even more alike. “Go,” called a voice as the whip met Chrissie’s thigh, just above the knee. Chrissie began to walk faster and, at the next command, started to trot. A moment later, Karen feeling the sharp pain of the whip on her back, ran after her sister. Her sweet, rosy breasts, still with the firmness of youth, jostled compactly. When they were side by side, their riders eased the girls back to trot. Once you were moving, it wasn’t much harder than carrying a backpack, something both girls had done throughout high school. Starting up, the effort needed to get the cart and driver into motion, was harder, but manageable. Going from a walk to a trot or a trot to a run was easier than having to begin from a complete stop. Slowing down was scary because you were always concerned that the driver would forget the brake or use too much braking. If they forgot, you’d get run over. If they used too much, the girl pulling the cart was snapped violently backward. Jogging along together, the next few
minutes were a peaceful respite for Karen and Chrissie and their drivers. Certainly it was among the least stressful moments the sisters had known since they decided to run away from home. No speeding up or slowing down. No shouts or whips or even a change of pace. On this sunlit Saturday morning, their pretty young faces equally reddened with exertion, they looked more than ever like twins
The respite ended abruptly when Clara thought it might be fun to teach their ponies to prance in unison. The girls were reined in, pressure of the bit pulling their cheeks toward back of the mouth, a steady tightening of the harness on back and shoulders. The pressure increased until both girls stopped completely. Then came a barrage of orders, often contradictory. Reins were loosened and they moved forward. No sooner did they start than they were jerked to a stop. At last it became clear that they were supposed to march in unison, matching each other step for step. As they became accustomed to each other's rhythm Karen and Chrissie were able to maintain their synchronized steps with only an occasional voice command. Sometimes, especially when they were turning, they lost their concentration. There were shouts again and blows.
Like a real mare concerned about her foal Gloria, was so intent on her daughter’s well being that she barely noticed the first few tugs until the sting of the whip and a sharp jerk sent her staggering off to her right.
Her driver cracked the whip across her back. They told him that an older woman would be easy to handle but here she was just poking along in the wake of that other cart, ignoring him. “Pay attention,” he hissed. “Keep your mind on what you’re doing.” Once the visual contact was broken, and the reality struck home that there was really nothing she could do for Susanna, Gloria became much more manageable. Very soon she was moving easily among the other pony girls, responding to the smallest adjustments of her reins, speeding up and slowing down on command. He thought that they were starting to understand one another. He would be sparing with his whip and gentle in the use of the reins so long as she responded promptly to all his commands. For her part, she was to remain alert, attentive and compliant. He was becoming sufficiently relaxed that he was able to look at the others. Certainly a good looking, well built, group of ponies, he thought. Was it like this every week? Were these girls a fair representation
of what was brought here? Or was this an above average collection? He was considering these questions when he noticed with dismay the daughter approaching. He turned Gloria aside. But the daughter’s driver swung her around and guided her toward them. Certainly a good looking girl, he thought, pretty face, slim waist, full round breasts that were larger than her mother’s.
The girl’s driver pointed at the two Lesbos, as he called them. Look what they were doing with the twin girls. He proposed that they should train the mother and daughter at least as well as that. You couldn’t have those Lesbos showing them all up. Gloria’s driver didn’t want to go along but found himself unable refuse. He pulled her in with a sharp jerk of the reins forcing the bit against the back of her mouth. Gloria grunted as she stopped in her tracks. Gloria and Susanna stood a few feet from each other. Five or six times the reins loosened and the pressure in their mouths relaxed. But each time they started, one or the other driver stopped them. At last Susanna’s driver thought they needed some voice commands. "Ho, Hey, Ho, Hey," he sang out, setting the cadence. "Ho, Hey, Ho, Hey," speeding the pair up and slowing them down with his chant while we moved across the open field. To the insistent "Ho, Hey, Ho, Hey" they matched their steps. Next they had to be trained to start and stop together. On command they leaned forward, taking up any slack in the harness and traces. Timing that first step, always beginning with the same leg, raised to the same height, took lots of practice, dozens of repetitions. Over and over, the pair halted, waited, started up, increased their speed, slowed down and stopped until, at last, Susanna’s driver pronounced himself satisfied.
No such stopping and starting for Andrea as Leroy kept her constantly trotting off in one direction or another, heedless of anyone in their way. Very quickly all the other drivers learned to give them a wide berth. Fortunately for Andrea, or perhaps unfortunately, she was an everyday jogger and easily able to keep up with Leroy’s demands.
Daniel pretty much let his Professor have her head and go at whatever speed she wanted to as long as she kept moving. He didn’t want Mary Louise to tire even before they started racing.