Bodacious: The Shepherd Cat. Suzanna Crampton

has an instinctive understanding of how to communicate with us, and she can work real magic with horses. In America, as her skills with animals grew, she became accomplished at schooling difficult horses. She would create a rapport calmly with the animal to motivate the horse to obey rather than to force it and she could sense how and when to nudge it gently to bring forth its abilities. She tells me that she would often lose herself in concentration while riding a young horse.

      When I first arrived at Black Sheep Farm, there was a mare who lived on the farm named Major Beth. She was a grey mare, half Connemara pony and half thoroughbred. She was tall enough at fifteen and a half human hands, or sixty-two inches. (For those of you who may not know, a horse’s height is measured from the bottom of the front hooves to the ‘withers’, which are at the base of the neck. Each hand measure is four inches – the average size of a man’s hand.) Major Beth was the first horse The Shepherd had ever owned outright. Previously she had just borrowed horses or owned only part of a horse.

      Last, but far from least, is the black pony, Marco Polo, who I also met when I first arrived at the farm. Like me, he has a fascinating rescue story that profoundly improved his life. Of course, I found many of us on our farm had had phenomenal escapes and rescues thanks to The Shepherd. Even when she was elsewhere, in the bustle of New York City during the 1980s when she was learning the ropes in the theatre, or later in London, she found herself drawn to animals. In London, she regularly exercised a beautiful bay thoroughbred gelding that lived at Kentish Town City Farm. The only drawback to this arrangement was having to ride the horse before 6.30 a.m. to avoid London’s rush-hour traffic, which would make the streets impassable for The Shepherd and her borrowed horse. The Shepherd would get up at 4 a.m. and walk from her flat in South Hill Park and then walk across Hampstead Heath to the City Farm. After unlocking the farm gate she would tack up the horse and ride along quiet London streets back up to Hampstead Heath.

      One of her most memorable rides, she tells me, took place on a chilly, foggy autumnal morning. As she rode from the farm gates, the horse’s hooves clip-clopped in muffled echoes as they moved along mist-shrouded streets. The fog eddied and flowed around and over them as if they waded through streaming liquid. Traffic lights appeared as dimly coloured glows through silver mist that slowly brightened as she drew nearer. The few early cars out and about drove slowly and cautiously.

      When they arrived at Hampstead Heath, horse and rider entered a fairyland, as the heath’s trees, clothed in autumn reds and golden yellows fringed with faded greens and dark browns, were veiled in shrouds of mist. They moved into the park’s obscure stillness at a brisk trot and as they did so, they heard a bagpipe faintly humming in the distance. When they came to the spot where they always began to canter up the centre of the park, The Shepherd squeezed her legs to ask the horse to gallop. They flew up the hill, hoof beats now a muted clatter on the path, mist swirling about both horse and rider. Both invigorated by their speed uphill and across open land, they penetrated a dark stand of forest. The far-off bagpipe grew louder, so they slowed to a collected canter. Suddenly they emerged from the dark wood into a small glade, mist swirling around them. They surprised the man who played his bagpipes. He had obviously chosen this woodland glade in which to practise as it was as far away as he could get from sleeping Londoners. The horse smoothly rocked the rider back and forth, very slowly prancing at the canter. He almost danced to the bagpiper’s marching tune, waited for the music to change to martial and readied himself for a cavalry charge towards enemies hidden among the wooded glade’s mist-shrouded trees. The piper played on and bowed his head to acknowledge a unique shared moment with horse and rider. He probably had not heard the galloping hooves over the musical sounds of his humming pipes. As The Shepherd rode back to the City Farm, she felt exuberant and recharged by her exceptional early morning adventure. She thrived on that day’s thrills for months afterwards.

      Returning to Marco Polo, The Shepherd had put the word out that she was looking for a companion animal for Major Beth. A friend got in touch with her and said he might have the perfect companion, a nice-looking small black Welsh Mountain pony. The only problem was that he was still a stallion. Just a few weeks earlier our pony’s rescuer, a farmer who lived on a less-travelled road – let’s call him the Gentle Man, as he would be embarrassed if we drew more attention to him – had noticed him, small and hungry, wandering the roads wearily and grazing edges and hedges. One day, as he passed the place where the pony usually nibbled, he saw a group of men trying to catch him. They tried to corner him but he always escaped at a fast gallop, head low, so no thrown rope could catch him, with a buck and a swish of his tail. Our Gentle Man was amused and secretly hoped the wee pony would continue to escape, since he knew from their distinctive overalls where those men worked. The meat factory just up the road round the corner on the hillside took in horses from all over the countryside, slaughtered them and made their meat into dog food.