Magic was so tense at first that I asked him to lunge for a bit to try to help him relax. Then I desensitized him with the stick and string. He did quite a bit better than I expected based on his behavior thus far. He was more anxious when I was on his right-- bolted forward again a couple times.
I thought I'd wrap things up by grooming him, figuring it would leave him with a nice, relaxed feeling about being in the barn. That didn't work out quite like I expected. You'd have thought I had a live snake in my hand when I approached (from the front!) with the curry comb in hand.
It was kind of funny. He tolerated the stick and string really well, but freaked out about the curry comb! Magic is a strange horse.