The lecturer on the platform lifted a protesting hand.
"You mustn't bash 'em, boy Jackson," he said. "Tain't accordin' to religion—at least not the religion what I'm here to teach you. No," said the preacher of righteousness, "you mustn't bash 'em. That'd never do."
"What then?" piped the cherub.
"You must lay for him," answered the moralist.
Alf was on his feet in a trice.
"At the Canal Turn," he chirped. "Bump him off and then jump on the flat of his face."
The moralist greeted the suggestion with warm approval.
"One up to Alfie!" he cried. "He'll make a jockey and a Christian yet, Alf will."
Ginger handed up a piece of chalk.
Jerry hushed his audience.
"Quiet now,ifyou please," said he.
He took the chalk and wrote up in sprawling letters on the board:
Bible Class.
First Question. What price Four-Pound-the-Second, Grand National?
Instantly there was a hub-bub, from which the words "Hundred to one" came with insistent force.
"Hundred to one," said the lecturer. "Thank you, genelmen."
He proceeded to write.
Second Question. Any takers?
"Yus," said the lofty Stanley. "I'll do it in dollars—twice over."
"Thankyou," said the scribe.
Third Question. What price Mocassin?
The name was received with groans.
"Sevens—if Chukkers rides," cried the cherub. "Tens if he don't."
The answer was received with jeers.
"Chukkersnotride!"
"O' course he'll ride!"
"He always has ridden her—here and in the States and in Australia!"
Stanley finally deigned to descend from his heights to crush the youth.
"They got a quarter of a million on God Almighty's Mustang, the Three J's 'ave. Think they'd trust anyone up only one of their fat selves? Now then!"
In the middle of the storm Monkey Brand, who had been waiting for the girl in the door, looked in.
He saw the writing on the board and crossed the barn. Monkey himself could neither read nor write, but he was well aware that anything written by the lads should be rubbed out at once.
"Who wrote this?" he asked.
Jerry, who on the other's entrance had descended swiftly from the platform, repeated the question.
"Who wrote this?" he asked authoritatively. "Can't you 'ear Mr. Brand?"
"Albert, I reck'n," answered Stanley, taking his cue from his pal.
The door opened, and a girl stood on the threshold.
"Who said Albert?" she asked.
The lads turned.
The young lady wore a long drab coat and had a fair pig-tail. She was like Boy Woodburn and yet unlike her: the figure much the same, the colouring identical. But if it was Boy, the years had coarsened her and altered the expression in her eyes not for the better.
With swift, decisive steps she made for the platform amid the suppressed giggles of the lads.
Jerry made way for her at once.
The girl proceeded to rub out with the duster all the questions but the first. Then she turned over the leaves of a Bible, wetting her thumb for that purpose, seized the pointer, and took her stand by the blackboard.
"The first question that arises h'out of h'our lesson to-day," she began quietly, "is this 'ere—'What price Four-Pound-the-Second?' Now think afore you answers, there's good little fellers."
It was Jerry who held up his hand.
The girl pointed at him.
"You there, Jerry me boy."
"Depends on who rides him, Mrs. Chukkers," he said.
There was a deadly silence. In it the girl let the handle of the pointer fall with the noise of a grounded rifle.
"Mrs. Who?" she asked, fatally quiet.
"Chukkers, ma'am," answered the courteous Jerry.
"Go on then," sneered the girl. "Chukkers ain't married. Nobody won't 'ave him."
Jerry had risen.
"No, ma'am. That he ain't," said the polished little gentleman. "You're his mother—from Sacramento. Anyone could see that by the likeness. You're the spit of each other, if I might make so bold. And I'm sure," said the orator, "speakin' on be'alf of all present, meself included, we feel honoured by the presence in our umble midst of the mother of the famous 'orseman—Chukkers Childers."
In the silence the speaker resumed his seat.
The lady addressed was too busy to reply.
She was taking off her drab coat, her picture hat, and her pig-tail, and she was spitting in her hands.
Soaping them together, she came to the edge of the platform.
"Shall I come down and give it you?" she asked. "Or will you come up and fetch it?"
"Neever, thank you," said Jerry, puffing imperturbably.
Albert jumped down.
"You're for it, Jerry," said Stanley, glad it was his friend's turn this time.
"Not me," Jerry replied. "No scrappin' Sunday. Miss Boy's orders."
Albert, very white, was sparring all round his adversary's head.
"Chukkered me, did ye?" he said. "Put 'em up then, or I'll spoil ye."
The offence was the unforgiveable in the Putnam stable, and the watching lads had every hope of a battle royal when a calm, deep voice stilled the storm.
"That'll do," it said.
The real Boy entered.
The dark blue of her dress showed off her fair colouring and hair.
She was nearly twenty-one now and spiritually a woman, if she still retained the slight, sword-like figure of her girlhood days. Her face was graver than of old and more quiet. The touch of almost aggressive resolution and defiance it once possessed had shaded off into something stiller and more impressive. There was less show of strength and more evidence of it. Her roots were deeper, and she was therefore less moved by passing winds. Something of her mother's calm had invaded her. She got her way just as of old, but she no longer had to battle for it now as then. Or if she had to battle, the fight was invisible, and the victory fought and won in the unseen deeps of her being.
"Who's been smoking here?" the girl asked immediately on entering the barn.
"Me, Miss," said Jerry.
Monkey Brand was fond of affirming that on the whole the lads told the truth to Miss Boy. But whether it was the girl's personality or her horsemanship that accounted for this departure from established rule it was hard to surmise.
"You might leave that to Jaggers's lads," said the girl. "Surely we might keep this one hour in the week clean."
Mr. Haggard had once said that the girl was a Greek. He might have added—a Greek with an evangelical tendency. For this Sunday morning hour was no perfunctory exercise for her. It was a reality, looming always larger with the years, and on horseback, in the train, at stables, was perpetually recurring to the girl throughout the week.
In the struggle between her father and her mother in her blood, the mother was winning the ascendancy.
"I thought the rule was we might smoke if you was late, Miss," said Jerry, in the subdued voice he always adopted when speaking to his young mistress.
"It's not the rule, Jerry," the girl replied quietly, "as you're perfectly well aware. And even if it was the rule it would be bad manners. Alfred, give me those cards."
"What cards, Miss?"
"The cards you were playing with when I came in."
The cherub produced a dingy pack.
"They're only picture cards, Miss," he said.
The girl's gray eyes seemed to engulf the lad, friendly if a little stern.
"Have you been gambling?" she asked.
"No, Miss," with obvious truthfulness.
"He's got nothin' to gamble with," jeered the brutal Stanley. "His mother takes it all."
The girl mounted swiftly on to the platform, saw the writing on the blackboard, and swept it away with a duster.
Then she turned to her little congregation, feeling their temper with sure and sensitive spirit.
They were out of hand, and it was because she had been late through no fault of her own. The kitchenmaid had fainted, and Boy had, of course, been sent for.
There was one hope of steadying them.
"We'll start with a hymn," she said, taking her seat at the harmonium. "Get your hymn-books. What hymn shall we have? Alfred, it's your turn, I think."
Alfred, after some hesitation, gaveThe Day Thou Gavest Lord Is Ended, amid the jealous murmurs of his friend.
"That's a nevenin nymn, fat-'ead," cried Jerry in a loud whisper.
"I don't care if it is," answered Alf stoutly. "It's nice."
"'E likes it because it makes him cry," jeered Stanley.
The girl started to play, her back to the congregation.
They sang two verses with round mouths, Jerry and Stanley shouting against each other aggressively and wagging their heads. The third verse went less well. There were interruptions. The voices grew ragged. Jerry spoke; somebody whistled; and the singing ran away into giggles.
Boy swung round.
The cause of the merriment was sufficiently obvious.
A lop-eared Belgian rabbit was hopping across the floor, entirely self-complacent and smug. As the sound of singing, which had covered him like a garment, died away in smothered titters, he sat up on his hind-legs and stared about him.
The girl descended from the platform, caught the rabbit by the ears and suspended him.
Tame as a cow, he made no resistance.
"Who's is this hare?" she asked.
"Mrs. Woodburn's, Miss," answered Jerry brightly. "That's Abe Lincoln. Queen Victoria's his wife. They lives together in a nutch."
"How did he come in?"
"Through the window," said the muffled voice of Albert from the back. "Flow'd."
The rabbit, which had been hanging placidly suspended, was now seized with spasms and began to twitch and contort violently.
The reason was not far to seek. A red-eyed ferret, tied by a string to the foot of a chair, was making strenuous efforts to get at him.
"Who's is that ferret?" asked Boy.
"That genelman's," replied the voice from the back.
The girl looked up and saw Silver standing in the door.
Coldly she dismissed the class.
"That'll do," she said. "You can all go now." The lads shuffled away, rejoicing. "There'll be no sing-song this evening," continued their cruel mistress. "Jerry, put that rabbit back in the hutch you took it from. Stanley, I don't want to see that ferret of yours at Bible Class again."
The lads trooped out, injured and innocent.
Albert was left in his shirt-sleeves and without a collar.
"What is it?" asked the girl.
"Can I 'ave me things, Miss?"
His face was stiff and impenetrable.
She handed him the long drab coat on the platform.
"And me 'at, Miss."
"Is this yours?"
"Yes, Miss."
She passed him the picture-hat. Albert received it with immobile face.
"And me pig-tail."
"You don't deserve it," said Boy.
Silver approached.
"Put 'em on, will you?" he said.
Albert obeyed without demur and without a symptom of emotion. In a moment he had become a coarse caricature of his young mistress, ludicrously alike and yet worlds away.
"Not so bad," commented the young man. "You could act, Albert?"
"Yes, sir," said Albert, in whom diffidence was not a defect.
The lad made for the door in his hat and pig-tail, and as though to manifest his quality gave a little coquettish flirt to the skirt of his coat as he went out.
"You'll be wanted this morning, Albert, you and Brand," the girl called after him.
"Yes, Miss."
"Mare's Back. Twelve-thirty. Make-Way-There and Lollypop, trial horses. Stanley and Jerry know. Silvertail for me."
"Yes, Miss."
He closed the door behind him.
Silver came toward the girl slowly and took her hand.
"How are you, Boy?" he asked.
The girl laid her firm, cool little hand lightly on his and let it rest there. Her eyes were soft in his, still and steady. She felt herself surrounded by his love as by a cloud, and dwelt in it with quiet enjoyment and content.
It was a while before she answered.
"I'm all right," she said. "You're through, aren't you?"
"Yes; I'm free."
"That's right," she said. "The rest doesn't matter."
Together they went out into the sunshine of the Paddock Close.
He stood a moment, filling his chest, and looking up toward the green wall of the Downs.
"Let's go slow," he said.
She accommodated herself to his stroll.
"By Jove," he said slowly. "Itisa delight to get down here again. And I don't feel anything's changed really."
"Nor has itreally," replied the girl.
Jim Silver turned out of the yard into the office.
As the young man entered, the old trainer sat dumped in his chair, rosy, bald, with innocent blue eyes, like a baby without a bib, waiting for its bottle. His round head was deeper between his shoulders than of old, and his pink face was strained and solicitous.
Some men said he was over eighty now.
"Well, sir," he wheezed, "I see you take it good and game."
"No good crying over spilt milk," replied Silver.
The old trainer raised his hand as he settled in his seat.
"Don't tell me," he said. "It's them there li'bilities. I was always agin 'em. Said so to Boy four year back. 'Cash in 'and's one thing,' I says. 'And li'bilities is another and totally different.'" He lifted a keen blue eye. "I understand from what Mr. Haggard tell me, you could ha' dodged 'em out o' some of it—only you was too straight." He held up a disapproving finger. "That's just where you done wrong, Mr. Silver. No good ever come o' bein'toostraight, as I often says to Mar. You're only askin' for trouble—same as the Psalmist says. And now you got to pay for it."
"Well, they're all satisfied now," laughed Silver. "And so am I."
"I should think they was," snorted Mat Woodburn. "I see 'em settin' round, swellin' and swellin', and rubbin' their fat paunches. Think they'll keep a nag among the lot of 'em! Not so much as a broken-down towel-hoss."
Silver stared out of the window.
"I shall have to sell the horses," he said.
The old man banged the table.
"Never!" he cried. "They've took a slice off o' you, and now you must take a bit off o' them. That mayn't be religion, but it'srightall right!"
He rose and, kicking off his slippers, padded to the door and looked out. Then he peeped out into the forsaken yard and half drew the curtain.
Silver, who loved the old man most when he was most mysterious, watched him with kind eyes that laughed.
"I don't bet, Mr. Silver, as you know," began the other huskily, "except when it's a cert., because it's againstherprinciples." He looked round him and dropped his voice. "But I took a thousand to ten about Fo'-Pound-the-Second at Gatwick on Saraday. Told Mar, too. And she never said No. Look to me like a sign like." He blinked up at the young man. "You ain't clean'd out, sir, are you—not mopped up with the sponge?" he asked anxiously.
"There'll be a few thousands left when it's finished, I guess," replied the other.
The old man lifted on his stockinged toes.
"Put a thousand on," he whispered. "I'll do it for ye, so there's no talk. If he wins, thar's a hundred thousand back. If he don't, well, it's gone down the sink and h'up the spout same as its fathers afore it."
The young man brimmed with quiet mirth.
"Will he win?" he asked.
Old Mat swung his nose from side to side across his face in a way styled by those who knew him trunk-slinging.
"He's up against something mighty big," said Jim, nodding at the wall.
On it was pinned a great coloured double-page picture fromThe Sporting and Dramaticof the famous American mare Mocassin. Beside it were various cuttings from daily papers, recounting the romantic history of the popular favourite, and beneath the picture were three lines from the Mocassin Song—
Made in the mould,Of Old Iroquois bold,Mocassin, the Queen of Kentucky.
Ikey indeed had found his horse at last; and she was American—Old Kentucky to the core. It was said that Chukkers had discovered her on one of his trips home. Certainly he had taken her across to Australia, where she had launched on her career of unbroken triumph, carrying the star-spangled jacket to victory in every race in which she ran. Then he had brought her home to England, her reputation already made, and growing hugely all the while, suddenly to overwhelm the world, when she crowned her victories on three continents by winning the Grand National at Liverpool—only to be disqualified for crossing amid one of the stormiest scenes in racing history. After that Mocassin ceased to be a mare. She became a talisman, an oriflamme, a consecrated symbol. She was American—youthful, hopeful, not to be put upon by the Old Country, quietly resolute to have her rights.
For the past twelve months indeed the Great Republic of the West had fixed her two hundred million eyes upon the star-spangled jacket across the sea in a stare so set as to be almost terrifying.
True that for a quarter of a century now her sons had followed that jacket with sporadic interest. But since the affair at Liverpool, that interest had become concentrated, passionate, intense.
Ikey with all his faults was an admirable citizen, beloved in his own country and not without cause, as Universities and Public Bodies innumerable could testify. For twenty-five years it had been known that he had been trying for a goal. At last he had won it—and then John Bull!... Ya-as.... American horse—American owner—American jockey! Sure....
Brother Jonathon turned in his lips. He did not blame John Bull; he was not angry or resentful. But he was determined and above all ironical.
Then, when feeling was at its highest, the Mocassin Song had suddenly taken America by storm. Sung first in the Empire Theatre on the Broadway by Abe Gideon, the bark-blocks comedian, ten days after the mare's victory and defeat, it had raged through the land like a prairie fire. Cattle-men on the Mexican Border sung it in the chaparral, and the lumber-camps by the Great Lakes echoed it at night. Gramophones carried it up and down the Continent from Oyster Bay to Vancouver, and from Frisco to New Orleans. Every street-boy whistled it, every organ ground it out. It hummed in the heads of Senators in Congress, and teased saints upon their knees. It carried the name and fame of Mocassin to thousands of pious homes in which horses and racing had been anathema in the past, so that Ministers from Salem and Quaker ladies from Philadelphia could tell you over tea cupssotto vocesomething of the romantic story of the mare from the Cumberland.
And that was not all.
The Song, raging through the land like a bush-fire, dying down here only to burst out in fresh vehemence elsewhere, leapt even oceans in its tempestuous course.
The English sang it in their music-halls with fatuous self-complacency. Indeed they, too, went Mocassin-mad, and the mare who had once already humbled the Old Country in the dust, and would again, became the idol of the British Empire.
In shop-windows, on boardings, stamped on the packet of cigarettes you bought, the picture of the mare was met, until her keen mouse-head, her drooping quarters and great fore-hand, had been impressed on the mind of the English Public as clearly as the features of Lord Kitchener. Jonathon watched his brother across the Atlantic with cynical amusement.
Honest John Bull, now that he had something up against him that could beat his best, what did he do? Admit defeat? Not John! If the mare won in the coming struggle he claimed her as his own with tears of unctuous joy. If she was beaten—well, what else did you expect?
America's feeling in the matter was summed up in the famous cartoon that appeared at Christmas inLife, where Jonathon was seen shaking hands with John Bull, the mare in the background, and saying:
"I'll believe in you, John, but I'll watch you all the same."
"That's God Almighty's Mustang, Chukkers up," said Old Mat. "The Three J's think they done it this time. And to read the papers you'd guess they was right. She's a good mare, too—I will say that for her; quick as a kitten and the heart of a lion. You see her last year yourself at Aintree, sir!"
"I did," replied the young man, with deep enthusiasm. "Wonderful! She didn't gallop and jump; she flowed and she flew."
"That's it, sir," agreed the other. "Won all the way. Only Chukkers must be a bit too clever o' course, and let her down by the dirty."
The old man pursed his lips and nodded confidentially. "Only one thing. My little Fo'-Pound's the daddy o' her." He sat down and began to draw on his elastic-sided boots with groans.
"Who's going to ride him?" asked Silver.
"That's where it is, sir," panted the old man. "Whoisgoin' to ride him. There's Monkey Brand down on his knees to me for the mount; and he don't go so bad with Monkey Brand—when he's that way inclined. But I don't know what to say." His efforts successfully ended, he lifted a round and crimson face. "See where it is, Mr. Silver; Monkey Brand's forty-five, and his ridin' days are pretty nigh over. He reckons he can just about win on Fo'-Pound and then retire. That's his notion. And ye see it ain't only that, but there's Chukkers and the little bit o' bitterness. See it's been goin' on twenty year and it's all square now. Chukkers broke Monkey's pelvis for him Boomerang's year, and Monkey mixed up Chukkers's inside Cannibal's National. And there it's stood ever since. And Monkey wants to get one up afore he takes off his jacket for good."
Silver was looking into the fire.
"If Monkey Brand don't ride, what's the alternative?" he asked.
"Only one," replied the trainer. "Albert. He's a honest hoss is Fo'-Pound-the-Second, only that fussy as to who he has about him. That's the way with bottle-fed uns. They gets spoiled and gives 'emselves airs. Albert's his lad, and Monkey's been about him since he was a foal. Sometimes he'll work for one, and sometimes for the other; and sometimes he won't for eether. One thing certain, he won't stir for no one else—onlyher, o' course. No muckin' about withher. It's justclick!and away."
"Pity she can't ride," said Silver.
"If she could ride I'd back him till all was blue," replied the old man. "No proposition in a hoss's skin that ever come out of Yankee-doodle-land could see the way he'd go."
"Who rode him at Lingfield?" asked Jim.
Just after Christmas Mat had put the young horse into a two-mile steeplechase to give him a gallop in public.
"Albert," answered the old man. "Rode him and rode him well. It was just touch and go through. Would he or wouldn't he? When he was monkeyin' at the post I tell you I sweat, sir. See he'd never faced the starter afore. And I thought suppose he's the sort that'll do a good trial and chuck it when the money's on. He got well left at the post; but when he did get goin' he ran a great horse. It was heavy goin', and he fair revelled in it. 'Reg'lar mudlark,' the papers called him. Half-way round he'd caught his horses and went through 'em like a knife through butter, and he could ha' left 'em smilin'. But that lad, Albert, he's got something better'n a sheep's head on his neck. Took to his whip and flogg'd his boot a caution. Oh, dear me!—fair sat down to it. All over the place, arms and legs, and such a face on him! And little Fo'-Pound he winks to 'isself and rolls 'ome at the top of his form just anyhow. 'Alf a length the judges gave it, and a punishin' finish the papers called it. Jaggers didn't see it, and Chukkers wasn't ridin'. So there was nobody to tell no tales; an' they're puttin' him in at ten stone."
"And the mare's got twelve-seven," said the young man meditatively.
"Twelve-three," said the trainer. "And she'll carry it, too. But I'll back my Berserk against their Iroquois any time o' day this side o' 'Appy Alleloojah Land."
The hacks were being led out into the yard with a pleasant clatter of feet, and Boy was already mounted.
"Come and see for yourself," panted the old man. "I'm goin' to send him along to-day. See whether he can reelly get four mile without a fuss. I was only waitin' till you come."
The old man, the young man, and the girl rode out of the yard into the Paddock Close.
"Where's Billy Bluff?" asked Silver. He was on Heart of Oak, she high above him, perched like a bird on tall old Silvertail, who looked like a spinster and was one. Almost you expected her to look at you over spectacles and make an acrid comment on men or things.
"In front with his friend," replied Boy.
"Are you going to pace him?" asked Jim.
"I believe so," replied the girl casually. "Dad's going to send him the full course to-day. Jerry and I are to take him over the fences the first time round. And then Stanley's to bring him along the flat the last two miles."
They travelled up the public path past the church amid the sycamores. Mat on his fast-walking cob rode in front, kicking his legs. Boy and Jim followed more soberly.
She rode a little behind him that she might see his profile. Suddenly he reined back and met her face, his own gleaming with laughter. At such moments he looked absurdly young.
"I say, Boy!" he began, dropping his voice.
She snatched her eyes from his face, and then peeped at him warily.
"What?"
He drew up beside her.
"I'm not a gentleman any more."
She looked straight before her. Her fine lips were firm and resisting, but about her eyes the light stole and rippled deliciously.
"I'm not sure," she said, half to herself.
He pressed up alongside her, lifting his face.
"I'm not!" he cried. "I'm not!" eager as a boy in his protestations. "You can't chuck that up at me any more."
Boy refused to face him or to be convinced.
"I don't," she said. "I don't believe in class. It's the man that matters."
"Hear, hear," he cried. "It's the man—not the money. I see it now. I haven't got tuppence to my name."
She turned her eyes down on him, brushing aside his coquetry with the sweep of her steady gaze.
"D'you mind?" she asked in her direct and simple way as they emerged on to the open Downs.
He sobered to her mood.
"Only in this way," he answered, "that it was my father's show, and I don't like to have let it down."
The girl deliberated.
"I don't see that you could have helped it," she said after a pause.
"No,Icouldn't," he admitted. "Hecould have. It was a One Man show. And when the One Man went it was bound to go in time. However, I've let nobody down but myself. And I don't care so much about the stuff."
"No," she said. "You don't want all that. Nobody does; and it's not good for you."
Preacher Joe had bobbed up suddenly in his fair grand-daughter, as he did not seldom. She was deliciously unaware of the old man's presence at her side; but Jim Silver welcomed him as a familiar with lurking laughter.
"Thank you, sir," he said, and touched his hat. Then he covered his daring swiftly. "Except for the horses I wouldn't cuc-care a hang," he said loudly. "They were the only things mum-money gave me."
Gravely she peeped at him again.
"Shall you sell the lot?"
"I shall sell the 'chasers," he answered.
"All but one," she corrected.
"Which one?"
She nodded up the hill.
"The one you share with me."
He laughed his resounding laughter.
"I'll sell you my share," he said.
"I won't buy," she answered firmly.
"Very well. Then I'll sell to Jaggers."
Boy tapped Silvertail with such an increase of emphasis that the old mare snatched resentfully at her bit.
"You won't," she cried with the old fierce, girlish note in her voice which so delighted him.
"Afterhe's won the National," continued the young man calmly.
"We'll see—after," replied Boy.
They passed out of the Paddock Close on to the Downs.
"How's he coming on?" asked Jim.
"Monkey Brand says he's streets better than Cannibal," replied the girl. "We've never had anything to touch him in my time." This was one of few subjects on which the girl sometimes would flow. "Of course he's young for a National horse—only five, and she's in her prime. But he's got the head of an old horse on the body of a young one. Nothing flurries him—once you can get him going."
"And the trouble is there's only one person who can get him going," mused the young man.
"I don't know about that," she answered tartly. "He's only run the once in public. And that time he ran rings round his field. Albert was riding—not me."
They were nearing the brow.
A man was labouring up the hill in front of them.
Old Mat pulled up, and the pair jogged up alongside him. The trainer nodded quietly at the heavy figure in front.
"He's out," he wheezed. "On to it pretty quick, too. Heard we're goin' to gallop Fo'-Pound and he's come to see what he can see."
The man drew to one side to let the riders pass.
It was Joses; and he had changed.
There was less of the sow and more of the wolf about him than of old. His shaggy whiskers were touched with gray, and there was something hard and fierce about his face. The old inflamed and flabby look had been hammered out of him in the hard school from which he had just emerged.
He eyed the riders as they passed.
Boy's grave eyes became graver and more self-contained. At once she was alert and had locked all her doors. In that firm, courageous face of hers there was no curiosity, no unkindness, and least of all no fear. The young man glancing at her thought he had never seen such strength manifest in any face; and it was not the strength that is based on hardness, for she was paler than her wont.
Then she spoke.
Her voice, deep as a bell and very quiet, surprised him in the silence. He had not expected it, and yet somehow it seemed to him beautifully appropriate.
"Good morning, Mr. Joses," said the voice, and that was all; but it wrought a miracle.
"Yes," growled the man in the wayside, "it wasn't you: it was Silver."
The young man's face flashed white. He pulled up instantaneously.
"What's that?" he said.
Boy, riding on, called sharply over her shoulder:
"Come on, Mr. Silver!"
Reluctant as a dog to leave an enemy, the young man obeyed, and caught up the other two.
"Little bit o' bitter," muttered the old man. He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "I got him five year for himself," he went on querulously. "And now he ain't satisfied. No pleasin' some folk."
On the Mare's Back a little group was awaiting the party.
There was Monkey Brand, Albert, and a sheeted horse, patrolling lazily up and down; while Billy Bluff lay on the ground hard by and gnawed his paw.
Ever since, years back, Joses had struck the paw with a stone Billy had bestowed a quite unfair amount of attention on it, spending all his spare time doctoring his favourite. There was nothing whatever the matter with it, but if he continued his attentions long enough there might be some day, and he would then be rewarded for his patient labours by having a real injury to mend.
It was somewhat misty up there on the hill, though clear above; the sea was wrapt in a white blanket, and the Coastguard Station at the Gap was invisible.
A little remote from the others in body and spirit, Jerry, deep in philosophic doubt, was walking Lollypop up and down—Lollypop, now a sage and rather superior veteran of seven; while on a mound hard by was Stanley on the pretty Make-Way-There.
The course was two miles round, running along the top of the hill over fences that looked stark and formidable in the gray.
"Strip him," grunted Old Mat.
Albert and Monkey Brand went swiftly to work.
A great brown horse, gaunt and ugly as a mountain-goat, emerged. His legs were like palings; his ears long and wide apart, and there was something immensely masculine about him. He looked, with his great plain head, the embodiment of Work and Character: a piece of old furniture designed for use and not for ornament, massive, many-cornered, and shining from centuries of work and wear.
That lean head of his, hollow above the eyes, and with a pendent upper lip, was so ugly as to be almost laughable; and his lazy and luminous eye looked out on the world with a drolling, almost satirical, air, as much as to say:
"It's all a great bore, but it might well be worse."
"A thundering great hoss," muttered Old Mat. "I don't know as ever I see his equal for power. Cannibal stood as high, but he hadn't the girth on him. And Cannibal was a man-eatin' mule, he was. Savage you soon as look at you. I never went into his loose-box without a pitchfork. I seen him pull his jockey off by the toe of his boot afore now. But him!—he's a Christian. A child could go in to him and climb on to his back by way of his hind-leg. Look at them 'ocks," he continued in the low, musing voice of the mystic. "Lift you over a house. And a head on him like a pippopotamus."
Jim Silver's eyes followed the line of the horse's quarters.
"He's come on a lot since Christmas," he remarked. "He's less ragged than he was."
"You could hang your hat on him yet, though," said the old man. "Walk him round, Brand."
The little jockey, now in the saddle, obeyed.
Four-Pound-the-Second shook his head and, blowing his nose, strode round with that wonderful swing from the hocks which made Mr. Haggard once say that the horse walked like a Highland regiment marching to the pipes.
"He's on C springs," said Mat, watching critically. "See where he puts his hind-feet—nigh a foot in front of the marks of his fore; and I don't know as I knows a knowin'er hoss. Look at that head-piece. He's all the while a-thinkin', that hoss is. That's the way he's bred. If they're much with human beings they picks up our tricks, same as dogs. He'd take to drink, he would, only he ain't got the cash."
Boy had stripped off her long riding-coat and sat on the tall Silvertail, a slight figure in breeches and boots, her white shirt fluttering in the wind, her face calm and resolute.
Mat kicked his pony forward.
"Four-mile spin and let him spread himself," he grunted. "I want to see him move to-day. And you, Jerry, ride that Lollypop out. He'll save himself if you'll let him. First time round over fences, Boy. Then you and Jerry'll pull out and Stanley'll pick up the running and take him round again over the flat. Now!"
Boy and Jerry set their horses going quietly. The girl's head was on her shoulder, watching if the horse she was to pace was coming along.
He was thinking about it. Monkey Brand, handling him with the wonderful tact of a nurse with a delicate child, gathered the great horse quietly, clicking at him. Four-Pound-the-Second broke into a reluctant canter. Billy Bluff began to romp and bark.
The young horse had found the excuse he sought, swung away from his leader, and began to buck round in a circle, propping and plunging.
"Put the dog on the lead, Albert," ordered the girl, trotting back.
She and Jerry tried again, cantering past the rebel, calling and coaxing.
Four-Pound-the-Second went marching round in a circle, champing at his bit, thrashing with his tail, and every now and then flinging a make-believe buck, as much as to say:
"I could throw you if I would, but I won't, because I like you too much."
Monkey Brand, wise and patient, humoured him.
"Let him take his time," called Boy. "Steady, lad, steady!"
Old Mat watched grimly.
"I thought as much," he muttered. "He ain't 'alf a little rogue. 'Tain't temper, eether. He's the temper of a h'angel and the constitootion of a h'ox. It's that he just won't. For all the world like a great spoilt boy. He'smischeevous. He wants to give trouble because that amooses him. I've known him sulk in his gallop afore now because Billy Bluff wasn't up here to watch him. Where it is to-day he wantsherto ride him. He don't care about nobody else whenshe'sabout."
Boy had ridden back to the young horse.
"Steady him," she said quietly. "Get up alongside him, Jerry. Now try and get him off the mark with me. All together. Now!"
The manoeuvre failed. Lollypop and Silvertail got well away, but the young horse merely pawed the air.
Monkey Brand's face was set.
"Give me that whip, Albert," he said between his teeth.
"No," said the girl. "That's no good."
Old Mat held up his hand.
"He ain't for it," he said masterfully. "Get off him, Brand."
The little jockey glanced at his master, saw he meant business, and slipped off the great horse, chagrin in every line of his face.
Albert, unbidden, had already gathered the reins in his hand and was preparing to mount.
"No," said Boy authoritatively. "Albert, take Silvertail."
She slipped off the tall old mare.
Her father nodded approval.
"She's right," he muttered. "Never do to try Albert when Brand has failed."
"Chuck me up, Brand," said the girl.
The little jockey turned.
"Yes, Miss."
The girl had broken the blow for him, and he tossed her into the saddle with a will.
She sat up there on the great horse, ordering her reins with masterful delicacy.
Jim Silver's eyes dwelt tenderly upon her face. He longed to dismount and kiss the girl's hand. But all he said in matter-of-fact voice was:
"You've got a lot in front of you."
"It's like a glacier," replied Boy.
"She could slide on that shoulder," commented Old Mat. "Like Napoleon on the Pyramids."
The young horse began to sidle and plunge.
"Right!" said Boy. "Stand clear!"
The little jockey jumped aside, and mounted Silvertail.
Four-Pound-the-Second gave a great bound. The girl rode him as a yacht rides the sea, swinging easily to his motion, and talking to him the while. He sprawled around with tiny bucks and little grunts of joy, brimming over with energy.
Then, as if by magic, he steadied down and began to walk round with that tremendous swing of his, blowing his nose, and playing with his bit. David had swept his hand across his harp and the dark spirit had been charmed away.
Old Mat nodded and said to himself: "Where it is, is there it is."
Nobody else spoke.
Boy, in her white shirt, her hair radiant against the dull heavens, began to feel at her horse's mouth.
Monkey Brand and Jerry watched her closely.
"Keep walking in front of me," called the girl sharply. "And move with me."
Both obeyed, eyeing the girl over their shoulders, and slowly gathering way.
Then she spoke to her horse; and he stole away, easy and quiet as a tide, Boy leaning forward, the two pacing horses, one on either side, leading him by half a length.
"Yes," commented Old Mat, as he slung his glasses round and adjusted them. "You'd think a little child could ride him be the look of it."
The three rose at the first fence all together, the white shirt sandwiched between the dark jackets.
Jim Silver felt a thrill at his heart. That thunder of hoofs moved him to his deeps.
"Gallops very wide behind," he remarked casually.
"That's Berserk, that is," muttered the old man, adjusting his glasses. "Chucks the mud about a treat, don't he?"
Billy Bluff was straining on his lead, whimpering to be after his big friend, while Albert leaned back against the wind, holding him.
The horses had settled to their gallop, their steady, rhythmical stride only varied as they rose at their fences, spread themselves, slid earthward and went away again with a steady roar of hoofs.
The three kept well together till they swung for home, then the white shirt began to bob up against the sky a second before the dark bodies of the other two showed.
"Tailin' 'em off," muttered Old Mat. "Ain't 'alf tuckin' into it, Four-Pound ain't."
Then Lollypop began to lag, and Jerry's arm was going.
"Stopped him dead," said Silver.
"And he's a good little two-mile hoss, too," replied Old Mat.
Another moment and the white shirt came over the last fence, the brown horse soaring like some great eagle.
Silvertail, clinging gamely to her leader, brushed through the fence and pecked heavily on landing.
Monkey punished her savagely.
"Ain't in a very pretty temper, Monkey ain't," muttered Old Mat, as the little jockey pulled aside and slipped off. "Now Make-Way-There'll take it up."
The brown horse came thundering by, steady and strong, his little jockey collected as himself, lying out over her horse's neck.
"The fences don't trouble her much," said Silver, his voice calm and heart beating.
"See, she's that strong," wheezed Old Mat confidentially. "You wouldn't think it, but there's eight stun o' that gal good. It's her bone's so big."
The brown horse had swept past them, going wide of the fences for the second time round.
Make-Way-There, who had been dancing on his toes away on the left as he waited for his cue, chimed in as Four-Pound-the-Second came up alongside him.
He settled down to his stride at once and took the lead.
The brown horse, entirely undisturbed by this new rival, held on his mighty way.
The two horses swung round the curve, on the outside of the fences, Four-Pound-the-Second on the inside berth and close to the quarters of his leader.
The horses dropped into a dip, but for some reason the echo of their hoofs came reverberating back to the watchers in ever-growing roar. When they emerged from the hollow and raced up the opposite slope they were still together.
Then they made for home.
Old Mat had edged up alongside Silver.
"When he lays down to it, belly all along the ground!" he whispered, in the ecstasy of a connoisseur enjoying a masterpiece.
"Whew!—can't he streak!" cried Albert.
Then a silence fell upon the watchers like a cloud. Their hearts were full, their spirits fluttering against the bars of their prison-house.
The horses dropped into a dip again, and only the heads and shoulders of the riders were seen surging forward, borne on the crest of a roaring avalanche of sound.
As they came up the last hill with shooting feet and knees that buffeted the air, they were locked together, the little riders lying over the necks of their horses and watching each other jealously.
In the silence there was something terrifying about the tumult of those swift, oncoming feet. The earth shook and trembled. Even Billy Bluff was awed and quivering.
Jim Silver never took his eyes off that little figure with the fluttering white shirt riding the crest of the oncoming storm and growing on him with such overwhelming speed. He dwelt with fascinated eyes upon the give-and-take of her little hands, the set of her shoulders, the swift turn of her head, as she watched the boy at her side. His will was firm, his heart high. She seemed to him so fair, so slight, and yet so consummately masterful, as to be something more than flesh and blood.
A rare voice penetrated to his ears through the tumult.
"That's a little bit o' better."
"Ain't it a cracker?"
"Hold that dog!"
As they came along the flat, the two horses seemed neck and neck.
The dark lad was riding a finish in approved style. Then the girl stirred with her hands, and the great brown forged ahead.
As the horses came past the watchers, Make-Way-There tailed off suddenly.
Four-Pound-the-Second thundered by like a brown torrent, the stroke of his hoofs making a mighty music.
"Gallops like a railway train," said a voice at Silver's side.
It was Joses.
The young man, lifted above himself, did not resent the other's presence at his side, did not wonder at it. Indeed, it seemed to him quite natural. The wonder of Infinite Power made manifest in flesh rapt the beholders out of themselves. They stood bare-headed in the presence of the abiding miracle, made one by it.
"Can she hold him?" thought Silver as the horse shot past them.
And either he expressed his thoughts unconsciously in words, or as not seldom happens in moments of excitement, Old Mat read his unuttered thoughts.
"She can hold him in a snaffle," he said. "She's the only one as can!"
And in fact the young horse was coming back to his rider. She was swinging to steady him. At the top of the rise she turned him, dismounted, and loosed his girths. Then she led him down the slope back to the group, an alert, fair figure, touched to glory by the gallop, the great horse blowing uproariously at her side, tossing his head and flinging the foam on to his chest and neck, looking like a huge, drenched dog wet from the sea.
"Pull at ye?" asked the old man.
"He caught hold a bit as we came up the slope," answered Boy.
Jim Silver had dismounted and laid a hand on the horse's shining neck.
"Great," he said.
The faint colour was in the girl's cheeks, and she was breathing deep as she peeped up at him with happy eyes.
"He's not clumsy for a big horse, is he?" she said. "Rug him up, Albert, and lead him home. He's hit himself, I see—that off-fore fetlock. Better put a boracic bandage on when you get him in."
She put on her long coat and mounted Silvertail.
"Yes, don't stand about," said her father; "or you'll have Mar on to me."
The three moved off the hill.
Stanley had already gone on with Make-Way-There, and Albert followed with the young horse still snorting and blowing.
Billy Bluff patrolled between his mistress and his friend, doing his best to keep the two parties together.
Monkey Brand was left alone.
"Took it 'ard!" muttered Old Mat, jerking his head.
"He'll be all right," said Boy, glancing back. "Give him time to get his second wind."
The little jockey went back to pick up a plate Make-Way-There had dropped.
Joses strolled up to him with portentous brow.
"Turned you down!" he said. "You're not horseman enough for them, it seems."
The little man gathered himself. He was very grim, curling his lips inward and whistling between his teeth as though to relieve inward pressure.
"How long have you ridden for 'em?" asked the fat man.
"Twenty-five year," the other answered, with the quiet of one labouring under a great emotion.
The other rumbled out his ironical laughter.
"And now they chuck you," he said. "Too old at forty. What?"
The little man spat on the ground.
"Blast 'em," he said. "Blast you. Blast the lot. It's a bloody world."
Boy did not appear at dinner.
The midday meal, especially on Sunday, she generally skipped.
Old Mat, Ma, and Silver lunched together and in silence.
The old trainer was absorbed in himself, and there was no question that he found himself exceedingly good company. His face became pink and his eye wet with the excellence of the joke he was brewing in his deeps. He slobbered over his food and spilt it. Mrs. Woodburn watched him with amused sympathy.
"You've been up to something you shouldn't, dad," she said. "I know you."
He held up a shaking hand in protest.
"Now don't you, Mar!" he said. "I been to church—that's all I done. Mr. Haggard preach a booriffle sermon on the 'Oly Innocents. 'There's some is saints,' he says, and he looks full glare at me; 'and there's some as isn't.' And he looks at his missus. 'There's some as is where they ought to be Sundays,' and he looks full glare at me. 'And there's some as isn't.' And he stares at the empty seat aside o' me. Yes, my dear, you'll cop it on the crumpet to-morrow when he comes to see you, and you'll deserve it, too."
After lunch, as the old man left the room, he beckoned mysteriously to Silver, and toddled away down the passage with hunched shoulders to his sanctum.
The young man followed him with amused eyes. He knew very well what was coming.
Once inside his office, Mat closed the door in his most secretive way.
"Only one thing for it," he whispered hoarsely. "The gal must ride."
Silver stared out of the window.
"But will she?"
The old man messed with his papers.
"She mayn't for me," he mumbled. "She might for someone—to help him out of a hole. I'll try her anyway. If she will I'll put a thousand on myself."
An hour later Silver was smoking a cigarette in the darkness of the wainscoted dining room, when the door burst open.
Boy came in upon him swift and radiant. She was in her blue skirt and blouse again, and her hair was like a halo against the dark wainscoting. The glory of the gallop was still upon her.
He rose to her, challenged and challenging.
She crossed the room to him, and stood with her hand on the mantelpiece. She did not laugh, she did not even smile, but there was in her the deep and quiet ecstasy that causes the thorn to blossom in beauty after a winter of reserve. It seemed to him that she was swaying as a rose sways in a gale, yet anchored always to the earth in perfect self-possession.
As always, she came straight to the point.
"Do you want me to ride him in the National?" she asked.
"I don't mind," he answered nonchalantly.
"Have you backed him?"
"Not yet."
"Are you going to?"
"I might—if I can get a hundred thousand to a thousand about him."
Her gray eyes searched him. Not a corner of him but her questioning spirit ransacked it.
"How much money have you got left?"
"When all's squared? a few thousand, I believe."
She looked into the fire, one little foot poised on the fender. He was provoking her. She felt it.
"I could just about win on him," she said. "I think."
"I'm not so sure," he answered.
She became defiant in a flash.
"One thing," she said, "I'm sure nobody else could."
He followed up his advantage deliberately.
"I'm not so sure," he said.
Her eyes sparkled frostily.
She understood.
He was furious because her father had spoken to her; resentful that in her hands should be the winning for him of a potential fortune.
She would show him.
"I might think of riding him perhaps," she said slowly, "on one condition."
"What's that?"
"That you don't bet on him."
He rolled off into deep, ironical laughter.
"Done with you!" he cried, holding out his hand.
She brushed it aside.
"What I said was that Imight thinkof it," she said, and made for the door.
He did not pursue.
"Oh, do!" he cried lazily. "Do!"
"I shall see," she answered. "I might and I might not. Probably the latter."
She went out with firm lips.
"I see what it is!" he cried after her, still ironical.
She turned about.
"What?"
"You're afraid of Aintree."
The girl, who in many matters was still a child, flared at once.
"Afraid of Aintree!" she cried. "I'll show you whether I'm afraid of Aintree or not!"
She marched down the passage, pursued by his mocking laughter, and went out into the yard with nodding head and flashing eyes.
Then she walked to the gate and looked across the Paddock Close.
Mr. Haggard was walking slowly up toward the church to take the children's service. On the public path by the stile were two figures engaged in conversation. She recognized them at once. They were Joses and Monkey Brand.
Thoughtfully she crossed into the stable.
It was Sunday afternoon, and there was nobody about but Maudie, who departed coldly on the entrance of the girl, suspecting trouble. Maudie's suspicions were but too well-founded.
The girl went straight to Four-Pound-the-Second's loose-box and opened it. The Monster-without-Manners emerged and greeted his mistress with yawns. The brown horse with the tan muzzle shifted slowly toward her. She ran her eye over him, adjusted a bandage, and went out into the yard.
Billy accompanied her, for he always passed his Sunday afternoons with his mistress.
As she left the stable Monkey Brand was entering the yard.
"What was Joses saying, Brand?" she asked sharply.
The little man did not seem to see or hear her. But as he passed her, she thought he dropped an eyelid. Then he limped swiftly on into the saddle-room.
Boy, balancing on the ladder, looked after him.
Then she went up into the loft, Billy Bluff at her heels trying with whimpers to thrust by that he might hold communion with fair Maudie on the top rung.
Maudie watched the approaching feet with sullen and apathetic disdain. When they were almost on her she rose suddenly. The languid lady with the manners of a West-End drawing-room became the screaming fish-wife of Wapping. She humped, swore, and scampered away to the loft, there to establish herself upon a cross-beam, where she was proof against assault.
Boy crossed the loft, entered her room, and closed the door.
She glanced out of the window.
Joses was crossing the Paddock Close toward the cottage where he lodged.
She watched him closely.
He was going to try it on. She was sure of it.
Then she would try it on him; and she would show no mercy.
She looked at herself in the glass, and smiled at what she saw.
Mr. Silver's affront still clouded her face, and the thought of Joses struck from the cloud a flash of lightning.
Suddenly an idea came to her. Her eyes sparkled, and she laughed merrily.
She let down her hair.
It was short, fine, and thick; massy, Mr. Haggard called it. Then she took a pair of scissors and began to snip. Flakes of gold fell on the floor and strewed her feet. She stood as on a threshing-floor.
As she worked, the boards of the loft sounded to the tramp of a heavy visitor.
Somebody knocked at the door. There came to the girl's eyes a look of amused defiance.
"Come in," she said, turning.
Mrs. Woodburn stood in the door, grieved and grim. She saw her daughter's face framed in thickets of gold, and the splendid ruin on the floor.
Boy crossed to her mother and closed the door quietly behind her. Then she led her mother to the bed, and sat down beside her.
The old lady was breathing deeply, and not from the effort of the climb.
The daughter's eyes, full of a tender curiosity, teasing and yet compassionate, searched her mother's face, in which there was no laughter.
"Are you going to, Boy?" asked the old lady.
"D'you want me not?"
The mother nodded.
"Why not?"
Mrs. Woodburn sighed.
"I'd rather not," she said.
"Why not?" persisted Boy.
"It's against the rules."
"Is that all?" with scorn.
"No."
"Then why not?"
"It's dangerous."
"Dangerous!" flashed the girl. "So you think I'm a coward, too!"
"I don't, I don't," pleaded the other. "But I don't want you to."
Boy put her hand on the old lady's knee.
Her mother and Mr. Haggard were the only two human beings to whom she ever demonstrated affection.
"Will you promise me?" said the mother.
"No," answered Boy.
Mrs. Woodburn tried to rise, but the girl held her down.
"Sit down, mother, please. You never come and see me up here."
Her eyes devoured her mother's face hungrily and with unlaughing eyes.
"Kiss me, mother," she ordered.
Mrs. Woodburn refrained.
"Kiss me, mother," sternly.
The mother obeyed.
"Shall you?" she asked.
"I shan't say," replied Boy.
She rose and went to the window.
Outside under the wood Mr. Silver, pipe in mouth, was sauntering round Ragamuffin's grave.
"He said I was afraid!" she muttered.
When her mother left the room, the girl went to the window.
The gallop had kindled in her for the moment the flame of her old ambition; but the desire had died down swiftly as it had risen.
Boy knew now that she no longer really wanted to ride the Grand National Winner. She wanted something else—fiercely.
Cautiously she peeped out of the window.
Mr. Silver, in that old green golf-jacket of his, that clung so finely to his clean shoulders, was prowling along the edge of the wood close to Ragamuffin's grave, peeping for early nests.
The girl remembered that it was St. Valentine's—the day birds mate.
She turned away.
Sebastian Bach Joses was the son of an artist of Portuguese extraction. The artist was a waster and a wanderer. In his youth he mated with a Marseillaise dancing-girl who had posed as his model. Joses had been the result. The father shortly deserted the mother, who took to the music-hall stage.
After a brief and somewhat lurid career on the halls in London and elsewhere she died.
The lad had as little chance as a human being can have. As a boy, with the red-gold mass of hair he inherited from his mother, and a certain farouche air, he had been attractive, especially to women. Clever, alert, and sensitive, brought up in a Bohemian set, without money, or morals, or the steadying factor of position, he had early acquired all the tricks of the artist, the parasite, and the adventurer. He could play the guitar quite prettily, could sing a song, dabbled with pen and brush, and talked with considerable facility of poetry and art.
An old-time admirer of his mother's, on whom that lady when dying had fathered the boy, paid for the lad's keep as a child. Later, attracted by the boy's beauty, and secretly proud of his putative share in it, he had sent him to a college in a south coast watering place and afterward to Oxford.
There Joses had swiftly worked his way into a vicious set of stupid rich men, morally his equals, intellectually his inferiors, but socially and economically vastly his superiors. They were all lads from public schools who desired above all to be thought men of the world. Joses, on the other hand, was a man of the world who desired above all else to be taken for a public-school man.
Each of the two parties to the unwritten contract got what was desired from the other. Joses had knocked about the Continent; he knew the Quartier Latin, Berlin night-life, and the darker haunts of Naples. His rich allies kept horses, hunted, and raced. They learned a good deal that Joses was ready to impart; and on his side he acquired from them some knowledge of the racing world and an entrée into it. His manners were good—rather too good; and the touch of the artist and the exotic appealed to the coarse and simple minds of his companions. He wore longish hair, softish collars, cultivated eccentricities and a slightly foreign accent; all of which things thejeunesse doréetolerated with a touch of patronage. And Joses was quite content to be patronized so long as his patrons would pay.