Part 4 (1/2)

I took my tub and Hacking gave me a right good rub down after; not a very artistic performance, but given with good will and with a strong hand. When it was done he looked me over with a critical eye, p.r.o.nouncing me very fit, ”barring a heavy pound or two;” but as I had done my work faithfully he could find no fault. He thought me a bit over-confident, and told me so; but I had never for a moment doubted my ability to defeat anything against me, and I paid little attention to his words. I was not conceited, but I knew there were not a half-dozen amateurs in all England in my cla.s.s, and was sure an Old-Country crack must outcla.s.s anything the States could produce.

As early as two o'clock the spectators began to arrive, and I, following my own inclination as well as Hacking's suggestion to ”get under cover,”

went upstairs and knocked at the door of Jennie's little sitting-room.

She greeted me most cordially with a handshake and a ”good day to a good winner.” She was dressed in her best gown, and had been sitting at the window to watch the arrivals. I took a seat by her side on the little chintz-cus.h.i.+oned window-seat, and watched with her.

To those who to-day see the throngs of well-dressed and refined people, many of them ladies, who attend college, amateur, and even professional sports, it may not be amiss to describe the spectators of my first match at Hacking's Brighton track, back in the sixties, for a typical sporting crowd it was.

They drove to the door in all sorts and descriptions of vehicles, drawn by animals as various. They soon filled the long sheds back of the house, and then a dilapidated fence was utilized for hitching-posts, and even a few trees of the young orchard.

The drivers were many of them Englishmen, for the average American was too keen after the dollars in those days to leave them for sport of any kind. The adjournment to the bar was almost unanimous, where enough money was taken for fancy drinks to make good Hacking's stake had he lost.

We could see them come swaggering up the steps, many of them carrying whip in hand, and there was much loud talk of pa.s.sing Tom, d.i.c.k, or Harry on the road, with the ”little bay” or the ”brown colt.”

We could hear them plainly, for the window was up a bit, and they did not talk in whispers.

Every now and again some one would chaff Hacking on his Unknown, telling him to ”trot out the wonder,” or ”give us a sight of the man who runs Simmons even.”

It was three o'clock when a long moving wagon labelled ”Boston Belle”

drove up to the door, containing Simmons, his backers and immediate attendants; and the crowd at the bar sauntered out on the piazza to meet them, and hurried back in augmented numbers to patronize still further the tall bottles behind the mahogany.

I had a glimpse of Simmons as he stepped out; but he was enveloped in a long ulster, and all I could discover was that he was extremely tall and dark.

His supporters had plenty of money, and soon ran the odds up to three to one, at which figures Hacking accommodated them to a considerable extent. I had not another supporter, however, for they all seemed to consider that Hacking had quite lost his head, and took the match as a huge joke. It was very evident that, if I broke the tape, it would be a most unpopular, as well as unexpected, win. Hacking stuck to them well, but at last got all he wanted, and declined to risk any more. So confident was Simmons' princ.i.p.al backer that he proposed another match, though this was not yet pulled off, agreeing to concede three yards when we ran again.

It is wonderful what effect such talk has on a contestant, no matter how confident he may be. I had not for a moment doubted the ability of a crack man like myself to beat anything in the States at my distance, but I now began to admit the possibility of defeat, and to consider that it meant almost starvation to me. You must remember I was barely twenty years old, in a strange country, and a man trained close to the limit is particularly liable to fancies.

Jennie had been talking to me all the time in her quiet way, for she had the good old English habit of subdued speech; but little did I hear then, and now I remember almost nothing at all.

I first noticed that she had become vastly indignant at a reflection on the courage of the ”Unknown who dares not show himself.”

”Don't fret: you'll see him soon enough, my man,” she said, with a toss of her head. She was giving me some absurd instructions about letting Simmons get the best of the start, and then sailing by him in the last few yards, so that the disappointment might be more intense, when some one in the crowd yelled out with a Yorks.h.i.+re accent, ”Fifteen dollars to five on the long-legged Chipper. Fifteen to five against the 'veiled lady.'”

There was a loud laugh at this, which was too much for Jennie. She jumped up, went to her little desk in the corner, and took from one of those secret drawers, which are so evident, her purse, and emptying it in her lap counted out five dollars and a few cents over. She then called the chamber-maid, gave her the five dollars, and told her to give it to Jerry, the hostler, to bet on Mr. Brown.

”'Tis an easy way to make money,” she said, with an immense amount of disdain at my remonstrance.

I sat with her a while longer, she doing all the talking, for my mind was occupied, to put it mildly. When the little clock on the shelf pointed to three-thirty, I left to get into my running-togs, she giving me a good grip with her soft warm hand, and saying, ”I shall see you win from the attic window.”

When I reached my room, which Hacking told me to keep locked, I had a difficulty in finding the key-hole that I had never experienced, except ”after dinner” or at late hours of the evening, my fingers being quite unsteady. As I stripped, my courage seemed to leave me with every garment. I remember I wondered if it would come back again when I put on my running-clothes. A little better I did feel, but at the last moment I broke the lace of my left shoe as I was pulling it tight.

Now, there is an old superst.i.tion that this means a lost race, and though I had never thought of such a foolish thing before, it seemed now a sure omen of defeat.

Indeed, I may as well confess first as last, that when Hacking knocked at my door, for the first time in all my life (and the last as well) I was in a blue funk.

Yes, a rank quitter was I on that afternoon of May 1, 186-, and I am not sure I should not have cut and run, had there been the least chance to get away.

Hacking discovered my condition at once, and grew mighty serious when his efforts to hearten me were unsuccessful. And truly the man had good reason to be serious,--a good three hundred dollars at risk, and here was his man with knees kissing and lips white.

There was nothing to do but to go on with the game, though, to make it worse, as I walked down the back stairs, I caught my spikes in a crack and nearly put myself out of the race by a bad fall before the start. It is almost an absurd thing to say, but when I picked myself up and discovered I was entirely uninjured, I cursed the ill-luck which had not allowed me to be disabled.