“BEFORE THE DAWN”
AN unshaved face, blotched and parti-coloured from waning inebriety,
upturned and open-mouthed in all the imbecility of profound sleep; a
recumbent form snoring loudly under a patchwork quilt, and supported by
a rickety bedstead, on an uncarpeted floor, in a room with a sloping
roof, of which the only furniture seemed to be a box, originally
intended for horse-clothing; a five-pound saddle, a pair of spurs, and a
black bottle containing a tallow candle that had guttered itself out
some two hours previously—all this does not sound like a cheerful and
inspiriting scene about five o’clock on a winter’s morning.
Nevertheless, such did not fail to call a grim smile into Isaac’s harsh
countenance, as he contemplated it, on this, his first visit to Mr.
Tiptop’s apartment. Isaac had been revolving the swell stud-groom’s
proposal of the evening before, and had come to a decision in his own
mind ere he went to sleep, the result of which was his matutinal
appearance in the chamber I have endeavoured to describe. He was not a
man to waste much time in the contemplation even of a more agreeable
sight than that which now met his eyes. He shook Mr. Tiptop roughly by
the shoulder till that worthy sat up in bed, and blinked at his
visitor’s candle with a ludicrous expression of astonishment and dismay.
“What’s up?” he exclaimed at last, as he began to be sensible of the old
man’s identity. “Blessed if I didn’t think the stables was a-fire, and
all our horses grilling, till I see it was you. Will you take any
refreshment?” added Mr. Tiptop jocosely, pointing to an earthenware ewer
containing cold water—and not much of that; “or is there anything I can
do for you besides telling you what o’clock it is?” he added, yawning,
and betraying strong symptoms of a desire to go to sleep again.
Old Isaac laid his finger to his nose.
“Get up,” said he in a cautious whisper. “It _is_ just to know _what’s
o’clock_ as I’ve come here. You lay your hand on a fourteen-pound
saddle, and there need be no mistake about the weights. My nag’s ready,
and turned round. You go and get yourn. There’s a bit o’ moon left: not
quite burned down yet. We can get it over and done with, and the horses
back in the stable afore the others is up.”
Mr. Tiptop was a man of considerable energy when anything like a robbery
was on the cards: he was, however, hardly prepared for such a display of
alacrity on the part of his companion. He put one skinny leg out of bed,
and then paused, staring vaguely at his visitor.
“Come, look alive!” said old Isaac, fishing a pair of breeches from the
floor; “there ain’t a minute to lose. Where’s the key o’ _your_ stable?”
The weaker nature obeyed instinctively: Tiptop put on his breeches, and
produced the key,
“Not a word to living mortal!” urged the old man impressively. “It’s as
much as my place is worth. I’ve left The Boy safe locked up. You go and
get _your_ horse, and meet me in the close. There’s just light enough to
gallop ’em. Look alive, man! Whatever should I do if master was to get
wind of this here?”
Isaac seemed unusually perturbed as he preceded Mr. Tiptop down the
creaking stairs, and wended his way to his own stable, leaving the
latter—still rather confused—to saddle and bring out the redoubtable
Chance.
The Honourable Crasher’s groom felt for the first time in his life
somewhat puzzled, and taken aback. He had not calculated on such
promptitude and decision from a “yokel.” Also, his intellects had hardly
recovered the potency of the flip, a beverage of which it requires
several hours’ sleep to obviate the effects. Altogether he was sensible
of less than his usual self-confidence. In his hurry, too, and by the
imperfect light of a stable-lantern, he put the wrong saddle on Chance,
who, by the way, was not a very pleasant animal to caparison, save by
her own accustomed attendant—a grey-haired, withered old helper, then
probably dreaming of the better days most of these ancient stablemen
have seen. The snaffle, too, that he wanted was not in its accustomed
place. Altogether, it took him some considerable time before he could
lead the horse out into the wan light of a morning moon. This interval,
however, had enabled him to recover the good opinion he generally
entertained of Mr. Tiptop. As he got upon Chance’s back, and felt the
animal step lightly and jauntily under him, the conviction came strong
upon his mind that in some way or other he was sure to get the better of
the yokel.
As the conscience-stricken Marmion riding his red-roan by night into the
enchanted ground was aware of a phantom cavalier looming dimly in the
distance in guise of his deadliest enemy, so Mr. Tiptop, opening the
gate of the close which he had appointed for a trysting-place,
distinguished the outline of the man and horse with whom he was about to
try the speed of his thorough-bred. As he neared his antagonist, he
observed that the animal he bestrode was sheeted and hooded, and
otherwise so swaddled up in clothing, that there was nothing visible of
it, save its legs; and in the uncertain twilight the general effect of
the pair much resembled that of those hobby-horses which so delighted
our ancestors in their Christmas revels.
“Look alive!” exclaimed Mr. Tiptop, somewhat angrily, as a black cloud
swept across the moon, and a raw morning breeze dashed a score of sharp
rain-drops into his feverish face. “It will be light in half an hour,
though it’s as dark as pitch now. Ain’t you going to strip him?”
“Strip him!” repeated Isaac, keeping off at a respectful distance the
while. “Not I; he always runs kindest in his clothes. Don’t ye come
anigh!” he added, as Mr. Tiptop ranged alongside. “He’s werry handy with
his heels when he’s at exercise. Are you ready?”
Now the close, as such open spaces are termed only in the midland
counties, was a field of sound old grass, comprising little less than a
hundred acres, and was much affected as an exercising ground by the
grooms of such sportsmen as had chosen Market Harborough for their
head-quarters. This was sufficiently attested by the trodden state of
its hedges, betraying the hoofs-marks of many a good nag, whose speed
had been tried here far oftener than was dreamt of by his master. Do you
think we know the merits of our steeds one-half as well as do their own
immediate attendants? Why are the hacks always in such good condition,
and constantly falling lame so unaccountably? Is it that on their
homeward way they are matched continually against each other, and
against Father Time, whereby many pots of beer and goes of brandy are
lost and won on the result? To a man who _really_ cares for his horses,
a groom he can depend upon is worth his weight in gold.
Both Isaac and Mr. Tiptop knew perfectly well that a straight run-in,
the long way of the furrows, up to a certain white gate which they would
pass on their right hand, was as near half-a-mile as possible. The
latter, keeping out of reach of his opponent’s heels, proposed a longer
distance; but Isaac, declaring it was simply a question of speed, as
they both knew their horses’ performances in the hunting-field,
overruled his friend on this point.
“When you’re ready,” said the old sinner, who could hardly see his
listener in the increasing darkness, “we’ll start, and run it from end
to end. Mind, Mr. Tiptop, I trust to your h’onour!”
“In course!” replied Mr. Tiptop, who was considering whether he could
make a better thing of it by acting, as he himself would have said,
entirely on “the square,” or otherwise.
Accordingly they took up their positions some ten yards apart, but
strictly on the same level, and went off with a rush, amicably and
honourably, when they were both ready.
It would be doing injustice to Mr. Tiptop to say that, when he really
chose, he was not a consummate horseman, either across a country or over
the flat. On the present occasion he was resolved to do all he knew, and
he sat down upon Chance, and got at her in the most masterly manner. The
mare, however, like many that have been in training, was a lurching,
shifty goer, taking several strides before she got fairly into her
speed. Mr. Tiptop, notwithstanding his proficiency, saw the dark figure
of his opponent a dozen lengths ahead of him, and could not overhaul him
do what he would. His finish, no doubt, was inimitable, but it failed to
land him first past the goal. Old Isaac, there was no disputing it, won
cleverly by a couple of lengths.
Mr. Tiptop couldn’t make it out. “They’ve got a flyer,” said he to
himself; “and they _know it_!”
He would fain have talked it over with Isaac then and there; but the
veteran, simply remarking that “he was quite satisfied, and it would be
daylight in ten minutes,” passed through the white gate already
mentioned, and trotted back to the town at a pace which Mr. Tiptop’s
regard for Chance’s legs forbade him to imitate.
Both horses were safe home in their stables before the helpers were up.
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