“Do my eyes deceive me,” said I, “or is Mr. Deuteronomy actually talking to Pegasus?
“Yes, that’s what he’s doing, pointing things to watch out for along the way, and where they might speed up, and so on.”
“And does the horse. .”
“Does he understand? Yes, I’d say he does. Deuteronomy, he’s got a special talent with them animals. I never seen nothin’ like it in my life before.”
Nor had I. The question that came to me, however, was whether the “special talent” was Mr. Deuteronomy’s or the horse’s. It would be difficult to say.
“Pegasus won’t let nobody but him on his back,” said my companion. “He’ll let me lead him, saddle him, rub him down to dry him off, all of that, but I dare not sit on his back.”
“That is indeed interesting,” said I, “Mr. . Mr. . ”
“Bennett. And you’d be young Mr. Proctor, I s’pose. Deuteronomy said you’d be coming by early.”
So this was the Bennett who had brought the pistol to the gunsmith Joseph Griffin. I would know what Deuteronomy had asked him. Later.
He pulled from his pocket a collapsed spy-glass and offered it to me.
“Here,” said he. “It’s getting lighter. You might want to take a look through this.”
I accepted it with thanks, opened it up, and peered through it. It only tended to confirm what my unaided eyes had suggested. Mr. Deuteronomy kept up a fairly constant chatter with Pegasus at his side. Indeed, through the spy-glass, the image of the jockey came through so plain that, were I a lip-reader, I am sure that I could have caught every word he spoke, all at a distance of a furlong or more. I wondered what he spoke. Which is to say, did Pegasus understand the King’s English, or did the two have a separate language between them? I entertained that thought, and others no less fanciful, whilst I studied the horse and the man approaching. I returned the spy-glass to Mr. Bennett just as the two arrived at our vantage point. He ducked under the rail and gave Mr. Deuteronomy a leg up that he might mount Pegasus. The jockey spoke his thanks politely to Bennett; to me, he gave only a nod. Then did the two, horse and man, start off on a tour of the course.
The first time round, and the second, they did no more than go at a trot. Then, at a signal from Mr. Deuteronomy, Pegasus sped up to a canter. It was twice round so-and then a walk, a trot, and a walk round again, this time Pegasus led round by his rider. Never once did they take the course, or any part of it, at a full gallop. But by this time, too, other horses, and their riders and trainers, had arrived. Deuteronomy signaled Bennett that it was time to go. Halfway up the hill there seemed so many horses marching down to the track that I was certain there would be a repetition of yesterday’s mob-scene in that part we had just left.
I fell in beside Mr. Deuteronomy, eager to talk, yet I saw that he was occupied by thoughts of the race, which was by then but two days hence. He signed his readiness to talk by opening the discussion himself.
“You see from this crowd of horseflesh why we got down here so early,” said he to me.
“Oh, I do indeed. Yesterday there were so many horses on the course, there was scarce any room for those entered in the race. That was in the late morning or early afternoon-sometime in there.”
“Oh, I know how it can be. I hope it clears out a bit this evening, for Pegasus needs a light workout. If it’s as bad as you say, I’ll take him out on the country roads. We have to bring him up to a peak in a couple of days, though. Not easy.”
“Still think you’ll win?” I asked.
“I haven’t seen any yet who could likely take him.”
We trudged along in silence for a fair distance, but then did I recall one of the reasons that had brought me down to the track so early in the morning. I had news for him.
“Yesterday, just after I saw you in the Good Queen Bess, we saw your sister.”
“Alice? I wasn’t just a-leading you on, now was I? Did you catch her?”
“No, she got away from us-or not that exactly. Constable Patley, who knows her by sight, saw her through the tap-room window. But by the time we got outside, she was nowhere in sight.”
“But you’re sure it was her?”
“Oh, I’m sure as long as Mr. Patley is-and he is truly sure.”
“I’d like to meet him.”
“And he’d like to meet you. There’s not much about horse racing he doesn’t know.”
“That so?”
“He was a horse soldier, he was. I hope to find him there in the tap-room, eating breakfast.”
“Hope” was the operative word in that statement, for while it was true that I hoped to find him there, I had no certainty of it. Thus was I surprised and gratified to see him there in the tap-room, just beginning what looked to be a considerable breakfast, eggs and all. I pointed him out to Mr. Deuteronomy, then ushered him over that I might introduce the two men. When Mr. Patley saw us approaching through the crowd, his mouth dropped open in surprise, and he rose in awe to accept the honor that was about to be bestowed upon him.
“Mr. Patley,” said I to him, “I have the pleasure to present to you Mr. Deuteronomy Plummer.”
He was quite speechless, so overcome that when the jockey offered him his hand, all he could do was stare down at it for an embarrassing length of time until he realized at last that Mr. Deuteronomy wished to shake hands with him. Then did he grasp it and pump the hand so hard I feared he might do it damage. Mr. Patley urged us to sit down and waved over the serving woman.
What passed during the next hour or so was a fascinating discussion of Mr. Deuteronomy’s career as a race rider, of which I understood only about half, at most. I simply hadn’t the background in racing to comprehend many of the questions asked and the answers given. Nor could I be so bold as to attempt to reproduce any part of it here. What I can offer the reader, however (and which may be somewhat more germane to the matter at hand), is the comparatively brief conversation that the two had regarding Deuteronomy’s sister, Alice.
This postscript to the main body of their talk occurred after the last bite of breakfast had been eaten and the final cup of coffee had been downed. I recall that a lull came, and, in the course of it, Mr. Deuteronomy leaned back and fixed the constable with a most piercing look.
“I understand, Mr. Patley,” said he, “that you met my sister a day or two after her daughter, Maggie, was taken away.”
“That’s correct, Mr. Plummer, sir.”
“And she claimed that Maggie had been stolen?”
“True, sir.”
“Why do you suppose she did that?”
“Ah, well. I wondered that m’self. And the best I could come up with is this: If she said that her daughter had been stolen, then whatever happened to the girl, she would be free of blame. Children are bought, sold, and stolen every day in London, but still, buying and selling them is against the law.”
“I recall,” said I, “that Sir John once said that it is considered as slavery in the sense that it is commerce in human beings.”
“And if someone should just happen to notice that Maggie was no longer about and that your sister was somewhat richer, they might point the finger at her, but nothing could be proved, for, after all, she’d reported that her child had been stolen from her.”
“But that was what happened, was it not?” said Mr. Deuteronomy. “Someone did envy her that she had become richer of a sudden, didn’t they?”
“Yes,” said I, “’twas her neighbor next door, Katy Tiddle, the day before she was murdered. Yet she herself was in on it in some way, and that, I’m sure, was what got her killed.”
Deuteronomy Plummer nodded at that, and he did keep his silence for what seemed a very long time. At last he turned to me and said, “What do you think about this?”
“First of all, from what I’ve heard from you and from others about your sister, I’d say she was not bright enough to think of that matter of reporting Maggie stolen.”