“When is the animal to be chosen?” asked Victor, carelessly.
“Immediately. We go down to Hallgrove next week, I shall select the horse whenever I can get Douglas to go with me to the dealer’s, and send him down to get used to his new quarters before his hard work begins.”
“Good. Let me know when you are going to the horse-dealer’s: but if you see me there, take no notice of me beyond a nod, and be careful not to attract Douglas Dale’s attention to me or introduce me to him.”
“What do you mean by that?” asked Reginald, looking suspiciously at his companion.
“What should I mean except what I say? I do not see how even your imagination can fancy any dark meaning lurking beneath the common-place desire to waste an afternoon in a visit to a horse-dealer’s yard.”
“My dear Carrington, forgive me,” exclaimed Reginald. “I am irritable and impatient. I cannot forget the misery of those last days at Raynham.”
“Yes,” answered Victor Carrington: “the misery of failure.”
No more was said between the two men. The sway which the powerful intellect of the surgeon exercised over the weaker nature of his friend was omnipotent. Reginald Eversleigh feared Victor Carrington. And there was something more than this ever-present fear in his mind; there was the lurking hope that, by means of Carrington’s scheming, he should yet obtain the wealth he had forfeited.
The conversation above recorded took place on the day after Mr.
Larkspur’s interview with Honoria.
Three days afterwards, Reginald Eversleigh and his cousin met at the club, for the purpose of going together to inspect the hunters on sale at Mr. Spavin’s repository, in the Brompton Road.
Dale’s mail-phaeton was waiting before the door of the club, and he drove his cousin down to the repository.
Mr. Spavin was one of the most fashionable horse-dealers of that day. A man who could not afford to give a handsome price had but a small chance of finding himself suited at Mr. Spavin’s repository. For a poor customer the horse-dealer felt nothing but contempt.
Half a dozen horsey-looking men came out of stables, loose boxes, and harness-rooms to attend upon the gentlemen, whose dashing mail-phaeton and stylish groom commanded the respect of the whole yard. The great Mr. Spavin himself emerged from his counting-house to ask the pleasure of his customers.
“Carriage-horses, sir, or ‘acks?” he asked. “That’s a very fine pair in the break yonder, if you want anything showy for a mail-phaeton. They’ve been exercising in the park. All blood, sir, and not an ounce too much bone. A pair of hosses that would do credit to a dook.”
Reginald asked to see Mr. Spavin’s hunters, and the grooms and keepers were soon busy trotting out noble-looking creatures for the inspection of the three gentlemen. There was a tan-gallop at the bottom of the yard, and up and down this the animals were paraded.
Douglas Dale was much interested in the choice of the horse which he intended to present to his brother; and he discussed the merits of the different hunters with Sir Reginald Eversleigh, whose eye had lighted, within a minute of their entrance, upon Victor Carrington. The surgeon stood at a little distance from them, absorbed by the scene before him; but it was to be observed that his attention was given less to the horses than the men who brought them out of their boxes.
At one of these men he looked with peculiar intensity; and this man was certainly not calculated to attract the observation of a stranger by any personal advantages of his own. He was a wizened little man, with red hair, a bullet-shaped head, and small, rat-like eyes.
This man had very little to do with the display of the horses; but once, when there was a pause in the business, he opened the door of a loose-box, went in, and presently emerged, leading a handsome bay, whose splendid head was reared in a defiant attitude, as the fiery eyeballs surveyed the yard.
“Isn’t that ‘Wild Buffalo?’” asked Mr. Spavin.
“Yes, sir.”
“Then you ought to know better than to bring him out,” exclaimed the horse-dealer, angrily. “These gentlemen want a horse that a Christian can ride, and the ‘Buffalo’ isn’t fit to be ridden by a Christian; not yet awhile at any rate. I mean to take the devil out of him before I’ve done with him, though,” added Mr. Spavin, casting a vindictive glance at the horse.
“He is rather a handsome animal,” said Sir Reginald Eversleigh.
“Oh, yes, he’s handsome enough,” answered the dealer. “His looks are no discredit to him; but handsome is as handsome does — that’s my motter; and if I’d known the temper of that beast when Captain Chesterly offered him to me, I’d have seen the captain farther before I consented to buy him. However, there he is; I’ve got him, and I must make the best of him. But Jack Spavin is not the man to sell such a beast to a customer until the wickedness is taken out of him. When the wickedness is taken out of him, he’ll be at your service, gentlemen, with Jack Spavin’s best wishes.”
The horse was taken back to his box. Victor watched the animal and the groom with an intensely earnest gaze as they disappeared from his sight.
“That’s a curious-looking fellow, that groom of yours,” Sir Reginald said to the horse-dealer.
“What, Hawkins — Jim Hawkins? Yes; his looks won’t make his fortune. He’s a hard-working fellow enough in his way; but he’s something like the horse in the matter of temper. But I think I’ve taken the devil out of him,” said Mr. Spavin, with an ominous crack of his heavy riding-whip.
More horses were brought out, examined, discussed, and taken back to their boxes. Mr. Spavin knew he had to deal with a good customer, and he wished to show off the resources of his stable.
“Bring out ‘Niagara,’” he said, presently, and in a few minutes a groom emerged from one of the stables, leading a magnificent bay. “Now, gentlemen,” said Mr. Spavin, “that animal is own brother to ‘Wild Buffalo,’ and if it had not been for my knowledge of that animal’s merits I should never have bought the ‘Buffalo.’ Now, there’s apt to be a good deal of difference between human beings of the same family; but perhaps you’d hardly believe the difference there can be between horses of the same blood. That animal is as sweet a temper as you’d wish to have in a horse — and ‘Buffalo’ is a devil; yet, if you were to see the two horses side by side, you’d scarcely know which was which.”
“Indeed!” exclaimed Sir Reginald; “I should like, for the curiosity of the thing, to see the two animals together.”
Mr. Spavin gave his orders, and presently Jim Hawkins, the queer-looking groom, brought out “Wild Buffalo.”
The two horses were indeed exactly alike in all physical attributes, and the man who could have distinguished one from the other must have had a very keen eye.
“There they are, gents, as like as two peas, and if it weren’t for a small splash of white on the inner side of ‘Buffalo’s’ left hock, there’s very few men in my stable could tell one from the other.”
Victor Carrington, observing that Dale was talking to the horse-dealer, drew near the animal, with the air of an interested stranger, and stooped to examine the white mark. It was a patch about as large as a crown-piece.
“‘Niagara’ seems a fine creature,” he said.
“Yes,” replied a groom; “I don’t think there’s many better horses in the place than ‘Niagara.’”
When Douglas Dale returned to the examination of the two horses, Victor
Carrington drew Sir Reginald aside, unperceived by Dale.
“I want you to choose the horse ‘Niagara’ for Lionel Dale,” he said, when they were beyond the hearing of Douglas.
“Why that horse in particular?”
“Never mind why,” returned Carrington, impatiently. “You can surely do as much as that to oblige me.”
“Be it so,” answered Sir Reginald, with assumed carelessness; “the horse seems a good one.”
There was a little more talk and consultation, and then Douglas Dale asked his cousin which horse he liked best among those th
ey had seen.
“Well, upon my word, if you ask my opinion, I think there is no better horse than that bay they call ‘Niagara;’ and if you and Spavin can agree as to price, you may settle the business without further hesitation.”
Douglas Dale acted immediately upon the baronet’s advice. He went into Mr. Spavin’s little counting-house, and wrote a cheque for the price of the horse on the spot, much to that gentleman’s satisfaction. While Douglas Dale was writing this cheque, Victor Carrington waited in the yard outside the counting-house.
He took this opportunity of addressing Hawkins, the groom.
“I want a job done in your line,” he said, “and I think you’d be just the man to manage it for me. Have you any spare time?”
“I’ve an hour or two, now and then, of a night, after my work’s over,” answered the man.
“At what time, and where, are you to be met with after your work?”
“Well, sir, my own home is too poor a place for a gentleman like you to come to; but if you don’t object to a public — and a very respectable public, too, in its way — there’s the ‘Goat and Compasses,’ three doors down the little street as you’ll see on your left, as you leave this here yard, walking towards London.”
“Yes, yes,” interrupted Victor, impatiently; “you are to be found at the ‘Goat and Compasses’?”
“I mostly am, sir, after nine o’clock of an evening — summer and winter—”
“That will do,” exclaimed Victor, with a quick glance at the door of the counting-house. “I will see you at the ‘Goat and Compasses’ to-night, at nine. Hush!”
Eversleigh and his cousin were just emerging from the counting-house, as Victor Carrington gave the groom a warning gesture.
“Mum’s the word,” muttered the man.
Sir Reginald Eversleigh and Douglas Dale took their places in the phaeton, and drove away.
Victor Carrington arrived at half-past eight at the “Goat and
Compasses” — a shabby little public-house in a shabby little street.
Here he found Mr. Hawkins lounging in the bar, waiting for him, and
beguiling the time by the consumption of a glass of gin.
“There’s no one in the parlour, sir,” said Hawkins, as he recognized Mr. Carrington; “and if you’ll step in there, we shall be quite private. I suppose there ain’t no objection to this gent and me stepping into the parlour, is there, Mariar?” Mr. Hawkins asked of a young lady, in a very smart cap, who officiated as barmaid.
“Well, you ain’t a parlour customer in general, Mr. Hawkins; but I suppose if the gent wants to speak to you, there’ll be no objection to your making free with the parlour, promiscuous,” answered the damsel, with supreme condescension. “And if the gent has any orders to give, I’m ready to take ‘em,” she added, pertly.
Victor Carrington ordered a pint of brandy.
The parlour was a dingy little apartment, very much the worse for stale tobacco smoke, and adorned with gaudy racing-prints. Here Mr. Carrington seated himself, and told his companion to take the place opposite him.
“Fill yourself a glass of brandy,” he said. And Mr. Hawkins was not slow to avail himself of the permission. “Now, I’m a man who does not care to beat about the bush, my friend Hawkins,” said Victor, “so I’ll come to business at once. I’ve taken a fancy to that bay horse, ‘Wild Buffalo,’ and I should like to have him; but I’m not a rich man, and I can’t afford a high price for my fancy. What I’ve been thinking, Hawkins, is that, with your help, I might get ‘Wild Buffalo’ a bargain?”
“Well, I should rather flatter myself you might, guv’nor,” answered the groom, coolly, “an uncommon good bargain, or an uncommon bad one, according to the working out of circumstances. But between friends, supposing that you was me, and supposing that I was you, you know, I wouldn’t have him at no price — no, not if Spavin sold him to you for nothing, and threw you in a handsome pair of tops and a bit of pink gratis likewise.”
Mr. Hawkins had taken a second glass of brandy by this time; and the brandy provided by Victor Carrington, taken in conjunction with the gin purchased by himself was beginning to produce a lively effect upon his spirits.
“The horse is a dangerous animal to handle, then?” asked Victor.
“When you can ride a flash of lightning, and hold that well in hand, you may be able to ride ‘Wild Buffalo,’ guv’nor,” answered the groom, sententiously; “but till you have got your hand in with a flash of lightning, I wouldn’t recommend you to throw your leg across the ‘Buffalo.’”
“Come, come,” remonstrated Victor, “a good rider could manage the brute, surely?”
“Not the cove as drove a mail-phaeton and pair in the skies, and was chucked out of it, which served him right — not even that sky-larking cove could hold in the ‘Buffalo.’ He’s got a mouth made of cast-iron, and there ain’t a curb made, work ’em how you will, that’s any more to him than a lady’s bonnet-ribbon. He got a good name for his jumping as a steeple-chaser; but when he’d been the death of three jocks and two gentlemen riders, folks began to get rather shy of him and his jumping; and then Captain Chesterly come and planted him on my guv’nor, which more fool my governor to take him at any price, says I. And now, sir, I’ve stood your friend, and give you a honest warning; and perhaps it ain’t going too far to say that I’ve saved your life, in a manner of speaking. So I hope you’ll bear in mind that I’m a poor man with a fambly, and that I can’t afford to waste my time in giving good advice to strange gents for nothing.”
Victor Carrington took out his purse, and handed Mr. Hawkins a sovereign. A look of positive rapture mingled with the habitual cunning of the groom’s countenance as he received this donation.
“I call that handsome, guv’nor,” he exclaimed, “and I ain’t above saying so.”
“Take another glass of brandy, Hawkins.”
“Thank you kindly, sir; I don’t care if I do,” answered the groom; and again he replenished his glass with the coarse and fiery spirit.
“I’ve given you that sovereign because I believe you are an honest fellow,” said the surgeon. “But in spite of the bad character you have given the ‘Buffalo’ I should like to get him.”
“Well, I’m blest,” exclaimed Mr. Hawkins; “and you don’t look like a hossey gent either, guv’nor.”
“I am not a ‘horsey gent.’ I don’t want the ‘Buffalo’ for myself. I want him for a hunting-friend. If you can get me the brute a dead bargain, say for twenty pounds, and can get a week’s holiday to bring him down to my friend’s place in the country, I’ll give you a five-pound note for your trouble.”
The eyes of Mr. Hawkins glittered with the greed of gold as Victor Carrington said this; but, eager as he was to secure the tempting prize, he did not reply very quickly.
“Well, you see, guv’nor, I don’t think Mr. Spavin would consent to sell the ‘Buffalo’ yet awhile. He’d be afraid of mischief, you know. He’s a very stiff ‘un, is Spavin, and he comes it uncommon bumptious about his character, and so on. I really don’t think he’d sell the ‘Buffalo’ till he’s broke, and the deuce knows how long it may take to break him.” “Oh, nonsense; Spavin would be glad to get rid of the beast, depend upon it. You’ve only got to say you want him for a friend of yours, a jockey, who’ll break him in better than any of Spavin’s people could do it.”
James Hawkins rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“Well, perhaps if I put it in that way it might answer,” he said, after a meditative pause. “I think Spavin might sell him to a jock, where he would not part with him to a gentleman. I know he’d be uncommon glad to get rid of the brute.” “Very well, then,” returned Victor Carrington; “you manage matters well, and you’ll be able to earn your fiver. Be sure you don’t let Spavin think it’s a gentleman who’s sweet upon the horse. Do you think you are able to manage the business?”
The groom laid his finger on his nose, and winked significantly.
“I’ve managed more di
fficult businesses than that, guv’nor,” he said.
“When do you want the animal?”
“Immediately.”
“Could you make it convenient to slip down here to-morrow night, or shall I wait upon you at your house, guv’nor?”
“I will come here to-morrow night, at nine.”
“Very good, guv’nor; in which case you shall hear news of ‘Wild Buffalo.’ But all I hope is, when you do present him to your friend, you’ll present the address-card of a respectable undertaker at the same time.”
“I am not afraid.”
“As you please, sir. You are the individual what comes down with the dibbs; and you are the individual what’s entitled to make your choice.”
Victor Carrington saw that the brandy had by this time exercised a potent influence over Mr. Spavin’s groom; but he had full confidence in the man’s power to do what he wanted done. James Hawkins was gifted with that low cunning which peculiarly adapts a small villain for the service of a greater villain.
At nine o’clock on the following evening, the two met again at the “Goat and Compasses.” This time their interview was very brief and business-like.
“Have you succeeded?” asked Victor.
“I have, guv’nor, like one o’clock. Mr. Spavin will take five-and-twenty guineas from my friend the jock; but wouldn’t sell the ‘Buffalo’ to a gentleman on no account.”
“Here is the money,” answered Victor, handing the groom five bank-notes for five pounds each, and twenty-five shillings in gold and silver. “Have you asked for a holiday?”
“No, guv’nor; because, between you and me, I don’t suppose I should get it if I did ask. I shall make so bold as to take it without asking. Sham ill, and send my wife to say as I’m laid up in bed at home, and can’t come to work.”
“Hawkins, you are a diplomatist,” exclaimed Victor; “and now I’ll make short work of my instructions. There’s a bit of paper, with the name of the place to which you’re to take the animal — Frimley Common, Dorsetshire. You’ll start to-morrow at daybreak, and travel as quickly as you can without taking the spirit out of the horse. I want him to be fresh when he reaches my friend.”
Delphi Works of M. E. Braddon Page 450