Rolf Boldrewood
Babes in the Bush
CHAPTER XI
MR. BOB CLARKE SCHOOLS KING OF THE VALLEY
The eventful day at length arrived. How many hundreds would have been disappointed if it had rained! From the sporting squatters, who looked out of window to see if the weather was favourable for Harlequin or Vivandière, to the farmer’s son, busy at sunrise grooming his unaccustomed steed, and pulling the superfluous hair from that grass-fed charger’s mane and tail, while his sister or cousin danced with joy, even before she donned the wide straw hat and alpaca skirt, with the favourably disposed bow of pink or blue ribbon, in which to be beautiful for the day.
And what more innocent pleasure? So very seldom comes it in the long months of inland farming life, that no moralist need grudge it to his fellow-creatures for whom fate has not provided the proverbial silver spoon. That brown-cheeked youngster believes that his bay Camerton colt, broken in by himself, will make a sensation on the course; perhaps pull off a ten-pound sweep in the Hurry-scurry Hack-race (post entry), and he looks forward with eager anticipation to the running for the Town Plate and the steeplechase. Besides, he has not been in town since he took in the last load of wheat. It is slow at home sometimes, though there is plenty of work to do; and he has not seen a new face or heard a new voice since he doesn’t know when.
In sister Jane’s heart, whose cheek owns a deeper glow this morning, what unaccustomed thoughts are contending for the mastery.
‘Will it not be a grand meeting, with ever so many more people there than last year? And the gentlefolks and the young ladies, she does like so to see how they dress and how they look. It is worth a dozen fashion books. Such fun, too, is a sweeping gallop round the course, and to feel the breeze blow back her hair. Everything looks splendid, and the lunch in the pavilion is grand, and every one so polite. Besides, there is Ben Anderson that she knows “just to speak to”; she saw him at a school feast last year, and he is certainly very nice looking; he said he would be sure to be at the Yass races. She wonders whether he will be there; nobody wants him, of course, if he likes to stay away – but still he might come; his father has a farm away to the westward.’
So the rhythm of human life, hope or fear, love or doubt, curiosity or sympathy, chimes on, the same and invariable in every land, in every age.
Thanks to the occasionally too fine climate of Australia, ‘the morning rose, a lovely sight,’ and if the sun flashed not ‘down on armour bright,’ he lit up a truly animated scene. Grooms, who long before day had fed and watered their precious charges, were now putting on the final polish, as if the fate of Europe depended upon the delicate limbs and satin-covered muscles. Owners, backers, jockeys, gentlemen riders, all these were collecting or volunteering information; while the ordinary business of the town – commercial, civil, or administrative – was suffered to drift, as being comparatively unimportant.
At an hour not far from nine o’clock the guests under the hospitable roof of the Budgeree Hotel were assembled at the breakfast-table. What a meal! What a feast for the gods was that noble refection! What joyous anticipation of pleasure was on all sides indulged in! What mirthful conversation, unchecked, unceasing! There had been, it would seem, a dinner and a small party at Horace Bower’s, and, strange to say, every one had there enjoyed themselves much after the same fashion as at Rockley’s. Bower had been in great form – was really the cleverest, the most amusing fellow in the world. Mrs. Bower was awfully handsome, and her sister, just arrived from Sydney, was a regular stunner, would cut down all before her. Mrs. Snowden had been there too – smartest woman in the district; seen society everywhere – and so on.
A race day owns no tremendous possibilities, yet is there a savour of strife and doom mingled with the mimic warfare. Many a backer knows that serious issues hang upon the favourite’s speed and stamina; on even less, on chance or accident. The steeplechase rider risks life and limb; it may be that ‘darkness shall cover his eyes,’ that from a crushing fall he may rise no more.
These entanglements weighed not in any wise upon the soul of Wilfred Effingham, as he arose with a keener sense of interest and pleasure in expectation than had for long greeted his morning visions. His responsibilities for the day were bounded by his vehicle and horses, so that his family should be safely conveyed to and from the course. Mrs. Effingham had at first thought of remaining quietly in the house, but was reassured by being told that the course was a roomy park, that the view of the performances was complete, that the carriages and the aristocracy generally would be provided with a place apart, where no annoyance was possible; that the country people were invariably well-behaved; and that if she did not go, her daughters would not enjoy themselves, and indeed thought of remaining away likewise. This last argument decided the unselfish matron, and in due time the horses were harnessed, the side-saddles put in requisition, and after a decent interval Black Prince was caracolling away in the lead of the dogcart, and Fergus exhibiting his paces among a gay troop of equestrians, which took the unused, but all the pleasanter, road to the racecourse.
At this arena it was seen that the stewards had been worthy of the confidence reposed in them. A portion of the centre of the course had been set apart for the exclusive use of the carriages and their occupants. Not that there was any prohibition of humbler persons; but, with instinctive propriety, they had apparently agreed to mass themselves upon a slight eminence, which, behind the Grand Stand, a roomy weather-board edifice, afforded a full view of the proceedings.
In the centre enclosure were shady trees and a sward of untrampled grass, which answered admirably for an encampment of the various vehicles, with a view to ulterior lunching and general refreshment combinations at a later period of the day.
Here all could be seen that was necessary of the actual racing, while space was afforded for pleasant canters and drives between the events, round the inner circle of the course; and indeed in any direction which might suit the mirth-inspired members of the party. The view, too, Mrs. Effingham thought, as she sat in Mrs. Rockley’s phaeton, in which a seat of honour had been provided for her, was well worth a little exertion. The park-like woodlands surrounded three sides of the little amphitheatre, with a distant dark blue range amid the dusk green forest tints; while on the south lay a great rolling prairie, where the eye roved unfettered as if across the main to the far unknown of the sky-line. Across this glorious waste the breeze, at times, blew freshly and keen; it required but little imagination on the part of the gazers to shadow forth the vast unbroken grandeur, the rippling foam, the distant fairy isles of the eternal sea.
Without more than the invariable delay, after twelve o’clock, at which hour it had of course been advertised in the Yass Courier of the period that the first race would punctually commence, and after sharp remonstrance from Mr. Rockley, who declared that if he had a horse in the race he would start him, claim the stakes, and enter an action against the stewards for the amount, a start was effected for the St. Leger. This important event brought six to the post, all well bred and well ridden. Wilfred thought them a curiously exact reproduction of the same class of horses in England.
His reflections on the subject were cut short by a roar from the assemblage as the leading horses came up the straight in a close and desperate finish. ‘Red Deer – Bungarree —no! Red Deer!’ were shouted, as Hamilton’s chestnut and a handsome bay colt alternately seemed to have secured an undoubted lead. The final clamour resolved itself into the sound of ‘Red Deer! Red Deer!!’ as that gallant animal, answering to the last desperate effort of his rider, landed the race by ‘a short head.’ Hamilton’s early rising and months of sedulous training had told. It was a triumph of condition.
Much congratulation and hand-shaking ensued upon this, and Wilfred commenced to feel the uprising of the partisan spirit, which is never far absent from trials of strength or skill. He had more than once flushed at disparaging observations touching the studs in his immediate neighbourhood, at gratuitous assertions that the Benmohr horses were not to be spoken of in the same day as So-and-so’s whatsyname of the west, or another proprietor’s breed in the north, and so on. Now here was a complete answer to all such, as well as a justification of his own opinion. He had determined not to risk a pound in the way of betting, holding the practice inexpedient at the present time. But the thought did cross his brain that if he had taken the odds more than once pressed upon him, he might have paid his week’s expenses as well as confuted the detractors of the Benmohr stud. This deduction, ex post facto, he regarded as one of the wiles of the enemy, and scorned accordingly.
He found the party more disposed to take a canter, after the enforced quietude of the last hour, than to remain stationary, so possessing himself of Guy’s hack, whom he placed temporarily in charge of the dogcart, taking off the leader as a precautionary measure, he rode forth among the gay company for a stretching canter round the course, which occasionally freshened into a hand-gallop, as the roll of hoofs excited the well-conditioned horses.
The Town Plate – a locally important and much-discussed event – having been run, and won, after an exciting struggle, by Mr. O’Desmond’s Bennilong, a fine old thoroughbred, who still retained the pace, staying power, and ability to carry weight, which had long made him the glory of the Badajos stud and the pride of the Yass district, preparations for lunch on an extensive scale took place.
The horses of the different vehicles, as well as the hackneys, were now in various ways secured, the more provident owners having brought halters for the purpose. Mrs. Rockley and Mrs. Bower, with other ladies, had arranged to join forces in the commissariat department, the result of which was a spread of such comprehensive dimensions that it required the efforts of the younger men for nearly half an hour to unpack and set forth the store of edibles and the array of liquors of every kind and sort.
Rich and rare the viands were,
Diversified the plate,
inasmuch as each family had sent forth such articles as, while available for immediate use, would cause less household mourning if reported wounded or missing. But the great requisities of an al fresco entertainment were fully secured. An ample cold collation, with such relays of the beloved Bass and such wines of every degree as might have served the need of a troop of dragoons. The last adjuncts had been forwarded by the male contingent, under a joint and several responsibility.
Eventually the grand attack was commenced by the impetuous Rockley, who, arming himself with a gleaming carver, plunged the weapon into the breast of a gigantic turkey, in the interests of Mrs. Effingham, who sat on his right hand.
After this assaut d’armes the fray commenced in good earnest. The ladies had been provided with seats from the vehicles, overcoats, rugs, and all manner of envelopes, which could be procured, down to a spare suit of horse-clothing. Shawls and cloaks were brought into requisition, but the genial season had left the sward in a highly available condition, and with a cool day, a pleasant breeze, the shade of a few noble eucalypti, fortunately spared, nothing was wanting to the arrangements. As the devoted efforts of the younger knights and squires provided each dame and damsel with the necessary aliment, as the champagne corks commenced to fusilade with the now sustained, now dropping fire of a brisk affair of outposts, the merry interchange of compliments, mirthful badinage, and it may be eloquent glances become no less rapid and continuous.
Our Youth! our Youth! that spring of springs.
It surely is one of the blessedest things
By Nature ever invented!
sang Tom Hood, and who does not echo the joyous, half-regretful sentiment. How one revelled in the$1‘$2’$3at the casual concourse of youthful spirits, where the poetic sentiment was inevitably heightened by the mere proximity of beauty. Surely it is well, ere the bright sky of youth is clouded by Care or gloomed by the storm-signal of Fate, to revel in the sunshine, to slumber in the haunted shade. So may we gaze fondly on our chaplet of roses, withered, alas! but fragrant yet, long ere the dread summons is heard which tells that life’s summer is ended, and the verdant alleys despoiled.
Another race or two, of inferior interest, was looked for, and then the party would take the road for town, concluding the day’s entertainment with a full-sized dance at the expansive abode of Mr. Rockley, which would combine all contingents.
The next day’s more exciting programme included the steeplechase, to be run after lunch. In this truly memorable event some of the best cross-country horses in Australia were to meet, including those sensational cracks, The Cid and St. Andrew, each representing rival stables, rival colonies. The former with Bob Clarke up, the latter with Charles Hamilton; each the show horseman of his district, and backed by his party to the verge of indiscretion.
The less heroic melodramas having been acted out with more or less contentment to performers, there was a general return to boot and saddle, previous to the leisurely progress homeward from the day’s festivities. This, as the hours were passing on towards the shadowy twilight, was not one of the least pleasant incidents of the day’s adventures.
The road skirted the great plain which bounded the racecourse, and as the westering sun flamed gorgeous to his pyre, fancy insensibly glided from the realism of the present to the desert mysteries of the past.
‘Oh, what a sunset!’ said Christabel Rockley, whom fate and the impatience of her horse had placed under the control of Mr. Argyll. ‘How grand it is! I never see sunset over the plains from our verandah without thinking of the desert and the Israelites, camels, and pillared palaces. Is it like that? How I should love to travel!’
‘The desert is not so unlike that plain, or any plain in Australia,’ explained Argyll (who had seen the Arab’s camel kneel, and watched the endless line of the Great Caravan wind slowly over the wind-blown hollows), ‘inasmuch as it is large and level; but the vast, awe-striking ruins, such as Luxor or Palmyra – records of a vanished race – these we can only dream of.’
‘Oh, how wonderful, how entrancing it must be,’ said Miss Christabel, ‘to see such enchanted palaces! Fancy us standing on a fallen column, in a city of the dead, with those dear picturesque Arabs. Oh, wouldn’t it be heavenly! And you must be there to explain it all to me, you know!’
As the girl spoke, with heightened colour, and the eager, half-girlish tones, so full of melody in the days of early womanhood, as the great dark eyes emitted a wondrous gleam, raised pleadingly to her companion’s face, even the fastidious Argyll held brief question whether life would not be endurable in the grand solitudes of the world, ‘with one (such) fair spirit to be his minister.’
‘My dear Miss Christabel,’ he made answer, ‘I should be charmed to be your guide on such an expedition. But if you will permit me to recommend you a delightful book, called – ’
Here he was interrupted by the deeply-interested fair one, who, pointing with her whip to the advanced guard of the party, now halted and drawn to the side of the road, said hurriedly, ‘Whatever are they going to do, Mr. Argyll? Oh, I see – Bob Clarke’s going to jump King of the Valley over Dean’s fence. It’s ever so high, and the King is such a wretch to pull. I hope he won’t get a fall.’
This seemingly abrupt transition from the land of romance to that of reality was not perhaps so wide a departure in the spirit as in the letter. The age of chivalry is not past; but the knights who wear khaki suits in place of armour, and bear the breech-loader in preference to the battle-axe, have to resort to means of proving their prowess before their ladies’ eyes other than by splintering of lances and hacking at each other in the sword-play of the tournament.
The King of the Valley was a violent, speedy half-bred. His owner was anxious to know whether he was clever enough over rails, to have a chance for the coming steeplechase. An unusual turn of speed he undoubtedly possessed, and, if steadied, the superstition was that the King could jump anything. But the question was – so hot-blooded and reckless was he when he saw his fence – could he be controlled so as to come safely through a course of three miles and a half of post and rail fencing, new, stiff and uncompromising?
To the cool request, then, that he would give him a schooling jump over Dean’s fence, which some men might have thought unreasonable, Bob Clarke, with a smile of amusement, instantly acceded, and making over his hackney to a friend, mounted the impatient King, shortened his stirrups, and then and there proceeded to indulge him with the big fence.
Then had occurred the sudden halt and general attitude of expectation which Miss Rockley had noted, and with which she had so promptly sympathised. Bob Clarke was a slight, graceful youngster, with regular features, dark hair and eyes, and a mild expression, much at variance with the dare-devilry which was his leading characteristic. Passionately fond of field sports, he had ridden more steeplechases, perhaps, than any man in Australia of his age. He had been carried away ‘for dead’ more than once; had broken an arm, several ribs, and a collar-bone – this last more than once. These injuries had taken place after the horse had fallen, for of an involuntary departure from the saddle no one had ever accused him.
As he gathered up his reins and quietly took the resolute animal a short distance back from the fence, unbroken silence succeeded to the flow of mirthful talk. The fence looked higher than usual; the close-grained timber of the obstinate eucalyptus was uninviting. The heavy posts and solid rails, ragged-edged and sharply defined, promised no chance of yielding. As the pair had reached the moderate distance considered to be sufficient for the purpose, Bob turned and set the eager brute going at the big dangerous leap. With a wild plunge the headstrong animal made as though to race at the obstacle with his usual impetuosity. Now was seen the science of a finished rider; with lowered hand and closely fitting seat, making him for a time a part of the fierce animal he rode, Bob Clarke threw the weight of his body and the strength of his sinewy frame into such a pull as forced the powerful brute to moderate his pace. Such, however, was his temper when roused, that the King still came at his fence much too fast, ‘reefing’ with lowered head and struggling stride – an unfavourable state of matters for measuring his distance. As he came within the last few yards of the fence more than one lady spectator turned pale, while a masculine one, sotto voce, growled out, ‘D – n the brute! he’ll smash himself and Bob too.’
As the last half-dozen strides were reached, however, the rusé hero of many a hard fought fray ‘over the sticks,’ suddenly slackening his grasp of the reins, struck the King sharply over the head with his whip, thus causing him to throw up his muzzle and take a view of his task. In the next moment the horse rose from rather a close approach, and with a magnificent effort just cleared the fence. A cheer from every man present showed the general relief.
‘Oh, how beautifully he rides!’ said the fair Christabel, whose cheek had perhaps lost a shade of its wild-rose tint. ‘No one looks so well on horseback as Mr. Clarke. Don’t you think he’s very handsome?’
‘Not a bad-looking young fellow at all, and certainly rides well,’ said Argyll, without enthusiasm. ‘I daresay he has done little else all his lifetime, like your friends the Arabs. Watch him as he comes back again.’
The margin by which he had escaped a fall had been estimated by the experienced Bob, who, taking advantage of a field heavy from early ploughing, gave King of the Valley a deserved breather before he brought him back.
By the time they were within a reasonable distance of the fence, the excited animal had discovered that he had a rider on his back. As he came on at a stretching gallop, he was seen to be perfectly in hand. Nearing the jump, it surprised no experienced spectator to see him shorten stride and, ‘taking off’ at the proper distance, sail over the stiff top rail, ‘with (as his gratified owner said) a foot to spare, and Bob Clarke sitting on him, with his whip up, as easy as if he was in a blooming arm-chair.’
‘There, Champion,’ said the victor as he resumed his hackney. ‘He can jump anything you like. But if you don’t have a man up who can hold him, he’ll come to grief some day.’
A few trials and experiments of a like nature were indulged in by the younger cavaliers before they reached town, most of which were satisfactory, with one exception, in which the horse by a sudden and wily baulk sent his rider over the fence, and calmly surveyed the obstacle himself.
Another dance, at which everybody who had been at the races, and who was du monde, finished worthily the day so auspiciously commenced. Wilfred Effingham, who had declared himself rather fatigued at the first entertainment, and had at that festival asserted that it would do for a week, now commenced to enjoy himself con amore– to sun himself in the light of Christabel Rockley’s eyes, and to badiner with Mrs. Snowden, as if life was henceforth to be compounded of equal quantities of race meetings by day and dances by night.
‘I suppose you are a little tired, Miss Rockley,’ he said, ‘after the riding and the picnic and the races; it is rather fatiguing.’
‘Tired!’ echoed the Australian damsel in astonishment. ‘Why should I be tired? What is the use of giving in before the week is half over? I shall have lots of time to rest and enjoy the pleasure of one’s own society after you have all gone. It will be dull enough then for a month or two.’
‘But are there any more festivities in progress?’ he asked with some surprise.
‘Any more? Why, of course, lots and quantities. You English people must be made of sugar or salt. Why, there’s the race ball to-morrow night, at which everybody will be present – the band all the way from Sydney. The race dinner the next night – only for you gentlemen, of course, we shall go to bed early. Then Mrs. Bower’s picnic on Saturday, with a dance here till twelve o’clock – I must get the clock put back, I think. And Sunday – ’
‘Sunday! haven’t you any entertainment provided for Sunday?’
‘Well, no; not exactly. But everybody will go to church in the morning, and Mr. Sternworth will preach us one of his nice sensible sermons – they do me so much good – about not allowing innocent pleasures to take too great hold upon our hearts. In the afternoon we are all going for a long, long walk to the Fern-tree Dell. You’ll come, won’t you? It’s such a lovely place. And on Monday – ’
‘Of course we shall begin all over again on Monday; keep on dancing, racing, and innocently flirting, like inland Flying Dutchmen, for ever and ever, as long as we hold together. Isn’t that the intention?’
‘Now you’re beginning to laugh at me. It will be serious for some of us when you all go away. Don’t you think so, now?’ (Here the accompaniment was a look of such distracting pathos that Wilfred was ready to deliver an address on ‘Racing considered as the chief end of man,’ without further notice.) ‘No; on Monday morning you are all to pay your bills at the Budgeree – those that have money enough, I mean; not that it matters – Bowker will wait for ever, they say. Then you go back to your stations, and work like good boys till the next excuse for coming into Yass, and that finishes up the week nicely, doesn’t it?’
‘So nicely that I believe there is a month of ordinary life compressed into it – certainly as far as enjoyment goes. I shall never forget it as long as I live – never forget some of the friends I have made here during the brightest, happiest time of my life, especially – ’
‘Look at that ridiculous Mr. Tarlton dancing the pas seul!’ exclaimed Miss Christabel, not quite disposed to enter upon Wilfred’s explanation of his sensations. ‘Do you know, I think quadrilles are rather a mistake after all. I should like dances to be made up of nothing but valses and galops.’
‘Life would be rather too rapid, I am afraid, if we carried that principle out. Don’t you think Mrs. Snowden is looking uncommonly well to-night?’
‘She always dresses so well that no one looks better.’
