Right Royal | Page 3

then, all will be lost."
Daily, in mind, I saw the Winning Post,
The Straight, and all the
horses' glimmering forms
Rushing between the railings' yelling
swarms,
My Father's colours leading. Every day,
Closing my eyes, I
saw them die away,
In the last strides, and lose, lose by a neck,

Lose by an inch, but lose, and bring the wreck
A day's march nearer.
Now begins again
The agony of waiting for the pain.
The agony of
watching ruin come
Out of man's dreams to overwhelm a home.
Go now, my dear. Before the race is due,
We'll meet again, and then
I'll speak with you.
In a race-course box behind the Stand
Right Royal shone from a
strapper's hand.
A big dark bay with a restless tread,
Fetlock deep in
a wheat-straw bed;
A noble horse of a nervy blood,
By O Mon Roi
out of Rectitude
Something quick in his eye and ear
Gave a hint
that he might be queer.
In front, he was all to a horseman's mind,

Some thought him a trifle light behind.
By two good points might his
rank be known,
A beautiful head and a Jumping Bone.
He had been
the hope of Sir Button Budd,

Who bred him there at the Fletchings

stud,
But the Fletchings jockey had flogged him cold
In a narrow
thing as a two-year-old.
After that, with his sulks and swerves,

Dread of the crowd and fits of nerves,
Like a wastrel bee who makes
no honey
He had hardly earned his entry money.
Liking him still, though he failed at racing,
Sir Button trained him for
steeple-chasing.
He jumped like a stag, but his heart was cowed;

Nothing would make him face the crowd;
When he reached the
Straight where the crowds began
He would make no effort for any
man.
Sir Button sold him, Charles Cothill bought him,
Rode him to hounds
and soothed and taught him.
After two years' care Charles felt assured

That his horse's broken heart was cured,
And the jangled nerves in
tune again.
And now, as proud as a King of Spain,
He moved in his box with a
restless tread,
His eyes like sparks in his lovely head,
Ready to run
between the roar
Of the stands that face the Straight once more;

Ready to race, though blown, though beat,
As long as his will could
lift his feet,
Ready to burst his heart to pass
Each gasping horse in
that street of grass.
John Harding said to his stable-boy,
"Would looks were deeds, for he looks a joy.
He's come on well in
the last ten days."
The horse looked up at the note of praise,
He
fixed his eye upon Harding's eye,
Then he put all thought of Harding
by,
Then his ears went back and he clipped all clean
The manger's
well where his oats had been.
John Harding walked to the stable-yard,
His brow was worried with
thinking hard.
He thought, "His sire was a Derby winner,
His legs
are steel, and he loves his dinner,
And yet of old when they made him
race,
He sulked or funked like a real disgrace;
Now for man or
horse, I say, it's plain,
That what once he's been, he'll be again.

For all his looks, I'll take my oath
That horse is a cur, and slack as
sloth.
He'll funk at a great big field like this,
And the lad won't cure that
sloth of his,
He stands no chance, and yet Bungay says
He's been
backed all morning a hundred ways.
He was twenty to one, last night,
by Heaven:
Twenty to one and now he's seven.
Well, one of these
fools whom fortune loves
Has made up his mind to go for the gloves;

But here's Dick Cappell to bring me news."
Dick Cappell came from a London Mews,
His fleshless face was a
stretcht skin sheath
For the narrow pear of the skull beneath.
He had
cold blue eyes, and a mouth like a slit,
With yellow teeth sticking out
from it.
There was no red blood in his lips or skin,
He'd a sinister,
hard, sharp soul within.
Perhaps, the thing that he most enjoyed

Was being rude when he felt annoyed.
He sucked his cane, he nodded
to John,
He asked, "What's brought your lambkin on?"
John said, "I had meant to ask of you,
Who's backing him, Dick, I
hoped you knew."
Dick said, "Pill Stewart has placed the money.
I don't know whose."
John said, "That's funny."
"Why funny?" said Dick; but John said naught;
He looked at the
horse's legs and thought.
Yet at last he said, "It beats me clean,
But
whoever he is, he must be green.
There are eight in this could give
him a stone,
And twelve should beat him on form alone.
The lad
can ride, but it's more than riding
That will give the bay and the grey
a hiding."
Dick sucked his cane and looked at the horse
With "Nothing's certain
on Compton Course.
He looks a peach. Have you tried him high?"

John said, "You know him as well as I;
What he has done and what
he can do.
He's been ridden to hounds this year or two.
When last
he was raced, he made the running,
For a stable companion twice at
Sunning.
He was placed,