Curse of the Blue Tattoo: Being an Account of the Misadventures of Jacky Faber, Midshipman and Fine Lady (44 page)

That's what Petey was tryin to say—"Don't let 'em box you in,"you incredibly stupid girl!
And George said, "
Stay outside on the first turn!" Oh, why didn't I, why do I always think I know everything about everything and all I ever really do is make a hash of things!

As we come out of the turn, Thayer slows his horse, just a little, not so the people in the stands could notice and cry foul, but just a little bit slower so a horse can come up behind us to keep us from escaping that way and the chestnut can come up on the outside to take the lead. It's a setup! A scam. I've been scammed again! Muir and Thayer never had no thought of winnin' the race! All they wanted to do was keep the Colonel's horse from winnin'!
Stupid, stupid, stupid...

The chestnut is now four lengths ahead, now five, and if he gets too far ahead, there'll be no catchin' him even if I do get out of this. In desperation I veer the Sheik to the right to try and force Muir away enough to break free, but Muir don't move. Instead he brings up his crop and
crack!
he brings it down on my leg, and it's like a hot poker was laid there. The pain shoots up me side and into me head and I lets out a howl of pain and sorrow and desperation right into the Sheik's ear and he hears it and the muscles of his neck swell up and he darts his head forward and bares his teeth and clamps down on the arse of Thayer's horse up there in front of his nose. The roan screams and breaks stride and there's an opening, and this time we make it through. We are free!

But the chestnut is now at least twelve lengths ahead and we're in the backstretch.

"Catch him, Sheik!" I shrieks. "Catch him!" The leader is so far ahead I despair of closing the distance, but I urge the Sheik on anyway, bouncing up and down in the saddle, tears of pain and desolation runnin' out the sides of my eyes—
how could I have been so stupid
—and the Sheik pounds on ever faster and I can feel his hatred for the horse ahead of him and I start to babble, "
Oh come on Sheik come on boy he's gonna beat you he's gonna shame you he's gonna take your mares he's gonna beat you boy,
" and the horse pumps faster and we've gained a length or two but that horse up there ain't no scrub, neither. He's fast and he's strong and he's at the end of the far stretch and he leans into the last turn and clods of dirt are flying up at us from his hooves what are diggin' out to the side as he leans. But we don't care, we just pound on and the white rail posts and the screaming people
standing and waving their arms flicker by in the corner of my eye like they ain't even real, just pieces of a crazy dream—
come on boy come on boy
—and we're in the last turn, too, and we go right up to the rail 'cause there ain't nobody to box us in now and we gain another length in the turn, and when we come out of it, we're only four lengths behind!

The roar of the crowd in the grandstand hits us like a wall when we turn onto the homestretch and the race for the line. We're only four lengths behind but that'll be enough to doom us if the chestnut don't weaken, and he ain't showin' no signs of that, no he ain't, so I keep babblin'. "
Beating you Sheik he's beating you,
" and the sun is in our eyes now and "
He's gonna beat you boy he's gonna beat you to the bright shinin' sun he's gonna beat you,
" and I know I ain't makin' no sense but it don't matter. What matters is that the Sheik would rather die than lose and he finds the strength somewhere down in him and now we're up to two lengths and now one. The other jock is flailing away with his whip but it ain't doin' him no good 'cause we're gainin', and now the Sheik's nose is up level with the chestnut's flank and now up to the jockey's knee and now the horse's shoulder and the crowd is howling. There's the white line up ahead and now we're neck and neck and now we push forward by a nose and then by a head and then are goin' away, and then the line flashes by underfoot and...

We win!

I pull the Sheik back and slow him down and turn him so I can get back to the clubhouse, but he don't want to quit just yet, no he don't—he rears up and screams out all the rage and defiance that's in his bloody, glorious heart. No, he
ain't done yet at all—he wants to get at the other horse and fight him and beat him into a bloody mess. He squeals in anger as if to say, "I didn't catch him just to let him go. Let me
go
!" and it's all I can do to hold him till George and his grooms come runnin' up to take his reins and calm him down.

Uh-oh.

The grandstand is emptying and people are pouring onto the track. I slide off the dear Sheik's back, give a few coughs, and wipe the tears from my eyes with an end of the scarf and wave off the grinnin' George's "Well done," and head for the clubhouse. I take three steps and then fall down in the dust, and this time I ain't faking. It's the pain in me leg, but I get right up and start a runnin', limpin' lope for Petey's room 'cause I see the Colonel bearing down on us but I can't let him catch me and fold me in his manly embrace, which is what the big, burly, grinnin' fool seems intent on doin'.

There's Amy and she throws her arm around me and helps me the last several yards. She gives the signal rap on the door and we fall into the room. Randall puts his back to the door again and looks at us with a big question in his eyes—and I don't think he really wants to hear the answer 'cause he's lookin' at me with the tears runnin' down through the dust on my face and he fears the worst.

"We won," says Amy, and Randall lets out a huge breath and sinks down a ways on the door. I whip off the scarf and go to the washstand and splash water on my face.
Stop crying,
I tell myself,
don't mess it up now. It's just the excitement. Stop it.
And I do, and I dry my face and straighten up and go to Petey's bedside.

"Pull back his covers," I orders. Amy furrows her brow in question. "Just do it!" I say, and she does it.

Poor Petey's skinny legs lie there helpless, the black hair on them standin' out sharp against the dead white of his skin. I swing the riding crop back over my shoulder and bring it down as hard as I can on Pete's right thigh. Amy gasps at the sound of the whip hitting flesh.

Petey's eyes pop open—I didn't think he'd wake, but he does. I kneel down by him. "Sorry, Petey, but you got that on the near turn. Muir give it to you. You won, Pete, you got that? You won and Muir give you that welt on the near turn."

"That son of a bitch, I'll get him for that," says he, all weak. A small smile comes to his lips. "Nice tattoo, Jack-o."

"You rogue," says I, putting my hand to his forehead. He is covered in sweat now, but his head is cooler. The fever has broken. "Worse luck. You'll prolly get better." His eyes close again.

The pounding on the door is loud and insistent.

"We can't keep them out forever," says Randall, his back to the shaking door. "You'd better hurry and change." His arrogant smile is back.

I cuts him a narrow-eyed glare.
Right, Randall.
I reflects that the I-know-Jacky's-got-a-tattoo-and-I-know-where's-she's-got-it club has just added two new members.
Only one show for you today, Mr. Trevelyne.

I turn away so that my bare back is all that's for him to look at as I take off the silk top and flip it to Amy. "See if you can slip that over Mr. Jarvis, if you would, Amy."

She goes to do it, and since there's a little more time for a bit more modesty now, I take my dress and pull it on over
me and then reach up under and pull off the pants and stockings.
Carefully
pull off the pants—the welt looks all purple and wicked, but there ain't no blood and that's good. I fling the silks to the floor as if Petey had just thrown them there on his way back to bed. I bundle up the rest of my clothes and tuck 'em under my arm. The cap goes on the bedpost and, "Button me up, Amy!"

"All right, done! Let 'em in, Randall!"

Randall steps back from the door and people pour into the little room, showering the half-conscious Pete with praise and congratulations. The Colonel was first in and he rushes over to Petey and shakes his senseless hand, and Amy speaks up with, "He will need salve for his leg, Father," and the Colonel nods and says that all saw the blow and that damned Muir shall never ride a horse at Dovecote again. A groom hustles over with a jar and the covers are pulled back and all around the room there are gasps at the soreness of the slash. Well, maybe I didn't have to hit him
that
hard...

A man who has to be Mr. Thayer bursts in and shouts, "Your horse bit mine! That's a foul!"

"Your nag had his fat,
slow
ass in my horse's face, and that's even more of a foul!" retorts the Colonel, puffing up. "And if you'd like to continue this discussion with pistols on the field of honor, then say one more word, Sir! One more word!" But Mr. Thayer don't say that word but instead turns red and storms out. Needless to say, he and his lady will not be joining us this evening.
And how much sure money did you lose today, Mr. Thayer, hmmm?

Colonel Trevelyne looks over and sees me standing there. "Get these girls out of here. This is no place for females!"

I put the back of my hand to my forehead and close my
eyes like I'm a poor, weak female about to swoon from tossin' around heavy spells and stuff, and Amy leads me out saying, "The poor thing needs rest," which, of course, I do.

The sheets feel so cool and nice, and I feel I could lie here forever in this delicious doze, their light weight resting smooth and easy on my skin. A great wave of tiredness sweeps over me like it always does after the wildness that comes on in me slowly ebbs away.

"Yeow!" I say, without meaning to. Amy has turned back the sheet and is putting some salve on my welt.

"I am sorry," she says. "I should be saying it serves you right, you could have been killed and all that. But I did not say that before you took the ride, so I have no right to say anything at all. Except thank you."

"Aw, g'wan. All I did was go out and ride a horse."

"That, and extract that promise from Father."

"Do you think he'll be as good as his word?"

"He will. Male honor and all that." Amy looks about her room and I know she is seeing it in a far different light than she did this morning, or anytime in the near past.
Go ahead, Amy. There's no sin in loving your own littie room.

There's a tap on the door and then it opens and Randall walks in.

"Randall! She's not dressed!" says Amy, and she brings the sheet back over my leg. I bend my other leg at the knee to make a tent so that the salve don't stick to it.

"Oh, it's all right," I say, all sleepy and drowsy, running my tongue quickly over my lips and parting them slightly in my best Dying Juliet's last-gasp pose. "The sheets are to my chin, so what's the harm?"

Randall comes over to the bedside but he don't say nothing, he just looks at me. He reaches down and, with one finger, gently pulls a lock of hair from my face. I smile all weak and frail.

"What can we do for you?" he finally asks.

"What?"

"How can we repay you? What will you have?"

I goes to say I don't want nothing, but then I changes my mind and says, "The silks. I want to keep the silks."

I don't know what he says to that, 'cause I slip off to sleep.

Later, when I wake up, the silks have been cleaned and are folded on my seabag, and by them is a pair of supple black riding boots. And they fit, too.

"We shall dance and we shall be gay. That tall midshipman is rather cute, don't you think?" I'm all rested up and ready to go to my first ball. Little Mary Faber, late of London's better gutters, is dressing for a ball with Captains, Colonels, Lieutenants, swells of all kinds, and the finest of Ladies, what a thing.

"Ah yes," smiles Amy, "Miss I-Am-Promised-to-Another Faber." Amy's been smiling a lot since the race and that is good.

I feel a wave of sadness slip over my gaiety, and I am quiet. Yes, and no word from the one I am promised to for over nine months. Not one word. Amy says mail comes to Dovecote on Monday, but I dare not hope.

"I shall be good," I say.
But I shall also be gay.

We had crimped up our side curls with the curling iron warmed on the cooking fire in the kitchen, being careful to stay out of the way 'cause mighty preparations are being
made for tonight's dinner and Mrs. Grubbs ain't puttin' up with no silly girls, not even if one of 'em is the daughter of the house. There's steamin' pots and great joints of meat, but thankfully, no little suckling piggy. Her serving girls are being run ragged and well I know the drill, so we get done and get out. But not before I lifts us a couple hot cherry tarts from a tray. Ain't lost me Cheapside touch.

We then go up and watch the doings in the great hall—men stringing banners and a chamber orchestra setting up their music stands, and that's sure to be a treat, dancing to music provided by someone other than myself. The men have also set up a long table with crystal goblets set out on it and another man brings in a huge punch bowl in the center. The great chandeliers are being lit and the place just glitters with light ... and promise.

Entering the dining room we find the table set, with the silver polished and the gold-rimmed plates placed just so, and the wineglasses winking in the light so cheerily. I walk around the table, peering at the name cards.

"Hmmm..." I muses. "I think there's been some mistake. You and I are all the way down at the end. Surely whoever did this didn't know I must sit next to the Royal Navy officers to get the news. So we'll just put this Mrs. Cabot in my place at the end. Who is she, anyway?"

"An old lady, but—"

"Good. She won't notice. And we'll put me next to this Captain Humphries and we'll take this Mr. Adams and put him here..."

"Jacky, you can't put an Adams down at—"

"I just did. And I'll put you in his place next to that Lieutenant—what's his name ... oh, Flashby, the one with the
mustachios. And Clarissa is there and Randall there, and I believe we've got it right now.

"Our work here is done," I say, all grand. "Let us go dress for the ball, dear Sister."