I remember the time when a man’s status was based on the quality of his horse and the price of his buggy. The well-bred horse bestowed upon its owner those qualities of breeding which set it apart and stamped it as an aristocrat amongst its kind. Men of lowly birth were lifted by the ownership of such horses to altitudes of importance they would never otherwise have attained. In keeping with the breeding of their horses they were regarded as well-bred men and could speak to squatters in terms of equality.
Which brings me to Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes.
She was the wife of the local baker but had the formation of a woman of breeding. She walked with an S-bend, the result, so my father said, of whalebone corsets so tightly laced that Sandow himself couldn’t have got another hitch in them. My siter informed me, speaking in whispers, that her underclothes were of the finest calico but heaven forbid that I should ever show an interest in the mysterious back country of Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes. To me she existed as a dignified exterior and only darkness lay beneath her floor-length, pleated skirt of tweed. The coat of her tailored costume was lined with silk and trimmed with oriental braid and cream lace. Fountains of lace burst beneath the cuffs and partly concealed her white-gloved hands. A lace collar reinforced with whalebone held her head in a permanent position of disdain.
But it was her hat that impressed me. It featured a stuffed bird—eyes, beak, legs—the whole bloody lot. I spend an hour with old Mick O’Shaughnessy who had a set of Gould’s bird books but I’m damned if we could track it down. Mick concluded, and I agree with him, that it must have been a bird from some foreign country where birds with red heads and yellow bodies were as common as sparrows are here. That was Mick’s opinion anyway and he knew more about birds than anyone I’ve ever met.
Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes’ hat, though evidence of impeccable taste, would never have convinced me of her high breeding unless I had not heard her described in these terms by men whose breeding was undeniable.
Mr Charles F. Robinson, the owner of the district flour mill, who frequently visited Mr Bryce-Forbes carrying an order book, was once talking to him in my presence. I was standing a few yards away eating a licorice strap and I heard him with my own ears.
He said, ‘You have a remarkably well-bred wife, Arthur.’ That’s what he said. Arthur, who was badly bred, gave him a look like a crow looking up a hollow log. He was a bit touchy about cracks that suggested his bread was crook. But Mr Robinson didn’t mean anything, I could see that. He had confirmed what I had already felt about Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes and I told father about it to show him how I understood women.
He was straightening a stanchion of the wagon at the time and I didn’t quite catch what he said but I think he said, ‘S’help me God!’ Anyway I was disappointed in what he said.
There was another well-bred man who drove up with an Abbott buggy and pair. He talked to Arthur about land or something. He gave me a penny to sit in the buggy and hold his horses and when he came out he said to me, ‘That’s a fine, stylish looking woman in there. What’s her name?’
‘Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes.’
‘Shit!’ he exclaimed.
I immediately realised this man’s breeding only came from his Abbott buggy and pair.
It was a horse that convinced me of Mrs Jane Bruce-Forbes’ breeding. He was a six-year-old gelding though father, after examining his mouth, said to me, ‘He’ll never see eight again.’ He also claimed that he’d been down and told me to look at his knees where the hair had grown awry. But they looked all right to me. She drove him in an expensive rubber-tyred jinker with long hickory shafts. It was exciting to see him in action with his free stride. He was by Warrior out of Gay Girl and had inherited some of his sire’s spirit. His mane was clipped and his tail was docked and he had a high lifting gait that suggested pride in movement. A martingale held his neck in a dignified arch and he often reefed at the bit and snorted when under restraint. Under the whip he could do a mile in three minutes.
This was all evidence of his aristocratic lineage and it lifted Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes and set her apart so that one imagined she must have been by Warrior out of Gay Girl herself. She always recognised me even when she was driving her horse, and though this was little enough it did succeed in increasing my importance. In fact several people saw her talking to me from the gig. She might only say, ‘Hello’ or something like that, but it put me on the map, so to speak. That was until I started riding Hairy Legs.
Hairy Legs was lent to me by a farmer who wanted her exercised. She was in foal and trotting would do her good, he said. But I wasn’t to gallop her. I could understand that. She would have galloped badly even if she wasn’t in foal, but in foal she moved like a sailing ship in a rough sea. But trotting! There was never a trotter like her. She had won a trotting race down at South Ecklin, the farmer told me, and though this was only a bush settlement it lifted her from obscurity to a position of respect. However, no one believed this story except me. I think it was her appearance that made people discredit such a claim. She was what was known as a ‘light delivery’ type, a horse by a half-draught out of a bush hack and gave the impression of being humiliated by her breeding. Her legs were feathered like a draught and swung beneath her as if they were weighted. The straight line of her back continued along her neck to her ears. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, undisturbed by the promises of her condition. She stood perfectly still when being mounted and only returned to reality when the rider, after settling himself comfortably in the saddle, brought his heel against her side. According to the urgency of the heel she either set off at a walk, a trot or a canter.
Hairy Legs had one peculiarity, the discovery of which came as a great shock to me. I was trotting her at a moderate speed when, to catch up with a school mate riding ahead, I urged her with heels and voice to a faster pace. She suddenly sank lower in height and broke into a pace and I found myself travelling at a speed of which I had never imagined her capable.
Hairy Legs was not a natural pacer. She always walked, never ambled. A pace was a gait she had discovered she could do when the speed demanded of her was greater than a trot. It explained how she won the trot at South Ecklin. It was a delightful gait for the rider. One did not have to rise to the trot but just sat there moving swiftly while looking down at her speeding legs describing sweeps each side of her, first to the right and then to the left, that gave the impression of swaying to those who watched her.
One day in early summer I was riding her home from school. She was walking with her head down and the reins slack on her neck. I concluded as I sat there that life was indeed hard on boys who rode disreputable horses. The drivers of the buggies and gigs that passed me with their spanking horses tossing contemptuous heads, hardly noticed me as I plodded along in the dust by the side of the road. I decided that some day I would own a horse like that of Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes and I would drive it in a rubber-tyred gig with gleaming harness just as she did.
I was considering how low you can get when burdened with a horse like Hairy Legs when I became conscious that a horse and gig were slowing up behind me. The vehicle drew level with me then the horse dropped into a walk. It was Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes, stuffed bird and all. The bird was partly obscured by a white gossamer that went round the hat and was fastened in a loose knot beneath her chin. She looked better bred than I’d ever seen her. I tightened my reins to lift the head of Hairy Legs into a position that would suggest she still had some interest in life, but she quickly dropped it again. Hairy Legs had no quality whatsoever. She liked her head down.
‘How are you, Alan?’ said Mrs Jane Bryce-Forbes as her horse pranced beside me on the metal. And although I say it myself, no woman could have been more gracious.
‘I am well, Mrs Bryce-Forbes,’ I said.
I never forget my manners when speaking to a well-bred woman even though I was in a highly nervous state owing to her having spoken to me.
‘That’s a funny old horse you’re riding,’ she said. ‘What’s its name?’
‘Hairy Legs,’ I answered, and I can tell you it cost me an effort to get the words out.
‘Dear me!’ she exclaimed. ‘It certainly suits the horse doesn’t it. But I can see he’s quiet, that’s the main thing isn’t it. Ride carefully won’t you.’
‘Oh, I’ll do that Mrs Bryce-Forbes,’ I said, but I was getting fed up with this ‘Ride carefully’ business. What in the hell did she take me for? I was eleven years old and had ridden for years.
‘Well, I’m in a hurry and must be going,’ she said. ‘Look after yourself.’
There she went again.
‘I’m in a hurry myself,’ I said. ‘Good-bye, Mrs Bryce-Forbes.’
I kicked Hairy Legs into a trot. She flicked her bay with a whip and we trotted side by side. She smiled sweetly down at me. ‘My, you are riding well,’ she said.
Hell!!
She touched her bay with a whip and he really got down to it. I shoved the boots into Hairy Legs and she suddenly flattened into a pace. I didn’t give a damn whether she foaled on the road. I left Mrs Bryce-Forbes for dead. I covered her stuffed bird with dust and went down that road like a bat out of hell.
Behind me I could hear the swish of her whip and the pounding feet of her bay. Then I was speeding on in silence and she was far behind me.
She never spoke to me after that.
Anyway, bugger Mrs Bryce-Forbes.