At ten o’clock in the morning the members of île de France’s fashionable set began to arrive at the parade grounds. As in London and Paris, stands had been erected for the wealthier spectators, but it was also customary for many of the belles of Port Louis to remain seated in their open carriages, so that they might best display themselves directly across from the gentlemen sitting in the governor’s box. Most of the young men were on horseback, preparing to ride alongside those racing on the inner track, while the members of the Port Louis Jockey Club circulated on the lawn, making and accepting bets with careless Creole prodigality.
By ten thirty all of Port Louis was assembled at champ de Mars. In the most elegant carriages sat Mademoiselle Couder and Mademoiselle Cypris de Gersigny, still one of the loveliest women in île de France, whose magnificent raven-black hair has become legendary even in the salons of Paris. There were the six Druhn sisters, so fair, fresh, and delicate that the carriage in which they usually rode together was known as “the Basket of Roses.” Still, on this day, the occupants of the governor’s box might have claimed the grand prize for loveliness. If you have not visited the colonies, especially île de France, you cannot imagine the charm and grace of the Creole women—most of them with velvet-dark eyes and ebony tresses, but a few English lasses with the gleaming golden hair, slender necks, and translucent skin of the North. In the eyes of the young men, the bouquets these beauties held in their slender hands were worth more than all the Odiot cups, Menton rifles, and Verdier umbrellas that the governor, even with his boundless generosity, could ever bestow.
In the front row of Lord Murray’s box that morning, between her uncle and the governess Henriette, sat Sara de Malmédie. Henri strolled the grounds, taking all bets offered against his winning of the gentlemen’s race—which were few, considering that Henri, besides being well known as an excellent rider, owned a horse that was reputed to be the fastest on île de France.
At eleven o’clock the band played to signal the first race—which was, as I have said, a pig chase. I imagine that most of my readers are acquainted with this odd pastime, since it is still common in many villages in both France and England. A pig, his rear end well greased, is set free upon the track, and the competitors must attempt to seize him by the tail. The man who catches the pig is declared the winner. This particular race was open to the public; the names of the contestants were not even written down.
Two Negroes duly led in the animal. He was a magnificent hog, enormous in size, already greased up and ready to be chased. The crowd roared at the sight of him, and the pursuers—Negro, Indian, Malay, Malagasy, and native-born islander—crashed through the barriers separating them from the track and hurled themselves toward the animal.
The pig, terrified, took flight—but measures had been taken to ensure that he would not escape, and his forelegs had been loosely tied to his hind ones as one would bind a horse to keep it from breaking into a run. He was thus able to run only at a moderate trot; the mob soon overtook him, and the usual frustrations ensued.
As you may imagine, in such a game, chance is not usually with those who lead at the start. A freshly greased pig’s tail is nearly impossible to seize, and the animal escapes easily from its pursuers at first. But as successive attempts rub off more and more of the lard, the hog realizes that the intentions of those hoping to seize him are not so ridiculous after all. He begins to emit squeals that alternate with frightened shrieks. From time to time, when the attack is too aggressive, he may turn against the men chasing him—who, according to their courage, either continue their pursuit or drop out of the race. Finally the moment comes when the tail, now bare of grease and returned to its natural state, no longer slides out of the hands that grasp it, and finally its owner is vanquished.
This race followed the ordinary progression. The unfortunate pig escaped easily from his early pursuers and, though bothered by the cords on his legs, attempted to gain on the racers. However, a dozen of the best and fastest runners grabbed at the ropes and then the tail of the poor animal so quickly that he had no time to react. Capture was inevitable for the hog, no matter how bravely he tried to escape. Eventually, though, five or six of the contestants grew winded and dropped out of the race—but, as the number of racers diminished, the chances of those who persisted increased. They redoubled their efforts accordingly, urged on by the shouts of the spectators.
Among the men still in the race were two of our old acquaintances, Antonio the Malay and Miko-Miko, the Chinese merchant. Both had stayed close on the pig’s heels from the beginning; his tail had slipped through their fingers a hundred times, but each was determined to catch his prey. A few moments more, and they were the only ones left in the chase. Now the event became truly interesting. The crowd roared, and extravagant bets were freely exchanged.
As it turned out, there were only ten minutes left in the chase. The pig, grunting and lunging backward without intimidating his enemies—who, like Virgil’s shepherds, took turns seizing his tail—in the least, and having by now made almost a complete circuit of the parade grounds, was tiring. Antonio managed to grab him, and for an instant he was believed to be the winner, but the animal used the last of his strength to jerk his tail from the Malay’s fingers once again. Miko-Miko immediately saw his chance and threw himself at the prize, clinging with both hands and allowing himself to be dragged along the dusty ground as he tugged at the tail with all his might. Antonio followed, scowling, sure that he had lost the game but keeping ready nonetheless, just in case his rival lost his grip. After towing the Chinese peddler a considerable distance, the pig slowed and stopped, too weakened to run any farther but still resisting Miko-Miko, who, also exhausted, continued to yank in the opposite direction. The crowd howled with laughter as man and pig writhed together on the ground—then, suddenly and violently, flew apart! The animal rolled forward and Miko-Miko tumbled backward. Antonio lunged, elated and certain that he had another chance for victory—but his joy was short-lived. He found himself unable to seize the pig’s tail, and for very good reason—it was no longer attached to the unfortunate pig, but was still clutched in Miko-Miko’s hands. The peddler rose from the ground, holding his trophy aloft. This was a new case for the judges. They deliberated for a few minutes and then decided by a majority vote of three to two that, since Miko-Miko would surely have captured the entire animal if it had remained attached to its tail, he should be declared the winner. The Chinese merchant triumphantly claimed his prize, grasping the pig’s hind legs and walking him from the grounds as if he were a wheelbarrow; Antonio the Malay withdrew, grumbling, into the crowd—which treated him with the sort of honor one might expect a rowdy mob to reserve for a man who has just lost a contest.
Now the spectators rose, buzzing about the pig chase, but they soon settled back into their seats once the sack race was announced.
The contestants were to race from the starting post to the governor’s box, a distance of about 150 feet. At the signal, the racers—around fifty of them—emerged from the small hut they had been assigned as a dressing room, approached the starting line, and arranged themselves in a row.
This may seem a rather large number of men willing to compete for an umbrella, no matter how magnificent it may be, but the reader should know that umbrellas are, mysteriously, highly sought-after in the colonies, especially among the Negroes of île de France. Lord Murray had been well advised in choosing that particular item as the sack race trophy.
I’m quite sure that most of my readers have witnessed a sack race at least once in their lives. Each competitor is enclosed in a sack that covers his arms and legs and is tied about his neck, so that he cannot run, but is forced to make a series of hops instead. It is always very funny; this particular race was even more so because of the strange variety of heads popping out of their respective sacks—as in the pig chase, a large number of Negroes and Indians of all colors had chosen to take part.
Foremost among the competitors were the black servants Télémaque an
d Bijou. Having assumed the rivalry that existed between their respective masters, the two rarely met without exchanging insults that often degenerated into fisticuffs. Now, since their hands and feet were hidden inside the sacks and three or four other racers stood between them, they had to be content with glaring ferociously at each other.
Just before the starting gun was fired, a new competitor bounded from the dressing room hut and took his place among the racers. It was none other than the recently disgraced Antonio the Malay.
At the sound of the opening shot, all of the sack racers began hopping like kangaroos; they bumped heavily against each other, fell backward, tripped forward, and scrambled with difficulty to their feet only to bump, fall, and trip again. For the first sixty feet of the race, it was impossible to predict the winner. Several of the contestants were clumped together so closely as to be indistinguishable, and the standings changed so often due to falls that in an instant the first racer might be last, and the last first. Still, even amid the chaos, three racers could be distinguished as slightly ahead of the pack: Télémaque, Bijou, and Antonio the Malay. By the time they reached the hundred-foot mark, it was clear that one of these three would emerge from the race victorious.
Antonio, with his usual wiliness, had immediately noticed the palpable hatred that existed between Bijou and Télémaque and decided to use it to his own advantage. He had started out between the two rivals, but a well-calculated fall allowed him to move to one side so they were next to each other. Sure enough, they bounded ever closer to each other, scowling and muttering invective, and the movements of their fists beneath the cloth sacks made it obvious to all that, had they not been restrained, they would soon have been trading punches. During all of this, Antonio—stealthily but steadily—gained ground.
The Malay was five or six feet ahead of Bijou and Télémaque before they noticed him; calling a momentary truce, both of them tried with gigantic hops to regain their lost advantage. Some progress had been made, particularly by Télémaque, when Antonio had a timely stumble and the Muniers’ servant was able to pass him. The finish line was by now only ten feet away. Bijou gave a yell of rage and, jumping desperately, drew near his rival—but Télémaque was not about to relinquish his lead without a fight, and he hopped so impressively that everyone was sure the prize umbrella would soon be his. The next moment, though, he took a false step. He wavered briefly while the crowd roared, then fell in a heap. Still, he found a way to use the tumble to honor his house—by falling directly in Bijou’s path. The Malmédie servant, unable to swerve in time, tripped inelegantly over Télémaque’s prostrate form and went sprawling in his turn.
At that instant, as they lay with limbs tangled in the dust, the same idea occurred to both of the archenemies at once—that it was better to let a third party win the race than to cede victory to the hated rival house. Both of them struggled to their feet, but to the astonishment of the crowd, rather than continuing the race they rushed at each other as aggressively as the sacks trapping their hands and feet would allow. Scuffling and wrestling, they allowed Antonio to reach the finish line unimpeded. The grinning Malay collected his prize and held it aloft before the envious eyes of the black onlookers, while Bijou and Télémaque continued to fight until they were finally dragged apart—the former minus a small piece of his nose, and the latter with a badly mangled ear.
The spectacle of the sack race over, the ponies were brought out. Thirty stout, handsome little animals from Timor and Pégu, ridden by Indian, Malagasy, and Malay jockeys, trotted from the holding area to a burst of enthusiastic applause; this event was especially popular with the island’s black population. These ponies, only marginally tamed, generally provided a much more interesting contest than the sleek, well-trained racehorses. The crowd cheered as the jockeys were obliged to use every bit of their strength and skill to restrain their impatient mounts. Lord Murray now gave the predetermined signal, and the race was on.
The ponies shot away from the starting line like a flock of birds, their feet hardly seeming to touch the ground. Predictably, they had gone only a short distance before a number of them bolted. Fully half disappeared into the woods surrounding the parade grounds, despite the desperate efforts of their riders to keep them on the track. When they reached the bridge, a third of the remaining animals shied and refused to cross—so that already only seven or eight ponies were left, a few of which ran aimlessly, having thrown their riders.
This race consisted of two complete circuits of the parade grounds, so the contestants crossed the finish line in a cloud of dust and continued on their way. Turning the first corner, they vanished. Loud shouts reached the straining ears of the crowd, followed first by hoots of laughter, then a moment of dead silence. It eventually became clear that only one horse remained on the track—all the others had now bolted into the Château-d’Eau woods or the creeks, or under the bridge.
Ten minutes went by; then a single pony appeared at the top of the hill—but with no rider. The animal had apparently galloped through the town, passed the church, and reentered the parade grounds by instinct alone. Now other horses and riders could be seen returning from various directions, but it was too late. In the blink of an eye the riderless pony crossed the finish line and came to a stop, seemingly aware that he had won the race. The handsome double-barreled Menton rifle was duly awarded to the intelligent animal’s owner, a colonist by the name of Saunders. The other ponies returned, one by one, to the holding area—except for those that had bolted so completely, their owners did not recover them for a day, or even two. Thus the pony race was concluded.
A thirty-minute intermission was now held, during which programs were distributed and final wagers placed. Among the highest bettors was Captain Van den Broek. Immediately upon stepping ashore, he had gone straight to the shop of M. Vigier, the town’s premier goldsmith and jeweler, and exchanged a hundred thousand francs’ worth of diamonds for banknotes and gold. Now, to everyone’s surprise, he staked all of it on a horse whose name was unknown on the island—one Antrim.
There were four steeds entered in the race:
Restoration, ridden by Colonel Draper;
Virginia, ridden by Monsieur Rondeau de Courcy;
Jester, ridden by Monsieur Henri de Malmédie; and
Antrim, ridden by Monsieur (here the program listed two asterisks, but no name).
The favorites were Jester and Restoration, who had won last year’s event. Even more was expected from them this year, ridden as they were by their owners, who both had reputations as highly skilled horsemen. Virginia, on the other hand, was at a disadvantage since she was running her very first race.
Captain Van den Broek continued to back Antrim, despite the multitude of charitable warnings that he was acting like a veritable fool; the spectators’ curiosity about this strange horse and rider only grew as a result.
Since the horses were to be ridden by their owners, there was no weighing-in of the jockeys. It was no great surprise, then, when neither Antrim nor the rider who, instead of giving his name, used a hieroglyphic symbol to represent himself, appeared in the tent where the mounts were saddled and bridled; it was simply assumed that the mysterious duo would simply appear at the starting line when it was time for the race to begin.
In due course the competitors emerged from the tent—and at that moment the unknown fourth rider who had been the source of so much curiosity could be seen approaching from the direction of the Malabar camp. His appearance, rather than solving the mystery that swirled around him, served only to increase it. He was dressed in an Egyptian style that revealed lavish embroidery beneath the burnoose that concealed half of his face, and he was mounted in the short-stirruped manner of an Arab rider. His horse’s trappings, moreover, were Turkish. As for Antrim, once they had seen him no one doubted that he was to be the stranger’s mount. His sleek lines and obvious rapport with his master seemed to justify the confidence shown in advance by Captain Van den Broek.
No one recognized the
stallion or his rider but, since he had entered the race under the governor’s auspices and must therefore be a friend of Lord Murray, the crowd respected his wish to remain incognito. Only one person in the governor’s box, perhaps, guessed the stranger’s identity and leaned forward, cheeks crimson, to be sure she was correct. This, of course, was Sara.
The competitors now took their places in a row at the starting line. Since there were only four gentlemen racing, and since it was expected to be mainly a contest between Jester and Restoration, whose reputations had frightened away most of the other potential contenders, the judges had decided to draw out the spectacle a bit and give the watchers an especial treat by having the riders make two circuits of the track instead of the single one that was customary in a gentlemen’s race. It was a total distance of three miles—one league—which would give the advantage to the horses that led out of the starting gate.
The signal was given, and the race was on. As we have seen, in such circumstances the beginning is often meaningless. Halfway through the first turn, Virginia—who, as I have said, was racing for the first time—had a lead of nearly thirty paces. Antrim was nearly alongside her, while Restoration and Jester, visibly restrained by their riders, brought up the rear. By the time they reached the top of the hill about two-thirds of the way around the track, Antrim had gained half a length, while Restoration and Jester were now ten paces closer. The second round of the race had begun. The audience leaned forward in their seats as the racers passed the governor’s box, clapping their hands and shouting encouragement to the riders, and Sara—by intention or chance—let her posy of flowers drop to the track. The mysterious rider saw the blossoms fall; with magnificent grace and without breaking stride, he leaned down, perilously close to the horse’s belly, as Arabian riders do when they play djerid, and swept up the bouquet. Saluting the flowers’ fair owner he resumed his course, having lost barely ten paces and seemingly unconcerned with regaining them.
Georges Page 20
