The Mirror of Present Events

by Brian Stableford

  Baron Isaac and Ely Pauwels had had their eyes of the Cup for a long time. As much as possible, they sought out the big races, certainly not for reasons of self-respect, not even that of allocation, but because the betting market is larger and it is easier to bring off a discreet and remunerative coup.

  Huit-Pour-Cent had been prepared for a long time, which is to say that he had carried Baron Isaac’s sky blue silks around all the hippodromes for two months, always running over distances too short for him, On every occasion, the Baron had had told his best friends: “The horse only has one burst of speed.”71

  However, the financier possessed form lines precise enough to be sure that with his weight and over three thousand meters, Huit-Pour-Cent had the beating of all his competitors, even though, on paper, those did not appear negligible.

  There was, naturally, Agamemnon, who, to all evidence, ought to be the favorite again. He might have finished last, but that was of no account. Stéphane Weiss’s horse could not be anything but a crack.

  There were also Monocle and Scaferlati, two three-year-olds who had shown stamina and a certain quality.

  Finally, and above all, there was the Tafoireau stable. For Griffith, partly by way of diplomacy and more particularly to soothe the wounded self-esteem of his first jockey, had added to Peau-de-Balle his stable-companion Salsifis, in the same colors, ridden by John Blight.

  In the general opinion, Salsifis was the veritable champion of the stable, the preceding performance of Peau-de-Balle being considered as deceptive, a pure fluke.

  From the viewpoint of Baron Isaac, Huit-Pour-Cent had the beating of Salsifis; in a handicap run recently at Maisons-Lafitte, he had felt out that competitor at the end of the race. The impression of the Pauwels stable jockey was that he would have reckoned with him that day if he had tried; they had been at level weights on that occasion, and in the Cup, Huit-Pour-Cent was getting six kilos from Salsifis.

  Baron Isaac de l’Échelle-Jacob, who never left anything to chance, disposed his batteries on the day of the race with the remarkable strategic art that ensures victory on all the battlefields where intelligence takes precedence over brute force.

  At the weigh-in he was seen running from group to group, affirming that his horse had no chance.

  “I’m letting him go to give him a good gallop with class horses; he’s going over the sticks next month; he’s already being trained for that.”

  And he was seen heading for the pari-mutuel windows, where he ostentatiously bet ten francs on Agamemnon.

  Meanwhile, he had small sums put on at good prices on Huit-Pour-Cent with the bookmakers in the ring. In addition, his agents on the Bourse, whom he used at the racecourses n Sundays, discreetly collected tickets at the windows in the cheap enclosure.

  Finally, Baron Isaac operated on the principle that the left hand ought to know what the right hand received, and had made arrangements to extend both hands; that is why the bookmaker Sem Lévy, who was his straw man, had a mission to lay Agamemnon and Salsifis with an open tap. Passing close to him, the financier asked, in a low voice: “What are the latest prices?”

  “Three to one Agamemnon, seven to two Salsifis, six to one Monocle and Scaferlati, twelve to one Huit-Pour-Cent. I’ve already taken three hundred louis on the two favorites. But there’s a strange movement going on at present, on the subject of which I’d like new instructions. It’s Peau-de-Balle that’s now in demand; the horse opened at twenty-five to one; it’s just passed fourteen, and there’s still a demand. Shall I also lay it on your account, Monsieur le Baron?”

  “Oh, as much as you can. It’s probably La Tafoireau and that silly fool Jérôme Thomas who’ve put that tip about. Anyway, if Peau-de-Balle were going to win, it’s not them that would have told you.”

  “I’d have known it from Griffith—he owes me enough money not to be able to refuse me a little tip. But I’m sure you’re right, Monsieur le Baron; in matters of horses, one can’t get the better of you.”

  That flattery struck home; Isaac had the pretention of profound knowledge in hippic matters, and even of being a brilliant rider.

  And yet, his opinion of the chances of Peau-de-Balle was not that of all competent people—far from it.

  Notably, the jockeys who were to ride in the race did not remember without anxiety what had happened the previous Sunday. They had no desire to recommence the hunt that the Biennal had constituted, and were determined not to let Peau-de-Balle escape, even though, this time, he appeared to be acting as a pacemaker for Salsifis.

  Tom Lane, who was not in the saddle this time, did not hide his opinion: “I think I know a little about the pace of a race. Well, I’m sure I didn’t lag behind in an exaggerated fashion the other day, whatever anyone says. If I were riding today, I’d be diabolically embarrassed…I think I’d try to stick close Peau-de-Balle, but I wouldn’t be tranquil, because a beast that can cover three thousand meters at that lick must have something in his belly.”

  “Certainly, the horse has something in his belly,” Griffith replied, calmly.

  The signal for the start was given; almost immediately, as expected, Peau-de-Balle took the lead. Huit-Pour-Cent, whose jockey, duly instructed, wanted to take advantage of his low weight, accompanied him, making sure of the rail. Monocle and Scaferlati, the two three-year-olds, followed immediately behind. Salsifis galloped at the rear, playing a sage waiting game; he allowed his stable companion to wear down the common adversaries, and only had Agamemnon behind him, whose action really was far from brilliant for a favorite.

  At the first bend, Peau-de-Balle lost a few lengths again, but quickly regained the lead.

  At the Windmill, to the general amazement, the jockeys who had tried to accompany him were seen agitating heir arms and legs, and then their whips; then the gap gradually widened between the leader and his immediate followers.

  Agamemnon and Salisifis tried in vain to get closer.

  At the little wood the race was over. Peau-de-Balle continued at his regular speed, in front of his exhausted adversaries.

  “Oh la la!” someone in the crowd shouted. “It’s a cakewalk! Go, Blight! Go, Salsifis!”

  “Bloody idiot,” riposted an honorable gentleman who did not know the other at all. “That’s not Salsifis! That’s not Salsifis! That’s not Blight! You’re looking through rose-tinted glasses. That’s Peau-de-Balle! Peau-de-Balle! Peau-de-Balle!”

  “I don’t care! I don’t care! I’ll collect all the same—I bet the Tafoireau stable on the mutuel.”

  The judge put up Peau-de-Balle, the winner by a distance. Second was his stable companion Salsifis, whose jockey had persevered furiously, for reasons that will be explained later.

  Gustave Louffe was radiant, Griffith too. Both had backed Peau-de-Balle to the limit of their respective means; the jockey could already see himself rising to the seventh heaven in a flying machine, and the trainer drinking three glasses of soda-water one after another at Rouzé’s, which was for him a sign of prosperity.

  When Griffith, with the necessary celerity and discretion, had embarked his jockey and his crack automaton for Chantilly, he went back to the weighing room, where he encountered Madame Tafoireau. The happy owner did not have an expression as delighted as the circumstance warranted.

  “Well, Madame, we’ve won the Cup. I told you that Peau-de-Balle was the best of your horses; I hope you bet on him.”

  “But no!” replied Madame Tafoireau. “Blight assured me that it was Salsifis who would win. That idiot Jérôme was also of that opinion. So I bet that that was true…and all my friends are cursing me now, because they did the same. Fortunately, I’ve won a lovely work of art. Come and see it—it’s on exhibition. It represents Hippolyte’s Chariot. It appears that it’s superb.”

  Baron Isaac de l’Échelle-Jacob was simply furious.

  The day had cost him fifty thousand francs. He had, in addition, the bitterness of being beaten by a horse he had previously owned, and, which was even harder, by a horse wea
ring the colors of Madame Tafoireau. He had an old grudge against that lady, compounded out of jealousy and wounded pride. In fact, in the days when Mag Iris was singing at the Boîte-à-Clous, he had manifested the desire to please her, and had made his propositions with all the delicacy that one could expect of him.

  Unfortunately, the Baron had a well-founded reputation for being a very economical man, a reputation justified even by the appearance of his garments and linen. Now, an economical man was not at all to the taste of the charming artiste, who was already on the trail of the large allocation represented by the millions of Comte Jérôme Thomas. However, Mag Iris had made the Baron climb a ladder,72 compared with which his ancestor’s had only been a child’s toy. She had rendered him completely ridiculous, and the conquest of a venerable actress of the Théâtre-Français, laden with glory and years, had only been a derisory compensation for the financier’s self-esteem.

  That disastrous day reserved another disagreement for him in seeing his prestige diminished in the eyes of the bookmaker Sem Lévy and his agents. He liked to pass everywhere for a sharp operator, and a sharp operator, by definition, ought not to lose his shirt. It was extremely painful for him to hear, a few days later, a few phrases pronounced, intentionally, loud enough for him not to miss any of them.

  “He’s bloodied his nose, Père Isaac.”

  “The God of Abraham and Jacob is just.”

  “The excellent fellow has certainly been rolled over by someone today.”

  “You mean that he hasn’t succeeded in rolling over someone else? That’s sufficient to explain the nose...”

  “Let’s not worry too much on his account. The buyers of shares in De Beer’s will pay him back on the day of liquidation.”

  There was another person who was not content, and that was the jockey John Blight.

  “Monsieur Griffith,” he said, “it’s me who wears the stable’s first colors. Why didn’t you instruct the little young man, once he was master of the race, a supposition, to stop his horse if he saw me behind him? Then you thought my place was behind, on Salsifis?”

  Griffith replied, in a convinced and affectionate tone: “But my dear Blight, you’re an intelligent man: tell me, really, with hand on heart, how we could have divined that Peau-de-Balle would find himself master of the race?”

  XI. Peau-de-Balle is a bloody good horse.

  The day after that sensational victory, the commentators of the sporting press were already conceding Peau-de-Balle permission to be a good horse, without nevertheless going as far as the discern class in him. Class, as everyone knows, is only obtained by a fashionable birth in a classic stud or two consecutive victories over eight hundred meters at the age of two. Horses acquire class, as children catch measles or win a medal in a baby contest. You might be a remarkable man or a cretin later; that is of no consequence; no human or divine power can henceforth alter the fact that you have or have not had measles at the age of four, that you have or have not obtained the gold medal in a baby contest at eighteen months.

  Then again, in Peau-de-Balle’s dossier there was an ineradicable flaw, something akin to a criminal conviction or a rejection by the draft board, which was that Ely Pauwels had declared him useless on the turf and sold him for export.

  After the Cup, the newspapers did not want to stress that unfortunate detail too much.

  Beni-Mora in La Cravache, even admired “the supple and powerful style” of Peau-de Balle, who, according to him had “visibly put on condition” since his last run. His skillful trainer had brought him to “the apogee of his form; he was a veritable picture; muscle had replaced in his the superfluous flesh, and his satiny coat testified to the completeness of his preparation.” Certainly, the result of the race was “subject to caution,” especially with regard to Agamemnon, whose performance was “too bad to be true”—a familiar leitmotiv—and “who was probably feeling the after-effects of the epidemic” that had been rife in the Stéphane Weiss stable five years previously. All things considered, however, “Peau-de-Balle promises to be better than a workhorse.”

  Brobdignac’s article was impressive in its authority. Technical details abounded therein, submerging the reader, who was fatally required to stop, stunned by admiration. He demonstrated, by means of that masterpiece, that Peau-de-Balle had necessarily to win the Cup, by virtue of a predestination dating from before the Deluge, Methuselah and even Genesis itself. In fact that product of pure blood was “the issue” of “the cross-breeding of family 3 and family 17, which is associated, by a consanguinity of which no one is unaware, to families 23 and 52”—here followed a genealogical tree in which no pig could have found its offspring. It therefore resulted, from the currents of blood that had circulated in his noble dam’s family, that Peau-de-Balle won in a style that did not come from a nose-bag. And Brobdignac concluded that he had foreseen the event a long time ago, well before the birth of Peau-de-Balle.

  Le Tuyau, incorrigibly, still had reservations. For him, the jockeys of the competitors had been too keen “to run after a horse whose initial break was shattering.” They had been “broken by his dash” and “if they had waited until he was at the end of his tether become coming to attack him, the physiognomy of the race would have been completely different.” (The works of Monsieur de La Palisse surely constituted by the Tipster’s bedtime reading,73 and at every moment, one saw him broadly inspired by his favorite author.) Furthermore, all of that was the fault of the deplorable Bowen, who had ridden in a fashion that would not have been tolerated in an apprentice.

  The same note was found in almost all the papers. The most audacious expressed the conviction that Peau-de-Balle might yet win more races.

  A reporter for the Sport du Soir, however, who had the strange habit of seeing through his own eyes and not borrowing the ready-made phrases so convenient for use in any eventuality, wrote under the rubric “From Day to Day” these inspired, and, so to speak, prophetic lines:

  Ought I to admit it? I experienced an inexplicable impression, a veritable malaise, in seeing Peau-de-Balle gallop. Certainly, his stride is long, powerful and regular; he dies not betray any fatigue at the end of a race, and nothing, thus far, permits the limit of his means to be glimpsed. But there is something artificial and staccato in his action. One has the impression of seeing a locomotive advance, or rather, a mechanical toy. The horse does not seem to be moved by a soul, but by a taut spring that one always senses ready to break.

  Alone in all the press, as can be seen, the reporter of the Sport du Soir issued a prognosis—or, rather, a diagnosis—approaching the truth. No one paid any attention to him.

  Peau-de-Balle, careless of these obscure blasphemers and fervent admirers, pursued his triumphant career. In eight weeks, the due dates specified by Fred and Tod arrived, and every one, coinciding with a victory, was settled in full. The two Yankees departed for Chicago, where they immediately began work on a stock of presidential automata ordered by various Republics in South America.

  The mechanical horse always won, and his exceptional form won the admiration of the weighing room and the crowd. A rain of gold fell upon Griffith, upon Gustave Louffe and even on Madame Tafoireau, who did not attach any great importance to it, having at her mercy the inexhaustible treasury of Comte Jérôme Thomas.

  Peau-de-Balle made a clean sweep of all the races to which four-year-old horses were admitted, at all distances from twelve hundred meters to four thousand. Griffith, out of dilettantism, had even amused himself winning small handicaps in which the horse led from start to finish with top weight of sixty-five kilos. The tone of the press became dithyrambic.

  Curiously enough, and which must be regarded as a simple coincidence, the good form of the automaton was communicated, by a kind of contagion, to the other horses in the same stable. All of them were now earning their oats.

  It’s extraordinary, Griffith said to himself. Three months ago, I was working like a dog with these damned nags, and I couldn’t pick up a prize in a claimer
. Today, I hardly pay any attention to them, and they’re always there, of their own accord. Well, so much the better; it pleases the bosses…and Blight, too.

  One fly in the ointment, of course, was the curiosity manifest on the subject of Peau-de-Balle. It became increasingly difficult to hide him under a bushel. One day, in fact, coming back from a victorious run, some imbecile had claimed that the horse was limping. Then Ely Pauwels, whose specialty was poking his nose in everywhere and interfering with things that were none of his business, had had the pretention, while Griffith had his back turned, to see whether Peau-de-Balle’s cannon-bone was warm.

  Already, he had leaned over to take hold of the leg and feel it. Fortunately, Gustave Louffe was there. He had delivered, with remarkable precision, a terrible blow of the whip to the extended hand of the trainer, who had straightened up howling like a man possessed. Gustave Louffe had then said to him, in the most polite fashion in the world: “Oh, beg pardon, Monsieur Pauwels, I didn’t see you there,” and led his horse away.

  Another story: Madame Tafoireau wanted to have a portrait of her horse made by an animal painter she had once known in Montmartre in the days when he peeled turnips and she was showing her legs in a dive at three francs a night (less fines). The artist now commanded very high prices and must, therefore, have acquired enormous talent.

  Griffith trembled for twenty-four hours, and was only reassured on observing the excessive myopia of the animal painter. He installed him in one corner of his yard and Peau-de-Balle in the opposite one. The artist marveled at the patience of the horse while the sittings lasted.

  “If only all models held their pose as well as that,” he is still repeating today.

  The painting is presently to be found in Comte Jérôme Thomas’ drawing room. Its author is a member of the Institut.