III
For three years Bonfire had been in leather and he had found the life far different from the dull routine of coddling that he had known at the Lochlynne Farm. There was little monotony about it, for the Jerrys were no stay-at-homes. Of his oak-finished stable, with its sanded floors and plaited straw stall-mats, Bonfire saw almost as little as did Mrs. Jerry of her white and gold rooms on the Avenue.
In the morning it would be a trip down town, where Topsy and Bonfire would wait before the big stores, watching the traffic and people, until Mrs. Jerry reappeared. After luncheon they generally took her through the Park or up and down the Avenue to teas and receptions. In the evening they were often harnessed again to take Mr. and Mrs. Jerry to dinner, theatre, or ball. Late at night they might be turned out to fetch them home.
What long, cold waits they had, standing in line sometimes for hours, stamping their hoofs and shivering under heavy blankets; for a stylish hackney, you know, must be kept closely clipped, no matter what the weather. Why, even Dan, muffled in his big coat and bear-skin shoulder-cape, was half frozen. But Dan could leave the footman on the box and go to warm himself in the glittering corner saloons, and when he came back it would be the footman's turn. For Topsy and Bonfire there was no such relief. Chilled, tired, and hungry, they must stamp and wait until at last, far down the street, could be heard the shouting of the strong-lunged carriage-caller. When Dan got his number they were quite ready for the homeward dash.
Seeing them come down the street, heads tossing, pole-chains jingling, the crest and monogram of the house of Jerry glistening on quarter cloth and rosette, their polished hoofs seeming barely to touch the asphalt, you might have thought their lot one to be envied. But Bonfire and Topsy knew better.
It was altogether too heavy work for high-bred hackneys, of course. Mr. Jerry pointed this out, but to no use. Mrs. Jerry asked pertinently what good horses were for if not to be used. No, she wanted no livery teams for the night work. When she rode she wished to ride behind Topsy and Bonfire. They were her horses, anyway. She would do as she pleased. And she did.
Summer brought neither rest nor relief. Early in July horses, servants, and carriages would be shipped off to Newport or Saratoga, there to begin again the unceasing whirl. And fly time, to a docktailed horse, is a season of torment.
Of Mrs. Jerry, who had once roused the Garden for his sake, Bonfire caught but glimpses. After that first day, when he was a novelty, he heard no more compliments, received no more pats from her gloved hands. But of slight or neglect Bonfire knew nothing. He curved his neck and threw his hoofs high, whether his muscles ached or no; in winter he stamped to keep warm, in summer to dislodge the flies; he did his work faithfully, early or late, in cold and in heat; and all this because he was a son of Sir Bardolph and for the reason that it was his nature to. Had it been put upon him he would have worked in harness until he dropped, prancing his best to the last.
No supreme test, however, was ever brought to the endurance and willingness of Bonfire. They just kept him on the pole, nerves tense, muscles strained, until he began to lose form. His action no longer had that grace and abandon which so pleased Mrs. Jerry when she first saw him. Long standing in the cold numbs the muscles. It robs the legs of their spring. Sudden starts, such as are made when you are called from line after an hour's waiting, finish the business. Try as he might, Bonfire could not step so high, could not carry a perfect crest. His neck had lost its roundness, in his rump a crease had appeared.
To Dan also, came tribulation of his own making. He carried a flat brown flask under the box and there were times when his driving was more a matter of muscular habit than of mental acuteness. Twice he was threatened with discharge and twice he solemnly promised reform. At last the inevitable happened. Dan came one morning to Bonfire's stall, very sober and very sad. He patted Bonfire and said good-by. Then he disappeared.
Less than a week later two young hackneys, plump of neck, round of quarter, springy of knee and hock, were brought to the stable. Bonfire and Topsy were led out of their old stalls to return no more. They had been worn out in the service and cast aside like a pair of old gloves.
Then did Bonfire enter upon a period of existence in which box-stalls, crested quarter blankets, rubber-tired wheels and liveried drivers had no part. It was a varied existence, filled with toil and hardship and abuse; an existence for which the coddling one gets at Lochlynne Farm is no fit preparation.