"It wasn't Bob Barrett that gave you the tip?"
"Not likely." The men laughed, and then Stack said—
"You know Bill Evans? You've seen him here, always wore a blue Melton jacket and billycock hat; a dark, stout, good-looking fellow; generally had something to sell, or pawn-tickets that he would part with for a trifle."
"Yes, I know the fellow. We met him down at Epsom one Derby Day. Sarah
Tucker, a friend of the missis, was dead gone on him."
"Yes, she went to live with him. There was a row, and now, I believe, they're together again; they was seen out walking. They're friends, anyhow. Bill has been away all the summer, tramping. A bad lot, but one of them sort often hears of a good thing."
"So it was from Bill Evans that you heard it."
"Yes, it was from Bill. He has just come up from Eastbourne, where he 'as been about on the Downs a great deal. I don't know if it was the horses he was after, but in the course of his proceedings he heard from a shepherd that Ben Jonson was doing seven hours' walking exercise a day. This seemed to have fetched Bill a bit. Seven hours a day walking exercise do seem a bit odd, and being at the same time after one of the servants in the training stable—as pretty a bit of goods as he ever set eyes on, so Bill says—he thought he'd make an inquiry or two about all this walking exercise. One of the lads in the stable is after the girl, too, so Bill found out very soon all he wanted to know. As you says, the 'orse is dicky on 'is forelegs, that is the reason of all the walking exercise."
"And they thinks they can bring him fit to the post and win the
Cesarewitch with him by walking him all day?"
"I don't say they don't gallop him at all; they do gallop him, but not as much as if his legs was all right."
"That won't do. I don't believe in a 'orse winning the Cesarewitch that ain't got four sound legs, and old Ben ain't got more than two."