"The race you are supposed to be driving, is the usual English mile and a half handicap heat," he said; "yours is the scratch horse, consequently you will start from here, and go three times round the track, the full mile and a half."
Gay nodded.
"My horse," continued Rensslaer, "is reckoned to be the limit horse. I will start 210 yards in front of you. Handicapping is supposed to be with the idea your horse can trot the mile and a half, at the rate of 2 minutes 30 seconds for the mile, the mile and a half therefore, in 3 minutes 45 seconds. Every ten yards means, roughly, one second, so my horse being put 210 yards in front of you, means that he is supposed to be 21 seconds slower than yours for a mile and a half, that is to say, he has to trot at the rate of a mile in 2 minutes 44 seconds, to make a dead heat of it with you."
Gay nodded again comprehendingly, her eyes sparkling with excitement.
"You must drive so as to gradually overtake me," went on Rensslaer, "but not starting too fast, or you would pump your mare, if she could really only trot a 2.30 gait, and you must not overtake me till you get into the back stretch the third time. I have given you a very fast mare, so as to make you judge speed, and also so as to make it easier for you to be sure of overtaking me, as I intend to drive strictly at no faster speed than 2.44 for the mile."
"And fast enough, too," thought Gay, her heart beating a little too quickly for comfort.
"Carry this watch in your left palm, slipping the strap over your hand," said Rensslaer, "so that you can see what speed you are going. Try and drive the quarter miles in 37½ seconds till you come up with me, which should be, if you drive to this time, thirty yards from the winning post."
He then hooked up Marvellous' check-rein, and told Gay to walk the mare back from her starting-post twenty yards, turn back again, and so on till she saw him at his mark, and then stand still at her mark.
Tugwood stepped into the centre of the grass plot, and held a pistol in the air. The moment Marvellous saw his arm raised (she had been thoroughly schooled to this), she fixed her eyes and ears in his direction, and commenced to tremble slightly.
As the smoke came from the pistol, before Gay could hear the report, Marvellous jumped forward with a jerk that nearly threw her out backwards, and landed on a square trot. She was so much stretched out that she seemed two inches lower than when standing, and was sending the earth in quick hoof-fulls on to Gay's chest. It was lucky, the girl thought, her eyes were protected by goggles.