Then the boy would canter away through the gray light, and the trainer, handkerchief in one hand and stop-watch in the other, would mount the fence. If the clock said .57 for that last half mile, or anything between that and .55, there was a slap on the back and a "Good kid," for Tim, but woe to him if the clicking hand cut it down to .53.
Mistakes he made, and many of them, but they grew fewer and fewer. Good hands he had (for they are born with a boy, if he's ever to have them) and an intuitive knowledge of the temper of a horse. A good seat they had taught him at The Vale. And gradually, little by little and bit by bit, he came to be what only one jockey in fifty ever grows into—an unerring judge of pace.
Just what it is that tells a boy whether the muscles of steel that he bestrides are shooting him rhythmically over a furlong of dull brown earth or black and slimy mud in .12½ or .13¼, some person may perhaps be able to tell, but certain it is that no person ever has told it. Long after Tim had learned the secret as few boys have ever known it, I asked him.
"Why," said he, "yew know your hoss, an' after thet, why, yew jest feel it."
It was not until the autumn meeting at Gravesend that Tim first wore the colors. It was in an overnight selling race for two-year-olds, for which Faulkner had in despair named Gracious.
Gracious was a merry little short-bodied filly, who was bred as well as any of the Holland lot, but who hadn't done well. Out of six starts she had never shown anything, and Faulkner had determined to start her once more and then weed her out. The weight, eighty-seven pounds, was so light that the stable jockey couldn't make it. Then Faulkner remembered the Colonel's words: "Give him a chance, if he makes good."
"I'll do it," he said, and told Tim.
Tim didn't sleep well that night, and with wide eyes he welcomed the first light of the great day. At last he was to wear the colors!
"Just get her off well and take your time," said Faulkner, as he put the boy up. "Rate her along to the stretch and then drive her."
Tim did all that. Coming into the stretch, there were four horses ahead of him on the rail. But two of them were weakening. Then Tim called on the filly. She answered and went up. But the colt next her was staggering. He swerved, and Tim had to pull out. He got Gracious going again and landed her third, only a head behind the second horse. Faulkner was radiant as Tim dismounted.