Read Online Dance of the Years by Margery Allingham - Free Book Online

that an animal had any, but in the ten minutes which followed, he began to get a very vivid idea of what Larch and Jason meant by a “blood.”
    The stallion’s name was Mandrake, and in the background somewhere Mandrake had an ancestor called Poteightos. As far as James could gather, Poteightos was a heavenly steed, a sort of Jehovah horse, a Zeus. More than this, however, he in turn had had a sire whose name was so impressive that Larch could scarcely trust himself to mention it. “Eclipse.” James never heard the word afterwards without experiencing a faint, superstitious thrill.
    James was not a fanciful little boy by nature, but he was not deeplyinformed, and it did not seem to him unreasonable that horses should be a race co-equal with men, the bloods being as it were a divine, or at least angelic, strain among them. He felt he was fairly familiar with angels since Dorothy had assured him that there was always one in the wall just above the head of his bed. He had heard it scratching sometimes.
    The whole thing was highly peculiar, of course, but seven years of life had convinced him that there was nothing to wonder at in that. Life was peculiar. The more you heard about it the more staggering it became. He saw clearly though, that Larch must be a sort of Dorothy of the horse world, and would know what he was talking about, so he listened with deep attention.
    The hall-mark, the sign of Eclipse, Larch said, lowering his voice on the mighty name, was the dark spots on the chestnut rump of a horse. Always in the direct male line there were these dark spots in the fiery hide, just there, on the quarters.
    James found the male line so mysterious that Larch had to explain it. “On the sire side,” he said, “come down through the father, see? Now the dam side, or as you might say, the mother’s, that doesn’t never carry it.”
    â€œMothers are not so good?” enquired James with interest, pouching another piece of information.
    â€œMothers are wonderful tricky,” affirmed Larch, with dark reminiscence. “Seems they can spoil a good ’un, but they can’t never make one. A good dam will always throw to the sire, whatever he be, right or wrong, but a poor little old dam may do anything. She’s a right dangerous thing. No mistake about it. Son may be all right, grandson likewise, and then trouble starts in a whole line on ’em.”
    James was not much clearer after all this, but he did not forget the maxim. It remained in his memory for years, and he regarded it as gospel long after he had forgotten where he had learned it.
    The notion of the Sign interested him immensely. He looked at the dark, irregular patches on the stallion’s soft gold skin, which were like oil stains on satin, and a thrill ran through him; for glory of glories, had not he himself a great black mole on his own seat? At one time it had alarmed him slightly, but Dorothy had said it was quite common, and nothing to fidget about.
    So hitherto he had accepted it without interest, but now he was indignant with her. Nothing to worry about indeed! That was just like Dorothy; always hiding important things in case they might make him conceited. He, James, had the Sign, too. True, he was not a horse, but might not this mark of superiority be universal? Belong to men as well as horses?
    He was so delighted, so pleased, and so eager to see the admiration of the gathering transferred from the stallion to himself, that all other considerations went out of his head, and with a single-mindedness which was pure Shulie, he pulled open his breeches, scruffed up his shirt, and nudging Larch displayed his buttock proudly to him, pointing out the big mole which was nearly the size of a shilling, and black as a coal.
    The shout of laughter went up all round in one great brutal roar, the clap of it burst over his head like a storm. Realization poured over him, chilling him, almost taking his breath