Crimmins eyed him askance as he entered.

“Goin’ for a canter, sir?  Ho, yuss; this ’ere is the ’orse the master said as ’ow you were to ride, sir.  It don’t matter which side yeh get on.  ‘E’s as stiddy-goin’ as a alarum clock.  Ho, yuss.  I calls ’im Waterbury Watch—­partly because I ’appen to ’ave a brother wot’s trainer for Mr. Waterbury, the turfman, sir.”

Crimmins shifted his cud with great satisfaction at this uninterrupted flow of loquacity and brilliant humor.  Garrison was looking the animal over instinctively, his hands running from hock to withers and back again.

“How old is he?” he asked absently.

“Three years, sir.  Ho, yuss.  Thoroughbred.  Cast-off from the Duryea stable.  By Sysonby out of Hamburg Belle.  Won the Brighton Beach overnight sweepstakes in nineteen an’ four.  Ho, yuss.  Just a little off his oats, but a bloomin’ good ’orse.”

Garrison turned, speaking mechanically.  “I wonder do you think I’m a fool!  Sysonby himself won the Brighton sweepstakes in nineteen-four.  It was the beginning of his racing career, and an easy win.  This animal here is a plug; an out-and-out plug of the first water.  He never saw Hamburg Belle or Sysonby—­they never mated.  This plug’s a seven-year-old, and he couldn’t do seven furlongs in seven weeks.  He never was class, and never could be.  I don’t want to ride a cow, I want a horse.  Give me that two-year-old black filly with the big shoulders.  Whose is she?”

Crimmins shifted the cud again to hide his astonishment at Garrison’s sudden savoir-faire.

“She’s wicked, sir.  Bought for the missus, but she ain’t broken yet.”

“She hasn’t been handled right.  Her mouth’s hard, but her temper’s even.  I’ll ride her,” said Garrison shortly.

“Have to wear blinkers, sir.”

“No, I won’t.  Saddle her.  Hurry up.  Shorten the stirrup.  There, that’s right.  Stand clear.”

Crimmins eyed Garrison narrowly as he mounted.  He was quite prepared to run with a clothes-basket to pick up the remains.  But Garrison was up like a feather, high on the filly’s neck, his shoulders hunched.  The minute he felt the saddle between his knees he was at home again after a long, long absence.  He had come into his birthright.

The filly quivered for a moment, laid back her ears, and then was off.

“Cripes!” ejaculated the veracious Crimmins, as wide-eyed he watched the filly fling gravel down the drove, “’e’s got a seat like Billy Garrison himself.  ‘E can ride, that kid.  An’ ’e knows ’orse-flesh.  Blimy if ’e don’t!  If Garrison weren’t down an’ out I’d be ready to tyke my Alfred David it were ‘is bloomin’ self.  An’ I thought ’e was a dub!  Ho, yuss—­me!”

Moralizing on the deceptiveness of appearances, Crimmins fortified himself with another slab of cut-plug.

Miss Desha, up on a big bay gelding with white stockings, was waiting on the Logan Pike, where the driveway of Calvert House swept into it.