Bertie and the Tinman Page 3

  The nurse, Charlotte Hornidge, came next, and she couldn’t have been above nineteen, with a high color to her cheek and black curls thrusting from her cap, far too pretty a creature to empty a bedpan, in my estimation.

  The coroner agreed with me, from the way he took off his glasses and cleaned them two or three times.

  “I was sent to dinner at seventeen minutes past two,” stated Nurse Hornidge, which impressed us all. Here, we thought, is a meticulous witness, as well as a decorative one. “Mr. Archer suggested it to Mrs. Coleman.”

  Perhaps poor Fred was out of his mind, after all, I thought. Any sane man would have sent his sister to dinner and asked the nurse to remain.

  “I had hardly been downstairs one minute when the bell rang violently,” she continued confidently. “I also heard cries of help, and a sound as if a pistol had gone off. I dashed upstairs and saw the patient lying on the hearth rug, quite dead. Mrs. Coleman was screaming. The valet was also present. He was just ahead of me.”

  “You say that your patient was dead, my dear. Did you examine him?”

  “I saw that he was bleeding in his mouth. I looked in his eyes and felt his pulse, but I didn’t examine him further. I waited for the doctor.”

  “Eminently sensible,” commented the coroner with an in­gratiating smile. “Now perhaps you would say something about his state of mind, as you perceived it that morning. Was he rational, so far as you could tell?”

  “Oh, yes. When I spoke, he always answered rationally, but he was very low-spirited when I was nursing him. I remember a conversation when he told me he thought he was going to die. I told him to cheer up, because there was no reason to think he would die. He replied, ‘I wish I was of your way of thinking.’”

  “But you still found him rational? He didn’t appear to you to wander in his mind?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Not in any way at all?”

  “Not in the least.”

  “You’re quite certain?”

  “Utterly.”

  I may be mistaken, but I thought the coroner sounded slightly less enchanted by Nurse Hornidge when he thanked her for her testimony and told her to return to her seat.

  The final witness stepped forward. Dr. J. R. Wright of New­market was a silver-haired, crisply spoken man, who must have appeared many times before the coroner. His manner of giving evidence carried authority.

  “I was Mr. Archer’s medical man for fourteen years. He had pretty good health. I have never attended him for a serious illness until this case of typhoid. I was called to see him last Friday morning, the fifth of November, and I found him in a high state of fever, extremely restless. I prescribed for him and saw him again at two. By then the fever symptoms had increased. Indeed, his temperature was so very high that I suggested having a second opinion. The patient declined, but I took it on myself to send for Dr. Latham from Cambridge.”

  “He is an authority on fevers?” inquired the coroner.

  “He is a colleague whose opinion I value,” stated the doctor in a tone that made the question seem superfluous.

  “Kindly proceed.”

  “Dr. Latham sent his carriage for me the next morning at seven-thirty. We examined the patient together. He was no better. His temperature was the same, and he was not prepared to be cooper­ative.”

  “In what way, Doctor?”

  “He told us he didn’t require another medicine. He wanted his wasting mixture.”

  “Why was that?”

  “He had a delusion that a dinner he’d eaten three days ago was still in his stomach.”

  “Ah,” said the coroner, removing his glasses and placing them on the table. “His mind was wandering.”

  “It is not unusual in cases of fever.”

  “I’m sure. Pray go on, Doctor.”

  “Dr. Latham attended again in the afternoon and told the patient he had typhoid fever, and he then became more quiet.”

  “You agreed on the diagnosis?”

  Dr. Wright answered, “There is no question of it. Admittedly, the patient appeared to rally during the course of the weekend and his temperature fell on Sunday afternoon, but this is not uncommon. In fact, on Monday morning, he was better.”

  “When you say ‘better,’ do you mean that his temperature was normal on the morning he died?”

  “Fluctuations in temperature are to be expected,” answered Dr. Wright.

  “I must have a more precise answer to my question, Doctor.”

  “The patient’s temperature was normal yesterday morning.”

  “How was his behavior?”

  “He was very low-spirited. He told me continually that he would die. I had a reassuring talk with him and left about nine-thirty. I was called back in the afternoon, about two-thirty. When I saw the deceased, he was on his back on the floor, covered with a sheet, quite dead. There was a wound at the back of his mouth. On examining the back of his head, I found an opening between the two upper cervical vertebrae. I was shown the revolver, and I have seen the bullet found on the dressing table, and I have no doubt that it was the bullet that passed through the spinal column, causing death.”

  “I am sure the jury has been greatly assisted by your evidence, Doctor. I have just one or two questions more concerning the state of mind of the deceased.”

  The doctor didn’t need to have them. He knew what was wanted. “I would say that he was not delirious in his fever, so much as disconnected in his thoughts. It seemed from the commencement of the illness to take the form of depression. One must also take account of the weakened state he was in from reducing his weight by unnatural amounts. This, followed by the fever, so disordered his brain that he was not accountable for his actions. In other words, he was temporarily insane when he committed the act.”

  Approving murmurs were heard. It was as if the doctor had spoken for the whole of Newmarket, and there was no question what the jury’s verdict would be.

  Fred Archer was found to have committed suicide while in a state of temporary insanity induced by typhoid fever.

  CHAPTER 4

  Hold on to your hat and keep your wits about you, for we’re about to make a backward leap. After that depressing inquest, I propose to treat you to a breath of fresh air and some sport. Of the four-legged variety, naturally. We’ll project ourselves back a fortnight, and bring poor Archer briefly back to life, put him on St. Mirin and look at his last ride of consequence, the 1886 Cambridgeshire. My weakness for the Turf is well known, so in case this smacks of self-indulgence, let me assure you that the race is fundamental to the crime I shall unfold.

  To Headquarters, then, on Tuesday, 26 October (Headquarters being the name by which Newmarket is affectionately known to all patrons of the Turf). A day for topcoats and mufflers: chill, slate gray and with a stiff breeze blowing off the fens. Not that October weather would deter the race-going public. They came in their thousands, trainloads from Liverpool Street and St. Pancras, the Midlands and the North. Personally, I avoid traveling on the day of a big race if I can possibly help it. I arrive on the first or second day of the meeting and stay overnight in my rooms in the Jockey Club. If affairs of state compel me to travel on race day, I make an outrageously early start. It’s either that, or trail the last five miles in slow procession between the four-in-hand full of jovial “men” from Cambridge, and a trap containing a farmer and his giggling daughters. No thank you.

  I wouldn’t mention this to the good people who live there, but between ourselves, the town of Newmarket is a fearful disap­pointment when you first see it. It’s little more than a stretch of the London to Norwich Road lined with dull buildings, most of them modern. The only edifice of interest is the Jockey Club, and that chooses to sit with its back to the High Street.

  Mercifully, there’s more to Newmarket than its buildings. From first light onward, the High Street echoes to the clatter of hooves as the trainers lead their strings to the gallops. See the breath on the morning air and the shimmer of well-groomed flanks and you’ll know what animates this place. It has been linked with the horse ever since Queen Boadicea in her chariot led the Iceni against the Romans, but the credit for making it the headquarters of racing should be awarded to the Stuarts. That shameless old reprobate, King James I, built a palace and royal stables here and was rebuked for spending too much time at the races, as were his son and grandson, Charles I and II. They have my sympathy. Do you know, my mama the Queen has never patronized a Newmar­ket meeting? Before I was old enough to declare an interest, she had the old palace of Newmarket auctioned. It was demolished by the purchaser, and now a Congregational chapel stands on the site.

  On this Cambridgeshire day, the High Street was practically impassable by noon. There is always a throng outside the Subscription Rooms, where the principal bets are laid. I had made sure of getting reasonable odds the previous night, so for the purposes of this narrative we can proceed at once to the Heath.

  The Cambridgeshire is the last great race of the season, with a character all its own. It gives the final chance for a horse to impress before it goes to winter quarters, an uphill one-mile, two hundred and forty yards for three-year-olds and over, where sprinters and stayers can try conclusions. Fortunes are staked on the outcome. For a betting man, the good old Cambridgeshire has more to commend it than the classics. Form and the handicapper aren’t infallible, thank the Lord, and there’s a rich history of sensations. Catch ’em Alive was the winner in 1863, but in the weighing room afterward, calamity! His jockey couldn’t draw the weight. They were about to disqualify him and award the stakes to the second, when someone thought of examining the scales. Would you believe it, some blackguard had tampered with them by fastening sheet lead to the bottom of the weight-scale. Another drama that outraged many was Isonomy’s two-length win at 40-1 in 1878, after that foxy old trainer John Porter kept his form from the touts for a twelvemonth. Fred Gretton, the owner, is said to have netted £40,000. Is it any wonder that I sent my horses to Porter? And I’ll give you one more Cambridgeshire controversy: Bendigo’s win by a head in 1883, believed by no one except his backers, and precious few of them, if truth be told.

  Back to 1886. The day couldn’t have started in finer style. My filly, Lady Peggy, easily carried home my colors at 10—1 in the Maiden Plate for two-year-olds, putting the crowd in bonny humor and one hundred guineas in my pocket. Amid a chorus of loyal acclaim, I took myself and several of my party down to the unsaddling.

  Archer was the jockey. For me, nothing can equal the pleasure of leading one of my own into the winner’s enclosure, and I don’t mind admitting that my heart swelled when the champion jockey dismounted and stood beside me and my steaming filly. As I write these words, I have a tinted photograph on my desk that brings it vividly to mind, Archer in my colors, the purple with gold braid and scarlet sleeves, and the gold-fringed black velvet cap.

  I’m racking my memory to see if I can possibly recall any sign that he was under strain. It’s difficult. The pinched look is common to all jockeys except boys, and Archer, as you know, had wasted more than usual to make the weight for his Cambridge­shire ride. He was an inch and a half taller than I and weighed all of six stones less (though I’ve never aspired to be a jockey).

  The only sign of anything untoward was that he was talkative. I must tell you that the greatest jockey in history wasn’t noted for his conversation. He generally saved his breath to cool his porridge, as the saying goes. Yet here in the unsaddling enclo­sure, surrounded by the usual gogglers and fawners, I was treated to a regular torrent of words.

  “She’s a plucky one, your Royal Highness,” says he. “I wouldn’t call her a classic prospect, but she’ll earn some tin if you pick her races carefully. Tidy work over the last furlong, wasn’t it? When I started to ride her with my hands, she half stopped and pricked up her ears as if she wondered what it meant. Then she did all I asked. Wasn’t it a tonic to watch?”

  “Emphatically,” I answered. “But let’s give the jockey some credit as well.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “You must be feeling confident,” I commented, fishing for information.

  “Cock-a-hoop, sir.”

  “So should I chance a tenner on St. Mirin?”

  “Every tenner you can spare, sir. I haven’t won a Cambridge­shire yet, but I’ve never had a prospect like today.”

  Lord Edward Somerset, the owner of the favorite, Carlton, happened to be one of my party, and close enough to hear this. “Get away, Fred!” says he. “You won’t beat my colt and you know it. Yours hasn’t learned how to gallop. Alec Taylor tried them together and Carlton took it by a street.”

  “I heard, my Lord,” commented Fred impassively, as he loosened Lady Peggy’s girth, “but did you take the riders into account? The lad on St. Mirin was a novice.”

  “Where did you discover that?” asked Somerset, flushing to the tips of his ears.

  “From the horse’s mouth,” responded Fred in all seriousness. He paused before he added, “The poor beast was never off the bit.” With that, he lifted off the saddle, touched his cap and left me laughing, and Edward Somerset purple faced.

  “Pig obstinate,” Edward commented when the jockey was out of earshot. “He was offered the ride on Carlton and he refused.”

  “Do I detect a dwindling of confidence?” I asked.

  “Not on your life.”

  Nonetheless, I dispatched one of my party to Tattersall’s ring to put fifty on St. Mirin at 10-1. In the Subscription Rooms the previous evening, I’d already backed an elderly outsider, The Sailor Prince, at 25-1 for sentimental reasons (he was the son of a horse called Albert Victor, and my A. V. went through Dartmouth, and my other boy George is in the Navy still).

  Edward Somerset’s story of the trial between Carlton and St. Mirin was true, and pretty common knowledge. Both colts were trained at Manton by Alec Taylor and regarded as useful three-year-olds. One morning on the Marlborough Downs, observed by touts from all the sporting press, he raced them over a measured mile, and Carlton came out an easy victor.

  Why, then, was Archer so confident of St. Mirin taking the Cambridgeshire? And why so talkative? Uniquely in his career, he had made sure every newspaper blazoned his confidence: “The crack jockey fancies his mount immensely.”

  Certainly St. Mirin was well sired, by that plucky Derby winner, Hermit, out of Lady Paramount. It had promised well, but hadn’t won anything as a two-year-old. If I’m any judge of horseflesh, it was too light about the loin and flank to possess much stamina. I like an animal with something behind besides ribs.

  My thoughts returned to St. Mirin’s hindquarters when the Cambridgeshire entrants were paraded in the saddling enclosure known to all Turfites as the Birdcage. Prominent there was the animal’s owner, the Dowager Duchess of Montrose, as formidable a female as ever graced the Turf. She is known unkindly, but not inaptly, as Six-Mile Bottom, and if St. Mirin had been half so generously endowed as she in that portion of the anatomy, the race would have been as good as over.

  Did that strike you as an ungallant observation? The fact is that Carrie Montrose had long since put herself beyond the pale. Before I was born, she scandalized society by insulting my mother the Queen. This was over the so-called Bedchamber Plot in 1839, when Mama, encouraged by Lord Melbourne, stoutly refused to dismiss certain of her Whig ladies-in-waiting, and so frustrated Peel in his attempt to form a Tory administration. Mama doted on Lord Melbourne, you know, and thanks to her firmness, he was returned as Prime Minister. At the Ascot races she invited Melbourne to sit beside her in her carriage for the drive up the racecourse. This was all too much for the young Duchess of Montrose and another Tory woman. They stepped brazenly forward and hissed the Queen. Mama was incensed. She said such creatures deserved to be horsewhipped. If you ask me, there was intemperance on both sides. Mama wouldn’t like it said, but she and Carrie Montrose have much in common. The difference is that Carrie’s tantrums take place in public.

  On this Cambridgeshire afternoon, the Duchess had wrapped herself in a sable coat that must have decimated the wildlife of Canada. She was haranguing Archer as he waited to mount St. Mirin, and half the racecourse could hear it: “I want no sleeping in the saddle, Fred. He’s a horse in a million and I adore him, but don’t spare the whip if he slackens.”

  Stony faced, the greatest jockey of the age kept his eyes on the horse in a million. No one knew exactly how much the Duchess had paid him as a retainer, but it was close to five figures for a claim of any sort, so he was well compensated for any embarrass­ment.

  On the far side of the Birdcage, Edward Somerset issued final instructions to the elder of the Woodburn brothers, who was riding Carlton, with only six stone, thirteen pounds, compared with St. Mirin’s eight stone seven. In Tattersall’s ring, Carlton remained the clear favorite, although his price had lengthened slightly. St. Mirin, for all the confidence bestowed in him by Archer and his owner, was some way down the betting. Melton, the 1885 Derby and St. Leger winner, was being heavily backed at 100-6, in spite of his in-and-out form and the nine stone, seven he was handicapped. Tyrone, of whom I knew little, had come in at 8-1. St. Mirin’s on-course price had lengthened to 100-8.

  The signal was given to mount, and we patrons of the Turf made the best speed we could to our points of vantage. I called for my hack and cantered up the hill to the finishing post. The Cambridgeshire, I must explain, takes a different course from the rest of the day’s program. It starts near the new stand at the Rowley Mile and proceeds up a stiff rise, “on the collar” all the way, to the part of the Heath known as the top of the town. A forty-minute interval is given after the finish of the previous race to allow the public to foot it up the hill, but few who make the effort are likely to be satisfied with what they see. A really good view of the Cambridgeshire is difficult to come by. You need to be on the roof of a brougham at the very least to look down the steep gradient to the start. The carriages reach all the way past the rails. I’m afraid the groundlings catch only a glimpse of the jockeys’ jackets, unless they miss the finish altogether and station them­selves opposite the Red Post, about two furlongs from home.