her they won
the Sefton, the International, and last of all the National. And though
Chukkers had been disqualified in the last race, his fame and hers had
reached a pinnacle untouched by any horse or man in modern racing
history.

The star-spangled jacket led the world.

* * * * *

When Joses came out of prison he journeyed down at once to Dewhurst.

Jaggers and Chukkers met him.

It did not take the tout long to get a hang of the situation.

The National was coming on in a few weeks. The mare had to win at all
costs.

Since her victory and defeat at Aintree in the previous March she had
never run but once in public, and that time had scattered her field.

Jaggers had been laying her up in lavender all the winter for the great
race, and she was now at the top of her form.

They took Joses round to her loose-box.

Just back from work she was stripped and sweating, swishing her tail,
savaging her manger with arched neck, tramping to and fro on swift,
uneasy feet as her lad laboured at her.

So perfectly compact was she that the tout heard with surprise that she
stood little short of sixteen hands. The length of her rein compensated
for the shortness of her back, and her hocks and hind-quarters were
those of a panther, lengthy and well let-down.

The fat man ran his eye over her fair proportions.

"She's beautiful," he mused.

Indeed, the excellence of her form spoke to the heart of the poet in
him. He dwelt almost lovingly upon that astonishing fore-hand and the
mouse-head with the wild eye that revealed the spirit burning within. As
her lad withdrew from her a moment, she gave that familiar toss of the
muzzle familiar to thousands, which made a poet say that she was
fretting always to transcend the restraint of the flesh.

"If she's as good as she looks," said Joses, "she's good enough."

"She's better," said the jockey with the high cheek-bones. He passed his
hand along the mare's rein. It was said that Chukkers had never cared
for a horse in his life, and it was certain that many horses had hated
Chukkers. But it was common knowledge that he was fonder of the mare
than he had ever been of any living creature.

"She's got nothing up against her as I know of," said Jaggers in his
austere way. "There's Moonlighter, the Irishman, of course."

"He can't stay," said Chukkers briefly.

"And Gee-Woa-There, the Doncaster horse."

"He can't gallop."

"And Kingfisher, the