Highway Robbery (8 page)

It’s a good thing that horses see better in the dark than people do, because I had no idea where we were going. Black Bess did, though, and her feet were sure and safe as she splashed through the muck and ice. Soon I could tell by the smell of the air that we had left the city behind and entered the countryside beyond. Still the mare galloped on, showing no sign of tiring. I very much wished she would.

I had no idea whether the soldiers were in pursuit, but I had another serious problem which might prove even more dangerous to me than them. The cloak, DickTurpin’s wonderful warm black cloak, was streaming out behind me just as it had streamed behind him when he galloped into town the previous day.

How he arranged it I have no idea, but I am sure it wasn’t throttling him the way it was now throttling me. And because I was no rider I didn’t dare lift a hand from my grip on the mare’s mane in case I tumbled off the side on to the unseen road rushing past beneath us. The reins were there somewhere, flapping against her neck and the backs of my hands, but it was going to
require a huge leap of faith for me to try and grab them.

Unless I did, though, I would be strangled by Dick Turpin’s cloak, and it seemed like a particularly stupid way to die, given all that I had gone through. So I took one hand from Black Bess’s mane and groped about in the wind that was whistling past her neck, until I felt the cold, greasy leather of the rein, and clutched at it.

Being a rider yourself, sir – and a fine one, I dare say – you will know better than to haul on one rein while leaving the other to dangle free. Had I been stronger it is likely that I would have brought Black Bess down, and myself along with
her in a heap in the mud. But as it was I only succeeded in turning her off the road and into a grove of trees, where she was obliged to come to a very rapid stop. Naturally I went straight over her head and landed in a bramble patch, with the black cloak settling on top of me.

And I was still trying to disentangle myself from that muddle when I heard the thunder of hooves on the road behind us, as the king’s captain and his troop of soldiers went flying past.

Yet again trying to capture someone who wasn’t there.

SO THAT’S MY
story, sir. And I don’t know how you would feel about it, but it seems to me that the mare is rightfully mine. She was left in my care, you see, and the man who owned her is due to be hanged very shortly,
as I’m sure you will have heard, and he has no use for her now.

It did cross my mind to take up where Dick Turpin left off, and to pursue the highwayman’s trade. But I’m small, sir, as you can see, and I can’t imagine coachmen or travellers paying much attention to me, especially since Dick Turpin took his saddlebag with him and left me with no pistol.

So that’s why I’m offering her for sale, sir, because I’m a poor city lad and can’t afford to keep a horse. The cloak too, if you were interested, though it wouldn’t come cheap because of its fascinating history.

Yes, I’ve heard the same thing myself, sir; that there are other people out there claiming to be in possession of Black Bess and offering her for sale. All I can say to
that is: see for yourself. You don’t need me to point out what a fine animal you’re looking at.

Well, naturally she looks a bit tired. Wouldn’t you, sir, if you’d been through what she has? And of course a new set of shoes would make her feet look a lot tidier. Well, maybe she could use a bit of a trim around the fetlocks, but really, sir, to call her a carthorse is most unfair.

No, no. I couldn’t take that for her. That’s an insult. She’s worth ten times that. This is Black Bess you’re looking at, sir, not just any old nag.

I see. Well, suit yourself, sir. No charge for looking. And there are plenty more horsemen out there that will leap at the
chance of buying the one and only Black Bess. I’ll have no trouble selling her, will I, Bess? No trouble at all.

Kate Thompson is a born storyteller and a uniquely imaginative and thought-provoking writer.
The New Policeman
won both the Whitbread Children’s Book Award and the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize in 2005, and the inaugural Irish BA Award for Children’s Books in 2006. Kate Thompson is also three times winner of the Irish Children’s Book of the Year Bisto Award for
The Beguilers
(2002),
The Alchemist’s Apprentice
(2003) and
Annan Water
(2005).