He turned and ran to Virginia Planter Hill and was about to enter upon the Shadwell, which I considered a stroke of good fortune. The street was wide and well lighted but would be largely deserted this time of night and I might have some small chance of overtaking him there.
As I struggled to gain upon him, or at the least not lose him entire, he ran onto Shadwell but in an instant threw himself back, nearly toppling over, as a speeding phaeton barreled past him, its driver shouting an insult at the man he almost destroyed.
Now again on his feet, he crouched like a great cat, and when another phaeton had nearly passed him, he leaped out and into it, giving the driver cause to let out a startled cry, just audible over the trample of hooves and the roar of wheels. What manner of man, I wondered, is so reckless with his life that he would attempt to leap into a speeding phaeton? It enraged me, for his having done so necessitated that I do the same.
I redoubled my efforts for speed as another phaeton passed, and another yet; it seemed to be as many as eight or ten involved in this race. Reaching Shadwell just as the straggler of the group came upon me, I was determined not to lose it. In the dark I could see it was green with gold stripes, one in the symbol of a serpent. I had just time enough to realize that this was the same machine that had run down Elias’s accuser some days ago, a man who would have run down a child if not for that worthy’s intervention. The phaeton was driven by a self-absorbed coxcomb, a man who considered his foolish race more important than human life. And he must be my companion, for I hurled myself in the air, hoping most earnestly to land inside and not be caught under his wheels.
In that, at least, I was successful. I landed hard in the phaeton, crashing into the driver, who let out a little shriek.
“What madness is this?” he demanded, his wide eyes reflecting the light of street lanterns.
I stood quickly and took the reins from him. “You are a fool, a monster, and a poor driver as well,” I said. “Now be quiet lest I shove you out.”
I spurred the horse hard with the whip and discovered it was capable of greater speed than its owner would allow. The man suffered, I saw, not from a lack of power but a lack of courage, for as the horse increased in its velocity he let out another little shriek.
“Slow down!” he cried, in a voice that cracked like dropped crystal. “You’ll kill us!”
“I observed you run down a man a fortnight ago and respond with nothing more than a laugh,” I called to him, making myself heard above the hooves and the rush of cold air. “I hardly think you deserving of mercy.”
“What do you want?”
“To overtake another man,” I said. “And, if time permits, to punish you.”
I raced hard and recklessly, urging the horse on to speeds most unsafe, but I had little choice. I passed one of the other phaetons, whose driver looked upon me and the cringing man at my side with the greatest confusion. I passed another after that, and then a third. If I had a mind to, I thought, I might win this race.
Ahead of me, the phaetons turned the corner onto Old Gravel Lane and slowed accordingly. If I were to overtake my letters, however, I would have to set aside my concern for safety, so I slowed hardly at all as we turned. As the phaeton turned up on one side, I clutched the reins with one hand, reached out with the other, and grabbed my unhappy passenger, pushing him toward the elevated side of the conveyance. This had little effect, but little was enough, for though we came close, we did not tip. In the process of rounding the turn, we passed three more of the racers, so that there were now only three ahead of us.
The horse appeared to be as excited as I that we had survived my foolish maneuver, and it found more reserves from which to draw as we began to close on the remaining racers. As we narrowed the gap, I saw that it was not the lead phaeton but the one behind it that contained two men. Knowing I would do what was required to stop it, I hit the reins again, hoping the horse would obey-or could obey, for that matter. I knew not what capabilities the horse yet possessed, but while the first phaeton increased its lead, the one with two men began to slow, so that I raced alongside it. I moved us closer, and though it changed with each bumpy instant, the space between us varied from as much as four feet to as little as two.
The men in the opposing phaeton shouted at me, but I could not hear them and had no desire to take time to try to understand. With the cold wind blowing hard against my face, I once more put the reins in my left hand and reached down with my right, hoisting the coward to his feet.
“Take the reins,” I shouted, so he might understand me. “Keep as close to him as you can. If you fail or defy me you shall answer for it. If I wish, I can find you by the marks on your phaeton, and I promise you do not want me to come looking.”
He nodded. Once too afraid to drive recklessly, now too afraid not to, he took the reins and attempted to hold the horse steady. I crept toward the edge of the phaeton, bracing myself as best I could. I knew I ought not to try it. The two phaetons moved too rapidly, the distance between them changing each instant. I have done many foolish things over the course of my life, I thought, but nothing so foolish as this endeavor, destined to fail, destined to end in my destruction. And yet if I did not do it the enemy would escape with my notes, and he would know far more than I wished him to know. I could not let my schemes turn to dust and see my uncle in debtor’s prison, so I sucked in a breath of air and leaped into the void.
Why I did not die, trampled under hoof and wheel, remains a mystery, but somehow, at the very moment of my leaping, my phaeton lurched toward the other, giving me extra power, and the other lurched toward mine, giving me less distance to cross, and so it was that I landed hard in the conveyance alongside, crashing hard into the man holding the reins.
I presumed him to be the letter thief and knocked him aside, grabbing the reins and forcing the animal into as sudden a stop as I might contrive. Only by bracing my feet against the bottom did I keep myself from flying forward. My fellow passengers were not so well prepared, however, and they went flying from the machine.
It was again thanks only to the ordering of providence that neither was trampled by the other racers, and it was owing only to the callousness of these men that none of the other contestants thought to stop and help their fellows. Once the horse had ceased its motions, I jumped out and ran back some twenty feet to find the two men huddled close together by the side of the road. A crowd had gathered to jeer at them, having no love for phaetoneers.
They appeared pathetic and bloodied but to my best guess not seriously hurt. However, I did not know how long that state would last.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out a pistol. A light snow had begun to fall, and I feared that even such moisture as that might ruin my ability to fire, but I hoped that in their state they would not think of such things. “Which one of you stole my papers?” I demanded.
“It wasn’t us,” one of them shouted.
“It was one of you. Yours was the only phaeton with two men aboard. Now, who was it?”
“It wasn’t us,” the other one echoed. “He’s telling you the truth. The other fellow was as strong as Hercules. He tossed me from my phaeton into Johnny’s, here. We tried to tell you. If you hadn’t ruined everything, we’d have caught him.”
Silently I replaced my pistol, hardly able to believe I had gone to such lengths for nothing. I had risked my life to stop the wrong carriage, and now the villain had escaped with my letters.
“He was a Hercules!” The man repeated, wiping the blood from his nose with his lace sleeve. “A great black-skinned Hercules with scars upon his face. I’ve never seen anyone like him.”