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Lanterns at Milewater
The starting lantern had a moustache. Somebody had drawn it on the glass, and whenever the flame jumped, the moustache appeared to disapprove of the entire race. Nell Marr approved of that. She sat on Button beneath the lantern, tightening the blue cord that held her flat copper race token. At sixty-four, she had won enough things to know that people always asked whether you were nervous when they hoped you were. Tonight nobody asked. Button had bitten a decorative rosette off the starting post, and everyone was watching him consider its flavour. "Spit it out," Nell said. The dun horse lowered his black-maned head and deposited the rosette in the starter's hat. Her companion made a noise that was not quite a cough.
Nell had brown skin, a long silver braid and a slate-gray broad-brimmed hat that had survived more weather than several local roofs. Her rust-red riding coat was fastened over a teal scarf; charcoal trousers disappeared into worn brown boots. Tobin Saye, twenty-two, pale and freckled, wore his black hair tied at his nape. His plum waistcoat had one brass button different from the others. Under it were a cream shirt and an ochre neckerchief, above dark trousers and black boots polished for an appointment rather than a race. A small rectangular wooden puppet case was strapped behind his saddle. Parcel, his dark bay horse with a white forehead star, kept turning to investigate it. "There is no food in there," Tobin said. "Only my future." Parcel looked disappointed.
Above Milewater, Copper Mesa lifted its red cliffs into moonlight. The horse trails climbed its western folds; the railway curled around the longer eastern flank to the high station. Nell and Tobin had until midnight to reach the finish bell there together. First pair through the arch with their token won a copper bell and two year-long rail passes. Horses or feet counted. Riding a train did not. At twelve-ten, the eastbound train would carry the Wandering Rooms theatre away from the mesa. Tobin had an invitation to show its director his puppets before departure. Nell wanted the bell. Tobin wanted both arrivals, and was trying not to think about the word before. The starter raised his unrosetted hat. "Ten-fifteen! Away with you!"