Bound for Glory by Sean O'Kane Page B

the rigs, snapping each one and taking notes of the names of the drivers and passengers for a record of the great day that would only be available to those present.
    Brian cracked his whip again and then wielded it in a long figure of eight across the four slaves’ backs and the wheels of the carriage began to crunch on the gravel, then, in his wake other whips began to snap and hiss, other wheels crunched and other steel shod sandals scraped and scrunched as drivers sorted themselves into a long procession behind the big carriage that had ponderously managed to turn around.
    Clive deftly piloted his trap into a gap about half way along the single file procession, just behind Amelia Johnson, whose passenger was Alberto Salazar, an arena owner and the two could be seen busily talking trade as the slaves got up to trotting speed. Clive made sure the whip had left his two in no doubt that he wanted a good high stepping gait and once he had achieved that he relaxed in his seat.
    The parkland looked superb in the bright summer sun which flicked across them as they passed under the trees that lined the drive. Ahead of them the slaves looked beautiful as they trotted, their buttocks rippling and their plumes nodding – his wore the scarlet of The Lodge, but the CSL ones had green and gold while the Girl Squad pair sported their stable’s yellow and black.
    Beside him Dandy breathed out in a sigh of pleasure and lay back against the quilted leather of the seat.
    “It’s been a long, hot summer, Clive, but I’m hearing that estates up and down the country are quiet and that law-abiding folk can walk out to take the evening air in safety. It’s working isn’t it? Everything we put in place is working at last!”
    “It looks that way, certainly,” Clive replied cautiously.
    “The people love us for it because we don’t just clean the streets we take the sweepings and make them into something better. Our party now indubitably rules the hearts and minds of the public. The salt of the earth, the people who really make the country tick! And we must make sure that that’s how it stays.”
    Clive wasn’t sure where this was going so he stuck to making an approving grunt and flicking the whip over Nine’s back a few times, before switching to Six and lacing her paler flesh as well.
    The column of traps had reached the path across the golf course and swung to the right and out into open sunlight, the ponies’ hooves stopping scraping on the tarmac and instead making soft thuds as they trotted out onto turf. Dandy, turned in his seat to watch the rigs behind them emerge from the trees, one after the other, more pony traps in one place than most men ever got to see – as he observed.
    “Makes you proud to be British,” he said as he turned back and relaxed again, maddeningly he seemed quite content to shed no further light on what he had been leading up to. Clive curbed his annoyance, he had seen Dandy use this tactic before to irritate someone into making a wrong move. He would divulge what he wanted Clive to know in good time. In the meantime if he, Clive, held his tongue, he would go up in Dandy’s esteem. He lashed his slaves a couple more times to calm himself down and beside him His Majesty’s Prime Minister hummed a happy little tune as the breeze caressed their faces.
    It was over a mile down to the lake by this long way and the ponies were lathered and restless when they finally arrived and were hobbled and tethered to the branches of the trees that lined the shore in spinneys. Smoke rose from barbecues set down by the lake’s edge, making the woods fragrant, and trestle tables were laid and ready for everyone.
    As the long afternoon wore on; dish followed dish – mostly of seafood, nothing too heavy that might deaden the carnal appetites of the gentlemen – and speech followed speech, until finally, after the ceremonial handover of The Lodge, Peter Lang bade them toast John Carpenter’s superb work with The Lodge