THE INIMITABLE JEEVES
PART 14
CHAPTER XIV
THE PURITY OF THE TURF
After that,
life at Twing jogged along pretty peacefully for a bit. Twing is one of those
places where there isn't a frightful lot to do nor any very hectic excitement
to look forward to. In fact, the only event of any importance on the horizon,
as far as I could ascertain, was the annual village school treat. One simply
filled in the time by loafing about the grounds, playing a bit of tennis, and
avoiding young Bingo as far as was humanly possible.
This last was a
very necessary move if you wanted a happy life, for the Cynthia affair had
jarred the unfortunate mutt to such an extent that he was always waylaying one
and decanting his anguished soul. And when, one morning, he blew into my
bedroom while I was toying with a bit of breakfast, I decided to take a firm
line from the start. I could stand having him moaning all over me after dinner,
and even after lunch; but at breakfast, no. We Woosters are amiability itself,
but there is a limit.
"Now look
here, old friend," I said. "I know your bally heart is broken and all
that, and at some future time I shall be delighted to hear all about it,
but——"
"I didn't
come to talk about that."
"No? Good
egg!"
"The
past," said young Bingo, "is dead. Let us say no more about it."
"Right-o!"
"I have
been wounded to the very depths of my soul, but don't speak about it."
"I
won't."
"Ignore
it. Forget it."
"Absolutely!"
I hadn't seen
him so dashed reasonable for days.
"What I
came to see you about this morning, Bertie," he said, fishing a sheet of
paper out of his pocket, "was to ask if you would care to come in on
another little flutter."
If there is one
thing we Woosters are simply dripping with, it is sporting blood. I bolted the
rest of my sausage, and sat up and took notice.
"Proceed,"
I said. "You interest me strangely, old bird."
Bingo laid the
paper on the bed.
"On Monday
week," he said, "you may or may not know, the annual village school
treat takes place. Lord Wickhammersley lends the Hall grounds for the purpose.
There will be games, and a conjurer, and cokernut shies, and tea in a tent. And
also sports."
"I know.
Cynthia was telling me."
Young Bingo
winced.
"Would you
mind not mentioning that name? I am not made of marble."
"Sorry!"
"Well, as
I was saying, this jamboree is slated for Monday week. The question is, Are we
on?"
"How do
you mean, 'Are we on'?"
"I am
referring to the sports. Steggles did so well out of the Sermon Handicap that
he has decided to make a book on these sports. Punters can be accommodated at
ante-post odds or starting price, according to their preference. I think we
ought to look into it," said young Bingo.
I pressed the
bell.
"I'll
consult Jeeves. I don't touch any sporting proposition without his advice.
Jeeves," I said, as he drifted in, "rally round."
"Sir?"
"Stand by.
We want your advice."
"Very
good, sir."
"State
your case, Bingo."
Bingo stated
his case.
"What
about it, Jeeves?" I said. "Do we go in?"
Jeeves pondered
to some extent.
"I am
inclined to favour the idea, sir."
That was good
enough for me. "Right," I said. "Then we will form a syndicate
and bust the Ring. I supply the money, you supply the brains, and Bingo—what do
you supply, Bingo?"
"If you
will carry me, and let me settle up later," said young Bingo, "I
think I can put you in the way of winning a parcel on the Mothers' Sack
Race."
"All
right. We will put you down as Inside Information. Now, what are the
events?"
*
* *
* *
Bingo reached
for his paper and consulted it.
"Girls'
Under Fourteen Fifty-Yard Dash seems to open the proceedings."
"Anything
to say about that, Jeeves?"
"No, sir.
I have no information."
"What's
the next?"
"Boys' and
Girls' Mixed Animal Potato Race, All Ages."
This was a new
one to me. I had never heard of it at any of the big meetings.
"What's
that?"
"Rather
sporting," said young Bingo. "The competitors enter in couples, each
couple being assigned an animal cry and a potato. For
instance, let's suppose that you and Jeeves entered. Jeeves would stand at a
fixed point holding a potato. You would have your head in a sack, and you would
grope about trying to find Jeeves and making a noise like a cat; Jeeves also
making a noise like a cat. Other competitors would be making noises like cows
and pigs and dogs, and so on, and groping about for their
potato-holders, who would also be making noises like cows and pigs and dogs and
so on——"
I stopped the
poor fish.
"Jolly if
you're fond of animals," I said, "but on the whole——"
"Precisely,
sir," said Jeeves. "I wouldn't touch it."
"Too open,
what?"
"Exactly,
sir. Very hard to estimate form."
"Carry on,
Bingo. Where do we go from there?"
"Mothers'
Sack Race."
"Ah!
that's better. This is where you know something."
"A gift
for Mrs. Penworthy, the tobacconist's wife," said Bingo confidently.
"I was in at her shop yesterday, buying cigarettes, and she told me she
had won three times at fairs in Worcestershire. She only moved to these parts a
short time ago, so nobody knows about her. She promised me she would keep
herself dark, and I think we could get a good price."
"Risk a
tenner each way, Jeeves, what?"
"I think
so, sir."
"Girls'
Open Egg and Spoon Race," read Bingo.
"How about
that?"
"I doubt
if it would be worth while to invest, sir," said Jeeves. "I am told
it is a certainty for last year's winner, Sarah Mills, who will
doubtless start an odds-on favourite."
"Good, is
she?"
"They tell
me in the village that she carries a beautiful egg, sir."
"Then
there's the Obstacle Race," said Bingo. "Risky, in my opinion. Like
betting on the Grand National. Fathers' Hat-Trimming Contest—another
speculative event. That's all, except for the Choir Boys' Hundred Yards
Handicap, for a pewter mug presented by the vicar—open to all whose voices have
not broken before the second Sunday in Epiphany. Willie Chambers won last year,
in a canter, receiving fifteen yards. This time he will probably be handicapped
out of the race. I don't know what to advise."
"If I
might make a suggestion, sir."
I eyed Jeeves
with interest. I don't know that I'd ever seen him look so nearly excited.
"You've
got something up your sleeve?"
"I have,
sir."
"Red-hot?"
"That
precisely describes it, sir. I think I may confidently assert that we have the
winner of the Choir Boys' Handicap under this very roof, sir. Harold, the
page-boy."
"Page-boy?
Do you mean the tubby little chap in buttons one sees bobbing about here and
there? Why, dash it, Jeeves, nobody has a greater respect for your knowledge of
form than I have, but I'm hanged if I can see Harold catching the judge's eye.
He's practically circular, and every time I've seen him he's been leaning up
against something, half asleep."
"He
receives thirty yards, sir, and could win from scratch. The boy is a
flier."
"How do
you know?"
Jeeves coughed,
and there was a dreamy look in his eye.
"I was as
much astonished as yourself, sir, when I first became aware of the lad's
capabilities. I happened to pursue him one morning with the intention of
fetching him a clip on the side of the head——"
"Great
Scott, Jeeves! You!"
"Yes, sir.
The boy is of an outspoken disposition, and had made an opprobrious remark
respecting my personal appearance."
"What did
he say about your appearance?"
"I have
forgotten, sir," said Jeeves, with a touch of austerity. "But it was
opprobrious. I endeavoured to correct him, but he outdistanced me by yards and
made good his escape."
"But, I
say, Jeeves, this is sensational. And yet—if he's such a sprinter, why hasn't
anybody in the village found it out? Surely he plays with the other boys?"
"No, sir.
As his lordship's page-boy, Harold does not mix with the village lads."
"Bit of a
snob, what?"
"He is
somewhat acutely alive to the existence of class distinctions, sir."
"You're
absolutely certain he's such a wonder?" said Bingo. "I mean, it wouldn't
do to plunge unless you're sure."
"If you
desire to ascertain the boy's form by personal inspection, sir, it will be a
simple matter to arrange a secret trial."
"I'm bound
to say I should feel easier in my mind," I said.
"Then if I
may take a shilling from the money on your dressing-table——"
"What
for?"
"I propose
to bribe the lad to speak slightingly of the second footman's squint, sir. Charles
is somewhat sensitive on the point, and should undoubtedly make the lad extend
himself. If you will be at the first-floor passage-window, overlooking the
back-door, in half an hour's time——"
I don't know
when I've dressed in such a hurry. As a rule, I'm what you might call a slow
and careful dresser: I like to linger over the tie and see that the trousers are
just so; but this morning I was all worked up. I just shoved on my things
anyhow, and joined Bingo at the window with a quarter of an hour to spare.
The
passage-window looked down on to a broad sort of paved courtyard, which ended
after about twenty yards in an archway through a high wall. Beyond this archway
you got on to a strip of the drive, which curved round for another thirty yards
or so, till it was lost behind a thick shrubbery. I put myself in the
stripling's place and thought what steps I would take with a second footman
after me. There was only one thing to do—leg it for the shrubbery and take
cover; which meant that at least fifty yards would have to be covered—an
excellent test. If good old Harold could fight off the second footman's
challenge long enough to allow him to reach the bushes, there wasn't a choirboy
in England who could give him thirty yards in the hundred. I waited, all of a twitter,
for what seemed hours, and then suddenly there was a confused noise without,
and something round and blue and buttony shot through the back-door and buzzed
for the archway like a mustang. And about two seconds later out came the second
footman, going his hardest.
There was
nothing to it. Absolutely nothing. The field never had a chance. Long before
the footman reached the half-way mark, Harold was in the bushes,
throwing stones. I came away from the window thrilled to the marrow; and when I
met Jeeves on the stairs I was so moved that I nearly grasped his hand.
"Jeeves,"
I said, "no discussion! The Wooster shirt goes on this boy!"
"Very
good, sir," said Jeeves.
*
* *
* *
The worst of
these country meetings is that you can't plunge as heavily as you would like
when you get a good thing, because it alarms the Ring. Steggles, though
pimpled, was, as I have indicated, no chump, and if I had invested all I wanted
to he would have put two and two together. I managed to get a good solid bet
down for the syndicate, however, though it did make him look thoughtful. I
heard in the next few days that he had been making searching inquiries in the
village concerning Harold; but nobody could tell him anything, and eventually
he came to the conclusion, I suppose, that I must be having a long shot on the
strength of that thirty-yards start. Public opinion wavered between Jimmy
Goode, receiving ten yards, at seven-to-two, and Alexander Bartlett, with six
yards start, at eleven-to-four. Willie Chambers, scratch, was offered to the
public at two-to-one, but found no takers.
We were taking
no chances on the big event, and directly we had got our money on at a nice
hundred-to-twelve Harold was put into strict training. It was a wearing business,
and I can understand now why most of the big trainers are grim, silent men, who
look as though they had suffered. The kid wanted constant watching. It was no
good talking to him about honour and glory and how proud his mother would be
when he wrote and told her he had won a real cup—the
moment blighted Harold discovered that training meant knocking off pastry,
taking exercise, and keeping away from the cigarettes, he was all against it,
and it was only by unceasing vigilance that we managed to keep him in any shape
at all. It was the diet that was the stumbling-block. As far as exercise went,
we could generally arrange for a sharp dash every morning with the assistance
of the second footman. It ran into money, of course, but that couldn't be helped.
Still, when a kid has simply to wait till the butler's back is turned to have
the run of the pantry, and has only to nip into the smoking-room to collect a
handful of the best Turkish, training becomes a rocky job. We could only hope
that on the day his natural stamina would pull him through.
And then one
evening young Bingo came back from the links with a disturbing story. He had
been in the habit of giving Harold mild exercise in the afternoons by taking
him out as a caddie.
At first he
seemed to think it humorous, the poor chump! He bubbled over with merry mirth
as he began his tale.
"I say,
rather funny this afternoon," he said. "You ought to have seen
Steggles's face!"
"Seen
Steggles's face? What for?"
"When he
saw young Harold sprint, I mean."
I was filled
with a grim foreboding of an awful doom.
"Good
heavens! You didn't let Harold sprint in front of Steggles?"
Young Bingo's
jaw dropped.
"I never
thought of that," he said, gloomily. "It wasn't my fault. I was
playing a round with Steggles, and after we'd finished we went into the
club-house for a drink, leaving Harold with the clubs
outside. In about five minutes we came out, and there was the kid on the gravel
practising swings with Steggles's driver and a stone. When he saw us coming, the
kid dropped the club and was over the horizon like a streak. Steggles was
absolutely dumbfounded. And I must say it was a revelation even to me. The kid
certainly gave of his best. Of course, it's a nuisance in a way; but I don't
see, on second thoughts," said Bingo, brightening up, "what it
matters. We're on at a good price. We've nothing to lose by the kid's form
becoming known. I take it he will start odds-on, but that doesn't affect
us."
I looked at
Jeeves. Jeeves looked at me.
"It
affects us all right if he doesn't start at all."
"Precisely,
sir."
"What do
you mean?" asked Bingo.
"If you
ask me," I said, "I think Steggles will try to nobble him before the
race."
"Good
Lord! I never thought of that." Bingo blenched. "You don't think he
would really do it?"
"I think
he would have a jolly good try. Steggles is a bad man. From now on, Jeeves, we
must watch Harold like hawks."
"Undoubtedly,
sir."
"Ceaseless
vigilance, what?"
"Precisely,
sir."
"You
wouldn't care to sleep in his room, Jeeves?"
"No, sir,
I should not."
"No, nor
would I, if it comes to that. But dash it all," I said, "we're
letting ourselves get rattled! We're losing our nerve. This won't do. How can
Steggles possibly get at Harold, even if he wants to?"
There was no
cheering young Bingo up. He's one of those birds who simply leap at the
morbid view, if you give them half a chance.
"There are
all sorts of ways of nobbling favourites," he said, in a sort of death-bed
voice. "You ought to read some of these racing novels. In 'Pipped on the
Post,' Lord Jasper Mauleverer as near as a toucher outed Bonny Betsy by bribing
the head lad to slip a cobra into her stable the night before the Derby!"
"What are
the chances of a cobra biting Harold, Jeeves?"
"Slight, I
should imagine, sir. And in such an event, knowing the boy as intimately as I
do, my anxiety would be entirely for the snake."
"Still,
unceasing vigilance, Jeeves."
"Most
certainly, sir."
*
* *
* *
I must say I
got a bit fed with young Bingo in the next few days. It's all very well for a
fellow with a big winner in his stable to exercise proper care, but in my
opinion Bingo overdid it. The blighter's mind appeared to be absolutely
saturated with racing fiction; and in stories of that kind, as far as I could
make out, no horse is ever allowed to start in a race without at least a dozen
attempts to put it out of action. He stuck to Harold like a plaster. Never let
the unfortunate kid out of his sight. Of course, it meant a lot to the poor old
egg if he could collect on this race, because it would give him enough money to
chuck his tutoring job and get back to London; but all the same, he needn't
have woken me up at three in the morning twice running—once to tell me we ought
to cook Harold's food ourselves to prevent doping: the other time to say that
he had heard mysterious noises in the shrubbery. But he reached the limit, in my opinion, when he insisted on my going to
evening service on Sunday, the day before the sports.
"Why on
earth?" I said, never being much of a lad for evensong.
"Well, I
can't go myself. I shan't be here. I've got to go to London to-day with young
Egbert." Egbert was Lord Wickhammersley's son, the one Bingo was tutoring.
"He's going for a visit down in Kent, and I've got to see him off at
Charing Cross. It's an infernal nuisance. I shan't be back till Monday
afternoon. In fact, I shall miss most of the sports, I expect. Everything,
therefore, depends on you, Bertie."
"But why
should either of us go to evening service?"
"Ass!
Harold sings in the choir, doesn't he?"
"What
about it? I can't stop him dislocating his neck over a high note, if that's
what you're afraid of."
"Fool!
Steggles sings in the choir, too. There may be dirty work after the
service."
"What
absolute rot!"
"Is
it?" said young Bingo. "Well, let me tell you that in 'Jenny, the
Girl Jockey,' the villain kidnapped the boy who was to ride the favourite the
night before the big race, and he was the only one who understood and could
control the horse, and if the heroine hadn't dressed up in riding things
and——"
"Oh, all
right, all right. But, if there's any danger, it seems to me the simplest thing
would be for Harold not to turn out on Sunday evening."
"He must
turn out. You seem to think the infernal kid is a monument of rectitude,
beloved by all. He's got the shakiest reputation of any kid in the village. His
name is as near being mud as it can jolly well stick. He's played hookey
from the choir so often that the vicar told him, if one more thing happened, he
would fire him out. Nice chumps we should look if he was scratched the night
before the race!"
Well, of
course, that being so, there was nothing for it but to toddle along.
There's something about
evening service in a country church that makes a fellow feel drowsy and
peaceful. Sort of end-of-a-perfect-day feeling. Old Heppenstall was up in the
pulpit, and he has a kind of regular, bleating delivery that assists thought.
They had left the door open, and the air was full of a mixed scent of trees and
honeysuckle and mildew and villagers' Sunday clothes. As far as the eye could
reach, you could see farmers propped up in restful attitudes, breathing
heavily; and the children in the congregation who had fidgeted during the
earlier part of the proceedings were now lying back in a surfeited sort of
coma. The last rays of the setting sun shone through the stained-glass windows,
birds were twittering in the trees, the women's dresses crackled gently in the
stillness. Peaceful. That's what I'm driving at. I felt peaceful. Everybody
felt peaceful. And that is why the explosion, when it came, sounded like the
end of all things.
I call it an
explosion, because that was what it seemed like when it broke loose. One moment
a dreamy hush was all over the place, broken only by old Heppenstall talking
about our duty to our neighbours; and then, suddenly, a sort of piercing,
shrieking squeal that got you right between the eyes and ran all the way down
your spine and out at the soles of the feet.
"EE-ee-ee-ee-ee!
Oo-ee! Ee-ee-ee-ee!"
It sounded like
about six hundred pigs having their tails twisted simultaneously, but it was
simply the kid Harold, who appeared to be having some species of fit. He was
jumping up and down and slapping at the back of his neck. And about every other
second he would take a deep breath and give out another of the squeals.
Well, I mean,
you can't do that sort of thing in the middle of the sermon during evening
service without exciting remark. The congregation came out of its trance with a
jerk, and climbed on the pews to get a better view. Old Heppenstall stopped in
the middle of a sentence and spun round. And a couple of vergers with great
presence of mind bounded up the aisle like leopards, collected Harold, still
squealing, and marched him out. They disappeared into the vestry, and I grabbed
my hat and legged it round to the stage-door, full of apprehension and what
not. I couldn't think what the deuce could have happened, but somewhere dimly
behind the proceedings there seemed to me to lurk the hand of the blighter
Steggles.
*
* *
* *
By the time I
got there and managed to get someone to open the door, which was locked, the
service seemed to be over. Old Heppenstall was standing in the middle of a
crowd of choir-boys and vergers and sextons and what not, putting the wretched
Harold through it with no little vim. I had come in at the tail-end of what
must have been a fairly fruity oration.
"Wretched
boy! How dare you——"
"I got a
sensitive skin!"
"This is
no time to talk about your skin——"
"Somebody
put a beetle down my back!"
"Absurd!"
"I felt it
wriggling——"
"Nonsense!"
"Sounds
pretty thin, doesn't it?" said someone at my side.
It was
Steggles, dash him. Clad in a snowy surplice or cassock, or whatever they call
it, and wearing an expression of grave concern, the blighter had the cold,
cynical crust to look me in the eyeball without a blink.
"Did you
put a beetle down his neck?" I cried.
"Me!"
said Steggles. "Me!"
Old Heppenstall
was putting on the black cap.
"I do not
credit a word of your story, wretched boy! I have warned you before, and now
the time has come to act. You cease from this moment to be a member of my
choir. Go, miserable child!"
Steggles
plucked at my sleeve.
"In that
case," he said, "those bets, you know—I'm afraid you lose your money,
dear old boy. It's a pity you didn't put it on S.P. I always think S.P.'s the
only safe way."
I gave him one
look. Not a bit of good, of course.
"And they
talk about the Purity of the Turf!" I said. And I meant it to sting, by
Jove!
*
* *
* *
Jeeves received
the news bravely, but I think the man was a bit rattled beneath the surface.
"An
ingenious young gentleman, Mr. Steggles, sir."
"A bally
swindler, you mean."
"Perhaps
that would be a more exact description. However, these things will happen on
the Turf, and it is useless to complain."
"I wish I
had your sunny disposition, Jeeves!"
Jeeves bowed.
"We now
rely, then, it would seem, sir, almost entirely on Mrs. Penworthy. Should she
justify Mr. Little's encomiums and show real class in the Mothers' Sack Race,
our gains will just balance our losses."
"Yes; but
that's not much consolation when you've been looking forward to a big
win."
"It is
just possible that we may still find ourselves on the right side of the ledger
after all, sir. Before Mr. Little left, I persuaded him to invest a small sum
for the syndicate of which you were kind enough to make me a member, sir, on
the Girls' Egg and Spoon Race."
"On Sarah
Mills?"
"No, sir.
On a long-priced outsider. Little Prudence Baxter, sir, the child of his
lordship's head gardener. Her father assures me she has a very steady hand. She
is accustomed to bring him his mug of beer from the cottage each afternoon, and
he informs me she has never spilled a drop."
Well, that
sounded as though young Prudence's control was good. But how about speed? With
seasoned performers like Sarah Mills entered, the thing practically amounted to
a classic race, and in these big events you must have speed.
"I am
aware that it is what is termed a long shot, sir. Still, I thought it
judicious."
"You
backed her for a place, too, of course?"
"Yes, sir.
Each way."
"Well, I
suppose it's all right. I've never known you make a bloomer yet."
"Thank you
very much, sir."
*
* *
* *
I'm bound to
say that, as a general rule, my idea of a large afternoon would be to keep as
far away from a village school-treat as possible. A sticky
business. But with such grave issues toward, if you know what I mean, I sank my
prejudices on this occasion and rolled up. I found the proceedings about as
scaly as I had expected. It was a warm day, and the hall grounds were a dense,
practically liquid mass of peasantry. Kids seethed to and fro. One of them, a
small girl of sorts, grabbed my hand and hung on to it as I clove my way
through the jam to where the Mothers' Sack Race was to finish. We hadn't been
introduced, but she seemed to think I would do as well as anyone else to talk
to about the rag-doll she had won in the Lucky Dip, and she rather spread herself
on the topic.
"I'm going
to call it Gertrude," she said. "And I shall undress it every night
and put it to bed, and wake it up in the morning and dress it, and put it to
bed at night, and wake it up next morning and dress it——"
"I say,
old thing," I said, "I don't want to hurry you and all that, but you
couldn't condense it a bit, could you? I'm rather anxious to see the finish of
this race. The Wooster fortunes are by way of hanging on it."
"I'm going
to run in a race soon," she said, shelving the doll for the nonce and
descending to ordinary chit-chat.
"Yes?"
I said. Distrait, if you know what I mean, and trying to peer through the
chinks in the crowd. "What race is that?"
"Egg 'n
Spoon."
"No,
really? Are you Sarah Mills?"
"Na-ow!"
Registering scorn. "I'm Prudence Baxter."
Naturally this
put our relations on a different footing. I gazed at her with considerable
interest. One of the stable. I must say she didn't look much of a flier.
She was short and round. Bit out of condition, I thought.
"I
say," I said, "that being so, you mustn't dash about in the hot sun
and take the edge off yourself. You must conserve your energies, old friend.
Sit down here in the shade."
"Don't
want to sit down."
"Well,
take it easy, anyhow."
The kid flitted
to another topic like a butterfly hovering from flower to flower.
"I'm a
good girl," she said.
"I bet you
are. I hope you're a good egg-and-spoon racer, too."
"Harold's
a bad boy. Harold squealed in church and isn't allowed to come to the treat.
I'm glad," continued this ornament of her sex, wrinkling her nose
virtuously, "because he's a bad boy. He pulled my hair Friday. Harold
isn't coming to the treat! Harold isn't coming to the treat! Harold isn't
coming to the treat!" she chanted, making a regular song of it.
"Don't rub
it in, my dear old gardener's daughter," I pleaded. "You don't know
it, but you've hit on rather a painful subject."
"Ah,
Wooster, my dear fellow! So you have made friends with this little lady?"
It was old
Heppenstall, beaming pretty profusely. Life and soul of the party.
"I am
delighted, my dear Wooster," he went on, "quite delighted at the way
you young men are throwing yourselves into the spirit of this little festivity
of ours."
"Oh,
yes?" I said.
"Oh, yes!
Even Rupert Steggles. I must confess that my opinion of Rupert Steggles has
materially altered for the better this afternoon."
Mine hadn't.
But I didn't say so.
"I have
always considered Rupert Steggles, between ourselves, a rather self-centred
youth, by no means the kind who would put himself out to further the enjoyment
of his fellows. And yet twice within the last half-hour I have observed him
escorting Mrs. Penworthy, our worthy tobacconist's wife, to the
refreshment-tent."
I left him
standing. I shook off the clutching hand of the Baxter kid and hared it rapidly
to the spot where the Mothers' Sack Race was just finishing. I had a horrid
presentiment that there had been more dirty work at the cross-roads. The first
person I ran into was young Bingo. I grabbed him by the arm.
"Who
won?"
"I don't
know. I didn't notice." There was bitterness in the chappie's voice.
"It wasn't Mrs. Penworthy, dash her! Bertie, that hound Steggles is
nothing more nor less than one of our leading snakes. I don't know how he heard
about her, but he must have got on to it that she was dangerous. Do you know
what he did? He lured that miserable woman into the refreshment-tent five
minutes before the race, and brought her out so weighed down with cake and tea
that she blew up in the first twenty yards. Just rolled over and lay there!
Well, thank goodness, we still have Harold!"
I gaped at the
poor chump.
"Harold?
Haven't you heard?"
"Heard?"
Bingo turned a delicate green. "Heard what? I haven't heard anything. I
only arrived five minutes ago. Came here straight from the station. What has
happened? Tell me!"
I slipped him
the information. He stared at me for a moment in a ghastly sort of way, then
with a hollow groan tottered away and was lost in the crowd. A nasty
knock, poor chap. I didn't blame him for being upset.
They were
clearing the decks now for the Egg and Spoon Race, and I thought I might as
well stay where I was and watch the finish. Not that I had much hope. Young
Prudence was a good conversationalist, but she didn't seem to me to be the
build for a winner.
As far as I
could see through the mob, they got off to a good start. A short, red-haired
child was making the running with a freckled blonde second, and Sarah Mills
lying up an easy third. Our nominee was straggling along with the field, well
behind the leaders. It was not hard even as early as this to spot the winner.
There was a grace, a practised precision, in the way Sarah Mills held her spoon
that told its own story. She was cutting out a good pace, but her egg didn't
even wobble. A natural egg-and-spooner, if ever there was one.
Class will
tell. Thirty yards from the tape, the red-haired kid tripped over her feet and
shot her egg on to the turf. The freckled blonde fought gamely, but she had run
herself out half-way down the straight, and Sarah Mills came past and home on a
tight rein by several lengths, a popular winner. The blonde was second. A
sniffing female in blue gingham beat a pie-faced kid in pink for the
place-money, and Prudence Baxter, Jeeves's long shot, was either fifth or
sixth, I couldn't see which.
And then I was
carried along with the crowd to where old Heppenstall was going to present the
prizes. I found myself standing next to the man Steggles.
"Hallo,
old chap!" he said, very bright and cheery. "You've had a bad day,
I'm afraid."
I looked at him
with silent scorn. Lost on the blighter, of course.
"It's not
been a good meeting for any of the big punters," he went on. "Poor
old Bingo Little went down badly over that Egg and Spoon Race."
I hadn't been
meaning to chat with the fellow, but I was startled.
"How do
you mean badly?" I said. "We—he only had a small bet on."
"I don't
know what you call small. He had thirty quid each way on the Baxter kid."
The landscape
reeled before me.
"What!"
"Thirty
quid at ten to one. I thought he must have heard something, but apparently not.
The race went by the form-book all right."
I was trying to
do sums in my head. I was just in the middle of working out the syndicate's
losses, when old Heppenstall's voice came sort of faintly to me out of the
distance. He had been pretty fatherly and debonair when ladling out the prizes
for the other events, but now he had suddenly grown all pained and grieved. He
peered sorrowfully at the multitude.
*
* *
* *
"With
regard to the Girls' Egg and Spoon Race, which has just concluded," he
said, "I have a painful duty to perform. Circumstances have arisen which
it is impossible to ignore. It is not too much to say that I am stunned."
He gave the
populace about five seconds to wonder why he was stunned, then went on.
"Three
years ago, as you are aware, I was compelled to expunge from the list of events
at this annual festival the Fathers' Quarter-Mile, owing to reports coming to
my ears of wagers taken and given on the result at the village inn and a strong
suspicion that on at least one occasion the race had
actually been sold by the speediest runner. That unfortunate occurrence shook
my faith in human nature, I admit—but still there was one event at least which
I confidently expected to remain untainted by the miasma of professionalism. I
allude to the Girls' Egg and Spoon Race. It seems, alas, that I was too
sanguine."
He stopped
again, and wrestled with his feelings.
"I will
not weary you with the unpleasant details. I will merely say that before the
race was run a stranger in our midst, the manservant of one of the guests at
the Hall—I will not specify with more particularity—approached several of the
competitors and presented each of them with five shillings on condition that
they—er—finished. A belated sense of remorse has led him to confess to me what
he did, but it is too late. The evil is accomplished, and retribution must take
its course. It is no time for half-measures. I must be firm. I rule that Sarah
Mills, Jane Parker, Bessie Clay, and Rosie Jukes, the first four to pass the
winning-post, have forfeited their amateur status and are disqualified, and
this handsome work-bag, presented by Lord Wickhammersley, goes, in consequence,
to Prudence Baxter. Prudence, step forward!"