‘Thanks.'
'One more stoup of port for Mr Corcoran, Baxter. You may bring the coffee, cigars and liqueurs to us in the library in about a quarter of an hour.'
The butler filled my glass and melted away. I looked about me dizzily. We were seated in the spacious dining-room of Ukridge's Aunt Julia's house on Wimbledon Common. A magnificent banquet had wound its way to a fitting finish, and the whole thing seemed to be inexplicable.
‘I don't understand this,' I said. 'How do I come to be sitting here, bursting with rich food paid for by your aunt?'
'Perfectly simple, laddie. I expressed a desire for your company tonight, and she at once consented.'
'But why? She has never let you invite me here before. She can't stand me.'
Ukridge sipped his port.
'Well, the fact of the matter is, Corky,' he said, in a burst of confidence, ‘things have been occurring recently in the home which have resulted in what you might call the dawning of a new life as far as Aunt Julia and I are concerned. It is not too much to say that she now eats out of my hand and is less than the dust beneath my chariot's wheels. I will tell you the story, for it will be of help to you in your journey through the world. It is a story which shows that, be the skies never so black, nothing can harm a man provided that he has a level business head. Tempests may lour -'
'Get on with it. How did all this happen?’
Ukridge mused for a while.
‘I suppose the thing really started,' he said, 'when I pawned her brooch -'
'You pawned your aunt's brooch?' 'Yes.'
'And that endeared you to her?'
'I will explain all that later. Meanwhile, let me begin at the beginning. Have you ever run across a man named Joe the Lawyer?'
‘No’
'Stout fellow with a face like a haggis.'
'I've never met him.'
'Endeavour not to do so, Corky. I hate to speak ill of my fellow-man, but Joe the Lawyer is not honest.'
'What does he do? Pawn people's brooches?'
Ukridge adjusted the ginger-beer wire that held his pince-nez to his flapping ears and looked wounded.
'This is scarcely the tone I like to hear in an old friend, Corky. When I reach that point in my story, you will see that my pawning of Aunt Julia's brooch was a perfectly normal, straightforward matter of business. How else could I have bought half the dog?'
'Half what dog?'
'Didn't I tell you about the dog?'
'No.'
‘I must have done. It's the nub of the whole affair.' 'Well, you didn't.'
'I'm getting this story all wrong,' said Ukridge. 'I'm confusing you. Let me begin right at the beginning.'
This bloke, Joe the Lawyer (said Ukridge), is a bookmaker with whom I have had transactions from time to time, but until the afternoon when this story starts we had never become in any way intimate. Occasionally I would win a couple of quid off him and he would send me a cheque, or he would win a
couple of quid off me and I would go round to his office to ask him to wait till Wednesday week; but we had never mingled socially, as you might say, until this afternoon I'm speaking of, when I happened to look in at the Bedford Street Bodega and found him there, and he asked me to have a glass of the old tawny.
Well, laddie, you know as well as I do that there are moments when a glass of the old tawny makes all the difference, so I assented with a good deal of heartiness. ‘Fine day,' I said.
'Yes,' said this bloke. 'Do you want to make a large fortune?'
'Yes.'
'Then listen,' said 'this bloke. 'You know the Waterloo Cup. Listen. I've taken over as a bad debt from a client the dog that's going to win the Waterloo Cup. This dog has been kept dark, but you can take it from me it's going to win the Waterloo Cup. And then what? Well, then it's going to fetch something. It's going to be valuable. It's going to have a price. It's going to be worth money. Listen. How would you like to buy a half-share in that dog?'
'Very much.'
Then it's yours.'
'But I haven't any money.'
'You mean to say you can't raise fifty quid?'
'I can't raise five.'
'Gawblimey!' said the bloke.
And looking at me in a despairing sort of way, like a father whose favourite son has hurt his finest feelings, he finished his old tawny and pushed out into Bedford Street. And I went home.
Well, as you may imagine, I brooded not a little on my way Back to Wimbledon. The only thing nobody can say of me, Corky, is that I lack the spacious outlook that wins to wealth. I know a good thing when I see one. This was a good thing, and I recognized it as such. But how to acquire the necessary capital was the point. Always my stumbling-block, that has been. I wish I had a shilling for every time I've failed to become a millionaire through lack of the necessary capital.
What sources of revenue had I, I asked myself. George Tupper, if tactfully approached, is generally good for a fiver; and you, no doubt, had it been a matter of a few shillings or half a sovereign, would gladly have leaped into the breach. But, fifty quid! A large sum, laddie. It wanted thinking over, and I devoted the whole force of my intelligence to the problem.
Oddly enough, the one source of supply that had never presented itself to me was my Aunt Julia. As you know, she has warped and peculiar ideas about money. For some reason or other she will never give me a cent. And yet it was my Aunt Julia who solved my problem. There is a destiny in these matters, Corky, a sort of fate.
When I got back to Wimbledon, I found her looking after her packing; for she was off next morning on one of those lecture tours she goes in for.
'Stanley,' she said to me, T nearly forgot. I want you to look in at Murgatroyd's in Bond Street, tomorrow and get my diamond brooch. They are re-setting it. Bring it back and put it in my bureau drawer. Here is the key. Lock the drawer and send the key to me by registered post.'
And so, you see, everything was most satisfactorily settled. Long before my aunt came back the Waterloo Cup would be run for, and I should have acquired vast affluence. All I had to do was to have a duplicate key made, so that I could put the brooch in the drawer when I had redeemed it. I could see no flaw in the scheme of things. I saw her off at Euston, sauntered round to Murgatroyd's, collected the brooch, sauntered off to the pawnbroker's, put the brooch up the spout, and walked out, for the first time in many weeks in a sound financial position. I rang up Joe the Lawyer on the phone, closed the deal about the dog, and there I was, with my foot on the ladder of Fortune.
But in this world, Corky, you never know. That is the thing I always try to impress on every young fellow starting out in life - that you never know. It was about two days later that the butler came to me in the garden and said a gentleman wished to speak to me on the phone.
I shall always remember that moment. It was a lovely, still evening, and I was sitting in the garden under a leafy tree, thinking beautiful thoughts. The sun was setting in a blaze of gold and crimson; the little birds were chirping their heads off; and I was half-way through the whisky and soda of a lifetime. I recollect that, an instant before Baxter came out to fetch me, I had just been thinking how peaceful and wonderful and perfect the world was.
I went to the phone.
'Hullo!' said a voice.
It was Joe the Lawyer. And Baxter had said it was a gentleman.
'Are you there?' said this bloke Joe.
‘Yes.'
'Listen.'
'What?'
'Listen. You know that dog I said was going to win the Waterloo Cup?'
'Yes.'
'Well, he isn't.'
'Why not?'
'Because he's dead.'
I don't mind telling you, Corky, that I reeled. Yes, your old friend reeled. 'Dead!'
'Dead.'
'You don't mean dead?'
'Yes.'
"Then what about my fifty pounds?'
'I keep that.'
'What!'
'Of course I keep it. Once a sale's g
one through, it's gone through. I know my law. That's why the boys call me Joe the Lawyer. But I'll tell you what I'll do. You send me a letter, releasing all rights in that dog, and I'll give you a fiver. I'll be robbing myself, but I'm like that. . . . Big-hearted Joe, I am, and that's all there is about it.'
'What did the dog die of?'
'Pewmonia.'
‘I don't believe he's dead at all.’
'You don't believe my word?'
'No.'
'Well, you come round to my stable and see for yourself.'
So I went round and viewed the remains. There was no doubt about it, the dog had handed in his dinner-pail. So I wrote the letter, got my fiver, and came back to Wimbledon to try and rebuild my shattered life. Because you can readily see, Corky, that I was up against it in no uncertain manner. Aunt Julia would be back before long, and would want to see her brooch; and though I'm her own flesh and blood, and I shouldn't be surprised if she had dandled me on her knee when I was a child, I couldn't picture her bearing with anything like Christian fortitude the news that I had pawned it in order to buy a half-share in a dead dog.
And the very next morning in blew Miss Angelica Vining, the poetess.
She was a gaunt sort of toothy female who had come to lunch once or twice while I had been staying in my aunt's house. A great pal of my aunt's.
'Good morning,' said this disease, beaming. 'What a heavenly day! One could almost fancy oneself out in the country, couldn't one? Even at so short a distance from the heart of the City one seems to sense in the air a freshness which one cannot get in London, can one? I've come for your aunt's brooch.'
I braced myself up with a hand on the piano. 'You've what?'
I said.
'Tonight is the dance of the Pen and Ink Club, and I wired to your aunt to ask if I might borrow her brooch, and she has written to say that I may. It's in her bureau.'
'Which is, most unfortunately, locked.'
'Your aunt sent me the key. I have it in my bag.’
She opened her bag, Corky, and at this moment my guardian angel, who had been lying down on his job pretty considerably for the last week or so, showed a sudden flash of speed. The door was open, and through it at this juncture there trickled one of my aunt's Pekes. You will recollect my aunt's Pekes. I pinched them once, to start a Dog College.
This animal gazed at the female, and the female went off like a soda-water bottle.
'Oh, the sweet thing!' she bubbled.
She put the bag down and swooped on the dog. He tried to side-step, but she had him. 'Oh, the tweetums!' she cried.
And, her back being turned, Corky, I nipped to the bag, found the key, trousered it, and back to position one. Presently she came to the surface again. 'Now, I really must hurry away,' she said. ‘I will just get the brooch and scurry.' She fumbled in her bag. 'Oh, dear! I've lost the key.'
'Too bad,' I said. 'Still,' I went on, thinking it might be all for the best, 'what does a girl need jewellery for? The greatest jewel a girl can possess is her youth, her beauty.'
It went well, but not quite well enough.
'No,' she said, ‘I must have the brooch. I've set my heart on it. We must break the lock.'
‘I couldn't dream of such a thing,' I said firmly. 'I am in a position of trust. I cannot break up my aunt's furniture.'
'Oh, but-'
'No.'
Well, laddie, there ensued a pretty painful scene. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, and not many like a woman who want a brooch and isn't allowed to get it. The atmosphere, when we parted, was full of strain.
T shall write to Miss Ukridge and tell her exactly what has happened,' said the poetess, pausing at the front door.
She then shoved off, leaving me limp and agitated. These things take it out of a fellow.
Something, I perceived, had got to be done, and done swiftly. From some source I had to raise fifty quid. But where could I turn? My credit, Corky - and I tell you this frankly, as an old friend - is not good. No, it is not good. In all the world there seemed to be but one man who might be induced to let me have fifty quid at a pinch, and that was Joe the Lawyer. I don't say I was relying on him, mind you. But it seemed to me that, if there was a spark of human feeling in his bosom, he might, after a good deal of eloquence, be persuaded to help an old business colleague out of a very tight place.
At any rate, he was the only relief in sight, so I rang up his office, and, finding that he would be at the Lewes Races next day, I took an early train there.
Well, Corky, I might have known. It stands to reason that, if a man has a spark of human feeling in his bosom, he does not become a bookie. I stood beside this bloke, Joe the Lawyer from the start of the two o'clock race to the finish of the four-thirty, watching him rake in huge sums from mugs of every description until his satchel was simply bursting with cash; but when I asked him for the loan of a measly fifty pounds he didn't even begin to look like parting.
You cannot fathom the psychology of these blighters, Corky. If you will believe me, the chief reason why he would not lend me this paltry sum appeared to be a fear of what people would say if they heard about it.
'Lend you fifty quid?' he said, in a sort of stunned way. 'Who, me? Silly I'd look, wouldn't I, lending you fifty quid!'
'But you don't mind looking silly.'
'Having all the boys saying I was a soft-hearted fool.’
'A man of your stamp doesn't care what fellows like that say,' I urged. 'You're too big. You can afford to despise them.'
'Well, I can't afford to lend any fifty quids. I'd never hear the last of it.'
I simply can't understand this terror of public opinion. Morbid, I call it. I told him I would keep the thing a dead secret - and, if he thought it safer, not even give him a line in writing to acknowledge the debt; but no, there was no tempting him.
'I'll tell you what I will do,' he said. Twenty quid?'
'No, not twenty quid. Nor ten quid, either. Nor five quid. Nor one quid. But I'll give you a lift back as far as Sandown in my car tomorrow, that's what I'll do.'
From the way he spoke, you would have thought he was doing me the best turn one man had ever done another. I was strongly inclined to reject his offer with contempt. The only thing that decided me to accept was the thought that, if he had as good a day at Sandown as he had had at Lewes, his better nature might after all assert itself even at the eleventh hour. I mean to say, even a bookie must have a melting mood occasionally; and if one came to Joe the Lawyer, I wanted to be on the spot.
'Start from here at eleven, sharp. If you aren't ready, I'll go without you.'
This conversation, Corky, had taken place in the saloon bar of the Coach and Horses at Lewes; and, having said these few words, the bloke Joe popped off. I stayed on to have one more, feeling the need of it after the breakdown of the business negotiations, and the fellow behind the bar got chatty.
'That was Joe the Lawyer just went out, wasn't it?' he said. He chuckled. 'He's wide, that man is.'
I wasn't much in the mood to pass the time discussing a fellow who wouldn't let an old business friend have an insignificant sum like fifty quid, so I just nodded.
'Heard the latest about him?'
'No.'
'He's wide, Joe is. He had a dog that was entered for the Waterloo Cup, and it died.'
'I know.'
'Well, I bet you don't know what he did. Some of the lads were in here just now, talking about it. He raffled that dog.'
'How do you mean, raffled it?'
'Put it up for a raffle at twenty pounds a ticket.'
'But it was dead.'
'Certainly it was dead. But he didn't tell them that. That's where he was wide.'
'But how could he raffle a dead dog?'
'Why couldn't he raffle a dead dog? Nobody knew it was dead.'
'How about the man who drew the winning ticket?'
'Ah! Well, he had to tell him, of course. He just handed him his money back. And there he was, a couple of hundr
ed quid in hand. He's wide, Joe is.'
Have you ever experienced, Corky, that horrible sensation of having all your ideals totter and melt away, leaving you in a world of hideous blackness where it seems impossible to trust your fellow man an inch? What do you mean, my aunt must often have felt that way? I resent these slurs, Corky. Whenever I have had occasion to pinch anything from my aunt, it has always been with the most scrupulous motives, with the object of collecting a little ready cash in order to lay the foundations of a vast fortune.
This was an entirely different matter. This fiend in human shape had had no thought but of self. Not content with getting fifty quid out of me and sticking to it like glue, he had deliberately tricked me into accepting five pounds for all rights in a dead dog which he knew was shortly about to bring him in a couple of hundred. Was it fair? Was it just?
And the terrible part of the whole thing was that there seemed nothing that I could do about it. I couldn't even reproach him. At least, I could - but a fat lot of help that would have been. All I could do was to save my train-fare home by accepting a lift in his car.
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