The Great Melbourne Cup Mystery

by Arthur W. Upfield

  ‘Are you going to plank your entire time doings on the last race?’ asked Dick, again like a demand, his eyes reflecting the gaity of the crowd; his hair reflecting the sunlight, his plain face reflecting the buoyancy of his soul.

  Not answering his friend, Roy gripped Dick’s arm above the elbow and led him to a place temporarily vacated by people who had hurried to the grandstand to view the race. And then, in his direct fashion, he said quietly:

  ‘I want you to tell me if you love Diana.’

  For two seconds Dick’s underjaw sagged. The light in his eyes dimmed and he answered the question in the affirmative by merely nodding. Roy stared with unseeing eyes at the short band of colours sweeping into the straight. Then quite abruptly he turned square to his friend.

  ‘We’ve been friends a long time now,’ he said slowly. ‘I hope we will never fall out over Diana.’

  Dick’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘Do you think there is any probability of our falling out?’ he asked in tones which did not make his question a demand.

  ‘It is hard to give an opinion. History is full of cases of two friends loving the same woman with disasterous results to their friendship.’

  ‘Not with us. We’ve been pals too long. If you love Diana, too, then we’ll play fair. What the hell are we going to do about it?’

  ‘Have you proposed to her?’

  ‘No,’ replied Dick. ‘I had a chance to in the stand a little while ago, but Alverey butted in. I might punch him on the nose yet.’

  ‘Well he’s making the pace and we have to keep up,’ Roy said determinedly. ‘We have got to decide the matter as far as we are concerned before the house-party breaks up to-morrow.’

  ‘All right. You box on. If Diana doesn’t accept you, I’ll try my luck and I reckon my luck is as good as Alverey’s, despite his money.’

  ‘No, I’m not going to accept priority like that,’ stated Roy firmly. ‘I’ll tell you what we’ll do. In the next race, the last this meeting, there are only two horses running, the third having been scratched.

  ‘We’ll each back one of those horses and the winner entitles his backer to propose first go to Diana.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ agreed Dick Cusack. ‘Let’s see: Paroo, Tindale’s horse, is running. Which one is scratched?’

  ‘Black Lucy.’

  ‘Good! Leaving Darling, owned by Smith. How do we pick ’em?’

  ‘Put the names in a hat and draw them, if you like.’

  ‘Do me. We’ll do it now—and no squealing from the loser as usual.’

  ‘Of course not, Dick. If you win, I’ll be your best man.’

  ‘Same here,’ Dick agreed readily, whilst Roy hastily wrote the names on two strips of paper torn from his note-book.

  Roy drew Mr Tindale’s horse, Paroo. He was sincerely pleased that Dick would get the first chance, for had not Paroo’s owner said he had backed darling?

  ‘And that’s that,’ Dick said briskly. ‘I don’t know one horse from t’other, but I’m backing my luck.’

  2

  When You Are Ready

  Diana Ross, radiantly flushed with excitement, for at twenty-three few girls are incapable of being thrilled even by second rate horses running a race, sat surrounded by her friends and her guardian’s guests of whom only Roy was absent. Senor Alverey was saying in his peculiar English:

  ‘But two horses, eh? The winner of thees race so easy to, what you say, find?’

  ‘Yes. Mr. Tindale’s horse, Paroo, is to win this race,’ announced Smith, the secretary to the Mount Lion Jockey Club. He was short and tubby, and his face was round and shining, yet a poker face. Confidently he added: ‘The horses have arranged it between them.’

  ‘A-ah! But was it not your so great general, Wellington, who said so sublimely: “It is all horses which are liars”?’

  Above the laughter in which the dark, handsome senor heartily joined, Mr. Tindale was heard to say calmly:

  ‘Darling will have to be mighty slow if she loses to Paroo after my animal’s performance in the Stakes.’

  ‘Oh, he didn’t do badly, guardie. He gained third place,’ Diana exclaimed with a partially bestowed smile on all. ‘You can’t expect the poor dear to win every time.’

  ‘Well, I expected him to win that time, anyway.’

  ‘You think he not win thees race, Mistaire Tindale?’

  ‘Not even in face of what the horses have arranged. Beside Paroo hasn’t a Tom Pink on his back.’

  ‘I love that man,’ asserted Diana with much conviction.

  ‘I don’t,’ Tom Pink’s employer stated emphatically.

  ‘But he’s such an original type,’ the girl argued mischievously. ‘A thorough Jekyll-Hyde man. On the ground he is like a crab. On a horse he’s like—like part of the horse.’

  ‘I grant he is all right when he’s on a saddle, Miss Ross,’ was Smith’s grudging surrender, ‘but he’s old enough not to stutter and splutter when he talks to you. I don’t mind a shower before breakfast, but...’

  ‘You can’t expect all things of a good rider,’ Mr. Tindale pointed out, in which he was backed by the Argentinian.

  ‘No, he is aver’ good rider, not a, what you call heem, a—a gate cracker.’

  ‘Still, for all that I’m not paying him to replace my shower bath,’ the secretary bitterly complained. ‘I’ve just come from telling him to ride his best, and I’ve made my mind never to talk to him again unless he’s sitting on a horse.’

  ‘But he cannot always be sitting on a horse,’ Diana pointed out, rising to her feet and trying hard not to giggle. Then, imperiously to Senor Alverey: ‘Please put this pound on Paroo for me.’

  ‘Sairtenly, Meese Ross,’ Alverey said, taking the proffered note with a bow that only the Latin can execute superbly. ‘I? I will follow your star. Twenty bills will I put on heem, too?’ Diana noted the dark eyes flashing from his dark, handsome face. There were moments when she thought she liked him immensely, and Alverey as quick to sense these transitory phases which gave him confidence that sooner or later he would win her.

  The object of Diana’s mirth and Mr. Smith’s well-grounded complaint, was he who seconded Roy’s statement in the bar that he was one of Mr. Tindale’s guests. A remarkable man, Tom Pink, in more than appearance. Even those people capable of guessing how many peas there are in a bottle, those shrewd men able to guess the dead weight of a beast, would have found difficulty in judging Tom’s age. His legs were too short for the length of his body, and his hands were too big for the size of his arms. The sleeves of the black and gold shirt he wore were rolled to his arm-pits, and when he removed his white cap to scratch his head it was seen that he was completely bald. He was an old young man, yet there was no accounting for this, for the one ruling passion of his life was horses.

  ‘I reckon we’ll be going,’ he said to Mr. Tindale’s rider, in a slow rolling drawl.

  ‘Yass, let’s. Old Bicton ’as bin at the barrier ten minutes.’

  As though two stockmen starting off for the days muster, so did Tom and Lew Jackson ride away to the barrier in this seven-furlong contest. And on the way to the irate starter, Tom said casually:

  ‘Well—I’m on a dead ’un.’

  It appeared that Lew Jackson required time mentally to assimilate this statement of fact, for a time-space of ten seconds elapsed before he said:—

  ‘Are yous. Well, I’m on a dead ’un, too.’

  ‘You don’t say,’ Tom remarked casually.

  ‘I do say.’

  ‘We can’t both ride dead ’uns.’

  ‘No—but I’m ridin’ the one dead.’

  ‘But you can’t be, ’cos I’m ridin’ it’

  ‘You ain’t. I got strict instructions from old Tindale to ride this disjointed cow as dead as mutton. An’ Tindale’s the president of the club.’

  ‘An’ Smithy is the secretary,’ Tom stated, as though he imparted a close guarded stable secret.

  ‘’E says: “Tom,” ’e says, �
��you will not ride Darling to win this race.” Wot’s more Lew, I am obeying owners orders.’

  ‘So’m I.’

  During the remainder of the short journey to the barrier these two were silent, even when Mr. Bicton, the starter addressed them like an admiral from his quarter-deck. Starting with his hand on the gate gear roundly cursed all unpunctual persons in idiom betraying the sea-faring career of his youth.

  The two horses were brought up to the barrier, when Tom with offside instep pressure spun Darling right round. Darling was so astonished she reacted and would have plunged away back to the grandstand had not his rider controlled the impulse with hands of steel.

  This made Lew’s bay gelding more anxious than ever to get away. For a second time they faced up to the barrier, and this time Darling, who took outside place, side-stepped smartly and badly bumped her fretting opponent.

  ‘Ain’t the world big enough?’ Lew snarled.

  ‘Come ’ere, you,’ drawled Tom to Darling, and edged her off the gelding then to knee his mount round to take the backward plunge once more.

  Mr. Bicton, who always carried with him a patent shooting stool opened it with studied deliberation and as deliberately sat down.

  ‘Just when you are ready,’ he roared in tones more insulting than a language he sometimes used.

  By this time Paroo was giving her rider much trouble, whilst Lew Jackson’s rising anger, becoming communicated to the horse, increased the animal’s impatience to be away.

  ‘Now, if you gentlemen have made up your minds to start we’ll weigh anchor,’ announced Mr. Bicton, standing up. And then, as the horses were both facing the barrier, although several yards from it, the starter swung up the gate and yelled:

  ‘Let go—let go, you flaming horse marines.’

  Suprised by this procedure, the jockeys looked at one another for a fleeting second, when Paroo almost took the bit in his mouth and bolted. With the yells of execration vented by the starter, thundering in his ears, Tom Pink permitted Darling to follow, and Darling, not having been used to being in that state known as dead, determined to catch up.

  Ahead, some four or five lengths Paroo moved along at easy speed. With his huge hands as light as feathers and as strong as iron clamps, Tom permitted his bewildered mare to creep up. Never before had he passed so slowly the little white posts marking the inside of the course.

  Now and then Lew Jackson, who had Paroo well under control by that time glanced back at Tom and noted the grin on Tom’s face.

  ‘I’m ridin’ a dead ’un,’ he yelled. ‘Come on up. This is the president’s horse.’

  ‘I’m ridin’ the sec’s horse, an he’s as dead as beef. Go on—you’re doin’ alright,’ screamed Tom, never before so like the Tom Pink on the ground.

  Half way to the post the two horses were moving at little more than a canter. Their riders could hear the roar of the spectators, and neither found difficulty in understanding the reason for it.

  Now, but a short distance ahead of them Tom could see the ornamental post marking that flank of the inside railings which ran to the same distance beyond the stand. Slower and yet slower galloped the horses. Each jockey was lying along his animal’s neck as though in the final burst of speed. Tom was raising and lowering his whip on pretence of thrashing the mare, but not once did he strike her.

  Neck and neck they turned into the straight, restraining bits in the mouths of anxious horses covering their riders with snow. On the inside, suddenly Paroo faltered, half reared, and ran off the course round the end of the inside railings.

  Tom Pink had the course to himself.

  Hilarious cat-calls, yells and groans, laughter and imprecations greeted him when Paroo, indignantly yet superbly, trotted like an old cavalry charger slowly past the stand to the winning post.

  This bush crowd accepted the farce in a sporting spirit. Men shouted with laughter and slapped each other on the back until their eyes watered—women laughing more shrilly but with less physical exuberance. When Tom Pink having dismounted, was met by Mr. Smith he saw that his employer’s face was white with rage.

  ‘Didn’t I tell you not to win the race?’ demanded the secretary with lowered voice.

  ‘Yyyes, you did,’ stuttered Tom, almost blinding Mr. Smith, like a ripple caused by a stone flung into still water, so from that point expanded a wave which silenced the crowd. Even from the far end of the grandstand people could hear Tom Pink disclaiming:

  ‘Y-y-yes, you told me to r-r-ride ’im dead. I rid ’im dead. I c-c-couldn’t have rid ’im no deader, c-c-could I? But Lew was on a dead ’un, too. An’ ’e rid Paroo dead. Dead—deader’n I rode Darling. Only two ’orses and them r-r-rid as dead as doornails, one ’ad to win, didn’t he? ’Ow was I t-t-to know Lew would turn off the flamin’ course? T-t-tell me that!’

  The distance defying voice died away, and there burst out a great sound of laughter which swelled into deep-throated mirth. And when the race was declared no race and all bets were cancelled, the throng streamed away to the parked motor cars and trucks and tethered horses still in great glee.

  It was arranged between the two friends that Dick Cusack should persuade Diana to return to Bulka with him in his single-seater, and thus take the opportunity to propose, which Roy insisted was his right.

  Senor Alverey & Diana Ross

  3

  A Sporting Run

  For mid-May the night was warm, sufficiently warm to dictate open windows, and towards midnight Roy and Dick, who occupied the same bedroom at Bulka, were lounging therein, in dressing gown and slippers. Although each knew that the opportunity to propose to Diana had been offered to the other, not until now did they compare notes with the freedom of old friends.

  ‘Well—how did you get on?’ inquired Roy, after a short silence, during which the lightly-falling rain on shrubs and earth sent a message of good promise drifting in through the wide french windows.

  ‘A complete thud,’ Dick replied, vulgarly explicit. ‘And you?’

  ‘Ditto.’

  Another short period of silence, spent in moody smoking. Then:

  ‘Diana said she was sorry, but she didn’t love me,’ Dick explained, with an unusually glum expression. ‘I suppose she said that to you, too?’

  Roy nodded.

  ‘Did she tell you, too, that the man she married would have to have done something worthwhile in the world?’

  ‘Yes. Something wonderful like building a great railway or a bridge or being a famous statesman. She pointed to Alverey as a shining example.’

  ‘Lovely, isn’t it?’ Dick growled. ‘Here are you helping your Dad to run a mammoth business in Melbourne and umpteen branches throughout Victoria and here’s me running sixty thousand sheep in the Riverina, and ’cos neither of us are bloomin’ politicians we cut no ice.’

  ‘She gave me a wee chance, or what she called a wee chance,’ Roy answered.

  ‘Oh—did she? Did she tell you she would marry you within a month if one of your mokes won the Melbourne Cup?’

  ‘She gave me that wee chance.’

  ‘It’s so wee that I canna see it. Can you?’

  ‘No. And yet—’

  ‘What?’ Dick vigorously tossed the end of his cigarette through the open windows. The glowing butt described an arc over the verandah and its low balustrade to fall into the garden beyond. Whilst not directly in the light, Dick could see a black cat crouched on the balustrade. It was slowly rising to its full height, when its back became arched and it softly spat ‘What were you going to say, Roy?’

  ‘That we might give the Melbourne Cup a fly.’

  ‘What with? None of our stuff has a single hair of a Cup winner sticking out of him.’

  ‘Nevertheless, we’ll give it a fly.’

  During the full following minute neither spoke; Roy earnestly regarding his friend, whilst Dick almost subconsciously watched the cat, and for the first time in his life not being thrilled by falling rain after a long dry period.

  �
�Well, what are we going to do about it?’ persisted the younger man.

  ‘About what?’ countered Dick.

  ‘About the Melbourne Cup.’

  ‘Oh! I was thinking of Alverey. Oh, yes, I suppose you could run Olary Boy and I could enter Pieface, but we’ll have to get busy and hire a gang of good horse-dopers.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Why—because every other galloper in the race will have to be doped if one of our horses is to win it.’

  ‘It is too early to know just what Pieface and Olary Boy might do. If it should rain the night before, Olary Boy would be suited. As four-year-olds both might do exceptionally well this winter and spring.’

  ‘They’d have a wee chance, as Diana said,’ Dick snorted.

  ‘Still, a chance Dick,’ Roy further persisted. ‘I’ve had a good offer for Olary Boy, as you know. I told Sparks to sell at noon tomorrow if he didn’t hear from me. I’ll write him in the morning not to sell. Diana is right after all. We haven’t done much in the world bar spend money we do not really earn. Come, let’s give Diana’s offer a sporting run.’

  Instead of at once vigorously backing this suggestion, Dick Cusack lit another cigarette, then to slump deeper into his chair. The cat was again arching its back and softly spitting. It actually was annoyed with him.

  ‘What is the good, Roy? Just suppose we were able to find a crook keen enough to dope every other horse but ours. Supposin’ Olary Boy or Pieface won the Cup? What do we do then? The winner takes it to Diana saying: ‘Here Diana take the cocktail shaker for the sideboard. Through my horse I have done a great and noble deed. My name is in all the papers. As per contract, red ink the wedding day.’ So far everything would be O.K. But winning the Cup isn’t going to create love in Diana’s heart for the winner, and I’m in love with Diana to the extent that I wouldn’t want her to marry me if she didn’t love me as much as I love her. Get me, Roy?’

  During this quite lucid presentation of their case, the cat had again sunk down to the verandah rail.