However, I didn’t say so. One must be diplomatic. I had not altogether given up hope of floating that loan, and anything in the nature of frivolous comment would, I felt, have the worst effect on the negotiations.
“What’ll I do?” said Joe, after a few general remarks.
“Better shout,” I suggested.
So he shouted. But nothing happened. The fact is, these bookies are never in very good voice after a day at the races, and he was handicapped by a certain roopiness. Besides, the owner of the cottage was evidently one of those blokes who plough the fields and scatter the good seed o’er the land, and he seemed to be out somewhere ploughing and scattering now.
Joe began to get emotional.
“Gawblimey!” he said, with tears in his voice. “This is a nice thing! Here I am, late already, and if I don’t get to Sandown in time for the first race it’s going to mean hundreds of pounds out of my pocket.”
You will scarcely credit it, Corky, but this was the first moment that that aspect of the affair had presented itself to me. His words opened up an entirely new train of thought. Naturally, I now perceived, mugs being what they are, every race a bookie misses means so much dead loss to him. Sandown was crowded with potential losers, all waiting to hand their money over to Joe; and, if he was not there, what would happen? They had to give their money to someone, so they would hand it over to one of his trade rivals. I felt as if a sudden bright light had flashed upon me.
“Look, here,” I said, “if you will lend me fifty quid, I’ll go in and get that satchel for you. I’m not afraid of a dog.”
He did not answer. He cocked an eye at me; then he cocked an eye at the satchel. I could see he was weighing the proposition. But at this moment the luck went against me. The dog, getting a bit bored, gave a sniff and trotted back round the corner of the house. And no sooner had he disappeared than Joe, feeling that now was the time, popped through the gate and galloped for the satchel.
Well, Corky, you know me. Alert. Resourceful. There was a stick lying in the road, and to leap for it and grab it was with me the work of a moment. I rattled it energetically along the railings. And back came old Colonel Dog as if I had pulled him at the end of a rope. It was an occasion when Joe had to move quick, and he did so. He had perhaps a foot to spare, or it may have been eight inches.
He was a good deal annoyed, and for awhile spoke freely of this and that.
“Fifty quid,” I said, when there was a lull.
He looked at me. Then he nodded. I don’t say he nodded genially, but he nodded. And I opened the gate and went in.
The dog bounded at me, barking; but I knew that was all swank, and I told him so. I bent down and slapped my tummy, and the dog shoved his paws on my shoulders and licked my face. Then I took his head and waggled it sideways once or twice, and he took my hand in his mouth and gnawed it slightly. Then I rolled him over and began punching his chest; and then, when these civilities were finished, I got up and looked round for the satchel.
It was gone. And there was that blot on the human race, Joe the Lawyer, standing outside, fondling it as if it were a baby. Not that a man like that would fondle a baby, of course. Much more likely to kick it in the face and break open its money-box. But what I mean is, he’d dashed in when my back was turned and collared the satchel.
I had a grim foreboding that our little deal was off, but I displayed a cheerful exterior.
“In large notes,” I said.
“Eh?” said the bloke Joe.
“I’d rather have my fifty quid in large notes. They take up less room in the pocket.”
“What fifty quid?”
“The fifty quid you were going to give me for getting the satchel.”
He gaped.
“Well, I’ll be blowed!” he said. “I like that! Who got the satchel, you or me?”
“I soothed the dog.”
“If you like to waste your time playing with dogs, that’s your business. I’d look silly, wouldn’t I, giving you fifty quid for playing with dogs? But, if you like doing it, you go on playing with him while I step down the road and get some water from one of those other cottages.”
Black-hearted. That, Corky, is the only adjective. It seemed to me at that moment as though this bloke Joe had allowed me to peer into his soul; and it was like looking into a dark cellar on a moonless night.
“Here, I say—” I began, but he had gone.
How long I stood there I don’t know. But, though it seemed a lifetime, it couldn’t really have been long, for Joe didn’t come back with the water; and a faint hope began to steal over me that he had found another dog at one of the other cottages and was now being bitten to the bone. And then I heard footsteps.
I looked round. A cove was approaching.
“Is this your cottage?” I asked.
He was a rural-looking sort of cove, with a full beard and corduroy trousers with string tied round the knees. He came up and stood gazing at the car. Then he looked at me, and then at the car again.
“Ah?” he said. A bit deaf he seemed to be.
“Is this your cottage?”
“Ah.”
“We stopped here to get some water.”
He said he hadn’t got a daughter. I said I never said he had.
“Water!”
“Ah.”
“But there was nobody in. So the man with me went down the road.”
“Ah,” said the cove.
“He was frightened by your dog.”
“Ah?”
“By your dog.”
“Buy my dog?”
“Yes.”
“You can have him for five shillings.”
Now,
