Читать книгу Good Evans! - Edgar Wallace - Страница 6

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The Miller met Mr. Evans at the corner of Bayham Street.

"One of these days," he said savagely, "you're going to get me hung; and if you don't get me, you'll get yourself hung. What the devil do you mean by calling up the police station and telling the sergeant that you had something hot and extra for me?"

Evans shrugged his shoulders.

"You've been a good friend of mine, Mr. Challoner," he said, "and I wasn't going to let you out of this coop. I got it this, mornin' from a feller that does a lot of betting at the club, an' I promised him I. wouldn't tell a soul."

"And you sent it out to your forty-three thousand clients, I presume?" said The Miller.

"Five hundred an' seventy-four," confessed Evans, in a modest vein. "I've been sendin' a army of messengers all over Camden Town puttin' them on to Hot Feet."

"A bookmaker's horse," said The Miller coldly. "It's the sort of stumer that bookmakers put around. Hot Feet! Cold Feet would be a better name for him!"

Mr. Evans smiled cryptically.

"He's been tried forty-one pounds—" he began.

The Miller silenced him with a look.

Apparently the legend that Hot Feet was a stumer, and that Mr. Evans was the misguided, perhaps the all too willing, victim of a penciller's machinations, was for some extraordinary reason general throughout Camden Town. When Mr. Evans, took the air at midday in the High Street he was accosted every few yards by sceptical clients.

"What's this Hot Feet you've sent me, Evans? Siniter's horse! I'm surprised at you sendin' a wire like that. He was beat a short head at Hurst and he'll be rubbin' out to-day."

Mr. Evans closed his eyes and looked pained.

A few yards on he met Mr. Harriboy, the far-famed fishmonger and poulterer.

"I've got your message, Mr. Evans, but I can't see Hot Feet winning. He's a bookmaker's horse, and everybody knows he'll be rubbing out, to- day."

Now "rubbing out," as the initiated know, is the art of discouraging backers from putting their money on horses that seem to have an outstanding chance. And this art is very widely practised. To-day you are a short head behind a good winner; next week your horse starts at 6-4 and finishes a bad fourth; and this may happen on his next outing, until newspaper tipsters and wily punters grow weary of supporting this erratic animal; and then he pops up at a price remunerative to all concerned. And Mr. Siniter was one of the best-known "rubbers out" of form.

"I can only tell you," said Mr. Evans patiently, "that he's On the Job. If there's any man in Camden Town who can teach me my business, let him come forward or for ever hold his speech. I'll allow him ten points for education an' then beat him. I'm like the far-famed salamander, I've got eyes in the back of me head—I've got to, Mr. Harriboy, to live."

Mr. Harriboy shook his head.

"I'm not backing your horse to-day, Evans," he said definitely.

And others had formed a conclusion as definite; and when, that afternoon, Hot Feet won at 7-1, there were sore hearts in Camden Town.

"It's Evans' fault," said Mr. Harriboy to a disgruntled friend. "If he'd only told us what he knew, instead of chucking his weight about up and down High Street, I'd have been on that horse."

After the race Lem got down to meet his enraged owner.

"What the hell do you mean by winning?" hissed Siniter. "Didn't I tell you that I'd not backed the horse? Didn't I ask you to start flat-footed?"

"I was left, but I couldn't hold him in," said Lem, and for two pins would have told him the strength of the position, but loyalty to his aristocratic friend kept him silent.

Mr. Siniter went away from the course a very thoughtful man; and two days later, when he met Margarita, expressed his suspicion.

"Lem's got something at the back of his mind. I don't think you and I had better be seen out together so much. I'll have to find another jockey."

Now Margarita was not a nice woman, but she had a curious sense of loyalty.

"You'll do nothing of the kind," she said. "Lem never did a crooked thing in his life." Mr. Siniter grew purple.

"He's not going to ride Blue Tick!" he stormed. "I've backed him to win me three thousand and I'm taking no risks."

She smiled.

"You don't know what risks you'll be taking if you put down Lem," she said significantly.

He very wisely did not ask questions. And later that day it came to his ears that one Educated Evans had sent Hot Feet to 49,732 clients, of which five had backed the horse and fifteen hadn't.

Mr. Siniter trusted no detective. He himself went in search of Educated Evans and found him engaged in the preparation of his morning advice.

"Sorry to intrude on you, mister," said the temporarily genial Siniter.

He looked round the apartment. It did not seem the kind of place from which 49,732 letters were likely to be addressed, but you never know what tipsters can do at a push.

"I've come to thank you for your tip on Hot Feet," said Mr. Siniter, and put a five-pound note on the table. "You sent it to a friend of mine, but I backed it. Now if you ever have any tips from this stable—"

"I have 'em every day," said Mr. Evans with a quiet smile. "There's nothin' that twistin' Siniter does that I don't know."

Siniter swallowed something.

"You knew that Hot Feet was going to win?" he said, maintaining his calm with difficulty.

Evans nodded.

"Information v. gaswork," he said. "I got a boy in the stable, and Dooby—"

"Ah—you know Dooby, I suppose?"

Evans smiled again.

"Me an' him's like brothers," he said. "I met him at the Jockey Club in Park Lane. He reminds me of the celebrated Fred Archer who rode the far-famed Eclipse when it won at San-down Park in 1795—I don't know whether it was the fourth or fifth of May.''

"You know a lot about Mr. Siniter's horses?" Educated Evans was amused.

"Everything," he said. "Take Blue. Tick—him they lay 7-4 about in the Epsom Handicap—not a yard!"

Mr. Siniter heard and perspired.

"What—who told you?" he demanded, trying to smother his wrath.

"Information," murmured Evans. "That race is a squinch for Dewflower—tried two stone better than Lopear an' walked it!"

When Mr. Siniter got home he summoned Lem by 'phone.

"Dooby, I'm putting up another jockey on Blue Tick. I don't think you understand the horse, old man."

Dooby understood. He was one of those little men who were treacherous to others and never imagined he would be suspected of treachery.

"Certainly," he said. "Now who shall we put up? What about Jim Gold?"

Now the name of Jim Gold had also occurred to Mr. Siniter, but the mere fact that Dooby suggested it was quite sufficient to put him off.

"No, I can't have Jim: he wouldn't ride one side of the horse," he said. "I don't mind any other jockey—bar Slick Markey."

Here again Lem understood. Slick Markey was as crooked as a flash of lightning. Even jockeys, who never give one another away, admitted that Slick was mustard. He was one of those clever jockeys who got twenty-five mounts a year and was popularly supposed to be in everybody's pocket but his own.

"No, I wouldn't advise you to take Slick—he can't help thieving any more than I can help scratching my head. What about Tommy Lutter?"

Mr. Siniter hesitated. It had been on the tip of his tongue to mention the same jockey.

"No," he said, "he doesn't understand the horse either. I don't care who rides him, but the only thing I bar is Slick."

"Naturally," murmured the sympathetic Mr. Dooby.

He went away without having discovered a solution to the pressing problem. By midnight Mr. Siniter had worked himself into a condition of nervous prostration, and at that hour he called up some one who was nearly a friend.

"I want a jockey to ride my horse Blue Tick," he said. "I don't think he'll win, but he's a curious horse to ride and I'd like to have the best man available."

His friend, who was also an owner, thought for some time.

"Isn't Dooby riding—no? Well, what about Joe Ginnett? He hasn't a mount. Funnily enough, I saw him to-night in Camden Town—"

"Oh, did you?" said Mr. Siniter loudly. "Well, he won't do! Can you suggest anybody else?"

After a long pause.

"I don't know... of course you can't have Slick: he's impossible. If he knew you'd backed the horse he'd stop it, and if you hadn't backed it he'd win. And he's in the pocket of... " He libelled half a dozen perfectly respectable but eminent pencillers of Tattersalls. "The only man I can suggest is Callison. He's a friend of Dooby's—"

"He won't do either," said Mr. Siniter promptly. "Sorry to bother you, old man—I'll think it out."

"Anyway, don't take Slick," came the final warning.

Mr. Siniter, in spite of his agitation, smiled.

Time was growing short. The next day he made another attempt. One jockey after another came up for review—none could be trusted. At eleven o'clock that night he rang up Slick Markey and offered him the mount.

Secretly, and in an assumed name, he had become one of Mr. Evans' subscribers. The morning post brought a communication from that genius.

EDUCATED EVANS,

The World's Premier Prophet and Turf Adviser.

KEEP OFF BLUE TICK!

KEEP OFF BLUE TICK!

KEEP OFF BLUE TICK!

Information v. Gaswork.

Straight from a reliable source.

My information is that

BEGGAR BOY***

is walking over for the important event as advertised in all leading papers.

Mr. Siniter wiped his perspiring brow. Somebody knew more than he; there was a conspiracy amongst these jockeys. What a fool he had been to put up Slick, the most notorious crook of all!

To change him now was neither possible nor desirable. There was only one thing to do. He sent secret instructions to his commission agents to lay Blue Tick, and drove to the course with the full assurance that he had taken the only wise course.

Before the race he interviewed the wizen-faced jockey with the shifty eyes.

"I've laid off all my bets on this horse," he said, "so you can handle him gently."

Slick nodded—he was a man of very few words, and they were mostly unprintable.

There was a big field. Mr. Evans, lounging against the rails, waited with a calm air of assurance for his unbeatable gem to materialise.

He never could read a race, and never learnt to look at any of the horses except the one he had backed—and usually he confounded that with another.

There was no mistaking Blue Tick: he was a grey, and the flamboyant colours of Mr. Siniter could not be mistaken nor confounded with anything more delicate. They lay in the centre of the field, about third for most of the journey. In the last furlong they drew to the front....

Blue Tick won, hard held, by three lengths.

"Information v. gasworks," said Evans bitterly. "It almost makes you give up trying to find 'em!"

Mr. Siniter watched the horses come back to the paddock like a man in a dream. And it was a pretty bad dream. He saw Dooby, who rode one of the last division, slip from his horse and unsaddle, and as the little man passed him Mr. Siniter noticed in a vague kind of way that he was beaming.

"I'm glad you won, guv'nor," said the jockey. "I think anybody could have won on him. He had us beat from start to finish. I hope you had a good win. My missus had eighty pounds on him."

Mr. Siniter recovered his voice:

"Who told her to back it?" he asked hollowly.

"Old Slick Markey, just before he went out," said Lem. "It's given me another idea of old Slick—first time I've known him to do the straight thing."