Читать книгу The Flying Fifty-Five - Edgar Wallace - Страница 12

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SIR JACQUES GREGORY left the course that night not ill-content with his day's work. In the argot of his kind, he had "packed up a parcel" over the disqualification of Fifty-Five, and had even been most gracious and as generous as it was his nature to be, to the man who brought about the overthrow of Stella Barrington's certainty.

He had to wait a little time outside the entrance to the enclosure for his car to come along, and fate willed that he should be joined by the one man he did not wish to see.

The Honourable Claude Barberry was a representative of that branch of British aristocracy which has gone to seed. His seediness even extended to his dress. He was one of those fair men who sport a long yellow moustache, and had the appearance of having shaved yesterday. Yet, because he was the son of the penniless and half-imbecile Lord Jenton, and because there was a time when he occupied some sort of position in society, he was to be met with in the heart of the social world, and there was no important function, from a horse-show to a garden-party, that he missed.

The cuffs of his shirt were grey with age, and showed signs of fraying, despite the assiduous attention he had paid to them that morning with a pair of scissors. His hat was of a glossiness which is not usually found in the royal enclosure. Claude Barberry had discovered a patent enamel which had rendered his hat both waterproof and age-proof. His spats had shrunk in the washing, his shoes showed a network of cracked enamel.

"By George! Dear old Jacques! What a lucky thing it is I saw you. My infernal car has broken down."

Sir Jacques Gregory knew that Claude Barberry's "in-fernal car" had no existence, and that he had probably foisted himself upon a party which he knew was coming to Ascot, to their intense discomfort and dismay, and that they had either given him the slip, or had point-blank refused to take him back.

"I've had a poisonous day," he said gaily, as he settled himself in the corner of Sir Jacques' comfortable car. "Simply poisonous, old thing. I lost a monkey on the last race, and a monkey on the Coventry. That's a thousand, isn' it? I was always a bad reckoner even as a kid. When I was at Eton I never quite learnt——"

He babbled on and Sir Jacques did not trouble to listen, for he knew that a monkey, or five hundred pounds, was a sum which this impecunious gentleman had not seen for many a year.

"A very bad day indeed. In fact, old boy, I've come away from Ascot without so much as a Bradbury in my pocket, but I am not going to borrow money from you," he chuckled, as he dropped his hand in a friendly fashion on the other's shoulder, and squeezed it with affection. "Don't think that, Jacques. I never borrow money from my friends."

He put his hand in his pocket.

"By Jove, I haven't a bean. I thought I was joking. You'll have to lend me a fiver to get across London."

Sir Jacques, who was only waiting to learn the amount which his unwelcome guest would demand, took out his note-book and extracted three one-pound notes and handed them to his companion.

"Three pounds," he said curtly; "that is all I'll give you. If you have more, you'll only drink yourself to death. I can't understand how you do it, Claude. How the devil do you live?"

The other shrugged his shoulders and sighed. "It's a wonderful thing to me, my boy, how I live," he admitted; "and to think of that swine of a cousin of mine, rolling in luxury, rolling in wealth—money to burn, dear old thing."

"I didn't know you had a swine of a cousin," said Sir Jaques unpromisingly.

The other half-turned in his seat with an extravagant grimace of surprise.

"You didn't know Fontwell——"

"Is Lord Fontwell your cousin?"

"He certainly is," said the Honourable Claude, nodding. "A distant cousin I admit—the only relation that he has got. If he'd only popped off in the war, Jacques..." He shook his head with gentle resignation. "To think of the thousands of people who were killed in that infernal war, and yet he came through! It is perfectly disgusting, and it's shaken my faith in the beneficence of Providence."

"For the matter of that," said Sir Jacques Gregory unpleasantly," you might have been 'popped off' yourself if you'd only got within range of a bullet."

"That's true, very true," agreed the other. "Fortunately, I spent the time in Madeira, nursing a bronchial attack. I was willing to fight, of course, but as long as one member of the family was in it——"

"Was he at Ascot to-day?"

"Who? Fontwell? No, I didn't see him. I looked everywhere for him."

"I expect you did," said the other significantly, but here his surmise was wrong, for the Honourable Claude Barberry was lying. He would have no more thought of approaching his cousin with a request for a temporary loan than he would have thought of marching up to the royal box with a similar request.

William, Earl of Fontwell, had an unpleasant side to his tongue, and Claude Barberry had long exhausted both his patience and his claims of relationship.

"As a matter of fact," went on the Honourable Claude, "I believe that Fontwell was not at Ascot. He's away fooling about. He's always fooling about, that fellow. It is a sin and a shame that a man with money to—to burn as he has, should shirk his responsibilities, both to his relation and to his—er—class. Where are we going, old thing?" he asked, as the car turned off the main road.

"I'm going to my house at Maidenhead. I'll send you along to London after I have been dropped. My chauffeur hates taking you anywhere," he went on frankly, "he says you never tip him."

"Servants should never be tipped. The tipping of servants is one of the causes of society's decadence. But you're not going to dismiss me without a cold bottle, are you, old boy? That's not hospitality, by gad! You'll take me in and give me something off the ice, eh?"

"You can come in and have anything you like off the ice," said Sir Jacques.

He had had a winning day in spite of the contretemps of the Trial Stakes, and he was inclined to be genial. Moreover, there was an idea at the back of his mind that possibly the Honourable Claude Barberry, drunkard and ne'er-do-well as he was, might be of some service to him. Barberry had an extraordinary number of friends, and despite his disreputable character, he had the entrée to houses, the doors of which were closed to Sir Jacques.

"Did you see that girl Barrington, Barberry?"

"Which girl Barrington?" asked the other. "I saw so many beautiful girls that I can't keep them in my mind.""

"The trainer," said Jacques patiently, "the girl who trains Fifty-Five."

"No, I didn't," admitted Claude. "I'll be perfectly honest with you, old fellow, I didn't."

"She's a beauty," said the other, talking to himself. "I only had one glimpse of her, and she's a beauty! I met her before, when she was just a long-legged kid who was home from school on a holiday, but she has grown into a perfect peach of a woman, Claude."

"I dare say," said the other, and then without a pause: "Have you any of that wonderful Ayala you used to stock, or have those guzzling devils of pals of yours wolfed it?"

"I have plenty of Ayala," said Sir Jacques, with unexpected graciousness," and you shall have the run of the wine-cellar, Claude. Where are you going to stay during the Goodwood week?"

"I'm staying with the Sembersons," said Claude. "They've asked me to come down and I suppose they'll be offended if I don't. I loathe the place and that infernal fellow at Folly Farm.—alliteration, Jacques, my boy—gives me the creeps, positively."

Jacques Gregory discounted this statement, guessing rightly that Claude Barberry had invited himself, and the family loyalty, for the Sembersons were distant cousins of his also, had succumbed.

"I wonder if you would get me an invitation," asked Sir Jacques.

"Like a shot," replied the other with alacrity. "I know Lady Semberson pretty well. I dare say she would have no objection——"

"Would you like to earn a hundred, Claude?"

The other looked at him reproachfully. "I should like to get it... I should hate earning it," he said truthfully.

"Do you think you could get Lady Semberson to invite Miss Barrington to Powel Court?"

Claude scratched his stubbly chin. "I dare say it could be managed," he said thoughtfully, "and you too? Yes, I dare say Lady Semberson... anyway, I could try."

His task was not going to be as difficult as he pretended. That afternoon Lady Semberson had suggested that Sir Jacques would be a welcome addition to her house party and had asked her unpleasant relation to sound him on the subject. She had a marriageable daughter, and she wanted at least two strings to the matrimonial bow. Sir Jacques was reputedly wealthy and though his past did not bear too close an inspection, Lady Semberson was more concerned with his present and her daughter's future. This, however, Claude very diplomatically kept to himself.

At this, Jacques grew more and more genial. He would not hear of Claude Barberry going to town; he must spend the night with him in his place at Maidenhead, and Claude accepted the invitation with alacrity, for the problem of getting to Ascot on the second day, though partially solved by the providential loan, was nevertheless a disturbing one.

"Yes, I think I can fix your young friend," he said as he descended before the broad stoep of Sir Jacques' beautiful riverside house. "I'll tell Lady Semberson that you're a friend of hers——"

"That is exactly what you will not tell her," said the other with a return to his old asperity. "If Stella Barrington knew that I was posing as a friend of hers, she wouldn't come."

Claude Barberry whistled. "I am beginning to see what you're driving at, dear old sport," he said. A statement which was very far from the truth.