Mr. Giveen, on his enlargement, had returned hot-foot to London. The
chicken-higgler's cart that had given him a lift on the road had
deposited him at Blankmoor Station, where he had managed to get the last
train up to town.
Too confused and shaken up with his adventures to do anything that night
he had repaired to Swan's Temperance Hotel in the Strand, where his
luggage was, told his tale to the landlady, received her commiserations,
and gone to bed.
Next morning, at ten o'clock, he appeared at the office of Mr. Lewis in
Craven Street.
"Is Mr. Lewis in?" asked Giveen.
"What name, please?" asked the clerk.
"Just tell him a gentleman from Ireland wants to see him," replied
Giveen. "Tell him it's on important business about Mr. French. He'll
know."
A moment later he found himself in the inner office, before a desk
table, at which an elderly gentleman with grey whiskers was opening his
morning letters.
"Mr. Lewis?" said Mr. Giveen.
Lewis bowed.
"I've come to you about a matter of importance," said Giveen. "You sent
a man over to Ireland to seize the goods of a relation of mine--Michael
French, of Drumgool House."
"I did not," said Lewis. "My agent in Dublin moved in the matter."
"Well, sure, it's all one and the same thing. French has skedaddled.
He's taken his horses away, and you don't know his address. Come, now,
isn't that the truth?"
"Yes, it is. By any chance, do you know his address?"
"I do."
"Then," said Mr. Lewis, "I must ask you for it."
"Oh, must you, faith? And how are you to make me tell you? See here,
now--a bargain is a bargain, and I'll sell you it for a fiver."
Half an hour later he left the office of Mr. Lewis with the promise of a
five-pound note should his information prove correct and the
satisfaction of having revenged himself on his kinsman.
He turned into O'Shee's in the Strand. Though he only drank gingerbeer
and soda-water he frequented O'Shee's, finding there compatriots whom he
could bore with his conversation.
He had arranged to return to Ireland on the 16th, and on the 14th, the
night before the City and Suburban, wandering into O'Shee's, he fell
into conversation with an affable gentleman adorned with rings, whose
name, given in the first few moments of conversation, was Paddy Welsh.
"So you're off to the Ould Counthry on Thursday," said Mr. Walsh. "And
what are you doin' to-morrow?"
"Nothing," said Mr. Giveen.
"Well, then," said Mr. Welsh, "you're just the bhoy afther me own
heart, and I'll give you a thrate you'll remimber to your dyin' day."
"And what's that?" asked the other.
"I'll take you down to the City and Suburban wid me, and give you a
dinner and do you fine. Whisht, now, and don't be tellin' any one! Do
you know what me thrade is? Well, I'm a bookmaker. You'll see me make,
maybe, two hundred pounds to-morrow. I'm not wan of the big bookies; I
just dale wid the ordinary men; ha'ff-crowns and five shillin's is what
I mostly take. Whisht, now, and listen to me, and I'll tell you what you
can do. Faith, it's an idea that has just struck me. Would you like to
earn a ten-pound note?"
"Faith, wouldn't I?"
"Well, you can come down and act as me friend. Now, listen to me. We'll
take our stand, meself on a tub and you beside me. I'll take the bets,
and you'll see the five shillin's and ha'ff-crowns pourin' in; then,
when the race is begun, I'll lave you to mind the tub while I run round
to see the clerk of the course."
"And what will you want to see him for?"
"Whisht, now," said Mr. Walsh, "and I'll tell you. But you must swear
never to split."
"Oh, you may be easy on that."
"Well, he and me is hand in glove. He lets me into all the saycrits, and
I give him ha'ff profits on the winnin's. I'll tell him how me bets lie,
d'you see? And afther the race, when the jockeys come to be weighed in,
he'll kibosh the weights so that the horse that wins will be
disqualified, if it suits me book. You tould me you knew nothin' of
racin's, so I can't 'xplain the inthricacies of the thing to you, but
that's how it lies. Then I'll come back to the tub to find you, and you
and me will go and have a good dinner, and there'll be a ten-pound note
for you."
"There's nothing against the law in all that, is there?" asked the
cautious Mr. Giveen.
"Law! Of course, there's not, for you and me. If the clerk of the course
chooses to earn an honest penny by doin' what he chooses, it's his
lookout; no one can touch him either but the Jockey Club, and they
daren't say a word, for they're all in it. Why, man alive, what's the
Jockey Club for but to jockey the public out of their money? Afther
every big race they hold a meetin' and divide the profits; as much as a
hundred thousand sometimes is split up between them, the blackguyards!
Where did you say you was stayin'? Shepherd's Temp'rance Hotel? Well,
I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll call for you in the mornin' and take
you with me. I'll pay the thrain, for you needn't bother a bit about
money when you are along with me."
"Right," said Mr. Giveen.