Chapter 42

Monkey Sulks

On the Sunday after the trial on the Mare's Back Jerry went solemnly round the assembled lads before Bible Class, his hat in his hand and in the hat a couple of coppers.

"What for?" asked Alf, the cherub.

The lads were used to what they called "levies" in the stable--sometimes for a new football or something for the club, sometimes for a pal who was in a hole.

"Mr. Silver," answered Jerry. "He's done us proud while he could. Now it's our turn to do a bit for him."

"Is it as bad as all that?" asked Alf, wide-eyed.

"It's worse," said Jerry, with dramatic restraint.

The cherub peeped into the hat, fingering a tanner.

He was genuinely concerned for Mr. Silver.

"If I put in a tanner, how'll I know Mr. Silver'll get it?" he asked ingenuously.

Stanley jeered, and Jerry shot his chin forward.

"Say, young Alf," he said. "Am I a genelman?--or ain't I?"

"That ain't 'ardly for me to say, Jerry," answered the cherub with delicate tact.

Then there might have been trouble but for the interference of the lordly Albert.

"Don't you let him pinch nothin' off o' you, Alf," he said. "Mr. Silver's all right."

"What ye mean?" asked the indignant Jerry. "Ain't he broke then?"

"He'll be a rich man again by then I done with him," answered Albert loftily. "That's what I mean."

"When will you be done with him then?" jeered Jerry.

"After the National," answered Albert. "Yes, my boy, you'll get your 'alf-dollar at Christmas same as usual--if so be you deserves it."

Jerry sneered.

"Albert thinks _he's_ goin' to get the ride," he cried. "Likely!--G-r-r-r!"

Albert was unmoved as a mountain and as coldly majestic.

"I don't think. I knows," he said, folding his arms.

"What do you know then?"

"I knows what I knows," answered Albert, in true sacerdotal style. "And I knows more'n them as don't know nothin'."

Albert did really know something, but he did not know more than anybody else. In those days, indeed, two facts were common property at Putnam's. Everybody knew them, and everybody liked to believe that nobody else did. The two facts were that Albert was going to ride Four-Pound-the-Second at Aintree, and that Mr. Silver stood to get his money back upon the race. There was a third fact, too, that everybody knew. It was different from the other two in that not even Albert pretended that he alone was aware of it. The third fact was that Monkey Brand was sulking.

The lads knew it, the horses knew it, Billy Bluff knew it; Maudie, who looked on Monkey as her one true friend in the world, knew it; even the fan-tails in the yard had reason to suspect it.

Jim Silver, who had a genuine regard for the little man, and was most reluctant to think evil of him or anyone, was aware of it, and unhappy accordingly.

The only two who seemed not to know what was obvious to all the rest of the world were, of course, the two most concerned--Old Mat and his daughter.

They were blind--deliberately so, Silver sometimes thought.

The young man became at length so disturbed that he ventured to suggest to the trainer that all was not well.

The old man listened, his head a-cock, and his blue eyes sheathed.

"I dessay," was all he said. "Men is men accordin' to my experience of 'em." He added: "And monkies monkies. Same as the Psalmist said in his knowin' little way."

Beaten back here, the young man, dogged as always, approached Boy in the matter.

He was countered with an ice-cold monosyllable.

"Indeed," was all she said.

The young man persisted in spite of his stutter.

She flashed round on him.

"So you think Monkey's selling us?" she said.

Jim Silver looked sheepish and sullen.

But whether the girl's attitude was due to the fact that he was still in disgrace or to her resentment that he should be telling tales, he did not know.

* * * * *

The young man's affairs in London were almost wound up, and he was making his home at Putnam's.

About the place, early and late, he became aware that Joses was haunting the barns and out-houses. More than once in the lengthening days he saw the fat man vanishing round a corner in the dusk.

Taking the bull by the horns, he spoke to Monkey Brand about it.

"Why not turn Billy Bluff loose after dark?" he suggested.

Monkey was stubborn.

"Can't be done, sir."

"Why not?"

"Can't leave Four-Pound's box, sir," the jockey answered, turning in his lips. "Else the 'orse frets himself into a sweat."

Silver was dissatisfied. He was still more so when two days later after dark he came on two men in close communion in the lane at the back of the Lads' Barn.

They were standing in the shadow of the Barn out of the moon. But that his senses were alert, and his suspicions roused, he would not have detected them, for they hushed into sudden silence as he passed.

He flashed an electric torch on to them.

The two were Joses and Monkey Brand.

He was not surprised, nor, it seemed, were they.

Monkey Brand touched his hat.

"Good-night, sir," he said cordially.

"Good-night," said Silver coldly. "Good-night, Mr. Joses!"

The tout rumbled ironically.

Silver passed on into the yard, and the two were left together in the dark.

"On the bubble," said Joses.

"I don't wonder, eether," answered Monkey. "Four-Pound's got to win it for him."

"Hundred thousand, isn't it?" said the fat man.

"That is it," said Monkey. "Guv'nor won't part for less."

"What's that?" asked Joses, stupefied.

"Silver!" answered Monkey. "He's got to put a hundred thousand down, or he don't get her. Old man's no mug."

"Don't get who?" asked the other.

"Minie," shortly.

The fat man absorbed the news.

"Hundred thousand down," continued Monkey. "That's the contrak--writ out in red ink on parchment. It's a fortune."

Joses was recovering himself.

"It's nothing to what the mare'll carry all said," he mused. "American's bankin' on her to the last dollar, let alone the Three J's.... There's more in it than money, too. There's pride and sentiment, the old animosities." He added after a pause--"Half a million's a lot of money though. There'll be pickings, too--for those that deserve them."

Monkey moved restlessly.

"I daresay," he said irritably. "Not as it matters to me. Not as nothin' matters to me now. Work you to the bone while you can work, and scrap you when they've wore you out. It's a bloody world, as I've said afore."

"Come!" cried the fat man. "The game's not up. There's more masters than one in the world!"

The little man was not to be consoled.

"See where it is, Mr. Joses: I'm too old to start afresh."

"Have they sacked you then?"

The other shook his head.

"They'll keep me on till after the National. He's not everybody's 'orse, Four-Pound ain't. If they was to make a change now, he might go back on himself."

The tout's breathing came a little quicker in the darkness.

"D'you see to him?"

"Me and Albert."

"Is Albert goin' to ride him?"

"Don't you believe it?" mocked the little jockey.

The tout drew closer.

"Who is, then?"

Monkey ducked his head and patted the back of it.

"Never!" cried Joses.

The other raised a deprecatory hand and turned away.

"You know best, o' course, Mr. Joses," he said. "You've the run o' Putnam's same as me. And you're an eddicated man from Oxford College, where they knows all there is to know."

He was limping away.

Joses hung on his heels.

"Steady on, old sport," he said. "D'you mean that?"

Monkey swung about.

"See here, Mr. Joses," he whispered. "When a gal's out to win a man she'll do _funny_ things."

The fat man breathed heavily.

Then he began to laugh.

"And it's win the National or lose the man!" he said. "Quite a romance!"