"Oh no, of course not; where should we all be?" said Vavasor.
"It"s you and me, Grindems," said Maxwell. "D---- parliament, and now let"s have a rubber."
They played till three and Mr. Calder Jones lost a good deal of money,--a good deal of money in a little way, for they never played above ten-shilling points, and no bet was made for more than a pound or two. But Vavasor was the winner, and when he left the room he became the subject of some ill-natured remarks.
"I wonder he likes coming in here," said Grindley, who had himself been the man to invite him to belong to the club, and who had at one time indulged the ambition of an intimacy with George Vavasor.
"I can"t understand it," said Calder Jones, who was a little bitter about his money. "Last year he seemed to walk in just when he liked, as though he were one of us."
"He"s a bad sort of fellow," said Grindley; "he"s so uncommonly dark.
I don"t know where on earth he gets his money from, He was heir to some small property in the north, but he lost every shilling of that when he was in the wine trade."
"You"re wrong there, Grindems," said Maxwell,--making use of a playful nickname which he had invented for his friend. "He made a pot of money at the wine business, and had he stuck to it he would have been a rich man."
"He"s lost it all since then, and that place in the north into the bargain."
"Wrong again, Grindems, my boy. If old Vavasor were to die to-morrow, Vavasor Hall would go just as he might choose to leave it. George may be a ruined man for aught I know--"
"There"s no doubt about that, I believe," said Grindley.
"Perhaps not, Grindems; but he can"t have lost Vavasor Hall because he has never as yet had an interest in it. He"s the natural heir, and will probably get it some day."
"All the same," said Calder Jones, "isn"t it rather odd he should come in here?"
"We"ve asked him often enough," said Maxwell; "not because we like him, but because we want him so often to make up a rubber. I don"t like George Vavasor, and I don"t know who does; but I like him better than dummy. And I"d sooner play whist with men I don"t like, Grindems, than I"d not play at all." A bystander might have thought from the tone of Mr. Maxwell"s voice that he was alluding to Mr.
Grindley himself, but Mr. Grindley didn"t seem to take it in that light.
"That"s true, of course," said he. "We can"t pick men just as we please. But I certainly didn"t think that he"d make it out for another season."
The club breakfasted the next morning at nine o"clock, in order that they might start at half-past for the meet at Edgehill. Edgehill is twelve miles from Roebury, and the hacks would do it in an hour and a half,--or perhaps a little less. "Does anybody know anything about that brown horse of Vavasor"s?" said Maxwell. "I saw him coming into the yard yesterday with that old groom of his."
"He had a brown horse last season," said Grindley;--"a little thing that went very fast, but wasn"t quite sound on the road."
"That was a mare," said Maxwell, "and he sold her to Cinquebars."*
[*Ah, my friend, from whom I have borrowed this scion of the n.o.bility! Had he been left with us he would have forgiven me my little theft, and now that he has gone I will not change the name.]
"For a hundred and fifty," said Calder Jones, "and she wasn"t worth the odd fifty."
"He won seventy with her at Leamington," said Maxwell, "and I doubt whether he"d take his money now."
"Is Cinquebars coming down here this year?"
"I don"t know," said Maxwell. "I hope not. He"s the best fellow in the world, but he can"t ride, and he don"t care for hunting, and he makes more row than any fellow I ever met. I wish some fellow could tell me something about that fellow"s brown horse."
"I"d never buy a horse of Vavasor"s if I were you," said Grindley.
"He never has anything that"s all right all round."
"And who has?" said Maxwell, as he took into his plate a second mutton chop, which had just been brought up hot into the room especially for him. "That"s the mistake men make about horses, and that"s why there"s so much cheating. I never ask for a warranty with a horse, and don"t very often have a horse examined. Yet I do as well as others. You can"t have perfect horses any more than you can perfect men, or perfect women. You put up with red hair, or bad teeth, or big feet,--or sometimes with the devil of a voice. But a man when he wants a horse won"t put up with anything! Therefore those who"ve got horses to sell must lie. When I go into the market with three hundred pounds I expect a perfect animal. As I never do that now I never expect a perfect animal. I like "em to see; I like "em to have four legs; and I like "em to have a little wind. I don"t much mind anything else."
"By Jove you"re about right," said Calder Jones. The reader will therefore readily see that Mr. Maxwell the banker reigned as king in that club.
Vavasor had sent two horses on in charge of Bat Smithers, and followed on a pony about fourteen hands high, which he had ridden as a cover hack for the last four years. He did not start till near ten, but he was able to catch Bat with his two horses about a mile and a half on that side of Edgehill. "Have you managed to come along pretty clean?" the master asked as he came up with his servant.
"They be the most beastly roads in all England," said Bat, who always found fault with any county in which he happened to be located. "But I"ll warrant I"m cleaner than most on "em. What for any county should make such roads as them I never could tell."
"The roads about there are bad, certainly;--very bad. But I suppose they would have been better had Providence sent better materials. And what do you think of the brown horse, Bat?"
"Well, sir." He said no more, and that he said with a drawl.
"He"s as fine an animal to look at as ever I put my eye on," said George.
"He"s all that," said Bat.
"He"s got lots of pace too."
"I"m sure he has, sir."
"And they tell me you can"t beat him at jumping."
"They can mostly do that, sir, if they"re well handled."
"You see he"s a deal over my weight."
"Yes, he is, Mr. Vavasor. He is a fourteen stoner."
"Or fifteen," said Vavasor.
"Perhaps he may, sir. There"s no knowing what a "orse can carry till he"s tried."
George asked his groom no more questions, but felt sure that he had better sell his brown horse if he could. Now I here protest that there was nothing specially amiss with the brown horse. Towards the end of the preceding season he had overreached himself and had been lame, and had been sold by some owner with more money than brains who had not cared to wait for a cure. Then there had gone with him a bad character, and a vague suspicion had attached itself to him, as there does to hundreds of horses which are very good animals in their way.
He had come thus to Tattersall"s, and Vavasor had bought him cheap, thinking that he might make money of him, from his form and action.
He had found nothing amiss with him,--nor, indeed, had Bat Smithers.
But his character went with him, and therefore Bat Smithers thought it well to be knowing. George Vavasor knew as much of horses as most men can,--as, perhaps, as any man can who is not a dealer, or a veterinary surgeon; but he, like all men, doubted his own knowledge, though on that subject he would never admit that he doubted it.
Therefore he took Bat"s word and felt sure that the horse was wrong.
"We shall have a run from the big wood," said George.
"If they make un break, you will, sir," said Bat.
"At any rate I"ll ride the brown horse," said George. Then, as soon as that was settled between them, the Roebury Club overtook them.
There was now a rush of horses on the road altogether, and they were within a quarter of a mile of Edgehill church, close to which was the meet. Bat with his two hunters fell a little behind, and the others trotted on together. The other grooms with their animals were on in advance, and were by this time employed in combing out forelocks, and rubbing stirrup leathers and horses" legs free from the dirt of the roads;--but Bat Smithers was like his master, and did not congregate much with other men, and Vavasor was sure to give orders to his servant different from the orders given by others.
"Are you well mounted this year?" Maxwell asked of George Vavasor.