"I"ve heard it myself, sir, several times. There being no light in the room, I"ve put it down to a loose ventilator. The wind moves it and it clicks."
"That"ll be it," I said. Five minutes later I had made sure that there was no loose ventilator in the billiard-room. Besides, the sound of one ball striking another is not quite like any other sound. I also went up to the board and turned the score back, which I had omitted to do the night before. Just then Harry pa.s.sed the door on his way from the bar, with a cigarette in his mouth as usual. I called him in.
"Harry," I said, "give me thirty, and I"ll play you a hundred up for a sovereign. You can tell one of the girls to fetch our cues from upstairs."
Harry took his cigarette out of his mouth and whistled. "What, uncle!"
he said. "Well, you"re going it, I don"t think. What would you have said to me if I"d asked you for a game at ten in the morning?"
"Ah!" I said, "but this is all in the way of business. I can"t see much wrong with the table, and if I can play on it, then other people may.
There"s a chance to make a sovereign for you anyhow. You"ve given me forty-five and a beating before now."
"No, uncle," he said, "I wouldn"t give you thirty. I wouldn"t give you one. The table"s not playable. Luck would win against Roberts on it."
He showed me the faults of the thing and said he was busy. So I told him if he liked to lose the chance of making a sovereign he could.
"I hate that room," he said, as we came out. "It"s not too clean, and it smells like a vault."
"It smells a lot better than your cigarettes," I said.
For the next six weeks we were all busy, and I gave little thought to the billiard-room. Once or twice I heard old Silas telling a customer that he could not recommend the table, and that the whole room was to be redecorated and refitted as soon as we got the estimates. "You see, sir, we"ve only been here a little while, and there hasn"t been time to get everything as we should like it quite yet."
One day Mrs Parker, the woman who had the Regency before me, came down from town to see how we were getting on. I showed the old lady round, pointed out my improvements, and gave her a bit of lunch in my office.
"Well, now," I said, as she sipped her gla.s.s of port afterwards, "I"m not complaining of my bargain, but isn"t the billiard-room a bit queer?"
"It surprises me," she said, "that you"ve left it as it is. Especially with everything else going ahead, and the yard half full of motors. I should have taken it all down myself if I"d stopped. That iron roof"s nothing but an eyesore, and you might have a couple of beds of geraniums there and improve the look of your front."
"Let"s see," I said. "What was the story about that billiard-room?"
"What story do you mean?" she said, looking at me suspiciously.
"The same one you"re thinking of," I said.
"About that man, Josiah Ham?"
"That"s it."
"Well, I shouldn"t worry about that if I were you. That was all thirty years ago, and I doubt if there"s a soul in Tanslowe knows it now. Best forgotten, I say. Talk of that kind doesn"t do a hotel any good. Why, how did you come to hear of it?"
"That"s just it," I said. "The man who told me was none too clear. He gave me a hint of it. He was an old commercial pa.s.sing through, and had known the place in the old days. Let"s hear your story and see if it agrees with his."
But I had told my fibs to no purpose. The old lady seemed a bit fl.u.s.tered. "If you don"t mind, Mr Sanderson, I"d rather not speak of it."
I thought I knew what was troubling her. I filled her gla.s.s and my own.
"Look here," I said. "When you sold the place to me it was a fair deal.
You weren"t called upon to go thirty years back, and no reasonable man would expect it. I"m satisfied. Here I am, and here I mean to stop, and twenty billiard-rooms wouldn"t drive me away. I"m not complaining. But, just as a matter of curiosity, I"d like to hear your story."
"What"s your trouble with the room?"
"Nothing to signify. But there"s a game played there and marked there--and I can"t find the players, and it"s never finished. It stops always at sixty-six--forty-eight."
She gave a glance over her shoulder. "Pull the place down," she said.
"You can afford to do it, and I couldn"t." She finished her port. "I must be going, Mr Sanderson. There"s rain coming on, and I don"t want to sit in the train in my wet things. I thought I would just run down to see how you were getting on, and I"m sure I"m glad to see the old place looking up again."
I tried again to get the story out of her, but she ran away from it. She had not got the time, and it was better not to speak of such things. I did not worry her about it much, as she seemed upset over it.
I saw her across to the station, and just got back in time. The rain came down in torrents. I stood there and watched it, and thought it would do my garden a bit of good. I heard a step behind me and looked round. A fat chap with a surly face stood there, as if he had just come out of the coffee-room. He was the sort that might be a gentleman and might not.
"Afternoon, sir," I said. "Nasty weather for motoring."
"It is," he said. "Not that I came in a motor. You the proprietor, Mr Sanderson?"
"I am," I said. "Came here recently."
"I wonder if there"s any chance of a game of billiards."
"I"m afraid not," I said. "Table"s shocking. I"m having it all done up afresh, and then--"
"What"s it matter?" said he. "I don"t care. It"s something to do, and one can"t go out."
"Well," I said, "if that"s the case, I"ll give you a game, sir. But I"m no flyer at it at the best of times, and I"m all out of practice now."
"I"m no good myself. No good at all. And I"d be glad of the game."
At the billiard-room door I told him I"d fetch a couple of decent cues.
He nodded and went in.
When I came back with my cue and Harry"s, I found the gas lit and the blinds drawn, and he was already knocking the b.a.l.l.s about.
"You"ve been quick, sir," I said, and offered him Harry"s cue. But he refused and said he would keep the one he had taken from the rack. Harry would have sworn if he had found that I had lent his cue to a stranger, so I thought that was just as well. Still, it seemed to me that a man who took a twisted cue by preference was not likely to be an expert.
The table was bad, but not so bad as Harry had made out. The luck was all my side. I was fairly ashamed of the flukes I made, one after the other. He said nothing, but gave a short, loud laugh once or twice--it was a nasty-sounding laugh. I was at thirty-seven when he was nine, and I put on eleven more at my next visit and thought I had left him nothing.
Then the fat man woke up. He got out of his first difficulty, and after that the b.a.l.l.s ran right for him. He was a player, too, with plenty of variety and resource, and I could see that I was going to take a licking. When he had reached fifty-one, an unlucky kiss left him an impossible position. But I miscued, and he got going again. He played very, very carefully now, taking a lot more time for consideration than he had done in his previous break. He seemed to have got excited over it, and breathed hard, as fat men do when they are worked up. He had kept his coat on, and his face shone with perspiration.
At sixty-six he was in trouble again; he walked round to see the exact position, and chalked his cue. I watched him rather eagerly, for I did not like the score. I hoped he would go on. His cue slid back to strike, and then dropped with a clatter from his hand. The fat man was gone--gone, as I looked at him, like a flame blown out, vanished into nothing.
I staggered away from the table. I began to back slowly towards the door, meaning to make a bolt for it. There was a click from the scoring-board, and I saw the thing marked up. And then--I am thankful to say--the billiard-room door opened, and I saw Harry standing there. He was very white and shaky. Somehow, the fact that he was frightened helped to steady me.
"Good heavens, uncle!" he gasped, "I"ve been standing outside. What"s the matter? What"s happened?"
"Nothing"s the matter," I said sharply. "What are you shivering about?"
I swished back the curtain, and sent up the blind with a snap. The rain was over now, and the sun shone in through the wet gla.s.s--I was glad of it.
"I thought I heard voices--laughing--somebody called the score."
I turned out the gas. "Well," I said, "this table"s enough to make any man laugh, when it don"t make him swear. I"ve been trying your game of one hand against another, and I daresay I called the score out loud.
It"s no catch--not even for a wet afternoon. I"m not both-handed, like the apes and Harry Bryden."