Returning to New York, Wallingford caught Beauty Phillips at breakfast about noon, and in a most charming morning gown, for the Beauty was consistent enough to be neat even when there was none but "mother" to see.
"h.e.l.lo, Mr. Mark, from Easyville," she hailed him. "I heard all about you."
"You did!" he demanded, surprised. "Who told you?"
"Phelps and Banting," she said. "They had the nerve to come up in the grand-stand yesterday and tell Mr. Block and me all about it; told me how much you won and how they got it away from you at poker."
"Did they tell you they put knock-out drops in my wine?" demanded Wallingford.
"They didn"t do that!" she protested.
"Exactly what they did. Whether we played poker afterward, I don"t know. I"d just as soon as not believe they went through my pockets."
"I wouldn"t put it past them a bit," she agreed, and then her indignation began to grow. "Say, ain"t it a shame! Now, if I hadn"t gone out to dinner with Mr. Block, you"d have been with me. I"d have had that lovely diamond brooch you promised me out of your first winnings, and we"d have had all the rest of it to bet with for a few days. Honest, Pinky, I feel as if it were my fault!"
"Don"t you worry about that," Wallingford cordially rea.s.sured her. "It was my own fault; but I wasn"t looking for anything worse than a knife in my back or a piece of lead pipe behind the ear. There"s no use in crying over spilled milk. The thing to do now is to get even, and I want you to help me."
"Don"t you mix in, Beauty," admonished the hired mother, but the Beauty was thoughtful for a while. "Mother" was there to give good advice, but the Beauty only took it if she liked it.
"I really can"t afford it," she said, by and by; "but I"ve got some principles about me, and I don"t like to see a good sport like you take a rough dose from a lot of cheaps like them; so you show me how and I"ll mix in just this once."
Wallingford hesitated in turn.
"How do you like Block?" he inquired.
Beauty Phillips sniffed her dainty nose in disdain.
"He won"t do," she announced with decision. "I"ve found out all about him. He"s got enough money to star me in a show of my own for the next ten years, but he"s not furnished with the brand of manners I like.
I"ll never marry a man I can"t stand. I"ve got a _few_ principles about me! Why, yesterday he tried to treat me real lovely, but do you know, he wouldn"t give me the name of a horse, even when he put a hundred down for me in the third race? There I sat, with a string of "em just prancing around the track, and not one to pull for. Then after the race is over he comes and tosses me five hundred dollars. "I got you four to one on the winner," says he. Why, it was just like _giving me money_! Jimmy, I"m going out to dinner with him to-night, then I"m going to turn him back into the paddock, and you can pal around with me again until I find a man with plenty of money that I could really love."
"Don"t spill the beans," advised Wallingford hastily. "Block thinks you"re about the maple custard, don"t he?"
"He"s crazy about me," confessed the Beauty complacently.
"Fine work. Well, just you string him along till he gives you the name of a sure winner in advance; jolly it out of him."
"Not on your three-sheet litho!" negatived the Beauty. "I never yet worked one mash against another. I guess you"d expect to play even on that tip, eh?"
"Sure, we"ll play it," admitted Wallingford; "but better than that, I"ll shred this Harry Phelps crowd so clean they"ll have to borrow car fare."
She thought on this possibility with sparkling eyes. She was against the "Phelps crowd" on principle. Also--well, Wallingford had always been a perfect gentleman.
"Are you sure you can do it?" she wanted to know.
"It"s all framed up," he a.s.serted confidently; "all I want is the name of that winner."
The Beauty considered the matter seriously, and in the end silently shook hands with him. The _pro tem_. Mrs. Phillips sniffed.
This was on a Sat.u.r.day, a matinee day, and Wallingford went out to the track alone, contenting himself with extremely small bets, merely to keep his interest alive. The day"s racing was half over before he ran across the Broadway Syndicate. They were heartily glad to see him.
They greeted him with even effervescent joy.
"Where have you been, J. Rufus?" asked Phelps. "We were looking for you all over yesterday. We thought sure you"d be out at the track playing that Boston Gouge Company"s tips."
"Your dear chum was in the country, resting up," replied Wallingford, with matter-of-fact cheerfulness. "By George, I never had wine put me down and out so in my life"--whereat the cadaverous Short-Card Larry could not repress a wink for the benefit of Yap Pickins. "What was the good-thing they wired yesterday?"
"Whipsaw!" scorned Phelps. "Say, do you see that horse out there?"--and he pointed to a selling-plater, up at the head of the stretch, which was being warmed up by a stable-boy. "Well, that"s Whipsaw, just coming in from yesterday"s last race."
Wallingford chuckled.
"They"re bound, you know, to land on a dead one once in a while," he grunted; "but I"m strong for their game, just the same. You remember what that Razzoo thing that they tipped off did for me the other day."
"Yes?" admitted Phelps with a rising inflection and a meaning grin.
"Nice money you won on him. It spends well."
"Enjoy yourselves," invited Wallingford cordially. "I"ve no kick coming. I"m through with stud poker till they quit playing it with a hole-card."
"I don"t blame you," agreed Short-Card Larry solemnly. "Anybody that would bet a four-flush against two aces in sight, the way you did when Billy won that three-thousand-dollar pot from you, ought never to play anything stronger than ping-pong for the cigarettes."
Wallingford nodded, with the best brand of suavity he could muster under the irritating circ.u.mstances.
"I suppose I did play like a man expecting his wife to telephone," he admitted. "Excuse me a minute; I want to get a bet down on this race."
"Whom do you like?" asked Pickins.
"Rosey S."
The four began to laugh.
"That"s the hot Boston tip," gasped Phelps. "Say, Wallingford, don"t give your money to the Mets. Let us make a book for you on that skate."
"You"re on," agreed J. Rufus, delighted that the proposition should come from them, for he had been edging in that direction himself.
"I"ll squander a hundred on the goat at the first odds we see."
They went into the betting-shed. Rosey S. was quoted at six to one.
Even as they looked the price was rubbed, and ten to one was chalked in its place. The laughter of the quartet was long and loud as they pulled money from their pockets.
"The first odds goes, Big Pink," Banting reminded him.
Wallingford produced his hundred dollars, and quietly noted that the eyes of the quartet glistened as they saw the size of the roll from which he extracted it. They had not been prepared to find that he still had plenty of money. Jake Block pa.s.sed near them, and Wallingford hailed him.
"Hold stakes for us, Jake, on a little private bet?" he asked.
"Sure thing," acquiesced Jake. "What is it?"
"These fellows are trying to win out dinner-money on me. They"re giving me six hundred to one against Rosey S."
Block glanced up at the board and noted the increased odds, but it was no part of his policy to interfere in anything.
"All right," he said, taking the seven hundred dollars and stuffing the money in his pocket. "You don"t want to lay a little more, do you, at that odds?"