National Velvet (24 page)

    
On the first Monday in January Mi took the whole entry money of a hundred pounds in gold sovereigns in a bag up to London. He went to Messrs. Weatherby in Cavendish Square, walked up the stone steps, pushed the doors, and stood at a wooden counter not unlike a bank. A tall man asked him offhandedly what he wanted.

    
“Entry. Fer the Gran' National,” said Mi, pulling out the completed form, dumping the heavy bag on the counter, and pushing it towards the man.

    
“What's that?”

    
“Th'entry money,” said Mi.

    
“Ten pounds. Have you brought it in silver?” said the man superciliously, touching the neck of the bag with his fingers.

    
“Ten? I've brought a hundred. In gold.”

    
The man drew the bag towards him and opened it. He peered inside with astonishment. “What's this? Sovereigns?”

    
“A hundred sovereigns,” said Mi.

    
The man looked at Mi consideringly. He indicated a stool. “Will you wait?” he said. He was away a moment, then returned with a companion whose air was even more exalted and critical.

    
“Do I understand,” said the second man, “that you have brought a hundred sovereigns in pre-war gold to pay for an entry for the Grand National . . . Race?” He brought out the word “race” as though it were the crime which Mi had committed.

    
“Yes, sir,” said Mi cheerfully and simply and shifted
his feet and leant on the counter. “It's quite simple, sir. I thought you'd like it best jus' as it was. I didn't know where best to change it into paper an' as this is as good's a bank (the man's eyes lightened just a shade) I thought I'd bring it here.”

    
“To what horse does this refer?”

    
“It's a piebald horse. Property of Miss V. Brown. She owns it. Her father's a butcher down . . . The address is here.” He smoothed out the form.

    
“Who is the trainer?”

    
“Privately trained, sir.”

    
“Not by the owner?”

    
“Well, yes, by the owner. Yes, sir, trained by her since she's had it.”

    
“How do you come to bring up this money?”

    
Mi paused a moment and sucked his tooth.

    
“It's a fancy of Miss Brown's mother, sir. She had the sovereigns tucked away for years. Kind of store, sir. She had a fancy it would bring the horse luck if she paid the entry money with the sovereigns.”

    
“I'm afraid we can't do deals in gold. This is worth more than a hundred pounds.”

    
“You mean I get some change back?”

    
“You would if we took it. But we can't have anything to do with the price of gold at the present rate. That is not our business.”

    
“I don't think,” said Mi slowly, “that Mrs. Brown wants any change. A hundred sovereigns is a hundred pounds to her. She's old-fashioned. She's set on paying
the entry with this hundred pounds here in this bag, sir.”

    
“There's another thing,” said the man. “You don't need to pay a hundred now. It's ten sovereigns now, fifty sovereigns extra if left in after January 30th, with an additional forty sovereigns if left in after March 13th.”

    
“Sovereigns,” murmured Mi. “It says ‘sovereigns,' and these are sovereigns.”

    
“Well, that's the . . .” (the gentleman looked acid), “the wording dating from the original . . . er . . . inception of this form.”

    
“Clear enough,” said Mi. “Sovereigns it says. I don't want to make difficulties, sir, but I've brought you sovereigns, haven't I?”

    
“I think you had better wait,” said the gentleman, and he and his companion disappeared. Mi sat on the stool again and eyed his bag. He read the antique sporting notices. There was a ginger and green notice, stiff with discoloured varnish, about paying for the weights in the weighing room. He frowned at it. He had never heard of such a thing. Then he saw that it was dated a hundred years ago.

    
After a long interval the gentleman returned, alone.

    
“The sovereigns will be accepted,” he said curtly, “but there is no need to deposit more than ten as yet.”

    
“I'd sooner leave the lot,” said Mi obstinately.

    
“The reason for the division of the entry amounts,” said the gentleman, disliking Mi more and more, “is in case the horse becomes by a later date unable to run.”

    
“This horse'll run,” said Mi.

    
“You cannot foresee,” said the gentleman, “acts of God.”

    
“M'm, I can,” said Mi, “M'm, I can. You take the lot an' stack it for me. Safer here. I might get it lifted off me on the way home. You got a fine big place here. You got room for ninety sovereigns stacked away. You can give me a paper for it. They need me at the butcher's down there. 'Tisn't easy to keep making journeys. You'll need the lot before we're done.”

    
Again the gentleman disappeared and a very exalted head was put round the lintel of an inner cubicle and two very shrewd and dwelling eyes inspected Mi.

    
Finally a receipt was handed to him, the bag and form taken from him and Mi was ready to depart.

    
“Who's your rider?” said the gentleman, almost sociably at last.

    
“Foreign chap,” said Mi instantly. “Comin' over later.”

    
“He'll have to get his Clearance, you know,” said the gentleman, “from his own accredited Jockey Club.”

    
“Yes, sir,” said Mi quickly. “Yes, thank you, sir.”

    
“What's his name? Do we know him?”

    
“Tasky. James Tasky.”

    
“English?”

    
“Mother's English. Chap's half Russian.”

    
“From which country then does he get his Clearance? There is racing of course still in Russia.”

    
“Mr. Brown's working it all out,” said Mi. “I'm just
the hand down there. I know what I hear them say, that's about all.”

    
“Well, good-day then. Just a minute. You'll notice on that receipt 'Received one hundred sovereigns in gold sovereigns, value to be decided by Coult's Bank when the final payment is due.' That means you get an amount returned. You'll explain that to the Owner, please.”

    
“Right, sir. Good-day, sir.”

    
Mi was out in the airy light of Cavendish Square and he ran his hand across his brow.

    
“Mother nearly bitched it with 'er whimsies,” he said.

    
It was March. The days of March creeping gustily on like something that man couldn't hinder and God wouldn't hurry.

    
“What about me jacket?” said Velvet in her whisper, somewhat hoarse, again and again.

    
“
Leave
yer jacket!” said Mi testily. “I keep telling you. Leave me thinking of it.”

    
“I can't sew, remember,” said Velvet warningly.

    
“Think I don't know that! My sister's sewing it.”

    
“Your SISTER! You gotta sister!” Velvet sat bolt upright.

    
“I gotta sister. I got two.”

    
“You never told us!”

    
“I'm no family man,” said Mi shortly.

    
“Your old Dan . . . your old father's dead?”

    
“He's dead!”

    
“You gotta mother?”

    
“Dead too. But where I sprung from an' what I left behind's my business.”

    
“But your sister's my business. She's sewing my coat.”

    
“And well she can do that for me,” said Mi, reflecting. “I never asked her for a penny. I got her her job. Bin there years.”

    
“Where?”

    
“Sews for a tailor at Newmarket. Does the tailored shirts. I sent her that top of yours yer ma said was past darning.”

    
“The top of that cotton dress what mother used the bottom for knickers?”

    
“That's the one.”

    
“Well, it was too small, anyway. I hope she makes it bigger. What about the stuff?”

    
“Black an' pink I told her. She's in the way of getting the stuff up there. She'll get the cap made, too.”

    
“And the breeches and the boots?”

    
“You leave it to me up at Aintree. That'll sort itself up at Aintree. Overnight. The valets go round with spares in their cases.”

    
“Valets?”

    
“Fellows that look after the jockeys. Press up their clothes an' do their boots. There's a gang of them go round the race meetings.”

    
“Now,” said Velvet at last, as low as low, “there's an other thing.”

    
“M'm?”

    
“Mother,” said Velvet. And the spinning air seemed to stop round them in anxiety.

    
“It's a thing I'm thinking of too,” said Mi. “Worries me.”

    
“Yes,” said Velvet. “D'you know, Mi?”

    
“What?”

    
“I couldn' do it f'I didn' tell her.”

    
The telling was done at the shop at night. Mi arranged it when Mrs. Brown was totting up. She spared the electric and totted by candlelight.

    
“You gotta pretend I'm not your child,” said Velvet, long after bedtime. She dragged up her words as though the roots were deep.

    
“You was nineteen when you swum the Channel,” said Velvet. “I'm fourteen but my chance's come early. You mustn't think I'm your child. I'm a girl with a Chance.”

    
Her mother's throat clicked. She blazed into fire without moving an eyelash.

    
“Mi's in the street, waitin',” said Velvet. “It's him an' me.” (She paused at the gasp her mother gave.)

    
“We're out on it together,” went on Velvet, not knowing the terror that cooled her mother's fire. “We think . . . I think . . .” (coming up closer and speaking very low) “I kin
ride
the horse.”

    
“Almighty God,” said Mrs. Brown, mild and reverent. She was thanking Him that her child was her shining Velvet. Not all messed up with love. Not all messed up with love an' such. That Mi was to Velvet what Dan had been to her, that stuff grander and tougher than a lover. Now what was this suggestion that was like a wild dream?

    
“In the race, Velvet?”

    
Velvet described the machinery, Mi's plans, Mi's devices.

    
“If I'm found out then they'll send me home. Father'll be angry. Just as likely I won't be found out. Well, then, we'll do our best. The horse is great. He's like a Bible horse.”

    
The interview was over, except the silence and the thinking.

    
“I don' want to speak to Mi about it,” said Mrs. Brown at last. “Tell him not to speak to me about it. Not a word. It's a weight on me. It's a terrible . . . I can't be but your mother, Velvet. . . . To think Mi shoulda lent himself to this.”

    
Then at the very end . . . “I'm all ashake. Let there be no whisperin' an' talkin'. I must put it from me an' pray to God.”

    
Velvet left her. The candle guttered but the totting did not continue. Later the heavy woman walked home.