Berry And Co. by Dornford Yates

Jonah, “is one thing, gluttonish sloth another. And even if you have once again overestimated the capacity of your stomach, why advertise your intemperance in a public place?” He lifted his hand from my shoulder to look at his watch. “It’s now ten minutes to three. Do you think you can stagger, or must you be carried, to the car?”
    I sat up and looked about me. Except for Jill, who was standing a-tiptoe before a mirror, we were alone in the lounge.
    “I’ve been dreaming,” said I. “About – about—”
    “That’s all right, old chap. Tell Nanny all about it tonight, after you’ve had your bath. That’s one of the things she’s paid for.”
    “Don’t be a fool,” said I, putting a hand to my head. “It’s important, I tell you. For Heaven’s sake, let me think. Oh, what was it?” My cousins stared at me. “I’m not rotting. It was real – something that mattered.”
    “’Orse race?” said Jonah eagerly. “Green hoops leading by twelve lengths or something?”
    I waved him away.
    “No, no, no. Let me think. Let me think.”
    I buried my face in my hands and thought and thought… But to no purpose. The vision was gone.
     
    Hastily I made ready for our journey to Town, all the time racking my brain feverishly for some odd atom of incident that should remember my dream.
    It was not until I was actually seated in the Rolls, with my foot upon the self-starter, that I thought about Berry.
    Casually I asked what had become of him.
    “That’s what we want to know,” said Jill. “He motored down here with Miss Childe, and now they’ve pushed off somewhere, but they wouldn’t say—”
    “Childe!” I shouted. “Miss Childe! I’ve got it!”
    “What on earth’s the matter?” said Jonah, as I started the car.
    “My dream,” I cried. “I remember it all. It was about that tallboy.”
    “What – the one we saw?” cried Jill.
    I nodded.
    “I’m going to double my bid,” I said. “We simply must have it, whatever the price.”
    Disregarding Jonah’s protests that we were going the wrong way, I swung the car in the direction from which we had come, and streaked down the road to Cranmer Place.
    A minute later I dashed into the hall, with Jill at my heels.
    The first person I saw was Mr Holly.
    “Has it come up yet?”
    I flung the words at him, casting strategy to the winds.
    “It ’as, Major, an’ I’m sorry to say we’ve lorst it. I never see such a thing. There was a gent there as meant to ’ave it. ’Cept for ’im, there wasn’t a bid after twenty-five pounds. I never thort we’d ’ave to go over fifty, neither. Might ’a bin the owner ’isself, the way ’e was runnin’ us up. An’ when we was in the eighties, I sez to meself, I sez, ‘The one as calls a nundred first ’as it. So ’ere goes.’ ‘Eighty-nine,’ sez ’e. ‘A nundred pound,’ sez I, bold-like. ‘Make it guineas,’ sez he, as cool as if ’e was buyin’ a naporth o’ figs. I tell you, Major, it fair knocked me, it did. I come all of a tremble, an’ me knees—”
    “Where’s the fellow who bought it?” said I.
    “I’m afraid it’s no good, Major. I tell you ’e meant to ’ave them drawers.”
    With an effort I mastered my impatience.
    “Will you tell me where he is? Or, if he’s gone, find out—”
    “I don’t think ’e’s gorn,” said Mr Holly, looking round. “I ’alf think – There ’e is,” he cried, suddenly, nodding over my shoulder. “That’s ’im on the stairs, with the lady in blue.”
    Excitedly I swung round, to see my brother-in-law languidly descending the staircase, with Miss Childe by his side.
    “Hullo,” he said. “Do you mind not asking me why I’m here?”
    “It’s not my practice,” said I, “to ask a question, the answer to which I already know.” I turned to Mr Holly and took out a one pound note. “I’m much obliged for your trouble. ‘Not a bid after twenty-five pounds,’ I think you said.” I handed him the note, which he