The Pothunters, P. G. Wodehouse [digital book reader .TXT] 📗

you start?’ I believe it’s an excellent specific for the gout.”

“Gout? What? No, I don’t think so, thanks.”

“And you’ll write to us sometimes, Jim, and give my love to little Henry, and always wear flannel next your skin, my dear boy?” said Charteris.

This seemed to strike even Jim as irrelevant.

“Do shut up for goodness sake, Alderman,” he said irritably. “Why can’t you go and rag somebody else?”

“My place is by your side. Go, my son, or else they’ll be starting without you. Give us your blazer. And take my tip, the tip of an old runner, and don’t pocket your opponent’s ball in your own twenty-five. And come back victorious, or on the shields of your soldiers. All right, sir (to the starter), he’s just making his will. Goodbye Jim. Buck up, or I’ll lynch you after the race.”

Jim answered by muffling him in his blazer, and walking to the line. There were six competitors in all, each of whom owned a name ranking alphabetically higher than Thomson. Jim, therefore, had the outside berth. Drake had the one next to the inside, which fell to Adamson, the victim of the lost two pounds’ episode.

Both Drake and Jim got off well at the sound of the pistol, and the pace was warm from the start. Jim evidently had his eye on the inside berth, and, after half a lap had been completed, he got it, Drake falling back. Jim continued to make the running, and led at the end of the first lap by about five yards. Then came Adamson, followed by a batch of three, and finally Drake, taking things exceedingly coolly, a couple of yards behind them. The distance separating him from Jim was little over a dozen yards. A roar of applause greeted the runners as they started on the second lap, and it was significant that while Jim’s supporters shouted, “Well run,” those of Drake were fain to substitute advice for approval, and cry “Go it.” Drake, however, had not the least intention of “going it” in the generally accepted meaning of the phrase. A yard or two to the rear meant nothing in the first lap, and he was running quite well enough to satisfy himself, with a nice, springy stride, which he hoped would begin to tell soon.

With the end of the second lap the real business of the race began, for the survival of the fittest had resulted in eliminations and changes of order. Jim still led, but now by only eight or nine yards. Drake had come up to second, and Adamson had dropped to a bad third. Two of the runners had given the race up, and retired, and the last man was a long way behind, and, to all practical purposes, out of the running. There were only three laps, and, as the last lap began, the pace quickened, fast as it had been before. Jim was exerting every particle of his strength. He was not a runner who depended overmuch on his final dash. He hoped to gain so much ground before Drake made his sprint as to neutralise it when it came. Adamson he did not fear.

And now they were in the last two hundred yards, Jim by this time some thirty yards ahead, but in great straits. Drake had quickened his pace, and gained slowly on him. As they rounded the corner and came into the straight, the cheers were redoubled. It was a great race. Then, fifty yards from the tape, Drake began his final sprint. If he had saved himself before, he made up for it now. The gap dwindled and dwindled. Neither could improve his pace. It was a question whether there was enough of the race left for Drake to catch his man, or whether he had once more left his sprint till too late. Jim could hear the roars of the spectators, and the frenzied appeals of Merevale’s house to him to sprint, but he was already doing his utmost. Everything seemed black to him, a black, surging mist, and in its centre a thin white line, the tape. Could he reach it before Drake? Or would he collapse before he reached it? There were only five more yards to go now, and still he led. Four. Three. Two. Then something white swept past him on the right, the white line quivered, snapped, and vanished, and he pitched blindly forward on to the turf at the trackside. Drake had won by a foot.

XII An Interesting Interview

For the rest of the afternoon Jim had a wretched time. To be beaten after such a race by a foot, and to be beaten by a foot when victory would have cut the Gordian knot of his difficulties once and for all, was enough to embitter anybody’s existence. He found it hard to accept the well-meant condolences of casual acquaintances, and still harder to do the right thing and congratulate Drake on his victory, a refinement of self-torture which is by custom expected of the vanquished in every branch of work or sport. But he managed it somehow, and he also managed to appear reasonably gratified when he went up to take his prize for the half-mile. Tony and the others, who knew what his defeat meant to him, kept out of his way, for which he was grateful. After lockup, however, it was a different matter, but by that time he was more ready for society. Even now there might be some way out of the difficulty. He asked Tony’s advice on the subject. Tony was perplexed. The situation was beyond his grip.

“I don’t see what you can do, Jim,” he said, “unless the Rugby chap’ll be satisfied with a pound on account. It’s a beastly business. Do you think your pater will give you your money all the same as it was such a close finish?”

Jim thought not. In fact, he was certain that he would not, and Tony