I’m
Rich
30
What a glorious morning. Turning my haughtibility on the management when they thought I was making a break for it. When it was only Matt helping me carry my parcel of money from the Hibernian to the bank. Safely situated with its great grey pillars across from Trinity College. This marvellous giant room. Two gentlemen in their black banking cloth. I could nearly see his lips forming the words. Have you robbed a bank. And I spoke reassuringly.
‘Had a rather good day at the races.’
One with a winged collar. Much delighted hand rubbing. Presenting me with a chequebook. The assistant manager, overseeing the reckoning of the massive stack of notes. One bookie was ashen faced paying me out. Kept peeling off the notes. As if waiting for me to say, that was enough. Had to tell him about five times that it wasn’t. And he was nearly sobbing. But the other bookie by the time we got to him was hurrying to pack and go home. Till Matt raised a fist at him and he undid his bulging satchel and began counting.
Take a horsecab to the Shelbourne. Waltz in. With not a soul racing instantly in my direction screaming, there he is. Chequebook out. And the merest shade of suspicion concerning my oversight.
‘I do believe there is an account of mine outstanding.’
Darcy Dancer jauntily emerging from the side Shelbourne door. Crossing straight over the street for a haircut and manicure. To lie back. Flush faced in peace. In revenge. Gave a shawled tinker lady following the races five pounds. As Uncle Willie had once bid me do if ever I were in luck. And taxi ride back to Dublin. In a vehicle held together with bits of wise and string. With a flat tyre before we went a hundred yards. Ran out of petrol in the first mile. Then the radiator boiling over. With the driver’s constant reassurance.
‘Ah sir I’ll have you back in Dublin in no time.’
In no time the window of the back door fell out on the road. And coming around a turning we rolled over a farmer’s wife’s three ducks. Then hit an irate cow who promptly gored out his head lights. Ah but one’s discomforts and delays were all merely events in which to take exquisite delight. And laughter. When the taxi finally stopped along the Quay. Paid the exorbitant fare. And just as the driver pulled twenty yards away his decrepit vehicle blew up. Making the world safe again for other road users. Ah but this gentle life. In pursuit of comfortable habits. My fingernails soaking in this manicurist’s dish. And after one’s safe delivery from the exploding taxi, took tea with Matt at the Four Courts Hotel. Listening and relistening to the retelling of his whole sad tale. Of his past life and especially most recently. When he put my loaned fiver and the rest of his borrowed money on the previous race and lost it all. His hands shaking as he lifted his cup to his lips. Steadied finally by a large brandy. I bid him to allow me book him a room. Where he could stay at my expense. Wrote a note for him to give my gentleman friend at the haberdasher. To outfit him in suitable clothes. And to report to me at the Hibernian. So blissful now to have one’s head rubbed by the big wheel brushes they lower whirring from the ceiling. And one’s troubles ended. Just turn to determine who the wearer of a kilt is. My god. The Marquis is in the next chair. Busy slinking down low. The barber plying him with sets of hair brushes and tonics. Slipping in the words, Your Lordship between that of Major and Jones. By my swift addition. He’s now bought eighty seven pounds and seventeen shillings worth of hair emoluments and dressings plus sundry scalp and hair grooming utensils. And poor man he groans as I now lean towards him with a five pound note.
‘Good grief what’s this.’
‘It’s five pounds I borrowed from you Major Jones.’
‘O it’s you. By jove that’s unexpectedly good of you. I don’t mean by that any offence. For a moment there I thought you were serving me with a writ.’
One took a modestly larger front bedroom with an attached sitting room facing down Molesworth Street. More befitting one when one was such a plutocrat. But I spent a somewhat terrified whole night clutching my valuables. Thought there were awfully noisy burglars in the next suite. Was in the middle of adding my couch to the writing desk, footstool and table I had just stacked against the adjoining suite’s locked door, when I heard a prolonged high pitched giggle. One’s eye had to navigate a double key hole. But one could easily put together in one’s mind those things which passed before it. With all the glimpses adding up to an overall sight. The Marquis. And Baptista. Both totally unmindful of the comfort of other guests. And both already rumoured to be next season’s joint Masters of Foxhounds. Both of them in the altogether, whooping and hollering. And one imagined Baptista delightedly bringing the whip down on the Marquis’s haunches. Then the Marquis taking a gallop. Exercising his mare Baptista. With her saddle worn held on her back with a cinch strap of pure silk. Nothing a courageous hunting gentleman enjoys more in a woman than her ability to walk if she cannot trot on her all fours across the bedchamber floor. Heinous of me. But one did shout shut up through the pair of locked doors.
Matt agreed to be my temporary chauffeur of my motor car. Formerly the property of an Ambassador. With lovely chromium ripples across the radiator. Over which each morning I ran my hand as it pulled up waiting for me in front of the Hibernian. Where now one stood this day. On the steps of this dignified most comfortable hotel. With dowagers passing in pursuit of coffee and buns. And country gentlemen idly twiddling thumbs before lunch. The weather report on the wireless. Sunny periods this morning. In the afternoon, cold and cloudy with rain or drizzle at times. With wind increasing to gale force in Sole Shannon and Fastnet.