‘I was thinking of other things,’ said Soames, gazing at his daughter.
‘We thought you were responsible for the shockin’ bad price.’
‘Why!’ said Soames, gloomily. ‘Did you expect me to bet against him?’
Jack Cardigan threw back his head and laughed.
‘I don’t see anything funny,’ muttered Soames.
‘Nor do I, Jack,’ said Fleur. ‘Why should Father know anything about racing?’
‘I beg your pardon, sir, I’ll tell you all about it.’
‘God forbid!’ said Soames.
‘No, but it’s rather queer. D’you remember that chap Stain-ford, who sneaked the Mater’s snuff-box?’
‘I do.’
‘Well, it seems he paid Val a visit at Wansdon, and Val thinks he picked up the idea that Rondavel was a real good one. There was a chap watching the gallop last Monday. That’s what decided them to run the colt today. They were going to wait for Goodwood. Too late, though; somebody’s made a pot over him. We only got fours.’
It was all Greek to Soames, except that the languid ruffian Stainford had somehow been responsible a second time for bringing about a meeting between Fleur and Jon; for he knew from Winifred that Val and his ménage had gone to stay at Green Street during the strike on purpose to see Stainford. He wished to goodness he had called a policeman that day, and had the fellow shut up.
They were a long time getting out of the traffic – owing to the perversity of ‘that chap Riggs’, and did not reach South Square till seven o’clock. They were greeted by the news that Kit had a temperature. Mr Mont was with him. Fleur flew up. Having washed off his day, Soames settled himself in the ‘parlour’ to wait uneasily for their report. Fleur used to have temperatures, and not infrequendy they led to something. If Kit’s didn’t lead to anything serious, it might be good for her – keeping her thoughts at home. He lay back in his chair opposite the Fragon-ard – a delicate thing, but with no soul in it, like all the works of that period – wondering why Fleur had changed the style of this room from Chinese to Louise Quinze. Just for the sake of change, he supposed. These young people had no continuity; some microbe in the blood – of the ‘idle rich’, and the ‘idle poor’, and everybody else, so far as he could see. Nobody could be got to stay anywhere – not even in their graves, judging by all those séances. If only people would attend quietly to their business, even to that of being dead! They had such an appetite for living, that they had no life. A beam of sunlight, smoky with dust-motes, came slanting in on to the wall before him – pretty thing, a beam of sunlight, but a terrible lot of dust, even in a room spick-and–spandy as this. And to think that a thing smaller than one of those dust-motes could give a child a temperature. He hoped to goodness Kit had nothing catching. And his mind went over the illnesses of childhood – mumps, measles, chicken-pox, whooping-cough. Fleur had caught them all, but never scarlet fever. And Soames began to fidget. Surely Kit was too young to have got scarlet fever. But nurses were so careless – you never knew! And suddenly he began to wish for Annette. What was she doing in France all this time? She was useful in illness; had some very good prescriptions. He would say that for the French – their doctors were clever when you could get them to take an interest. The stuff they had given him for his lumbago at Deauville had been first-rate. And after his visit the little doctor chap had said: ‘I come for the money tomorrow!’ or so it had sounded. It seemed he had meant: ‘I come in the morning tomorrow.’ They never could speak anything but their own confounded language, and looked aggrieved when you couldn’t speak it yourself.
They had kept him a long time there without news before Michael came in.
‘Well?’
‘Well, sir, it looks uncommonly like measles.’
‘H’m! Now, how on earth did he get that?’
‘Nurse has no idea; but Kit’s awfully sociable. If there’s another in sight, he goes for him.’
‘That’s bad,’ said Soames. ‘You’ve got slums at the back here.’
‘Ah!’ said Michael: ‘Slums to the right of us, slums to the left of us, slums to the front of us – how can you wonder?’
Soames stared. ‘They’re not notifiable,’ he said, ‘thank goodness!’
‘Slums?’
‘No. Measles.’ If he had a dread, it was a notifiable disease, with the authorities poking their noses in, and having up the drains as likely as not. ‘How’s the little chap feeling?’