Dinner at the Dogs

By KENNETH GREGORY

TACITUS or peanuts was the choice which the White City seemed to offer me. But with dinner less than half an hour away I ignored the peanut vendor's blandishments and turned again to the little book provided by the Greyhound Racing Association of Great Britain. This quota- tion from Tacitus, was it a perfectly normal reflec- tion of the Stewards' background (mainly Wel- lington, Marlborough and Clifton with Sandhurst as aftermath) or had it been inserted by some ingenious publicity man to shatter the prejudices of those who, like myself, had once heard Mr. St. John Ervine pronounce the words 'men in cloth caps who lead greyhounds'•and were irretrievably biased? Vitia erunt donee !tontines—I walked twice round the stadium in search of a cloth cap. Not one, and many of the near-by houses were without a TV aerial, which was even odder.

Past the popular entrance where the plebs were assembling with their peanuts, past the rapidly filling car park (two and sixpence), around the Packards and the Jaguar. I arrived at the restaurant entrance. Three bulging commissionaires frisked me with their eyes and seemed satisfied; they were more concerned with their regulars, the White City patricians gathering for the Saturday night ritual.

'Here's the Major,' said one flunkey, and a well- creased man stared his way in. A second flunkey glanced outside.

'The Indian lady,' he said, swelling slightly. Anticipating a sari which could assimilate foreign sporting philosophies. I was surprised when the lady oozed into sight clad in a garment which started below the shoulders and ended above the knees, a creation Miss Jayne Mansfield might select for road-opening in the Guatemalan hot season. Three paces behind—and six inches shorter—came a sleek gent in heavy camel coat. He watched the Indian lady effect a deft right turn by thrusting her hips in the opposite direction and growled 'Hi !' to no one in particular. Having caught up with his companion in the lift he pressed his nose against her neck. More military types arrived, also types whose military cornice-

tions were perhaps confined to the sale of war surplus. The voices varied but most reminded me of what Mr. A. J. Liebling calls 'the mysterious England that speaks neither public school' nor Cockney.'

Awaiting my host I consulted the GRA hand- book. If Tacitus is quoted for the sake of culture, Sir Alan Herbert is brought in for the usual reason. Since 1948 the Government tax on totalisators— these may operate for only one hundred and four days in the year—has amounted to £67,327,084. For a moment I felt outraged, then I deduced that the remaining 90 per cent. is hardly a neg- ligible sum. I turned to my race card. For the uninitiated I should mention that there is a wide difference between dogs who run at White City and dogs who preen at Cruft's. The latter can afford a suggestion of dilettantism and get christened Vinovium Mayblossom or Cointreau of Eyeworth. Things are more democratic at White City. Celtic Conqueror does not deny the fact that his mother (maybe I have got both their sexes wrong) was née Valley of Corruption, and Gentle Mistress acknowledges Esquire Girl as parent. Even so, democracy should not flaunt the higher principles of Shakespearian criticism; Polonius and Bunny Hop may legally have con- summated their affections, but I recoil when their issue is named Kiss Me Kate.

Once inside the restaurant I experienced a strange feeling of claustrophobia. True, I was received by a gracious head-waiter, my chair wel- comed me, the greyhounds on the table-light shades were not obtrusive and from the next table came chatter of John Stuart Mill from two young men in Oxford college ties, over the wine list. Behind me women in the first pink pallor of middle age were inspecting their arms. But it was the vast expanse of glass which explained every- thing. The restaurant patricians are as hermetically sealed off from contact with corruption as the newly elected Member for Bournemouth East and Christchurch. I could see the stadium, the herded plebs (nigh on twenty thousand with a turnover of about £4 a head); the totalisator, the Beerbohm Tree green of the grass, the officials who moved stiffly as if by clockwork, but could hear nothing. Well, almost nothing. The White City patricians are spared the canned cinema organ music which jells the night air outside.

At 7.20, by which time the two Oxonians had forsaken Mill for Wittgenstein, I heard a muted fanfare of trumpets. This proclaimed the entry of six greyhounds, four men and two girls—the male humans in long white coats and bowlers, the girls in riding caps. Not until they were well down the track did I realise they were being followed by another man, a Peter Sellers character also in white coat who carried a dustpan and brush at the ready. At 7.25 the traps were wheeled into posi- tion, at 7.28 the dogs inserted, whereupon some- one waved a white flag. A few seconds before the alf-hour as I was putting a piece of steak in my mouth the restaurant lights were dimmed. Down below, the hare, moving at first like Noddy's friend Mr. Wobbly-Man, scuttled past the traps to be followed by six greyhounds. 525 Yards Flat, said the race card, not a great distance for creatures who could give a Jesse Owens thirty yards in a hundred. Before I had time to start chewing my steak the restaurant lights went up again. The race was over, the dogs were relaxing (greyhounds, incidentally, are treated rather like athletes are in the Soviet Union), the two Oxonians were discus- sing commodity prices and the middle-aged women were patting their hair. I was struck by the nonchalance of it all, the professional exper- tise or indifference of the patricians. I felt proud of the Island Race when the Chief Steward (tweeds and the inevitable bowler) stepped forward and raised his hat to the victorious dog.

The remainder of the evening was devoted to contemplation and variations on the theme I had just witnessed. How, 1 asked myself, how does one become a Steward at the White City? At present there is a Lieutenant-Colonel, two Majors, a Lieutenant-Commander and a Squadron-Leader with a Captain, RN, as General Manager. Why, in this democratic sport, is there no trade unionist among the Stewards? I answered my question by picturing Mr. Frank Cousins underneath a bowler. Contemplation and variations on a theme. . . . I derived great pleasure from watching the Duchess of Bedford's Altcar (661 lb.) win, not because I am sentimental and wish to have grey- hound racing recognised as the sport of peers, but because Altcar brought its owner £10 in less than thirty seconds. Something in excess of £1,200 an hour is not bad even by Woburn Abbey standards.

And then there was the conversation between two devotees as they poised cigars over their brandy.

`Don't like the look of him.'

'Eh? Seems a decent sort of dog to me.'

'Got yellow eyes.'

`You sure?'

'Sure! Damn it all, man, I've been as close to that dog as I am to you now. He won't look you straight in the face. The worst of these yellow-eyed beggars.

Never trust a dog who won't look you straight in the face.'

Ten minutes later the yellow- eyed dog romped home by four lengths.

The dinner was excellent.