[The Artful Bodger 05] • Never Go to Sea

Since the days of Admiral Rous, the liaison between the Senior Service and the Sport of Kings has been a long and an honourable one. Slow horses have contributed just as much as fast women to the downfall of many a good naval man. It is therefore surprising that one very distinguished naval officer, none other than Commander Robert Bollinger Badger, D.S.C., R.N., known throughout the Navy as the The Artful Bodger, should reach a ripe age knowing less than a Hottentot about flat- racing. As Assistant Director of Naval Public Relations responsible for the public image of the Navy, and as part-owner of a racehorse entered in the Derby, The Bodger finds himself struggling to keep his feet in two strange worlds. Somehow the two worlds merge. Gambling everything on one chance, The Bodger attempts the most spectacular publicity coup of the century - nothing less than an assault upon the highest pinnacle of the Turf, the Blue Riband of the Epsom Derby.