Chapter 5

"But on the level," said the Kid earnestly, "is Elisha lame?"

"Come and see for yourself," said Old Man Curry, taking his lantern from the peg. After an interval they returned to the tack-room, the Bald-faced Kid shaking his head commiseratingly.

"That would have been rotten luck if it had happened to a dog!" said he. "And the Handicap coming on and all."

"There'll be a better opening price than 3 to 1 now, I reckon," said Old Man Curry grimly.

"Opening price!" ejaculated the Kid, startled. "Say, what are you talking about? You don't mean to tell me you're thinking of starting him with his leg in this shape, old-timer?"

"'M--well, no, not in this shape, exackly."

"But Lordy, man, the Handicap is on Saturday and here it is Wednesday night already. You can't fix up a leg like that in two days. You're going some if you get it straightened out in two weeks. Of course, you can shoot the leg full of cocaine and he'll run on it a little ways, but asking him to go a mile and a half--confound it, old-timer! That's murdering a game horse. You're liable to have a hopeless cripple on your hands when it's over. I tell you, if Elisha was mine----"

"You'd own a real race hoss, son," said Old Man Curry. "Now run along, Frank, and don't try to teach your grandad to suck aigs. I was doctoring hosses before you come to this country at all, and I'm going to doctor this one some more and then go to bed."

Shortly thereafter the good horse Elisha entertained a visitor who brought no lantern with him, but operated in the dark, swiftly and silently. Later a door creaked, there were muffled footfalls under the stable awning and one resounding thump, as it might have been a shod hoof striking a doorsill. Still later Squeaking Henry, returning to his post of duty, saw a light in Elisha's stall and looked in at Old Man Curry applying cold compresses to the left foreleg of a gaunt bay horse with a small splash of white in the centre of the forehead.

"How they coming, uncle?" asked Henry.

"Oh, about the same, I reckon," was the reply.

"You might as well hit the hay. You've been fooling with that leg since dark, but you'll never get the bird ready to fly by Saturday."

"'Wisdom crieth without,'" quoted Old Man Curry sententiously. "'She uttereth her voice in the street.'"

"Quit kidding yourself," argued Henry, "and look how sore he is. You're in big luck if he ain't lame a whole month from now."

"Well," said Old Man Curry, "Solomon says that the righteous man regardeth the life of his beast."

"He does, eh?" Squeaking Henry chuckled unpleasantly. "There's a whole lot of things Solomon didn't know about bowed tendons. That leg needs something besides regards, I'm telling you."

"And I'm listening," said Old Man Curry patiently. "Wisdom will die with you, I reckon, Henry, so take care of yourself."

If the Jungle Circuit knew an event remotely approaching a turf classic, it was the Northwestern Handicap, by usage shortened to "the Handicap." It was their Metropolitan, Suburban, and Brooklyn rolled into one. The winner was crowned with garlands, the jockey was photographed in the floral horseshoe, and the fortunate owner pocketed something more than two thousand dollars--a large sum of money on any race track in the land, but a princely reward to the average jungle owner.

The best horses in training were entered each year and while a scornful Eastern handicapper would doubtless have rated them all among the cheap selling platers, they were still the kings of the jungle tracks, small toads in a smaller puddle, and their annual struggle was anticipated for weeks. Each candidate appeared in the light of a possible winner because the purse was worth trying for and each owner was credited with an honest desire to win. The Handicap was emphatically the "big betting race" of the season.

This year Black Bill, famed for consistent performance and ability to cover a distance of ground, was a pronounced favourite. Black Bill had been running with better horses than the jungle campaigners and winning from them and it was popularly believed that he had been shipped from the South for the express purpose of capturing the Handicap purse. His single start at the meeting had been won in what the turf reporters called "impressive fashion," which is to say that Jockey Grogan brought Black Bill home three lengths in front of his field and but for the strength in his arms the gap would have been a much wider one.

Regulator, a sturdy chestnut, and Miss Amber, a nervous brown mare, were also high in public esteem, rivals for the position of second choice.

"It's a three-horse race," said the wiseacres, "and the others are outclassed. Whatever money there is will be split by Black Bill, Miss Amber, and Regulator. If anything happens to Bill, one of the others will win, but the rest of 'em won't get anything but a hard ride and a lot of dust."

From his position on the block Abe Goldmark looked down on a surging crowd. He was waiting for the official announcement on the third race. The crowd was waiting for the posting of the odds on the Handicap, waiting, money in hand, ready to dash at bargains. Al Engle forced his way through the press and Goldmark bent to listen.

"The old nut is going to start him sure enough," whispered the Sharpshooter. "No--he won't warm him up. Would you throw a gallop into a horse with his leg full of coke? Curry is crazy, but he ain't quite as crazy as that."

"The old boy was putting bandages on him at midnight last night," grinned Goldmark. "Dang it, Al, a man ought to be arrested for starting a horse in that condition."

"The coke will die out before he's gone half a mile," said Engle. "Might not even last that long--depends on how long they're at the post. I saw a horse once----"

The melodious bellow of the official announcer rose above the hum of the crowd and there was a sudden, tense shifting of the nervous human mass. A dozen bookmakers turned leisurely to their slates, a dozen pieces of chalk were poised aggravatingly--and a hoarse grunt of disappointment rose from the watchers. Black Bill the favourite, yes, but bet fives to win threes? Hardly. Wait a minute; don't go after it now. Maybe it'll go up. Regulator, 8 to 5--Holy Moses! What kind of booking is this, anyway? Miss Amber, 2 to 1.

"Make 'em _all_ odds on and be done with it!" sneered the gamblers. "Talk about your syndicate books! Beat five races at this track and if your money holds out you may beat the sixth, too. Huh!"

One bookmaker, more adventurous than his fellows, offered 4 to 5 on Black Bill and was immediately mobbed. Then came the prices on the outsiders. Simple Simon, 8 to 1; Pepper and Salt, 12 to 1; Ted Mitchell and Everhardt, 15 to 1; and so on. Last of all, the chalk paused at Elisha--40 to 1.

"Aw, be game!" taunted Al Engle. "Only 40--with what you know about him? He ought to be 100, 40, and 20! Be game!"

"Who's doing this?" demanded Goldmark. "Come on, gentlemen! Make your bets! We haven't got all day. Black Bill, 6 to 10. Simple Simon, 40 to 5. Thank _you_, sir."

Out in the paddock Old Man Curry rubbed the red flannel bandage on Elisha's leg, stopping now and then to answer questions.

"Eh? Yes, been a little lame. Will he last? Well, it's this way; you can't never tell. If it comes back on him--no, I didn't warm him up. Why not? That's _my_ business, young man."

The Bald-faced Kid came also, alert as a fox, eager for any scrap of information which might be converted into coin. He shook his head reprovingly at Old Man Curry.

"I didn't think you'd have the heart, old-timer," said he. "Honest to Pete, I didn't! Don't you care what happens to this horse or what?"

"Son," said the patriarch simply, "I care a lot. I care a-plenty. If you've got any of that seven dollars left, you might put it on his nose."

"Him? To win? You're daffy as a cuckoo bird! Why, last night he couldn't put that foot on the ground!"

"Well, of course, Frank, if you know that much about it, don't let me advise you. If I had seven dollars and was looking for a soft spot I'd put it square on 'Lisha's nose."

"You've been losing too much sleep lately," said the Kid, edging away. "You want to win this race so much that you've bulled yourself into thinking that you can."

"Mebbe so, Frank, mebbe so," was the mild response, "but don't let me influence you none whatever. Go play Black Bill. What's his price?"

"Three to five. One to two in some books."

"False price!" said the old man. "He ain't got no license to be odds on."

"See you later!" said the Bald-faced Kid, and went away with a pitying grin upon his face. The pity was evenly divided between Elisha and his owner.

Old Man Curry heaved little Mose into the saddle.

"Mind now, son. Ride just like I told you. Stay with that black hoss. He'll lay out of it the first mile. When he moves up, you move up too. We've got a big pull in the weights and that'll count in the last quarter. Stay with him, just like his shadow, Mose."

"Yes, suh," said Jockey Jones. "If I'm goin' to be his shadder, he'll sho' think the sun is settin' behind him when he starts down at stretch!"

Abe Goldmark craned his neck to see the parade pass the grand stand. Elisha was fifth in line, walking sedately, as was his habit.

"Not so very frisky, but at that he looks better than I thought he would," was Goldmark's mental comment. "They must have shot all the coke in the world into that old skate. As soon as he begins to run the blood will pump into that sore leg and he'll quit. Black Bill looks like the money to me. He outclasses these other horses."

Goldmark passed the eraser over his slate. Black Bill, 2 to 5. Elisha, 60, 20, and 10.

A dozen restless, high-strung thoroughbreds and a dozen nervous, scheming jockeys can make life exceedingly interesting for an official starter, particularly if the race be an important one and a ragged start certain to draw a storm of adverse criticism. The boys on the front runners were all manoeuvring to beat the barrier and thus add to a natural advantage while the boys on the top-weighted horses were striving to secure an early start before the lead pads began to tell on their mounts. As a result the barrier was broken four times in as many minutes and the commandment against profanity was broken much oftener. The starter grew hoarse and inarticulate; sweat streamed down his face as he hurled anathemas at horses and riders.

"Keep that Miss Amber back, Dugan! Go through that barrier again and it'll cost you fifty! ---- ---- ----!!"

"I can't do nothing with her!" whined Dugan. "She's crazy; that's what she is!"

Through all the turmoil and excitement two horses remained quietly in their positions waiting for the word. These were Black Bill and Elisha, stretch runners, to whom a few yards the worst of the start meant nothing. Out of the corner of his eye little Mose watched Jockey Grogan on the favourite. The black horse edged toward the webbing, the line broke, wheeled, advanced, broke again and a third time came swinging forward. As it advanced, Mose drove the blunt spurs into Elisha's side. A roar from the starter, a spattering rain of clods, a swirl of dust--and the Handicap was on.

"Nice start!" said the presiding judge, drawing a long breath.

Across the track, the official starter mopped his brow.

"Not so worse," said he. "Go on, you little devils! It's up to you!"

Away went the front runners, their riders checking them and rating their speed with an eye to the long journey. Simple Simon, Pepper and Salt, and Ted Mitchell engaged in a brisk struggle for the pace-making position and the latter secured it. Miss Amber and Regulator were in fifth and sixth places respectively, and at the tail end of the procession was Black Bill, taking his time, barely keeping up with the others. A distance race was no new thing to Black Bill. He had seen front runners before and knew that they had a habit of fading in the final quarter. Beside him was Elisha, matching him, stride for stride.

Down the stretch they came, Ted Mitchell gradually increasing the pace. Jockey Jones heard the crowd cheering as he passed the grand stand and his lip curled.

"We eatin' it now, 'Lisha hawss," said he, "but nex' time we come down yere they'll be eatin' _ow'_ dust an' don't make no mistake! Take yo' time, baby. It's a long way yit, a lo-ong way!"

Entering the back stretch there was a sudden shifting of the coloured jackets. The outsiders, nervous and overeager, were making their bids for the purse, and making them too soon. The flurry toward the front brought about a momentary spurt in the pace followed immediately by the steady, machine-like advance of Regulator, but as the chestnut horse moved up the brown mare went with him, on even terms.

"There goes Regulator! There he goes!"

"Yes, but he can't shake Miss Amber! She's right there with him! Oh, you Amber!"

"What ails Black Bill? He's a swell favourite, he is! He ain't done a thing yet."

"He always runs that way," said the wise ones. "Wait till he hits the upper turn."

Abe Goldmark, standing on a stool on the lawn, wrinkled his brow in perplexity. "About time for that bird to quit," said he to himself. "He ain't got any license to run a mile with a leg like that!"

Jockey Moseby Jones was also beginning to wonder what ailed Black Bill. Grogan sat the favourite like a statue, apparently unmoved by the gap widening in front of him.

"We kin wait 'long as he kin, baby," said Mose, comfortingly, "but I sut'ny don't crave to see 'em otheh hawsses so far ahead!"

At the end of the mile Black Bill and Elisha were still at the end of the procession. Miss Amber had managed to shove her brown nose in front, with Regulator at her saddle girth. Many an anxious eye was turned on Black Bill; many saw his transformation but none was better prepared for it than Jockey Moseby Jones. He saw the first wrap slide from Grogan's wrists.

"Come on, baby!" yelled Mose, bumping Elisha with his spurs. "Come on! We got a race here afteh all! Yes, suh, 'is black hawss wakin' up! Show him something, baby! Show him ow' _class_!"

Jockey Grogan laughed and flung an insult over his shoulder.

"Class? That skate?" said he. "Stay with us as long as you can. This is a-a-a horse, nigger, a-a-a horse!"

Black Bill was beginning to run at last, as the grand stand acknowledged with frenzied yells. Yes, he was running, but a gaunt bay horse was running with him, stride for stride. Old Man Curry, at the paddock gate, tugged at his beard with one hand and fumbled for his tobacco with the other.

Side by side the black and the bay swept upon the floundering outsiders, overwhelmed them, and passed on. Side by side they turned into the home stretch, and only two horses were in front of them--Regulator and Miss Amber. The mare was under the whip.

"You say you got a-a-a hawss there!" taunted Mose. "Show me how much hawss he is!"

Grogan shook off the last wrap and bent to his work. Not until then did he realise that the real race was beside him and not with the chestnut out in front.

"Show him up, 'Lisha! Show him up!" shrilled Mose, and the bay responded with a lengthened stride which gave him an advantage to be measured in inches, but Black Bill gamely fought his way back on even terms again. Miss Amber dropped behind. The boy on Regulator was using his whip, but he might just as well have been beating a carpet with it. Third money was his at the paddock gate.

Seventy-five yards--fifty yards--twenty-five yards--and still the two heads bobbed side by side. Jockey Michael Grogan, hero of many a hard finish; cool, calculating, and unmoved by the deafening clamour beating down from the packed grand stand, measured the distance with his eye--and took a chance. His rawhide whip whistled through the air. Black Bill, unused to punishment, faltered for the briefest fraction of a second, and came on again, but too late.

The presiding judge, an unprejudiced man with a stubby grey moustache, squinted across an imaginary line and saw the bay head before he saw the black. "_Jee-roozalum, my happy home!_" said he. "That was an awful tight fit, but the Curry horse won--by a whisker. Hang up the numbers. Lord! But that Elisha is a better horse than I gave him credit for being!"

"Yeh," said the associate judge, "and the nigger outrode Grogan, if anybody should ask you. He had a chance--if he hadn't let that horse's head flop to go the bat!"

"It wasn't that," said the other quickly. "The horse flinched when he hit him."

"I been photographed and interviewed till I'm black in the face," complained Old Man Curry, "and now you come along. You're worse than them confounded reporters!"

"You bet I am," was the calm response of the Bald-faced Kid, "because I know more. And yet I don't know enough to satisfy me. Somebody played Elisha, and it wasn't me. You never went near the betting ring. I watched you."

"My money did. Quite a gob of it."

"And you--you thought he'd win?"

"Didn't I tell you to bet on him?"

"Hell!" wailed the Bald-faced Kid. "He was _lame_--he couldn't walk the night before! Bet on him? How could I after I'd seen him in that fix?"

"Frank," said the old man, "you believe everything you see, don't you?"

The Bald-faced Kid sat down and took his head in his hands.

"Tell it to me, old-timer," said he humbly. "I'm such a wise guy that it hurts me; but something has come off here that's a mile over my head. Tell me; I'm no mind reader."

Old Man Curry combed his beard reflectively and gazed through the tack-room door into the dusk of the summer evening.

"Son," said he at length, "you never swapped hosses much, did you?"

"Never owned any to swap," was the muffled response.

"Too bad. You would have learned things. For instance, there's a trick that can be worked when you want to buy a hoss cheap and can get at him for a minute. It's done with a needle and thread and a hair from the hoss's tail. There's a spot in the leg where the tendons come together, and the trick is to pass that hosshair in between the tendons and trim off the ends just long enough so's you can find 'em again. Best part of the trick is it don't hurt the hoss none, but he knows it's there and he won't hardly rest his foot on the ground till it's pulled out. Then he's as good as new again."

"Lovely!" groaned the Kid. "What makes you so close-mouthed, old-timer?"

"Experience, son, experience. 'He that hath knowledge spareth his words.' I spared quite a-many. I knew there was a spy in camp, and I sewed up Elisha on Wednesday and let Henry see him. Al Engle came over and peeked to make sure. I had the little nigger watching for him. You saw Elisha that same night, and the whole kit and boiling of you got a couple of notions fixed in your heads--first, that it _was_ Elisha; second, that he was a tol'able lame hoss. You expected, when you looked in that stall again, you'd see a big red hoss with a white spot on his forehead--lame. Well, you did, but it wasn't the same one."

"Elijah!" said the Kid. "And you lamed him too?"

"I had to do it. People expected to see a lame hoss; I had to have one to show 'em, didn't I? But nobody got a look at him in bright daylight, son. After you went away Wednesday night I pulled out the hosshair, put Elisha in Elijah's stall, and vice versey, as they say. Then I worked on Elijah, and when Henry came along he didn't know the difference. Them hosses look a lot alike, anyway; put a little daub of white stuff on Elijah's forehead, keep him blanketed up pretty snug, and--well, I reckon that's about all they was to it."

"Fifty and sixty to one--going begging!" mourning the Kid. "Why didn't you tell me what was coming off?"

"Because Henry was watching both of us," was the reply. "And, speaking of Henry, it was you told me the sons of Belial had gone into the spy business, so I p'tected your interests the best I could. Here's a little ticket calling for quite a mess of money. It's on the Abe Goldmark's book, and I didn't cash it because I wanted you to have a chance to laugh at him when he pays off. Last I seen of him he was sore but solvent."

THE LAST CHANCE

It was the Bald-faced Kid who christened him Little Calamity because, as he explained, Jockey Gillis was a sniffling, whining, half portion of hard luck and a disgrace to the disreputable profession of touting. "Every season," said the Bald-faced Kid, "is a tough season for a guy like that. He carries his hard luck with him. He's cockeyed something awful; his face was put on upside down; you can't tell whether he's looking you in the eye or watching out for a policeman, and drunks shy clear across the betting ring to get away from him. That's the tip-off; when a souse won't listen to your gentle voice, it's time to change your system of approach. This Little Calamity person has only got one thing in his favour, and that's an honest face; he _looks_ like a thief, and, by golly, he _is_ one. He couldn't sell a twenty-dollar gold piece for a dime or make a sucker put down a bet with the winning numbers already hanging on the board in front of him. They all give him the once over and holler for the police. And as for his riding, he's about as much help to a horse as a fine case of the heaves. I'm darned if I know how he manages to live!"

Little Calamity sometimes wondered about this himself. Of course there were the rare occasions when he was able to persuade a weak-minded owner to give him a mount on a hopeless outsider or a horse entered only for the sake of the workout, but the five-dollar jockey fees were few and far between. They could not be stretched to cover the intervening periods, so Little Calamity did his best to be a petty larcenist with indifferent success.

He infested the betting ring with a persistence almost pitiful, but he had neither the appearance nor the manner which begets confidence in unlikely tales, and in his mouth the truth itself sounded like a fabrication. He was a willing but an unconvincing liar, and the few who lingered long enough to listen to his clumsy attempts went away smiling.

Little Calamity was nearer thirty than twenty, wrinkled and weazened and bow-legged. Worse than everything else, he was cross-eyed. The direct and compelling gaze is an absolute necessity in the touting business because the average man believes that the liar will be unable to look him in the eye. Little Calamity could not look any man in the eye without first undergoing a surgical operation. He had few acquaintances and no friends; he ate when he could slept where he could, and life to him was just a continued hard-luck story.

Imagine, then, the incredulous amazement of the Bald-faced Kid when Old Man Curry informed him that Jockey Gillis had secured steady employment.

"That shrimp?" said the Kid. "Why, if he had the ice-water privilege in hell he'd starve to death!"

"Frank," said the old man, "I wish you wouldn't be so blame keerless with your figures of speech. There won't be any ice water for the wicked, it says in the Book, and, anyway, it ain't a fit subject to joke about. It don't sound pretty."

The Bald-faced Kid took this reproof with a sober countenance, for he respected the old man's principles even if he did not understand them.

"All right, old-timer. I'll take your word for it. Got a steady job, has he? For Heaven's sake, what doing?"

"Running a racing stable for a man named Hopwood."

"Running a stable! What does Calamity know about training horses?"