Chapter 16

Accustomed to reading Langdon's mind, Crane surmised from the Trainer's manner that the latter had something that he had not yet broached. Their talk had been somewhat desultory, much like the conversation of men who have striven and succeeded and are flushed with the full enjoyment of their success. Suddenly the Trainer drew himself together, as if for a plunge, and said: “Did you notice Porter's mare in the Brooklyn, sir?”

“Yes; she ran a pretty good race for a three-year-old.”

“She did, an' I suppose they'll start her in the Derby. Do you happen to know, sir?”

“I fancy they will,” answered Crane, carelessly.

“She stopped bad yesterday; but I've heard somethin'.”

Crane remembered his own suspicion as to Lucretia's rider, but he only said, “Well?”

“After the race yesterday the jockey, Redpath, was talkin'--to the Porter gal--”

Crane started. It jarred him to hear this horseman refer to Allis as “the Porter gal.”

“Redpath told her,” proceeded Langdon, “that when he saw he couldn't quite win he pulled his mount off to keep her dark for the Derby.”

“How do you know this?”

“A boy in my stable happened to be in the stall an' heard 'em.”

“Who's the boy? Can you believe him?”

“It's Shandy. He used to be with the Porters.”

Like a flash it came to Crane that the spy must be the one who had written him the note about Faust and the change of saddles.

“Well, that doesn't affect us, that I can see,” commented Crane. “I'm not backing their mare.”

“It means,” declared Langdon, with great earnestness, “that if Lucretia could have beat all the others but Diablo, she has a rosy chance for the Derby; that's what it means. The Black got away with a flyin' start, and she wore him down, almost beat him; I doubt if The Dutchman could do that much. She was givin' him a little weight, too.”

“Well, we can't help it. I've backed The Dutchman to win a small fortune, and I'm going to stand by it. You're in it to the extent of ten thousand, as you know, and we've just got to try and beat her with our colt; that's all there is to it.”

“I don't like it,” muttered Langdon, surlily. “She's a mighty good three-year-old to put up a race like that.”

“She may go off before Derby day,” suggested Crane; “mares are uncertain at this time of year.”

“That's just it; if she would go off we'd feel pretty sure then. I think the race is between them.”

“Well, we'll know race day; if she goes to the post, judging from what you say, it'll be a pretty tight fit.”

“She didn't cut much figure last year when Lauzanne beat her.” Langdon said this with a drawling significance; it was a direct intimation that if Lucretia's present jockey could be got at, as her last year's rider had been--well, an important rival would be removed.

Crane had not been responsible for the bribing of Lucretia's jockey, though he was well aware what had occurred; had even profited by it.

“There'll be no crooked work this time,” he said; “nobody will interfere with the mare's rider, I hope,” and he looked significantly at Langdon.

“I don't think they will,” and the Trainer gave a disagreeable laugh. “From what Shandy tells me, I fancy it would be a bad game. The truth of the matter is that gosling Redpath is stuck on the gal.”

Crane's pale face flushed hot.

“I believe that Shandy you speak of is a lying little scoundrel. I have an idea that he wrote me a note, a wretched scrawl, once. Wait, I've got it in my pocket; I meant to speak to you about it before.”

Crane drew from the inner pocket of his coat a leather case, and after a search found Shandy's unsigned letter, and passed it over to the Trainer.

“It's dollars to doughnuts Shandy wrote it. Let me keep this, sir.”

“You're welcome to it,” answered Crane; “you can settle with him. But about the Derby, I have reasons for wishing to win that race, reasons other than the money. I want to win it, bad. Do you understand?”

“I think I do. When you say you want to win a race, you generally want to win it.”

“Yes, I do. But see here, Langdon, just leave their jockey to take orders from his own master, see?”

“I wasn't goin' to put up no game with him, sir.”

“Of course not, of course not. It wouldn't do. He's a straight boy, I think, and just leave him to ride the best he knows how. We've got a better jockey in Westley. Besides, the Brooklyn Handicap has taken a lot out of their mare; they may find that she'll go back after it. I think you'd better get rid of that Shandy serpent; he seems ripe for any deviltry. You can't tell but what he might get at The Dutchman if somebody paid him. If I'm any judge of outlawed human nature, he'd do it. I've got to run down to Brookfield on a matter of business, but shall be back again in a day or so. Just keep an eye on The Dutchman--but I needn't tell you that, of course.”

“That two-year-old I bought at Morris Park is coughin' an' runnin' at the nose; I blistered his throat last night; he's got influenza,” volunteered the Trainer.

“Keep him away from The Dutchman, then.”

“I've got him in another barn; that stuff's as catchin' as measles.”

“If The Dutchman were to get a touch of it, Porter would land the Derby with Lucretia, I fancy.”

“Or if they got it in their stable we'd be on Easy Street.”

“I suppose so. But Dixon's pretty sharp; he'll look out if he hears it's about. However, we've got to watch our own horse and let them do the same.”

XXVII

That evening Langdon and Jakey Faust were closeted together in a room of the former's cottage. An A1 piece of villainy was on, and they were conversing in low tones.

“It's a cinch for The Dutchman if it wasn't for that damn mare Lucretia,” Langdon observed, in an injured tone, as though somehow the mare's excellence was an unwarranted interference with his rights.

“What about the jock?” asked Faust.

“No good--can't be done. He's mooney on the gal.”

“Huh!” commented the Cherub. “Did you talk it over with the Boss? He's not a bad guy gettin' next a good thing.”

“He gave me the straight tip to give Redpath the go-by.”

“What's his little game? Is he going to hedge on the mare?”

“No; he'll stand his bet flat-footed. Say, he's the slickest! If he didn't give me the straight office that the mare might get sick, then I'm a Dutchman.”

“We're both Dutchmen.” The Cherub laughed immoderately at his stupid joke. “See, we're both standin' for The Dutchman, ain't we?”

Langdon frowned at the other's levity. “You'll laugh out the other side your mouth if Lucretia puts up a race in the Derby like she did in the Handicap.”

“But ain't she goin' to get sick? We could whip-saw them both ways then, that's if we knew it first. I could lay against her an' back your horse.”

“I wish the old man wasn't so devilish deep; he makes me tired sometimes; gives it to me straight in one breath that he's got reasons for wantin' to win the race, an' then he pulls that preacher mug of his down a peg an' says, solemn like: 'But don't interfere with their jockey.' Then he talks about The Dutchman or Lucretia gettin' the influenza, an' that Andy Dixon is pretty fly about watchin' the mare. Now what do you make of all that, Jake?”

“Well, you area mug. It don't need no makin' up. That book's all rounded to. He wants the mare stopped, an' don't want no muddlin' about with the jockey, see? Wasn't there a row over stoppin' Lucretia last year? Wasn't the boy set down for the meetin'? You ought to know; you had to pay through the nose for shuttin' his mouth. But what made the old man talk about the mare gettin' sick?”

Langdon searched his memory; just how was that subject started? “Damn it! yes, of course; I told him about the two-year-old havin' the influenza.”

“Well, Dick, my boy, you've guessed it, though you weren't trying. Crane would like to see the Porter mare coughin'.”

“But you can't take a strange horse into their stable, an' him sick,” objected the Trainer.

“Right you are, Dick. But you could take the sickness there, if you had a boy with the sabe.”

“I was thinkin' of that,” said Langdon, reflectively; “I was wonderin' if that's what the Boss meant.”

“Sure thing--that's his way; he never wants to stand in for none of the blame, but he likes to feel sure that he's goin' to win.”

“It looks a bit like it, damn me if it don't; an' I believe he was givin' me a pointer about the proper boy for the job, too. He said Shandy would get at a horse quick enough if he was paid for it.”

“There you are; what more do you want? Would you have Crane get out on the housetop an' shout to you to go an' cruel Porter's mare? He's slick, he is, an' if it can be done you've got a great chance.”

“I'm a poor man,” whined Langdon, “an' I can't take no chances on loosin' ten thousand, if it can be helped.”

“It's got to be done right away, 'cause it'll take a couple of days to get the mare coughin'.”

“I told Shandy to come here,” said the Trainer; “he ought to be turnin' up soon. When you hear him knock, just slip into that other room, an' leave the door open a little so that you can hear what takes place. God knows what that young imp wouldn't swear if a fellow had no witnesses. I think he's comin' here to-night to ask me to pay him to do some dirty job, an' I won't do it, see?” and he winked at Faust. “He's a bad boy,” said the Bookmaker, in a tone of mock condemnation.

“There he is now,” declared Langdon. “I hear a step on the gravel. Quick, slip into the room; he'll be peepin' through the windows; he's like a fox.”

There was a knock at the door. When Langdon opened it Shandy shuffled into the room with a peculiar little rocking-horse sort of gait, just like the trot of a skunk. His whole appearance somehow suggested this despised animal.

“Have you heard anything from the Porter stable?” Langdon asked, when the boy had taken a seat.

“The little mare's well,” the boy answered, laconically.

“That's bad luck for us, Shandy. We'll be poorer by the matter of a few thousand if they win the Derby.”

“Who's we?” questioned Shandy, with saucy directness.

“The whole stable. A man has played The Dutchman to win a hundred thousand, an' he's goin' to give the boys, one or two of them, five hundred if it comes off.”

The small imp's weak, red-lidded eyes took on a hungry, famished look. “What're you givin' us is that straight goods?” he demanded, doubtingly.

Langdon didn't answer the question direct; he said: “My man's afraid somebody'll get at The Dutchman. There's a lot of horse sickness about, an' if anyone was to take some of the poison from a sick horse's nose and put it in The Dutchman's nostrils at night, why he'd never start in the Derby, I reckon.”

A look of deep cunning crept into the boy's thin freckled face; his eyes contracted and blinked nervously.

“What th' 'ell's the difference? If the Porter mare starts Redpath thinks he's got a lead-pipe cinch.”

“You'd lose your five hundred; that's the difference,” retorted Langdon.

“An' if she doesn't start, an' our horse wins, I get five hundred? Is that dead to rights?”

“If The Dutchan wins you get the money,” replied the Trainer, circumspectly. “You mustn't come to me, Shandy, with no game about takin' the horse sickness from, our two-year-old an' fixin' Porter's mare, 'cause I can't stand for that, see?”

The boy would have interrupted, but Langdon motioned him to keep silent, and proceeded:

“You see, if it leaked out an' we'd won a lot of money over The Dutchman, damn fools would say that I'd been at the bottom of it; an' if they had me up in front of the Stewards I couldn't swear that I'd had nothing to do with it.”

He pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket, held it in front of Shandy's eyes, and said: “What did you write that letter for?”

The boy stared in blank amazement. He trembled with fear; it was the warning note he had sent to Crane.

“Now if I was to show that to Faust he'd put a pug on to do you up, see? I wouldn't give three cents for your carcass after they'd finished with you.”

“I didn't mean nothin', s' help me God, I didn't,” pleaded the boy; “give it back to me, sir.”

“You can take it, only don't play me the double cross no more. If you're doin' anything crooked, don't mix me up in it. You couldn't get into Porter's stable, anyway, if you tried to fix the mare.”

“I didn't say I was goin' to do no bloomin' job; but I could get in right enough.”

“Well, I ain't puttin' you next no dirty work, but if you hear that the mare gets this horse sickness that's goin' about, let me know at once, see? Come here quick. If Faust got a chance to lay against the mare he probably wouldn't say anythin' about that note, if he did know.”

“I'll give you the office, sir, when she's took sick.”

“That's right. You ain't got any too many friends, Shandy, an' you'd better stick to them that'll help you.”

“Do I get that five hundred, sure?”

“If Lucretia don't beat The Dutchman, you get it.”

When the boy had gone Faust came forth from his hiding like a badger.

“That's a bad boy--a wicked boy!” he said, pulling a solemn face. “You're a good man, Langdon, to steer him in the straight an' narrer path. He'll take good care of The Dutchman for that five hundred.”

“Yes, if you don't pay these kids well they'll throw you down; an' I ain't takin' no chances, Faust.”

“The Porter mare might catch the influenza, eh, Dick?”

“If she does, I'll let you know at once, Jake. But I ain't in it. I threatened to kick that kid out when he hinted at something crooked.”

“I heard you, Langdon, I'll take my oath to that. But I must be off now. You know where to find me if there's anything doin'.”

XXVIII

The next day, intent on persuading Porter to accept the money won over Diablo, Crane took a run down to Ringwood farm.

As Allis had foreshadowed, his visit was of no avail, so far as Porter's acceptance of the winnings was concerned.

With natural forethought Crane first talked it over with Mrs. Porter, but that good lady would have felt a sort of moral defilement in handling any betting money, much less this that seemed obscured in uncertainty as to its rightful ownership. She believed very much in Crane's bona fides, and had no doubt whatever but his statement of the case was absolutely truthful. But Allis had refused to accept the money; it would never do for her to go beyond her daughter's judgment. She even thought it unadvisable for Crane to discuss the matter with her husband; it would only worry him, and she was positive that, in his pride of independence, he would refuse to touch a penny that was not actually due him.

“But there's a payment on Ringwood due in a few days,” Crane argued, “and we must arrange for that at all events. If this money, which is rightfully your family's, could be applied on that, it would make a difference, don't you think?”

“I suppose John must settle it,” she said, resignedly; “perhaps you had better see him. I can't interfere one way or the other. I have no head for business,” she added, apologetically; “I'm not sure that any of us have except Allis. We just seem to drift, drift, drift.”

Crane stated the facts very plausibly, very seductively, to John Porter. Porter almost unreasonably scented charity in Crane's proposal. He believed that the bet was a myth; Crane was trying to present him with this sum as a compensation for having lost Diablo. It wasn't even a loan; it was a gift, pure and simple. His very helplessness, his poverty, made him decline the offer with unnecessary fierceness. If Allis had refused it, if she were strong enough to stand without this charity, surely he, a man, battered though he was, could pass it by. He had received a hopeful message from Allis as to Lucretia's chances in the Derby; they felt confident of winning. That win would relieve them of all obligations.

“I can't take it,” Porter said to Crane. “Allis is more familiar with the circumstances of the bet--if there was one--than I. It must just rest with her; she's the man now, you know,” he added, plaintively; “I'm but a broken wreck, and what she says goes.”

“But there's a payment on Ringwood falling due in a few days,” Crane remonstrated, even as he had to Mrs. Porter.

Porter collapsed, fretfully. He could stand out against prospective financial stringency, but actual obligations for which he had no means quite broke down his weakened energy. He had forgotten about this liability, that is, had thought the time of payment more distant. He would be forced to recall the money he had given Dixon to bet on Lucretia for the Derby, to meet this payment to the bank.

Quite despondently he answered the other man. “I had forgotten all about it; this shake-up has tangled my memory. I can pay the money, though,” he added, half defiantly; “it will hamper me, but I can do it.”

A sudden thought came to Crane, an inspiration. “I've got it!” he exclaimed.

Porter brightened up; there was such a world of confidence in the other's manner.

“We'll just let this Diablo money stand against the payment which is about due on Ringwood; put it in the bank to cover it, so to speak; later we can settle to whom it belongs. At present it seems to be nobody's money; it's seldom one sees a few thousand going abegging for an owner,” he added, jocularly. “You say it isn't yours; I know it isn't mine; and most certainly it doesn't belong to the bookmaker, for he's lost it fair and square. We can't let him keep it; they win enough of the public's money.”

Reluctantly, Porter gave a half-hearted acquiescence. He would have sacrificed tangible interests to leave the money that was in Dixon's hands with him to bet on Lucretia. It would be like not taking the tide at its flood to let her run unbacked when her chances of winning were so good, and the odds against her great enough to insure a big return.

It was after banking hours, quite toward evening, by the time Crane had obtained this concession. He had brought the winnings for John Porter's acceptance, should the latter prove amenable to reason. Now it occurred to him that he might leave the money with one of the bank staff, who could deposit it the next day.

Crane drove back to the village and went at once to the cashier, Mr. Lane's house. He was not at home; his wife thought perhaps he was still in the bank. Crane went there in search of him. He found only Mortimer, who had remained late over his accounts. From the latter Crane learned that the cashier had driven over to a neighboring town.

“It doesn't matter,” remarked Crane; “I can leave this money with you. It's to meet a payment of three thousand due from John Porter about the middle of June. You can put it in a safe place in the vault till the note falls due, and then transfer it to Porter's credit.”

“I'll attend to it, sir,” replied Mortimer. “I'll attach the money to the note, and put them away together.”

On his way to the station Crane met Alan Porter.

“I suppose you'd like a holiday to see your father's mare run for the Derby, wouldn't you, Alan?” he said.

“I should very much, sir; but Mr. Lane is set against racing.”

“Oh, I think he'll let you off that day. I'll tell him he may. But, like your mother, I don't approve of young men betting--I know what it means.”

He was thinking, with bitterness, of his own youthful indiscretions.

“If you go, don't bet. You might be tempted, naturally, to back your father's mare Lucretia, but you would stand a very good chance of losing.”

“Don't you think she'll win, sir?” Alan asked, emboldened by his employer's freedom of speech.

“I do not. My horse, The Dutchman, is almost certain to win, my trainer tells me.” Then he added, apologetic of his confidential mood, “I tell you this, lest through loyalty to your own people you should lose your money. Racing, I fancy, is very uncertain, even when it seems most certain.”

Again Crane had cause to congratulate himself upon the somewhat clever manipulation of a difficult situation. He had scored again in his diplomatic love endeavor. He knew quite well that Allis's determined stand was only made possible by her expectation of gaining financial relief for her father through Lucretia's winning the Derby. Should she fail, they would be almost forced to turn to him in their difficulties. That was what he wanted. He knew that the money won over Diablo, if accepted, must always be considered as coming from him. The gradual persistent dropping of water would wear away the hardest stone; he would attain to his wishes yet.

He was no bungler to attempt other than the most gently delicate methods.

XXIX

Encouraged by Jockey Redpath's explanation of his ride on Lucretia, Allis was anxious that Dixon should take the money her father had set aside for that purpose and back their mare for the Brooklyn Derby.

“We had better wait a day or two,” Dixon had advised, “until we see the effect the hard gallop in the Handicap has had on the little mare. She ain't cleanin' up her oats just as well as she might; she's a bit off her feed, but it's only natural, though; a gallop like that takes it out of them a bit.”

It was the day after Crane's visit to Ringwood that Dixon advised Allis that Lucretia seemed none the worse for her exertion.

“Perhaps we'd better put the money on right away,” he said. “She's sure to keep well, and we'll be forced to take a much shorter price race day.”

“Back the stable,” advised Allis, “then if anything happens Lucretia we can start Lauzanne.”

The Trainer laughed in good-natured derision. “That wouldn't do much good; we'd be out of the frying pan into the fire; we'd be just that much more money out for jockey an' startin' fees; he'd oughter been struck out on the first of January to save fifty dollars, but I guess you all had your troubles about that time an' wasn't thinkin' of declarations.”

“It may have been luck; if Lauzanne would only try, something tells me he'd win,” contended the girl.

“And somethin' tells me he wouldn't try a yard,” answered Dixon, in good-humored opposition. “But I don't think it'll make no difference in the odds we get whether we back the stable or Lucretia alone; they won't take no stock in the Chestnut's prospects.”

So Dixon made a little pilgrimage among the pencilers. He was somewhat dismayed and greatly astonished that these gentry also had a somewhat rosy opinion of Lucretia's chances. Her good gallop in the Brooklyn Handicap had been observed by other eyes than Crane's. Ten to one was the best offer he could get.

Dixon was remonstrating with a bookmaker, Ulmer, when the latter answered, “Ten's the best I'll lay--I'd rather take it myself; in fact, I have backed your mare because I think she's got a great chance; she'll be at fours race day. But I'll give you a tip--it's my game to see the owner's money on,” and he winked at the Trainer as much as to say, “I'll feel happier about it if we're both in the same boat.”

“It'll be on, sure thing, if I can get a decent price.”

“Well, you go to Cherub Faust; he'll lay you longer odds. I put my bit on with him at twelve, see? If I didn't know that you an' Porter was always on the straight I'd a-thought there was somethin' doin', an' Faust was next it, stretchin' the odds that way. How's the mare doin--is she none the worse?” Ullmer asked, a suspicious thought crossing his mind.

“We're backin' her--an' money talks,” said Dixon, with quiet assurance.

“Well, Faust is wise to somethin'--he stands in with Langdon, an' I suppose they think they've got a cinch in The Dutchman. Yes, that must be it,” he added, reflectively; “they made a killin' over Diablo, an' likely they got a good line on The Dutchman through him in a trial. But a three-year-old mare that runs as prominent in the big Handicap as Lucretia did, will take a lot of beatin. She's good enough for my money.”

Thanking him, Dixon found Faust, and asked of him a quotation against Porter's stable.

“Twelve is the best I can do,” answered the Cherub.

“I'll take fifteen to one,” declared Dixon.