Old Man Curry Part 26

"Exackly what I hoped it would do, son," and Old Man Curry fairly beamed.

"_What's that?_" The cigarette fell from the Kid's fingers, and his lower jaw sagged. "You thought Elisha could _win_--and you went and touted me on to the other one?"

Old Man Curry nodded, smiling.

As the boy watched him, his expression changed to one of deep disgust. He dipped into his vest pocket and produced his silver stop watch. "Here's something you overlooked," he sneered. "Take it, and I'll be cleaned right!"

Old Man Curry sat down beside him, but the Kid edged away. "I wouldn't have thought it of you, old-timer," said he.

"Frank," said the old man gently, "you don't understand. You don't know what I was figgerin' on."

"I know this," retorted the Kid: "if it hadn't been for you, I wouldn't have to go to b.u.t.te alone!"

"You've told her, then?"

"Last night."

"And I was right about the forgivin' business, son?"

"Didn't I say she was going to b.u.t.te with me? We had it all fixed to get married, but now----"

"Well, I don't see no reason for callin' it off." Old Man Curry's cheerfulness had returned, and as he spoke he drew out his old-fas.h.i.+oned leather wallet. "You know what I told you 'bout bad money, son--tainted money? You wouldn't take my word for it that gamblers' money brings bad luck; I just nach.e.l.ly had to fix up some scheme on you so that you wouldn't have no bad money to start out with." He opened the wallet and extracted a check upon which the ink was scarcely dry--the check of the Racing a.s.sociation for the winner's portion of the stake just decided. "I wouldn't want you to have bad luck, son," the old man continued. "I wanted you to have good luck--and a clean start. Here's some money that it wouldn't hurt anybody to handle--an honest hoss went out and run for it and earned it, an' he was runnin' for you every step of the way! Here, take it."

He thrust the check into the boy's hand--and let it stand to his credit that he answered before looking at it.

"I--I had you wrong, old-timer," he stammered: "wrong from the start.

I--I can't take this. I ain't a pauper, and I--I----"

"Why of course you can take it, son," urged the old man. "You said this game owed you a stake, and maybe it does, but the only money you can afford to start out with is clean money, and the only clean money on a race track is the money that an honest hoss can go out and run for--and win. No, I can't take it back; it's indorsed over to you."

Then, and not before, did the Kid look at the figures on the check.

"Why," he gasped, "this--this is for twenty-four hundred and something! I don't _need_ that much! I--we--_she_ says three hundred would be plenty! I----"

"That's all right," interrupted Old Man Curry. "Money--clean money--never comes amiss. You can call the three hundred the stake that was owin' to you; the rest, well, I reckon that's just my weddin' present. Good-bye, son, and good luck!"

A MORNING WORKOUT

"Well, boss, they sutny done it to us again to-day. Look like it gittin' to be a _habit_ on thisyere track!"

Thus, querulously, Jockey Moseby Jones, otherwise Little Mose, as he trudged dejectedly across the infield beside his employer, Old Man Curry, owner of Elisha, Elijah, Ezekiel, Isaiah, and other horses bearing the names of major and minor prophets. Mose was still in his silks--there were reasons, princ.i.p.ally Irish, why the little negro found it more comfortable to dress in the Curry tack room--and the patriarch of the Jungle Circuit wore the inevitable rusty frock coat and battered slouch hat. Side by side they made a queer picture: the small, bullet-headed negro in gay stable colours, and the tall, bearded scarecrow, the frayed skirts of his coat flapping at his knees as he walked. Ahead of them was Shanghai, the hostler, leading a steaming thoroughbred which had managed to finish outside the money in a race that his owner had expected him to win: expected it to the extent of several hundred dollars. "Yes, suh, it gittin' to be a habit!" complained Little Mose. "Been so long since I rode into 'at ring I fo'get what it feels like to win a race!"

"It's a habit we're goin' to break one of these days, Mose. What happened!"

"Huh! Ast me whut didn't happen! Ol' 'Lijah, he got off good, an'

first dash--_wham_! he gits b.u.mped by 'at ches'nut hawss o' Dyer's. I taken him back some an' talk to him, an' jus' when I'm sendin' him again--_pow_! Jock Merritt busts ol' 'Lijah 'cross 'e nose 'ith his whip. In 'e stretch I tries to come th'oo on inside, an' two of 'em Irish jocks pulls oveh to 'e rail and puts us in a pocket. 'Niggeh,'

they say to me, 'take 'at oat hound home 'e long way; you sutny neveh git him th'oo!' They was right, boss! 'Lijah, he come fourth, sewed up like a eagle in a cage!"

"H'm-m. And the judges didn't pay any attention when you claimed a foul?"

Little Mose gurgled wrathfully. "Huh! I done claim _three_ fouls!

Judges, they say they didn't see no foul a-a-a-tall! Didn't see us git b.u.mped; didn't see Jock Merritt hit 'Lijah; didn't see us pocketed. 'Course they didn't; they wasn't _lookin'_ faw no foul! On 'is track we not on'y got to beat hawsses; we got to beat jocks an'

judges too. How we goin' lay up any bacon agin such odds as that?"

"It can't last, Mose," was the calm reply. "'There shall be no reward to the evil man; the candle of the wicked shall be put out.'"

"It burnin' mighty bright jus' now, boss. Sol'mun, he say that?"

Old Man Curry nodded, and Little Mose sniffed sceptically. "Uh huh.

Sol'mun he neveh got jipped out of seven races in a row!"

"Seven, eh!" The old man counted on his fingers. "Why, so it is, Mose! This is the seventh time they've licked us, for a fact!" Old Man Curry began to chuckle, and the jockey eyed him curiously.

"You sutny enjoy it mo'n I do, boss," said he.

"That's because you don't read Solomon," replied the owner. "Listen: 'A just man falleth seven times and riseth up again.' Mose, we're due to rise up and smite these Philistines."

"Huh! Why not smite some 'em Irish boys first? You reckon 'em crooked judges kin see us when we risin' up?"

"We'll have to fix it so's they can't overlook us, Mose."

"Ought to git 'em some eyegla.s.ses then," was the sulky response.

"Seven and one--that's eight, Mose. We've got Solomon's word for it."

Jockey Moseby Jones shook his head doubtfully. "Mebbe so, boss, mebbe so, but thisyere Sol'mun's been dead a lo-o-ng time now. He neveh got up agin a syndicate bettin' ring an' crooked judgin'. He neveh rode no close finish 'ith Irish jocks an' had his s.h.i.+n barked on 'e fence. You kin take Sol'mun's word faw it, boss, but li'l Moseby, he's f'um Mizzoury. He'll steal a flyin' start nex' time out an' try to stay so far in front that no Irish boy kin reach him 'ith a lariat!"

A big, jovial-looking man, striding rapidly toward the stables, overtook them from the rear and announced his presence by slapping Old Man Curry resoundingly on the back. "Tough luck!" said he with a grin. "Awful tough luck, but you can't win all the time, you know, old-timer!"

"Why, yes," said Curry quietly; "that's a fact, Johnson. n.o.body but a hog would want to win _all_ the time. And I wish you wouldn't wallop me on the back thataway. I most nigh swallered my tobacco."

Johnson laughed loudly. "How do you like our track?" he asked.

"Your track is all right," answered the old man, with just a shade of emphasis placed where it would do the most good. "A visitor don't seem to do very well here, though," he added.

"The fortunes of war!" chuckled Johnson.

"Ah, hah," said Curry. "My boy here can tell you 'bout that. He says the other jockeys fight him all the way round the track."

"Well," said Johnson, "you know why that is, don't you? The boys ain't stuck on his colour, and you can't blame 'em for that, Curry.

If you had a boy like Walsh, now, it would be different."

"I'll bet it would!" was the emphatic response of Old Man Curry.

"I think I can get Walsh for you."