"Yes, I know I did," said the Steward. "But I want to give him one more
run. I have a bet on him against a new Dog here. It won't hurt him now;
he can do it. Oh, well. Here now, Mickey, don't you get sassy. One run
more this afternoon. The Dogs run two or three times a day; why not the
Jack?"
"They're not shtakin' thayre loives, sor."
"Oh, you get out."
Many more Rabbits had been added to the pen,--big and small, peaceful
and warlike,--and one big Buck of savage instincts, seeing Jack
Warhorse's hurried dash into the Haven that morning, took advantage of
the moment to attack him.
At another time Jack would have thumped his skull, as he once did the
Cat's, and settled the affair in a minute; but now it took several
minutes, during which he himself got roughly handled; so when the
afternoon came he was suffering from one or two bruises and stiffening
wounds; not serious, indeed, but enough to lower his speed.
The start was much like those of previous runs. The Warhorse steaming
away low and lightly, his ears up and the breezes whistling through his
thirteen stars.
Minkie with Fango, the new Dog, bounded in eager pursuit, but, to the
surprise of the starters, the gap grew smaller. The Warhorse was losing
ground, and right before the Grand Stand old Minkie turned him, and a
cheer went up from the dog-men, for all knew the runners. Within fifty
yards Fango scored a turn, and the race was right back to the start.
There stood Slyman and Mickey. The Rabbit dodged, the Greyhounds
plunged; Jack could not get away, and just as the final snap seemed
near, the Warhorse leaped straight for Mickey, and in an instant was
hidden in his arms, while the starter's feet flew out in energetic
kicks to repel the furious Dogs. It is not likely that the Jack knew
Mickey for a friend; he only yielded to the old instinct to fly from a
certain enemy to a neutral or a possible friend, and, as luck would
have it, he had wisely leaped and well. A cheer went up from the
benches as Mickey hurried back with his favorite. But the dog-men
protested "it wasn't a fair run--they wanted it finished." They
appealed to the Steward. He had backed the Jack against Fango. He was
sore now, and ordered a new race.
An hour's rest was the best Mickey could get for him. Then he went as
before, with Fango and Minkie in pursuit. He seemed less stiff now--he
ran more like himself; but a little past the Stand he was turned by
Fango and again by Minkie, and back and across, and here and there,
leaping frantically and barely eluding his foes. For several minutes it
lasted. Mickey could see that Jack's ears were sinking. The new Dog
leaped. Jack dodged almost under him to escape, and back only to meet
the second Dog; and now both ears were flat on his back. But the Hounds
were suffering too. Their tongues were lolling out; their jaws and
heaving sides were splashed with foam. The Warhorse's ears went up
again. His courage seemed to revive in their distress. He made a
straight dash for the Haven; but the straight dash was just what the
Hounds could do, and within a hundred yards he was turned again, to
begin another desperate game of zigzag. Then the dog-men saw danger for
their Dogs, and two new ones were slipped--two fresh Hounds; surely
they could end the race. But they did not. The first two were
vanquished--gasping--out of it, but the next two were racing near. The
Warhorse put forth all his strength. He left the first two far
behind--was nearly to the Haven when the second two came up.
Nothing but dodging could save him now. His ears were sinking, his
heart was pattering on his ribs, but his spirit was strong. He flung
himself in wildest zigzags. The Hounds tumbled over each other. Again
and again they thought they had him. One of them snapped off the end of
his long black tail, yet he escaped; but he could not get to the Haven.
The luck was against him. He was forced nearer to the Grand Stand. A
thousand ladies were watching. The time limit was up. The second Dogs
were suffering, when Mickey came running, yelling like a
madman--words--imprecations--crazy sounds:
"Ye blackguard hoodlums! Ye dhirty, cowardly bastes!" and he rushed
furiously at the Dogs, intent to do them bodily harm.
Officers came running and shouting, and Mickey, shrieking hatred and
defiance, was dragged from the field, reviling Dogs and men with every
horrid, insulting name he could think of or invent.
"Fair play! Whayer's yer fair play, ye liars, ye dhirty cheats, ye
bloody cowards!" And they drove him from the arena. The last he saw of
it was the four foaming Dogs feebly dodging after a weak and worn-out
Jack-rabbit, and the judge on his Horse beckoning to the man with the
gun.
The gate closed behind him, and Mickey heard a bang-bang, an unusual
uproar mixed with yelps of Dogs, and he knew that Little Jack Warhorse
had been served with finish No. 4.
All his life he had loved Dogs, but his sense of fair play was
outraged. He could not get in, nor see in from where he was. He raced
along the lane to the Haven, where he might get a good view, and
arrived in time to see--Little Jack Warhorse with his half-masted ears
limp into the Haven; and he realized at once that the man with the gun
had missed, had hit the wrong runner, for there was the crowd at the
Stand watching two men who were carrying a wounded Greyhound, while a
veterinary surgeon was ministering to another that was panting on the
ground.
Mickey looked about, seized a little shipping-box, put it at the angle
of the Haven, carefully drove the tired thing into it, closed the lid,
then, with the box under his arm, he scaled the fence unseen in the
confusion and was gone.
'It didn't matter; he had lost his job anyway.' He tramped away from
the city. He took the train at the nearest station and travelled some
hours, and now he was in Rabbit country again. The sun had long gone
down; the night with its stars was over the plain when among the farms,
the Osage and alfalfa, Mickey Doo opened the box and gently put the
Warhorse out.
Grinning as he did so, he said: "Shure an' it's ould Oireland thot's
proud to set the thirteen stars at liberty wance moore."
For a moment the Little Warhorse gazed in doubt, then took three or
four long leaps and a spy-hop to get his bearings. Now spreading his
national colors and his honor-marked ears, he bounded into his hard-won
freedom, strong as ever, and melted into the night of his native plain.
He has been seen many times in Kaskado, and there have been many Rabbit
drives in that region, but he seems to know some means of baffling them
now, for, in all the thousands that have been trapped and corralled,
they have never since seen the star-spangled ears of Little jack
Warhorse.