THE HORSE-RACE.
"Yer darsn't do it! Yer old Malden's slave, yer know yer are, and yer
darsn't breathe 'less he says so."
It was in front of the Miners' Home in Gold City, and the speaker was
an overgrown, brawny, low-browed boy of some seventeen years, who, in
ragged clothes and an old slouch hat, leaned against the post that
helped support the tumble-down roof of that notorious establishment.
In front of him, barefooted and in overalls rolled up over
well-browned legs, old blue cap, astride a little black pony whose
eyes rolled appreciatively as he lovingly half leaned upon her neck,
sat Job Malden, as the store-keepers called him; or "Andy's
Tenderfoot," as the boys dubbed him.
You would not have dreamed, had you seen him, that this brown-skinned,
tall fifteen-year-old, who rose in his saddle at this remark and spoke
out sharp and strong, was the same pale-faced city lad who had come in
the stage three years ago, homeless and friendless. The mountains had
done wonders for him; the pallor had gone from his cheeks; the sun had
tanned his shapely limbs; the wild life of nature and the still
rougher world of humanity had roused all his temper and passion. Yet,
withal, there was the touch of another world in his face. No stranger,
at second view, would have taken him for a native born. He had known a
different realm, and it had left its trace in a high brow, a fine
face, a clearer eye than one usually saw on the streets of the mining
camp.
"Yer darsn't do it!" leered again the same contemptible fellow. "Yer a
city kid an' hain't got sand 'nuff to make an ant-hill. I hearn tell
yer get the old man to button yer clothes, and yer cry in the
dark--guess it's so, ain't it, tenderfoot?"
At this remark the crowd of loungers around broke forth into cheers,
and Job's eyes, usually so blue, flashed fire. He sprang from Bess'
back, and, in an instant, had struck the bully a blow that sent him
reeling back into the arms of Yankee Sam. A moment, and a general
melee seemed imminent, when Dan Dean stepped up and called a halt. He
was the smoothest, most affable, meanest fellow in town, nephew by
marriage to the lord of Pine Tree Mountain, and, as he had always
boasted, the lord that was to be.
Job had always felt, ever since he came to Grizzly county, that Dan
was his mortal enemy, yet he had always been so sly Job had never been
able to prove him guilty of any one of the thousand petty annoyances
he was sure were instigated by him.
Taking Job by the arm, Dan now led him off to one side, while the
crowd were laughing at the blubbering bully backing up the street and
threatening all sorts of vengeance on "that tenderfoot."
All the trouble was over a horse-race. It was coming off next Sunday
down at Coyote Valley, four miles below town. Pete Wilkins had offered
his horse against all Grizzly county, and Dan Dean had boasted that he
had a horse, a black mare--or at least his Uncle Andy had--that could
beat any horse Pete could trot out. Pete had dared him to appear with
the mare; and Dan, well knowing he could not get her, was doing his
best to induce Job to steal away with her and run the race for him.
"Me and yer is cousins, yer know, seein' yer call the old man uncle
and he's my sure-enough uncle; so we's cousins, and we ought to be
pardners; now yer run the race, get the gold nugget the fellows at the
Yellow Jacket have put up, and I'll get Pete's bet, and my! won't we
have a lark! Fact is, yer don't want fellers to think yer a baby, I
know; and, as for its being Sunday, I say the better the day the
better the deed. Come, Job. I jest want to see the old black mare come
in across the line and you on her! My! what a hot one yer'll be! The
fellers will never call yer tenderfoot again!"
It was a big temptation to Job, the biggest the boy had ever known--to
beat Pete; to show off Bess; to prove he was no "tenderfoot" or "kid"
any more. But--oh, that but!--how could he deceive Mr. Malden! And
then, Sunday, too!
"Gold nugget! Whew! Such a chance!" insidious Dan still kept crying,
till Job shut his teeth together, turned from his mother's face which,
somehow, persisted in haunting him just then, laughed a sort of hollow
laugh, and said with an oath--the first he had ever uttered out
loud--that sure he would be there and show these Gold City bullies and
Pete and the whole crowd he was nobody's slave. Yet, as he said it,
there came a sort of feeling into his soul which he repelled, but
which yet came back again, that he was now indeed a slave--a slave to
Dan, a slave to the Evil One.
* * * * *
Coyote Valley was all alive. Vaqueros from the foot-hill ranches were
tearing up and down the dusty road along Coyote Creek from Wilkins'
ranch to the foot of the valley, buckboards loaded with Mexicans,
Joe's stage creaking beneath the weight of half the roughs of Gold
City, groups of excited miners on foot, were making their way as fast
as possible to Wilkins' old hay barn, which had been turned into a
combination of saloon and grand stand. Under the shade of an immense
live-oak just west of the barn, the big waiter at the Miners' Home was
running an opposition saloon to the one inside, with a plank on two
kegs for a bar. The center of the barn was already filled with
dark-skinned Senoritas and tall, gawky miners dancing to the music of
a squeaky violin.
The air was filled with dust and bets and oaths, when on that strange
Sunday morning Job galloped up Coyote Valley and pulled up in time to
hear Dan's voice in high pitch cry out:
"There she is, the best mare in Grizzly county; ten to one against the
crowd! Come in, Job; come up, boys! Let's have a drink around to the
success of the Hon. Job Malden, the slickest rider in all the hills!"
Almost before he knew it. Job was hauled bodily up to the bar and had
a beer glass in his hand. How strange he felt! How queer it all was!
He had been in the mountains three years, but this was his first
Sunday picnic.
Andrew Malden, though he had no religion, had always seen that Job
went to Sunday-school at the Frost Creek School. To-day he had
ostensibly started for there. But this was very different from the old
log school-house.
How different Job looked from the rest! He wore "store clothes" and a
neck-tie. In the rush, something dropped on the floor. He looked down
and picked it up, with a quick glance around, while a great lump came
into his throat. It was a little Testament, his mother's, the one she
had given him the day she died, and there was the old temperance
pledge he had signed in a boy's scrawling hand. He was supposed to be
at Sunday-school, so he had been obliged to carry the book.
For a moment he hesitated, then he jammed it in his pocket out of
sight. He hated it, he hated himself. The step was taken; he took the
glass, he drank with the rest. He left the bar with a proud air. He
was a man. He would win that race or die.
* * * * *
All day long the violin squeaked, the clattering feet resounded on the
barn floor, the kegs were emptied into throats, and races of all
kinds--fat men's races, women's races, old men's races--followed each
other. At last, the great event was called--Malden's mare against
Pete's noted plunger. The Vaqueros cleared the way, a pistol shot in
the distance announced they had started, a cloud of dust that they
were coming. It was not a trot; it was a neck-and-neck run, such as
Job had taken hundreds of times over the great pasture lot on Pine
Tree Ranch. He was perfectly at home. With arms clasped around her
neck, he urged Bess on; he sang, he coaxed, he cheered her. Bess knew
that voice, and, catching the passion of the hour, fairly flew. Faster
and faster she went, but faster and faster came Pete at her heels--now
Job felt the hot breath of the other horse on his cheek--now they fell
back--now they were close behind him. They were near the line--but a
hundred paces and the old oak would be passed. Pete was desperate; the
fire of anger was in his eyes. Job heard one of Pete's excited friends
shout, "Throw him, Pete!" The thought of awful danger flew through
Job's mind: The angry man would do it--Bess must go faster. She was
white with foam now, but go she must. He hugged her closer; he
sang--how out of place the piece seemed! 'Twas the song, though, that
always roused her, so he sang it, as so often be had sung it in the
great oak pasture of the home ranch--"Palms of victory, crowns of
glory I shall wear,"--and, singing it, dashed across the line the
victor, while the mob yelled and Dan hugged Bess and the waiter
offered a free treat to the whole crowd. Job Malden had won the race,
the gold nugget was his, but oh, how much he had lost!