_And the Evaporation of His Resolution to Have Nothing to Do With Them._
"Touts," said Busyday, oracularly, to his companion on a train bound for
the Bay on Suburban day, "are the derned nuisances of the racing game.
You want to watch out for them. If by chance you should get separated
from me in the crowd, don't you let any of the sharp-eyed, soft-voiced
ducks talk you into playing this or that one. Just you stick to those
selections I wrote out for you on that piece of paper. They're the
logical winners. A friend of mine, whose brother is a bookmaker,
handicapped 'em for me, and I'm going to play every one of 'em myself.
That's the only way to win; stick to your selections, and don't let
yourself be touted. The man who listens to touts smokes a pipe.
Understand?"
"Uh, huh," replied Busyday's friend, who was from Busyday's native town
out West. He had never seen a horse race in his life, whereas Busyday
was an old-timer and learned at the game, having seen three Handicaps
and two Suburbans ran.
"They make kind of a lukewarm effort to keep the touts off the tracks,"
went on Busyday, disparagingly; "but the touts are too smooth for 'em,
and they're always around, looking for good things like you, old man.
All you've got to do is just to flout 'em from the jump, as soon as they
edge up to you, and they'll shoo-fly instantly, rather than take chances
on being spotted by the Pinkerton people. Tell 'em to go to the devil,
that's all."
"Uh, huh," answered Busyday's friend and guest, once more.
It came to pass that Busyday and his visiting townsman were separated
before they had got off the train. The car was jammed, and in the
confusion of getting off they made their exits by different doors.
Busyday frantically yelled out his friend's name as soon as he found
himself alone on the platform, but, of course, he got no reply. His
friend was engulfed in the crowd.
"I s'pose I ought to have held hold of his hand, like a fellow does when
he takes his sister's kids out for a walk," he reflected. "This is
blasted mean luck from the go-off. The touts'll get hold of him now,
sure as shootin', and they'll strip him. Good thing he's got his ticket
back to the little old slab of a town where we used to play shinny
together."
Busyday roamed around the grand-stand and the betting ring for ten
minutes before the slates went up for the first race, trying to catch
sight of his friend, but it was no use. His townsman wasn't visible
anywhere. Then a sudden swirling and eddying in the betting ring told
him that the prices were up for the first race.
"I'll have to pass the old boy up until I get this bet down," said
Busyday to himself, pulling out of his pocket the slip of paper that the
handicapper had given him the evening before. "Let's see, what one of
'em have I got to win this? Oh, yes; Peaceful--good name, but it doesn't
sound as if a horse with a name like that could run much. I'd rather
have a horse called Lightning Express, or Cyclone, or Helen Blazes, or
something like that, run for my money. S'pose, though, this handicapping
chap knows what he is doing, and so I'll just put my first ten on
Peaceful to win. Hey? How's that?"
There was a soft, persuasive buzz right in Busyday's ear.
"D'ye notice all the suckers breakin' their necks t' land on that
Peaceful dead one?" were the words that formed the buzz.
Busyday jerked his head around suddenly, and he found within four inches
of his ear the countenance of a young-old man with red hair, a freckled
skin, and a pale-blue, shifty eye.
"Dead one?" echoed Busyday, the red-haired, young-old man smiling
amiably in his face.
"Libster," said he of the pale-blue, shifty eye, looking entirely
disinterested. "Out-and-out libster. Crab. Run about a dozen sprints,
and still a merry maiden. And look at the chancts th' mutt's had to win!
Leads th' percession into th' stretch every whirl, and then chucks it. A
proper dog, Cap. That's on the dead. Worst quitter on th' grounds."
"Um," said Busyday, stroking his chin and wondering why his handicapper
had picked Peaceful.
"I got th' baby," buzzed the freckle-faced, young-old man, after a
silence.
"Hey?" asked Busyday.
"For a pipe," said the shifty-eyed one. "Say, I don't git out o' me
Waldorf bunk at 3 o'clock every mornin' for me health."
"Is that so?" inquired Busyday, just for the sake of saying something.
"Not on yer dinner pail," said the aged youth with the shifty eye. "I
light out fer th' tracks t' watch 'em at their early mornin' works. I'm
a railbird, all right, but I know where th' dough is. I seen this baby
that I'm tellin' you about do the five-eighths in a minute flat th'
other mornin', an' if he ain't a moral fer this, here's my lid an' you
can eat it," whereupon the shifty-eyed one removed his 50-cent straw hat
and offered it to Busyday.
"What's the name of this wonder?" inquired Busyday, trying to work up a
superior smile.
The aged youth bent over, placed his mouth within a quarter of an inch
of Busyday's ear, and whispered:
"Stuart. He'll walk."
"Oh, well, then, I'll waste a ten-spot on Stuart," said Busyday, trying
to say it languidly, as if he didn't take much stock in himself or
anybody else. Then he plunged into the vortex around one of the
bookmakers' elevated chairs, got his feet trod upon, his hat jammed down
over his eyes, and his ribs treated to an all-hands elbow massage, and
finally succeeded in passing up his ten-dollar bill on Stuart to win.
"Stuart, thirty-five to ten," droned the bookmaker to the sheet-writer,
and then Busyday found himself beaten to the outskirts of the crowd.
"You on?" he heard in his ear, and, turning, he saw the freckle-faced
one smiling up at him.
"Yep--dropped ten on it," replied Busyday. "Kind o' liked Stuart myself
when I saw him entered."
Then Busyday steered for the lawn to see the finish of the race. He was
trying to get some sense out of the list of owners' colors on his
program, so as to be able to distinguish his horse as they raced under
the wire, when a calm man next to him, with a pair of field-glasses to
his eyes, mumbled:
"They're off!"
There was a big shout all around.
"Lady Uncas out in front," said the calm man coolly. "She'll curl up.
She seems to be staying, though, at that. Nope, she's collared. Stuart's
nailed her. He walks," and the calm man put down his glasses as the
horses galloped past the sixteenth pole.
Stuart came in all alone, and Peaceful was back in the ruck.
"I had my suspicions about that Stuart horse right along," said Busyday
to himself. He had never seen the horse's name until the evening before.
"Don't know why, but I kind o' liked him. Probably because the Stuart
were a pretty swift bunch," and he chuckled to himself over his humor as
he made his way to the bookmaker's line to cash.
"Somethin' easy--like findin' it, hey?" he heard buzzed into his ear as
soon as he put his foot into the betting ring, and there was the
old-faced young man, grinning complaisantly up at him.
Busyday handed to the shifty-eyed one, who stuck to him right up to the
paying-off line, buzzing learnedly all the time about the race just ran,
a $10 bill out of his $35 winning.
"Th' next," said the red-haired wiseacre of the rail when Busyday had
fought himself away from the cashing crowd, "is what you might call a
one-hoss race. A one-hoss race, right."
"Lambent, of course?" said Busyday, looking at his piece of paper with
the selections on it. Lambent was his handicapper's selection.
The freckle-faced screwed the whole left side of his face up into one
prodigious wink.
"Not this cage," said he. "Try the next. Lambent?" and he put one large,
white, freckled hand over his face, as if to hide his confusion, and
grinned through his fingers.
"Well, Lambent figures to win, doesn't she?" asked Busyday weakly.
"Who, Lambent?" and the shifty-eyed smiled some more. "I'm goin' t'
match her in a sweepstakes against me old aunt, and back me aunt off th'
boards fer a hog-killin'. There's on'y one in this. Skinch. You can tap
on it."
"Which one?" asked Busyday in a wabbly tone.
Again the aged youth bent over until his mouth was within a quarter of
an inch of Busyday's ear.
"Swiftmas," he replied. "Been saved up for a good thing, right. If he
don't buck-jump in, here's me lid," and once more he extended his
half-dollar straw hat for Busyday's mastication.
"Well," said Busyday to himself between his teeth as he made his way
through the jostling crowd to one of the bookmakers' stands, "I guess
I'm a weak and erring brother, all right, but danged if I don't play
that redhead once more, anyhow," and he got $40 for his $20 on Swiftmas
to win. Swiftmas won by a head.
"They were too foxy t' win too far off," Busyday was informed by means
of a buzz in his ear, by this time well known, as he was elbowing his
way again to the cashing line. "Boy drew it fine so's not t' spoil th'
price next time out."
The freckle-faced old youth got $15 out of Busyday's $40 winning, and
then he looked Busyday over carefully and inquired:
"How about me?"
"You'll do," replied Busyday, candidly. "Name the next."
"His Nibs, the Prince of Melbourne," whispered the freckle-faced, and
Busyday glanced at his handicapper's selections. It was the Prince of
Melbourne there, too.
"He can't lose," said the shifty-eyed. "Just a pleasant airing fer him.
Nothin' to it. W'en you put yer coin down, you might as well stay right
here so's t' be foist in line. Put a bunch on."
"I've got some of their money," mused Busyday, "and I won't pass it all
back to 'em in a lump."
He got $75 to $30 on Prince of Melbourne to win, bought three cigars for
a dollar and a pint of wine, and then suddenly wondered where his
townsman was.
"No use trying to look him up, though," he reflected, "in this jam of
Indians. Poor old chap, I s'pose he's smashed flatter'n a pancake by
this time, without the price of a bottle of pop," and he reproached
himself a good deal for not having hung on to his guest when they left
the train. He was aroused from his reflections by the yowl, "They're
off!" and by the time he got out to the lawn the horses were coming down
the stretch.
"His Princelets, with his mouth wide open," he heard the crowd yell, and
then his chest expanded, and he muttered to himself: "I always did have
a soft spot for that derned old plug!" For the moment he forgot that the
Prince of Melbourne happened to be a two-year-old.
"Oh, w'en I pick up a good one as I go along I like t' put me fren's
on," buzzed the freckle-faced in his ear, as he made for the paying-off
line. Notwithstanding the fact that the Prince of Melbourne's name
appeared on his handicapper's list of selections, Busyday very
cheerfully gave up one-third, or $25 of his winnings, on the
two-year-old to the red-haired youth. The latter soaked the bills away
in his white-and-brown-striped trousers, and then he remarked, in an
offhand sort of way:
"Well, this is where you pass me up, ain'd it, so?"
"Well," said Busyday, "I came down to play Banastar, and I think I'll
have to stay with that hunch, if you're agreeable."
"Cert'nly," said the shifty-eyed, with an expression more of sorrow than
of anger on his lined face. "Go ahead. Help yourself. Have all th' fun
that's comin' t' you."
"Why, what's the matter?" inquired Busyday. "Ain't Banastar the play?"
"And he looks like a duck with a purty good top-knot on him, at that,"
said the freckle-faced, dreamily, paying no attention to Busyday's
question, and apparently addressing empty air.
"What's the matter with Banastar?" repeated Busyday.
"I'm not queerin' yer fun, Cap," went on the shifty-eyed. "You come down
wit' th' Banastar bug in yer nut, like all the rest, and I'm not
a-switchin' you."
"Look a-here," said Busyday, "what the dickens are you giving us,
anyhow? Don't you think Banastar'll win the Suburban?"
"Cap," said the aged youth, spitting dryly and for the first time
looking Busyday squarely in the eye, "there's a mare in this bunch
that'll run things around all the Banastars from here to Hoboken an'
back. She kin fall down, an' win. She kin take naps between poles an'
walk. She's a piperino, if ever one was pushed up fer geezers to nibble
at. But I'm not a-switchin' you, un'stand?"
"Mare, hey?" said Busyday, looking over his program. "You mean that
Imp?"
"Ain't it?" said the freckle-faced. "Well, I guess yah. She win th' last
time out with' 126 up, eatin' peanuts down th' stretch, from a bunch
purty near as good as this. Banastar? Cap, I ain't no hog, an' you've
passed along what coin was a-comin' to me. I'll lay you 2 t' 1 Banastar
won't git one, two, t'ree."
"Dog-goned if I know what to do," mused Busyday. "Here I've been
shouting Banastar ever since the Handicap, and I promised my wife
faithfully that I'd play Banastar. Say," addressing the freckle-faced,
who stood by sorrowfully regarding him, "is this Imp fast enough, that's
what I want to know? Won't Banastar beat her on speed?"
The aged youth held up one thumb vertically and indicated with the
forefinger of his other hand.
"De Empire State Express," said he.
Then he held up his other thumb.
"Steam roller," said he. "Take yer pick."
Busyday made a sudden dive for a bookmaker's line.
"Which I may remark, in strict confidence," he said to himself as he
tugged at his wad and counted out five twenty-dollar bills, "that there
may be softer marks between here and High Bridge than myself; but,
confound that freckle-faced tout's red head, I'm just a-going to slide
along with him and play Imp at that, Banastar or no Banastar!" and ten
seconds later the bookmaker was taking Busyday's five twenties and
droning out, "Six hundred to $100 on Imp to win."
Busyday was lighting the last of his three-for-fifty cigars over in a
corner of the betting ring when the well-known buzz reached his ears
again.
"On?" inquired the buzz. "Good and hard?"
"Yep," said Busyday. "Hundred."
Imp's win is turf history. As Busyday handed the tout two crisp $100
bills the freckle-faced remarked:
"An' you ain't th' on'y collect I make on this, Cap. I got a hayseed on
th' mare fer $300, an' I had him on all th' rest o' them good things, at
that."
"Well, so long, Red," said Busyday. "I'm getting back to town to dinner.
Next time I come down I'll give you my trade if I see you around."
Then Busyday went up into the stand to take a final look around for his
townsman. He didn't see him, and he started for the gate. Just as he got
outside the gate he saw his fellow townsman and guest stepping into a
hack. His fellow townsman and guest looked pretty jaunty, but Busyday
didn't notice it.
"Hey, there, old man," he called after his friend, and the latter looked
around.
"Oh, here you are," said Busyday's friend, with an expensive cigar stuck
at an angle of forty-five degrees in one corner of his mouth. "Trimmed?"
"Nope," said Busyday. "I landed on a few little good things that
occurred to me after I got to looking at the program, and I win 'bout a
thousand. Poor old jay, I suppose they put you out o' business, eh?"
"Not by a long sight!" said his friend. "I ran into a freckle-faced,
red-headed duck as soon as I got in the grounds. I lost that piece o'
paper you gave me with the whadyoucallem--selections--on it, and so I
played what this red-headed chap told me to. Copped out 'bout $2800,
altogether. Had $300 on Imp to win the big race."
Then Busyday knew to whom the freckle-faced had referred when he spoke
of a hayseed.