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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..396935f --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #69890 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69890) diff --git a/old/69890-0.txt b/old/69890-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 74eaeb3..0000000 --- a/old/69890-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,1599 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of The golden bridle, by Jane Rice - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: The golden bridle - -Author: Jane Rice - -Release Date: January 28, 2023 [eBook #69890] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GOLDEN BRIDLE *** - - - - - - THE GOLDEN BRIDLE - - By Jane Rice - - Illustrated by Alfred - - [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from - Unknown Worlds April 1943. - Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that - the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] - - -Say, that is mighty white. I do not mind if I do, though I remembers -the day when I would not of touched beer with a ten-foot pole. Weight. -Jockeys has got to watch their weight like it is tombstones they is -putting on instead of pounds. - -Well, here's luck, mister. May all your double parlays give the bookies -fits. - -What's that? Yeah, sure I am a jockey. Was. There is not no point in -giving you the old three and five. You look like a right guy. Why -should I kid you? I have not been up on a horse for four years. Six -months cold for a jock is a wide turn, but four years--say, four years -is--what the devil, I am washed up cleaner than a choirboy's ears. - -And this is not my fault. That is what gives me the burn. It is not my -fault. When Lady Luck smiles in the racing game she has got a grin so -broad you can count her back fillings, but, when she quits smiling, -brother, she just quits and you might as well go wrap your head in a -sweat blanket and forget it. - -You know, you is going along good, not winning no Champagne Stakes nor -nothing like that, but hitting the percentages and going along O.K., -see, when all of a sudden you finds that things begin to happen. And -they keeps right on happening and you can spit in the wind all you want -to and chew four-leaf clovers and take a horseshoe to bed with you -and it does not have no effect. Things just keeps right on happening -until after a while the trainers puts the double O on you and you can -not even get a leg up on a spavined brood mare and everybody takes to -calling you "Jinx." - -That is me, mister. Jinx Jackson. - -Oh, I am not beefing none. I manages, what with one thing and another. -But believe me, buddy, it is enough to give you the yelping wipes when -you stands there by the fence with the sun beating down on you, and the -crowd milling around excitedlike, and the bugles blowing, and the flags -waving, and the horses walking past--nervous--and the colors up with -their pants skintight and their shirts bellying out like silk balloons, -and then they are wheeling the barrier in, and you look at the track -and it is smooth and sweet and fast as a filly with bees in her ears, -and everything gets still except the popcorn peddlers, and there is -that awful minute when you is waiting and the shirt sticks to your back -and you gets that old, familiar, tight feeling on the inside of your -thighs, and your tongue is like a sponge bit between your teeth, and -then that cry--like a rising wind--"THEY'RE OFF!" - -That is when it hits you. Right here. As if somebody has yanked your -stomach out and let it go _wham_ back at you, like a pair of -suspenders. - -That--and when you see a snipe getting hisself boxed on a inside turn, -or bearing out in the run through the stretch, or--aw, nuts with it. It -gets you, that is all. It gets you. - -Once you has got the feel of horses in your blood you is a goner. A -gone goner. It is there, brother, and there is not no use fighting it. -You cannot no more keep away from a paddock than you can stop blinking -your eyes. - -Jimmie Winkie used to say, "You can shake grief and sorrow, you can -bury remorse--but you can't never lose the feel o' a horse." - -Jimmie Winkie. Yeah, Wee Willie. That is the same. - -Good! Man, he had the magic touch. Why, he could add twenty lengths to -anything on four legs. Easy. Jimmie was tops. Why, I has seen him come -from behind the hard way and spot them a extra advantage by pulling out -and still win and there was not no photo finishes, neither. When he -won, mister, he won. - -He was a funny guy, he was. Had a kind of puckery face and big ears. -Walked springy, like a banty rooster. Used to use a special bridle when -he was up. Superstitious? It is not superstition exactly. It is just -a kind of a feeling you get about certain things. Lots of us jocks -are thataway. I know I would of had a hissy--four years ago--if I had -of mislaid a old wore-out crop I always carried. Moe Prentice had a -buckeye he would not of parted with for nobody. Jackie Watson had some -sort of a medal on a silver chain. Cry Baby Noolan would not no more of -thought of riding with his cap anyway but hind side to than he would -of thought of riding without any clothes on. In fact, if he would of -had to make a choice, I reckon he would of rode in his skin before he -would of changed his cap proper. And, like I said, Jimmie has this here -special bridle, though there is not much special about it except that -it is goldish-looking if you hold it in the right light. But seems he -takes a fancy to it and from the way he acts you would of thought it -is made from the tanned hide of a Derby winner. But it is not no such -thing, of course. It is just a bridle like any racing bridle only, like -I said, it is goldish-looking in a unnoticeable manner. - -He gets it one year when we is finishing up the circuit down in -Tijuana. This is before he hits his stride. When he is going along, -like me, not snaffling no tall money nor nothing but knocking off his -percentages. He is plain Jimmie Winkie then. The newspapers has not -tagged that there Wee Willie on to him yet and he is not endorsing no -leather jackets, nor saying as how he likes Puffie Wuffies because they -is superroasted and rolled on hoops. - - * * * * * - -Well, as I was saying, we is down in Tijuana and it is nighttime and -we is walking down one of them crooked streets which is about as thick -in Tijuana as saddle sores is in a riding academy. We is walking along -with our hands in our pockets and not much else, being as how we has -inadvertently got mixed up in a game knowed as faro, the same which is -like being on the wrong end of a loco bronc, and which we would not of -got into if Jimmie had not of wanted to increase a five-dollar bill -into a ten-dollar bill so as to buy a real nice present for Ditsy. -Anyhow, like I said, we is walking along minding our own business when -there is-- - -Ditsy? Oh, Ditsy was Jimmie's sister. Name was Dorothy, but Jimmie -called her Ditsy. He was crazy about her. Seemed like he had raised -her since she was knee high to a feed box. Guess they had some muddy -tracks, them two, and what with their not having nobody but theirselves -and her being crippled, why, one way and another, he set a lot of store -by her. - -Anyway, we is walking along, Jimmie and me, and I am thinking about -what we is going to eat for breakfast the next day, and lunch, and -supper, and Jimmie is thinking about how is he going to buy Ditsy -something when we hear a rumpus going on around a corner up ahead. -It increases graduallike and when we gets to the corner we meets it, -head-on you might say. - -There is about a dozen people who is all personal acquaintances of -John Barleycorn, and they is pestering a woman who looks like she is -on her way to a masquerade at a insane asylum. She has got on a sheet -all draped and wrapped every which way and her feet is laced up in -sandals and there is a wreath on her hair, only now it is setting -cockeyed on account of as how these here people has been chasing her, -and she is carrying a bridle. In fact, if I had of spent my money on -John Barleycorn instead of faro, I probably would of joined in on the -side of these here people who is laughing theirselves sick and grabbing -at this here sheet and having a big time, for which I cannot blame them -any as this woman is sure a curious sight. - -While I am thinking what a curious sight she is, Jimmie busts up the -party. He does this with very little fuss, hitting merely one guy who -goes down like a sack of wet oats and the rest takes to their heels as -I am doubling up my fists preparing to wade in. - -"Now, sister," Jimmie says, rubbing his knuckles tenderlike, "if I was -you I would vamoose. Tijuana is no place for a lady without as how she -has got company to see that she gets where she has started out for." - -Well, this woman straightens her wreath and breaks out in some kind of -a foreign language which sounds like nothing I ever heard unless it is -"Chopsticks" played on a piano which is out of tune and is minus some -of the keys. - -"Look, sister," Jimmie says, "vamoose while the vamoosing is favorable." - -The woman makes some motions and spouts some more of this here talk and -there is just one word I get and that is "grease." She says this over -and over, "Grease, grease," meanwhile gesturing for all she is able. - -"Grease?" Jimmie says, puzzled, and she nods violently and shakes the -bridle she is carrying and does a act like she is putting it on a horse -and then flaps her arms like she is flying. - -"Grease," she says. - -I begins to get uneasy. "Say," I says to Jimmie, sotto voice, "let's us -get out of here--this gal has got bats in her belfry." - -"I think she has lost a horse," Jimmie says slow. - -"Horse!" I says. "How is she going to straddle a horse in that getup? -She has lost her mind. Let's us get out of here. Loonies is not no -picnic." - -Jimmie does not pay no attention to me. He takes the bridle away from -her--gentle--so as not to scare her and _he_ does a act like -_he_ is putting it on a horse. "Horse?" he says. - -This looney looks at him a minute, then her face kind of brightenslike. -She points to the bridle Jimmie is holding and says, "Hippos." - -"She has got the D. T.'s," I cheeps. "She is talking about a -hippopotamus what flies or I will eat that there bridle. Come on," -I says, "this is not no place for--" But I do not get no further -because there is a faint whinny and this here woman shrieks joyfully -and--without so much as a kiss-my-foot--lams in the direction of this -here nickering which, judging from the sound, is a block or so to our -rear--though we has not seen no sign of no horse when we is walking by -thataway. - -We stands there gawking after this dame while she disappears in the -night and Jimmie, suddenlike, yells, "Hey, here is your bridle," and -starts after her and me after Jimmie, because I has not got no wish to -see Jimmie sucked in on something that is not kosher, and it is plain -that there is something here that does not meet the eye right off. - -I dope it that this here dame is a kind of a lead rein for some guys -which is laying low in a alley or some place figuring to roll whoever -she ropes in, and it is a unpleasant statistic that persons is often -beat up severe when it is discovered they has not got no wherewith to -make such a business profitable. - -When we gets down the street a ways I catches up to Jimmie and stops -him and I says, "Has you taken leave of your senses? This here is one -of them cul-de-sacs or I am a ring-tailed--" But I do not say baboon, -which I had intended, because somewhere I hears a noise like a lot of -pigeons taking off--like they has been shooed--and from way up, like -on a roof, I hears this woman laughing and it dwindles away and, then, -it is quiet and a little white feather drifts down and lands in the -gutter. It is all very weird and I do not like it. - -"I would of swore a horse nickered down here a minute ago," Jimmie says. - -"Shut up," I says, "and let's us get out of here before we is knifed in -the back." - -So we does and that is how Jimmie come by the bridle. - - * * * * * - -Well, say, I do not mind if I do. There is this about beer. You do not -have to worry none the next morning about tying your shoes. Ever try -sticking a hot knife in it? Many's the time I has seen my old man heat -the poker until it is as red as the old Scratch hisself and then plunge -it into the pail. That was when you could get all you wanted for a dime -with boiled ham and cheese and bologna throwed in to boot and, like as -not, a slice of liver for the cat. - -Here's bumps, mister. And may you never tear up your ducats without -looking twice. - -Where was I? Oh, yeah, Tijuana. Well, here we is without a buffalo -between us. Broke as a skillet of scrambled eggs and up in the fifth -the next day, the same which dawns bright and early and finds me and -Jimmie nearly splitting a girth trying to trade that there bridle for a -plate of buckwheat cakes, but everybody gives us the zero gaze until I -begins to wonder if we is coming down with smallpox. So we hunts up a -dopester by the name of Stew Hatcher and he stakes us to a meal after -which we hangs around until he has got up his sheet and then we rides -out to the track with him and his girl. We asks Stew, just kidding, who -he is picking in the fifth and Stew says it is not us and he is not -kidding. For his money, he says, it is High Jinks, Admirella and Sky -Eagle. One, two, three. - -I am up on Black Boy and Jimmie he is up on Peajacket, so we thumbs -our noses at Stew and gives him the buzz and says as how we is pleased -to have met this girl he is with--which is a lie because she is very -snooty--and we goes on in. - -We gets into our colors and sets around with the fellows dishing out -a lot of bull about what we done in Tijuana and Jimmie gives me the -wink and says he has got hold of a nifty bridle he is willing to take -a loss on. And he gets this here bridle out of his locker and says if -anybody will give him a fin for it they can have it, though they will -be rooking him on the deal. - -Boy, does he get the laugh. Moe says he will give him a fin for it if -Jimmie will throw in Peajacket and shine his boots for a week, too. And -Cry Baby Noolan says if it is such a hot bridle why don't he bridle -Peajacket with it. And everybody starts gaffing Jimmie and I acts real -indignant and I says what is it worth to them if he _does_ bridle -Peajacket with it, them being such sports. Jimmie, seeing the lay of -the land, plays up to me and says, "No," and everybody chimes in giving -him the merry ha-ha and when there is three bucks up he will not do it, -why, then Jimmie says O.K., he will do it, see. - -Does a holler go up when they catches on to how they has been taken! -But Jimmie says a bet is a bet and he is game enough to live up to his -end of the bargain if they is. "Of course, if they _isn't_--" -he says, inferring that anybody who reneges is a horse's patoot, so, -naturally, nobody reneges, though there is some grousing. - -I used to say to Jimmie, I would say, "Jimmie, remember the day at -Tijuana when we nicked Moe and them for three bucks?" And Jimmie, he -would say, "Yeah," and kind of draw in his breath like he was thinking -about it--hard. Remembering how Peajacket upset the bookies' apple cart. - -You see, Stew Hatcher is wrong. It is Peajacket, High Jinks and -Admirella. One, two, three. And the owner of Peajacket--I forget his -name, big loose-mouthed chap with a face like a side of beef--is fair -to be hobbled because he has not bet on his own entry on account of as -how it is a cinch to lose. It is a two-year-old he has picked up for -seven and a quarter at a public sale and he is just feeling him out and -damn if Jimmie does not bring in a win. - -Me? Oh, I comes in with the tailbearers. I could of got in a lame -fourth, but I am so whooper-jawed watching Jimmie go down the stretch -like a lighted fuse that I lets this here Black Boy I am up on bear -out--he was death on bearing out--and, of course, that puts the quietus -on us. There is not no percentage in whipping a horse over for fourth -place. A horse has got sense enough to know when you is making a fool -out of him. - -No, I do not guess you will recollect Peajacket. He turns out to be a -foozle, after all. He is entered a couple of more times, Saratoga, I -thinks, and Empire City--Syl Patton up--but he does not do nothing but -pick up a coupla pounds of mud. - -But he sure is not no foozle that afternoon at Tijuana. - -There is not no barrier. You just keeps back of the line as best you -can. That is one way to lose a race before the gun. I has seen them do -it on purpose. You know, too tight a rein, get your horse skittered, -make him break three or four times, and, when the gun goes, hold him -back just long enough to let him see that he is a cooked potato. Nine -times out of ten you can whip him raw and he will run, but he will not -run fast enough. But _your_ nose is clean. The trainer cannot say -as how _you_ did not try. - -Say, am I boring you with this? If I am--okke doke, any time you has -had a sufficiency, say so. - - * * * * * - -Well, as I was saying, there is not no barrier. Outside of a little -tail flicking and head tossing, Black Boy is as calm as a Jersey cow. -High Jinks breaks once and Sky Eagle and some of the field prances -around a bit, but Peajacket he acts like he has been fed hopped oats. -In fact, there is some talk of it later on, but they cannot never prove -nothing. Anyway, this here Peajacket is taking on for a fare-you-well -with Jimmie trying to gentle him down and the starter getting mad and a -jock, name of Happy Slauderwasser--that is a moniker for you, nice guy -though--who is next to Peajacket swearing something fierce. Finally, -Jimmie gets this here Peajacket backed in and he is lathered up like a -ad for saddle soap, and the gun goes, and out of the tail of my eye as -me and Black Boy takes off I sees Peajacket rearing up and I thinks, -"Oh, Lordy," because it is a rule last one in has to pitch a buck in -the kitty. And it is plain to see, in a field of fifteen, Jimmie is -slated to be the last one in and then we will only have a buck apiece -instead of a buck fifty. - -I settles down and starts easing over to the inside track hoping for -a pocket. High Jinks is up ahead and he is not anywheres near let out -yet. There is three or four horses in between, then Admirella nosing -up, Sky Eagle alongside, doing like me, playing a wait, and Jimmie and -the rest of the field bunched in behind. - -I am not thinking about Jimmie no more, though. I am concentrating on -them three or four babies cutting off my view of High Jinks. I am not -worried about them none, but when there is a opening I wants to be -there instead of Sky Eagle. So I am concentrating, like I said, and I -hear this horse coming. You do not actually hear them as much as you -_feel_ them. It is a mixture of both. It is like you got an alarm -system inside of you and all of a sudden it is ringing like who popped -Mollie and you know with a kind of a ... of a ... a kind of a awareness -that you got heavy competition. - -I remembers wondering who it could be. There is High Jinks and -Admirella in plain sight. Sky Eagle and me practically pat-a-caking at -each other, some of the field ahead, but they is giving by now and, so -far as I know, what is left in tow is not capable of doing nothing but -horse apples. - -I do not take my mind off this here opening, though. It is getting -ripe, I can see that, and I am bound I am going to be there when it is -due before it closes in and strings out. - -Then, I catches a glimpse of this here horse on the off side of Sky -Eagle. A kind of consciousness it is of this here third horse and I am -sort of cheered when I see it is not bothering none about no openings, -nor no inside track, nor nothing like that. And, while I am being -cheered and thinking what a smart guy I am, this here third horse -pounds ahead past Sky Eagle, a shoulder, half a length, a length, and -that opening I been hovering over swings wide as a barn door and Sky -Eagle is through it because I am yawping at Jimmie Winkie with his ears -skinned back crouched high on Peajacket, and if I had not of knowed -better I would of swore he was scared green, and while I am yawping, -Black Boy bears out so, as I said, that puts the quietus on us. - -There has been better races run and bigger ones has been won by darker -horses, but, off-hand, I cannot call any to mind that I got such a -thrill out of. I do not know whether it is because I am so cocksure -Jimmie is bringing up the rear, or because Moe Prentice--he is up on -High Jinks--is took down a peg or two, or maybe because there is a -certain something about the way that there horse runs with his nostrils -red and wide, and his tail streaming out behind him like it has been -starched, and his hoofs beating music out of that there track like a -crazy drummer, and Jimmie pasted to him close as a surcingle and with -a kind of a look about him like night wind sounds, if you know what I -mean. A kind of a queer, wild, blowy look. But most of all I guess it -is the horse. - -Jimmie says it is the horse and he ought to of knowed being as how he -was up on him. Jimmie says it is also a great surprise to him that -Peajacket wins, but, naturally, he does not say this out--but just to -me--as it is not a good policy to let on that you are surprised when -you bring in a winner. - -How does it feel to bring in a winner? Brother, you can have the -greatest symphony that was ever wrote; I will take the thunder of -a winner's hoofs coming down the straightaway. That is something, -brother. That is really _some_thing. It is like a ... like a ... -well, like I said, a kind of a awareness. Like you was conscious of the -noise and the feel all at the same minute. Take that there Peajacket. I -got it right away. The noise and the feel together, I mean. Like there -was two horses running. One on top the other. - - * * * * * - -We bums a ride back after the seventh and gets out on the main drag and -flips a coin to see whether we eats or buys Ditsy something. It comes -out buying Ditsy something so we goes to one of these here shops that -has a window full of everything from jewelry to tablecloths and we -picks out a powder box that plays a tune when the lid is lifted off. A -thin, tinkly, sort of _plink, plink_ tune, but pretty. Reminds you -of the way ladies used to rustle when they walked, if you know what I -mean. - -While the guy is wrapping it up, Jimmie goes over and picks up a vase -which is setting on a shelf with a lot of other vases. This here vase -he picks up is blue and has a lot of well-built dames on it holding -garlands of flowers. Jimmie kind of whistles. - -"Look at this here," he says. - -I agrees it is nice, but points out that we has got exactly twenty-nine -cents between us and the price is marked clear two fifty. - -"This is a strange coincidence," he says, more to hisself than me, and -I says it is not no coincidence it is a vase and if he is thinking -about switching over, why, there is a vase on the shelf above which is -better-looking on account of as how it has a scene painted on it and -the price is twenty-five cents cheaper. - -This guy comes up about this time and washes his hands in the air and -asks if we are interested in a vase. - -"No," I says. - -"Yes," Jimmie says. "Who is this here middle dame on this here vase?" - -"They represent the Muses," this guy says. "A marvelous buy for the -money." - -"This here middle dame is a Muse?" asks Jimmie. - -"They are all Muses," this guy says, "goddesses of the arts and poetry -and science. A very artistic vase. Only two fifty." - -"Did any of them have a horse?" Jimmie asks. - -"Horse?" - -"Horse." - -"I could not say. It is a very handsome vase, howinever, and I will -make you a special price of two twenty-five, if you are interested." - -"Where can I find out if any of them had a horse?" - -"I could not say, unless it is the library. Two dollars even I will -make it. Below that I cannot go." - -"Very well," I chimes in, being tired of Jimmie ribbing this here guy -about a horse, "we will take it in place of the powder box." - -With that this guy freezes over like the outside of a mint julep and he -says chillylike, "I have just remembered that this vase has been put -aside for another party." - -And I says, "That is very odd being as how you were so all fired set on -us having it at reduced cost." - -"Herman," this guys says. - -And another guy with a neck like a Percheron, shoulders his way through -a curtain in the back and stands there like as if he is itching for -somebody to say "When." So we takes our package and we leaves. - - * * * * * - -I am in favor of hunting up a crap game and shooting our twenty-nine -cents and Jimmie says that is a splendid idea and for me to do so and -he will meet me at the pool parlor in a hour. I asks where is he going? -And he says the library. And as he has never been inside a library in -his life to my certain knowledge, I figure he is telling me in a nice -way to mind my own business. Which I does. And in a hour I has run the -twenty-nine cents into eight bits and a Masonic emblem. - -I meets Jimmie like he said and I can see right away he is exceptional -thoughtful. We go to a place called La Cucuracha where the second cup -of coffee is free and you gets gravy with your potatoes, although -Jimmie seems to have lost his appetite. He keeps transferring his food -from one side of his plate to the other until I outs and asks him -pointblank what is ailing him. - -"Did you ever hear tell of a horse called Pegasus?" he says by way of -answer. - -"No," I says. "Who sired him?" - -"He is out of Medusa by Neptune," says Jimmie. - -"I never heard of them, neither," I says shoveling in a mouthful of -potatoes and gravy. "What has this here Peg-whoit got to do with you?" - -"I am not certain for sure," he says, "but I has got a idea," - -"Which is?" - -"Could be he got blowed off his course," Jimmie says, "or got scared by -another gadfly or some such, landed in Tijuana and this here Muse comes -after him and--" - -"Look," I says, "one of us has got a screw loose and it is not me. -Begin over and repeat slow and there is apple pie with the dinner and -if you do not want it I will eat your piece, if it is all the same to -you. Now what was you saying?" - -He shoves his plate back. "I am going to break the track record -tomorrow," he says, and there is something about the way he says it, -some quality in his voice that makes me sit up and take notice all of a -sudden. - -A kind of creepy sensation comes over me and I am reminded of when I -am a kid and the grandfather's clock in the hall would strike during -the night. It would go _bong--bong--bong_ real slow and soft, but -filling the house, howinever, and making the air vibrate. I would lie -there and think, "It is just the grandfather's clock in the hall," but -that did not make no difference. My feet would get cold and my eyes -near bug out of my head, and I would not have no swallow and I would -lie there thinking, "It is just the grandfather's clock in the hall." - -I gives Jimmie one of them searching looks you read about, but it does -not tell me nothing except that he is a mite tightened-uplike and is -letting some fifty cents worth of food go to waste. - -"Thanks for the tip," I says. "Who you planning on being up on? -Man-o'-War?" - -"Ditsy has always wanted a grand piano," he says, "since she was not -bigger'n a boot-jack." And he says, "I will get her the best one money -can buy." - -It is obvious that he tightened up more than I think because there is -not enough space in that two-room flat in Cleveland to hold both Ditsy -and a grand piano at the same time. - -"That will be dandy," I says, "but I am afraid there will not be no -grand piano in it. Them things cost folding money." - -"Folding money," he repeats and the words sounds like a three-inch -sirloin the way he says them--thick and red and juicy. "You know what -I am going to have," he says, "I am going to have a pair of handmade -boots--them that laces at the ankle--and I am going to have a suit with -buttonholes under the buttons on the sleeves. Not just thread sewed to -look like buttonholes--_real_ buttonholes I am going to have under -the buttons and a yellow chamois bag." - -"A yellow chamois bag under the buttons," I says and, recalling to mind -a chap named Joe Hankins who fought a bunch of Comanches all one night -in a psycopathic ward at a hospital in Louisville, I continues to smile -pleasantly while I eases my chair back. - -"Yeah," Jimmie says, "lined with flannel so as the bridle will not get -scratched up none." - -"Sure," I agrees, "flannel." - -"Saratoga," says Jimmie, "Havre de Grace, Narragansett, Hialeah, -Aqueduct." - -"Hawthorne, Churchill Downs, Empire City, Belmont Park, Thistledown," I -chimes in nodding like a Chinese laundryman who has lost your wash. I -holds my breath and gets to my feet praying that I will be able to ease -him out quiet. - -"Through?" Jimmie says, cool as a cucumber. "What say we see if we can -get a game of pool on the cuff?" - -The next day he breaks the track record. - - * * * * * - -I has thought about it a great deal since then and do you know what I -figure? I figure it like this. I figure that Jimmie had got on to a -secret. There is a secret to doing everything. Like tight-rope walking, -or shooting par golf consistent, or whizzing a ball over a tennis net -so as it falls just so and dribbles off before it can be got up off -the ground. There is a secret to juggling plates and a secret to pole -vaulting higher than anybody else. The plates and the pole and the -rope and the golf clubs and tennis racquet is all the same. What I -mean is you could take half a dozen plates and throw them up in the -air and they would land behind the eight ball. But take these here -same identical plates and give them to a juggler and he will make them -perform without so much as mussing his tie. Why? Because he knows the -secret. - -Well, then, why can it not be the same way with horses? I am not saying -you can take a plow horse and make him win a race any more than that -there juggler can juggle plates made out of pig iron. But I am saying, -if you know the secret, you can take a _race horse_ and make him -win a race. And, like I said, I has thought about it a lot and I figure -there is a secret and Jimmie has got on to it. I figure the secret -comes to him in a flash like when you know, in a sort of a burst of -knowing, that the dealer has aces back to back. Because from that day -on he never rides a loser. Except one. I will get around to that in a -second. - -Saratoga and Hialeah and Havre de Grace and all of them is not no pipe -dream. And neither is Ditsy's grand piano, though it is not in no -two-room flat. It is in a living room as big as from here to there. -One of them two-storied jobs that goes all the way up to the roof. -One of them studio living rooms. And done real classy with drapes and -hand-carved furniture and lamps with rose silk on the underneath parts -of their shades, and them black-and-white, pen-and-ink-looking pictures -on the walls, and a rug that feels like it will arch in the middle and -purr if you rub it, it is that soft. - -Of course, it does not happen pronto. It starts out gradual with -Jimmie's name in the papers--"Keep your eye on So-and-So up on -So-and-So"--and then it takes a up curve with the sports writers -pegging him with this here Wee Willie and first thing you know he is -appearing regular Sundays in the rotogravure, him and Ditsy, holding -a horseshoe or a shamrock or this here bridle or such as that, and -persons are talking about the "Winkie Technique" and children is eating -their weight in cereal because Wee Willie Winkie says as how it has got -Vitamin Q and for six box tops or reasonable facsimiles thereof the -cereal people will send you a handsome, autographed photograph of Wee -Willie on Martinique or Little John or Fireflow or some such as them. -And his stock is going up like a fever chart. And he is in the bucks. -But I mean _in_, brother. - -It changes him some. I do not mean he goes around putting out like -he has hung the moon and painted the blue sky; if anything, he -quietens down and kind of draws into hisself like. In fact, when he -is congratulated on his ability, which he is every time he turns -around, he acts like it is making him sick to his stomach. And when the -write-ups come out about how modest he is and shy and retiring and how -he always tries to give the credit for a win to the horse, why then he -acts like he is even sicker and getting no better fast. - -Naturally, while most of the publicity is along the lines of sweetness -and light, there is some of it as squeezes out a few lemons. Like them -that says as how Winkie rides a horse walleyed, and them as hints it -is mighty peculiar he does not never lose and a pity, furthermore, -because the odds on a horse what is toting Winkie is something to -behold in a new all-time low. - -Then there is the follow-up gang that always seems to heel to a celeb. -Whether he gets to be a celeb by riding horses or eating goldfish -or drinking thirty buckets of beer does not make no noticeable -difference--they follows. It gets so Jimmie cannot go nowheres without -getting the press took out of his pants and he is lucky if the pants is -not also took out with the press. - -People sends him alligators from Florida and salmon from Alaska. He -gets lariats made out of tail hair plaited, and high-heeled boots with -tooling. He gets silver spurs, and leather jackets, and saddles, and -gloves, and sombreros. He gets blankets and pipes and racks for this -and holders for that. He gets a sheep dog, a pair of love birds, a -coon cat, a baby leopard, a bearskin rug with the teeth still in it, a -stuffed owl, a collection of butterflies, and some twisty horns off a -mountain goat all set and glued on a wooden thing to hang on the wall. -He gets socks by the gross, handkerchiefs by carloads and one dame even -sends him a box of pink silk underwear with his initials stitched in -fancy in orchid embroidery. - -To give you the idea, one day he appears in the papers cutting a -piece out of one of them round coffee cakes and the next day there is -nineteen round coffee cakes delivered to his address and he does not -_like_ round coffee cakes nor no kind of coffee cakes, but is -cutting this here piece to please the press photographer who wants a -homey touch. - -But for everybody what is giving him something there is two wanting him -to give _them_ something. Jimmie used to say he got so he could -tell right off who was a givee and who was a gimme. Not that he does -not appreciate what is give him, even if he does not keep it, and not -that he does not hand out to the gimmes--it is just that he does not -want nothing off of nobody and does not want nobody to want nothing off -of him. - -But when you gets in the major brackets that is not the way things is. -So, like I said, it changes him some. Some way, he reminds me of a kid -what has eat a quarter's worth of jelly beans all one flavor. - - * * * * * - -It changes Ditsy, too. Her hair is not loose-like and fluffy no more. -It is on the order of a cocker spaniel's, only precise, and her ears -has got earbobs in them, and instead of wearing print housedresses she -is all diked out in them dresses which is not referred to as dresses, -but as "creations." She has got a new wheelchair which is streamlined -and has more chrome on it than a limousine, and some bird with a -Vandyke and a accent you can spread like marmalade is giving her some -kind of underwater massage for her legs, so she should be very happy. -She is not, though. - -She puts on like she is happy and anybody what does not know her would -say, "My, she is happy," and they would be ninety-nine and forty-four -hundreds percent wrong because she is not happy by no means. She fools -Jimmie because Jimmie is so anxious for her to be happy that, when she -keeps saying she is happy, he believes she is happy and it does not -occur to him that when you are happy you does not go around saying, -"My, I am happy," like you was learning a lesson in memorizing. - -When a woman is happy she sings and brushes her hair a lot and says -stuff like, "I declare, it is four o'clock _already_, can you beat -that?" and she looks smily even when she is not actually smiling. So -it is obvious Ditsy is not happy because she is not doing none of them -things. When she smiles it is more or less of a lip movement going on -under her nose and not having nothing to do with the rest of her face, -and she does not sing spontaneous, though when she is in that two-room -flat the landlady has had to request her several times to pipe down. -And, instead of saying, "I declare it is four o'clock _already_," -she just says, "It is four o'clock," like you would say, "The dodo -is now become extinct," or, "I see where there in a population of -ninety-two in East Gleep, Nevada." - -So, as I said, it changes Ditsy, too. And it is pathetic to watch them -two, him and her, working so hard at being happy and pretending that -life is a bowl of cherries when it is plain life is a onion poultice. - -Some time passes and I am here, there, and yonder and word gets around -that Jimmie Winkie is hitting the paint which occasions me to be -surprised because Jimmie Winkie is never one to hit the paint even in a -mild manner. So I am not paying any attention to these here remarks and -I am once or twice very near smacking persons in the puss who say that -it is a fact that Ditsy is turned into a red-hot momma. - -What's that? Oh, that. Well, it seems that this here underwater massage -is the stuff and she is able to get around some--not good, understand, -but some. - -What! Her! Say, listen here, bub--well, all right, no offense taken, -but she is not that kind. O. K. O. K. Let it ride. Sure I will have -another beer, only do not make no more remarks like that, see. O. K. O. -K. - -Maybe I do not make myself clear. I mean she has gone in for -double-jointed cigarette holders and red fingernails and them -long-haired guys what paints a picture of somebody so as they have one -eye here and one here and clockwork springs for the top of their head -and maybe a spare tire for one hand and a fiddle for the other with a -bunch of carrots sprouting out of it. - -Anyway, that is what I am hearing and--here's bumps, brother. You know -I set and watched a glass of beer bubble from the bottom one night -and it bubbled for three hours and a half 'fore it got flat. That was -when Ditsy--But I will get around to that quick enough. Now and again -I still catches myself trying _not_ to think about it. And it has -been a long time. A long time. - -What was I saying? Oh, yeah, Jimmie hitting the paint. He _is_ all -right because I am setting in a place in Cleveland--having just got off -the train--and some fellow comes in and I does not pay no attention -until I see he is walking like a banty rooster which is sea-sick. And -I yells, "Jimmie!" And he looks up and focuses on me and I see it is -true he is hitting the paint and, if his present condition is a fair -example, he is hitting it with a capital H. - -I am not one to stick my nose in other people's business. I am one who -says other people's business is their own business and no business of -mine, having found that a nose stuck in other people's business usually -gets itself pinned up so as it does not look like a nose for quite a -while after. - -But this is different. First, it is Jimmie Winkie. Second, he is -running a race the next day I have seen by the papers. Third, it will -not put no shine on his shoes if somebody says, "Oh, look, is that not -Wee Winkie and is he not skizzled?" - -To make a long story short, I gets him out of there. I thinks about -checking into a hotel, but there is those somebodies again, so there is -not nothing to do but get a cab and take him home. The same which I -does. - -When I first sees Ditsy I also thinks it is true that she has turned -into a red-hot momma. She has done something to her mouth so it looks -like it has been swatted by a ripe plum, and she is wearing one of them -"creations" that does not leave but very little to the imagination, and -she is walking with two silver-headed canes, and her fingernails looks -like they has been dipped in calves' liver while it is still in the -calf. - -She is quite a sight for sore eyes until you remembers it is Ditsy -and, then your collar gets too tight and you say, "Hello, Ditsy," and -she does not say nothing. She just looks at Jimmie until you thinks -she does not know who it is and, then, she looks at me and her eyes -is the color of a horse's flanks after a workout--dark and wet and -velvety--and she says, "Bring him in, Jacks," and, some way, her voice -sounds like it is bleeding. And, all at once, you know that underneath -all this cover-up she has put on is the same old Ditsy. Worn finer, and -kind of tired, but Ditsy. - -She knows what to do, too. She does not put him to bed. She has me set -him up in the bathroom with his head over the basin and she feeds him -soapy water and as fast as one glass full comes up down goes another. -And when he says he cannot do it no more, she wheedles him into doing -it until his insides is as clean as a old maid's conscience, and his -head is woozy but not boozy. Also, I am under the impression this is -not the first time them two has underwent this here same procedure. - -Soapy water? Best thing on earth. Makes you feel like you has been -hollowed out and whittled thin, but it does not leave nothing in you -that you would want to wake up with the next morning. Of course, it is -not exactly a pleasant treatment while it is going on, but, after it is -done, although you could not fight no mess of apes, you could give them -a run for their money, if such become necessary. - -After some time, Jimmie says in a washed-out voice, "O.K., go ahead. -Tell me I am a louse." - -Ditsy does not say nothing and I does not say nothing, neither, being -busy examining my cuticles. - -"I know I am a louse," he continues. "Go on. Get it over with. Go on, -tell me I am a louse." - -So I says, "You are a louse, period," and I leaves off examining my -cuticles and takes up examining Jimmie like he is a rare specimen of -garbage that has got in among us while we are occupied elsewhere. - -"I was not asking _you_," Jimmie says, and he looks at Ditsy and -Ditsy looks at him and Ditsy does not say nothing. - -"I beg your pardon," I says, "I thought you was addressing the general -public of which there are several that says you has lost hold of your -senses." - -"Shut up," Jimmie says. "SHUT UP. I did not ask you to butt in, did I? -Why do you not go back where you come from?" - -"Sure," I says, "I will be delighted. But when you is handing out -your interviews tomorrow do not give the credit for the win to the -horse--give it to Ditsy, here. _If_ you win." - -"What do you mean 'if'?" Jimmie says. "It is in the bag." He laughs. -"Literal," he says. "You and Ditsy need not worry none." - -"I am not worrying," Ditsy says toneless-like. "It does not matter -either way. Nothing does not matter. Any more." - -The way she tags that "any more" on to it is horrible to listen to. It -has a dead, flat, hopeless sound and I keep thinking, if I look down, -I will see it laying there on the bath mat spread out on its back with -its eyes rolled up. - -It gets Jimmie, too, because it is clear that if Ditsy had batted him -on the bean with a lead sock he would not be more took back. - -"What do you mean?" he says. "What do you mean?" like that, see, with a -up on the end. - -"I mean it is no good," Ditsy says. "I cannot stand it. You are not -Jimmie Winkie any more. You are somebody else. Somebody else I do not -know. Somebody else who I do not want to know. I hope you do lose -tomorrow," she says and her words bump into each other and bunch up, -like the field in a steeple-chase taking the first hedge. "I hope you -lose tomorrow," she says, "and the next day, and the next and the next -and next and next, and we can go back to that two-room flat and eat -beef stew and take turns washing the dishes and put toothpicks in the -windows to keep them from rattling, and play pinochle and watch the car -lights come over the Freeway and, maybe, have a pint of ice cream for a -treat and ... and ... be ... happy"--and her voice breaks in the middle -and she puts her face in her hands and starts crying. - - * * * * * - -It is a awful experience to see a girl cry. It makes you feel like all -your joints has swelled and your ears and feet belong to a two-humped -camel. - -Jimmie says, "You want me to _lose_?" like he is suffering from -hallucinations. - -Ditsy keeps on crying. - -I gives her my handkerchief and wonders if I ought to pat at her or -something. - -"I cannot lose," Jimmie says. - -"Look," I says, "I think I has had sufficient. I am going." - -"I cannot lose," Jimmie says, "and, if I do, they will not call me Wee -Willie no more. Guys like Moe Prentice will give me the laugh. I got to -keep on winning. I cannot stop now." - -"You has not _got_ to do nothing but die," I says, "and if what -guys like Moe Prentice says means more to you than Ditsy, here, I would -go on off and die if I was you." - -"What about your grand piano?" Jimmie says to Ditsy. - -"I hate it," Ditsy says through her fingers. "I would like a c-c-canary -b-b-bird." - -"But I cannot lose," Jimmie says, shaking his fist. "I -cannot--unless--" And he quits shaking his fist and uncloses it and -looks at it like he expects to find it has varicose veins. And he looks -at Ditsy setting there on the floor. - -"You mean what you said?" he says. - -Ditsy makes a kind of soft _oooooo_ing noise like a stable hound -what has been stepped on. - -"O.K.," Jimmie says. "O.K." He gets up and sort of wavers a minute -and then he goes out and Ditsy keeps on crying and I clears my throat -once or twice and wishes she is a horse so as I could gentle her and -then Jimmie comes back in and he is carting this here bridle. - -"From me to you," he says, plunking it on the floor. And there is a -long pause and then he adds, "Temporarily." - -Ditsy looks at the bridle, hiccuping slightly like a baby what has been -having colic. - -"I do not get it," she says, hiccuping again. - -Jimmie indicates the bridle. "Remember the time," he says, "that we was -in the Home and you found a four-leaf clover in a book what belonged to -Miss Watson? I had a toothache, so you snitched the four-leaf clover -to put in my shoe so as it would go away--the toothache I mean. Only -you said it was 'temporarily' because it was somebody else's four-leaf -clover and might have repre ... repercussions being as how it does not -actually belong to me. So I did--put it in my shoe I mean--and I got a -blind abscess and it was--well, you know how it was." - -"I still do not get it," Ditsy says looking at the bridle like she is -expecting it to turn into a four-leaf clover. - -"It is like this," Jimmie says. "That there"--he points to the -bridle--"is the same as the four-leaf clover. Maybe you got a toothache -now, but, if I lose, it might turn out to be a blind abscess. So it is -only temporary. I am not giving it to you. I am only letting you keep -it for me." - -"I _still_ do not get it," Ditsy says, blowing her nose in my -handkerchief. - -"I do," I says. "He is saying you thinks you wants a canary bird when -what you really wants is a grand piano, which you have already got." - -"You stay out of this," Jimmie says. - -"Lay off Jacks," Ditsy says to Jimmie. "He is all right." - -"Jacks is a old lady," Jimmie says to Ditsy. - -"I am going," I says. Which I does. - - * * * * * - -No. No more beer. I am not half through with this one. I do not like to -crowd them. And, speaking of crowding, that is what I think happens to -Jimmie. - -Lose? I reckon he does. He does not even get away from the post. - -What I mean about crowding, I figure this here horse Jimmie is up on -gets crowded quick. There is some crows slow, some easy, some quick. -Jimmie happens to be up on Beeknight and, the way I figure, I figure -Beeknight crowds quick. You know how it is, out of the barrier, -everybody trying for a inside track, some pushing maybe, though this is -not noticeable unless you is up. Now them that crowds slow gets out and -tries, and them that crowds easy falls in, but them that crowds quick -rears up and starts doing the Highland fling. There is not many. But -there is some. And, like I said, the way I figure, Beeknight is one of -the some. - -After it is all over, there is plenty who say there is something fishy -because Beeknight is never one to crowd slow, easy, _or_ quick. -Jimmie has been up on Beeknight before and Beeknight has always came in -home free. In fact, before this here episode I am getting ready to tell -you about, Beeknight is being touted for the Jockey Gold Cup, so there -is plenty who say the atmosphere smells highly of cod. - -Jimmie pull him? You mean on account of Ditsy saying what she said? -Maybe. I thought about that angle, but I am almost sure for certain -that is not the case. I seen him right after it is over and, if he is -putting on a show, I am a snub-tailed bloodhound. - -No, I figure horses like I figure human beings. They is subject to -change. This here Beeknight might of slept restless, he might of been -overtrained, he might of been scary, he might of had gas, he might of -sensed Jimmie was not in no mood. Them things affects a horse. So I say -there is nothing off-color, but that this here Beeknight has underwent -a change and happens to crowd quick. - -It is like this, see. I avoided Jimmie like he has got the plague and -this is reciprocated on his part. I see he is jittery and keyed up, but -this is no mud on my boots, so I leave him be. Not that he is left be, -because there is many who do not think he has got the plague. It is -very sickening to watch. - -I wonder if Ditsy is in the stands, but I do not wonder long as -somebody asks him if his sister is in the stands and he says, "No, she -is home." And somebody says, "Don't she like horse races?" And he says, -"No." And somebody says, "Well, that is odd. Your own sister." And he -says, "How would you like to go bag your ears," which shows that he is -keyed up to a considerable degree. - -He is up in the first, again in the third, and again in the fourth. I -am not up at all until the next day. In fact, I am only there because -I cannot stay away, so I goes out and hangs over the veranda rail to -watch the first. - -It is a swell day. One of them high, blue ones. There is music -coming out of the announcing system and people is walking around and -everything is kind of stirred up like--like it is before the start. It -is a fast track and pretty to look at and Happy Slauderwasser comes out -and says, "Move over," and we both hangs over the veranda rail and just -look at how everything looks, if you know what I mean. - -Then the horses is mincing past, Jimmie about as big as a good-sized -pea, and then the barrier is in, and it is Beeknight in No. 6, and -everything gets quiet with a little murmur running through it like a -breeze with a lid on it, and you can hear the popcorn peddlers real -plain, and then there is that swelling cry, "THEY'RE OFF!" But it -chokes in the middle and there is a surge for the fence and the stands -rise up and cranes their necks and Happy says, "My God!" and I near -falls over the veranda rail because Beeknight is pawing the air and -kicking and acting in general like he is a prize exhibition at a rodeo -and for all them shenanigans he does not go nowheres. It is like he is -trying to kick his way through a wall or something. Jimmie is stuck -closer than a plaster, but not for long. Beeknight gives a lunge and -Jimmie goes over, and a sort of a soft, gusty sound goes up from the -crowd like a thousand breaths has been let out at once. - -By the time Jimmie has hit the ground, they is taking Beeknight out and -do you know that confounded horse is as calm as a June morning? Jimmie -gets out under his own power. - -Yeah. You see it coming, kick loose and roll with the fall and it does -not no more than scrape off the top fuzz. - -It seems like a hour at least has gone past, but it cannot be no more -than a handful of seconds because it is all clear when the field moves -into the stretch. - -Happy and me look at each other. - -Happy says, "Wow." - -I says, "It looks like somebody is going to get a bird." - -"Yeah," Happy says, "a Bronx one." - -"No," I says, "a yellow one with feathers what sings," and I go on down -to stand on the edge of the crowd what is surrounding Jimmie and listen -to what is being said. - - * * * * * - -What is being said is all the same color and cut equal. Howinever, I am -positive that Jimmie did not do no pull. He is white as death and keeps -shaking his head like there is lead shot in it and he is listening -to it rattle. He keeps saying, "I cannot understand it, I cannot -understand it," over and over. No, he did not do no pull. Spencer Tracy -cannot act that good and Jimmie Winkie is not no Spencer Tracy. - -I mosey on off and am popping my knuckles and thinking when it comes -over the announcing system that Winkie is not hurt none and will be up -in the third as scheduled. - -But this does not take place, as before the third, Gus Wever comes up -to me and he is pale and his Adam's apple is riding up and down on his -collar and he says, "Jacks, I got something for you to do." - -"Shoot," I says. - -"I want you should break the news to Winkie." - -"What news?" I says. "They is not going to disqualify him for falling -off a horse, I hopes." - -"No," Gus says. "Word has just came that his sister has met with a -accident." - -I says, "Ditsy," or I tries to, but it sticks in my throat and, some -way, I finds I am grabbing hold of Gus and there is guys endeavoring to -pull us apart thinking we is having a altercation. - -"Leave go," Gus says, shrugging them off--he is a big guy--"I am asking -Jacks, peaceful, if he will tell Winkie his sister has met with a fatal -accident. He is a friend of Winkie and if your sister is dead, it is -better it comes from a friend. That is all I am asking. I, myself, -cannot do it." - -So I does it. - -When we gets there everything is confusion. There is people everywhere -and a important-acting guy is asking the maid questions, only this does -not do no good as she is setting in a chair having hysterics. And there -is other men down on their knees examining the floor and blowing powder -on the doorknobs and there is a doctor putting his stuff away in a -little black bag. - -And there is Ditsy. - -It does not look like Ditsy. It does not look human even. It is just a -smashed-in, crumpled-up thing what is wearing Ditsy's clothes, and it -has blood all over. - -It reminds me of the way Tod Beemis looks when he is drug out and laid -on a shutter after he is caught in a stall with a crazy stallion. Kind -of ... kind of ... trampled-looking. It makes me feel kind of numblike, -like maybe I has got a scream in me that has froze solid before it can -get out. - -The important-acting guy, by now, has saw us and advances forward. - -"The maid, here," he says, "says she left Miss Winkie setting by the -window and holding a bridle in her lap. Mooning over it kind of, she -says. She goes downstairs, the maid does, and she has not no more'n got -good and down when she hears a racket and she runs back up fast as she -can and it is like this. We has not touched nothing. This," he, says -pointing to a scruffed-looking place on the rug, "I guess is where she -fell down and got up again, and this"--pointing to a spot where the -plaster has been gouged out of the wall--"this here is where whoever -done it must of swung and missed--and, from the evidence, whoever must -of done it was strong as a horse. And this here is the bridle she was -holding, which looks as if it was tore out of her hands and--" He -pauses and squints at Jimmie. "Hey," he says, "you do not look like no -coroner, who are you?" - -"He is her brother," I says, and my voice seems to come from some -far-off place and does not seem to belong to me at all. - -"Oh," the man says embarrassed. "I am sorry, buddy. I did not know -about you being related to the deceased. I am mighty sorry." - -Jimmie does not answer. He is looking at the bridle like it is Lazarus -arose from the dead and it is plain he is going to keel over. - -He puts out his hand, as if he is in a trance, and takes the bridle -from the man. - -"It is all right," I says, "it is his bridle. Leave him have it. I will -take him out of here." Which I do as they bring in a wicker basket and -set it down by this thing on the floor around which they draws a white -chalk mark before ... before they-- - - * * * * * - -Guess I must be coming down with a cold. Yeah. Sure I will have another -one. Just to wet my whistle. I seems to be kind of dried up like. -Talking too much, I guess. There is times, though, when you has got -to get it out of your system--the cold, I mean. Yeah. Well, here's to -nothing, mister. If you got nothing, you got nothing to lose and, even -if you does, it stands to advantage. - -What did who win after what? Oh, Winkie. He does not win no more. And -does not lose no more. Because he does not ride no more. No, I mean -no more. Never. You see, he ... he bumped hisself off. I took it for -granted you knew. - -Yeah. Yeah. It was one of them things. After Ditsy--why, he kind of -went haywire. I tried talking to him. Thought if he got to riding again -it would take his mind off what it was brooding on. No, no, they never -did catch whoever done it. I wish they _had_ of. If I could of got -just within reaching distance-- - -No, Jimmie would not pay no attention to me. He would just set there -staring straight ahead and sometimes he would look at me like he could -see clean through my backbone and out the other side. - -"Do not bother none, Jacks," he would say. "You do not understand. It -was my fault. I should of knowed." - -And I would say, "Do not be like that. Them ... them kind of accidents -is figured out statistical. You could not of knowed in a million -years." - -"I was wrong. I was the one who had the blind abscess. Not Ditsy," -he would say. Morose, see. Only I thought he would snap out of it, -eventual. But he does not. When he snaps, he snaps the other way. - -I remember the night that he done it. I set up with him until midnight -talking up Parvalu, which Colonel Crandall wanted him to ride in the -Bay Shore. I says, "Look here, Jimmie, if you will just get out and mix -around some, you will be O. K." And I says, "Do not forget what you -always said: 'You can shake grief or sorrow, you can bury remorse--but -you can't never lose the feel o' a horse.'" - -"Yeah," he says, and he looks at me for the first time like he really -sees me. "Yeah," he says, straightening up, "you can shake grief or -sorrow, you can bury remorse ... bury remorse--" - -"But you can't never lose the feel o' a horse," I finishes for him. - -"Yeah," he says--slow. "Yeah, that is it." - -So I goes home brightened up, thinking I has at last got him squared -around and the next morning--it is in the papers. - -They was two thoroughbreds, them two was. Yessir, two thoroughbreds -that, some way, got boxed on a inside turn. - -What's that? Bridle? Oh, that. I had it buried with Jimmie. He had made -a will leaving everything he possessed to me. Can you beat it? That is -the kind of guy he was. Yeah. Oh, I could of kept it if I had of had a -mind to, but bridles is cheap and he had set such a store by that one -that it did not seem right to keep it. Besides, I could not ever of -used it and kept my mind on what I was doing. He ... he hung hisself -with it, see. He was out of his head with grief, that is all. He did -not think. Jimmie was not no coward to take the easy way out. I know -that. But I could not of had it around me just the same. So I buried it -with him. Holding the reins in his hand. I think he would of liked it -if he could of knowed. - -Well, bottoms up. I got to be going. - -Thanks, brother, and the same to you. It has been a pleasure. No, I do -not reckon you will be seeing me in no papers, unless it is the funny -papers. Did I not tell you? Horses has got a habit of slowing down when -I am up on them. Like they has got a dead weight swinging on the bridle -holding them back. They calls me Jinx. Yeah. Jinx Jackson. - -Well, so long, buddy. - - - THE END. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GOLDEN BRIDLE *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: The golden bridle</p> -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Jane Rice</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: January 28, 2023 [eBook #69890]</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em; text-align:left'>Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net</p> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GOLDEN BRIDLE ***</div> - -<div class="titlepage"> - -<h1>THE GOLDEN BRIDLE</h1> - -<h2>By Jane Rice</h2> - -<p>Illustrated by Alfred</p> - -<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br> -Unknown Worlds April 1943.<br> -Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br> -the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> - -</div> - -<hr class="chap"> - -<p>Say, that is mighty white. I do not mind if I do, though I remembers -the day when I would not of touched beer with a ten-foot pole. Weight. -Jockeys has got to watch their weight like it is tombstones they is -putting on instead of pounds.</p> - -<p>Well, here's luck, mister. May all your double parlays give the bookies -fits.</p> - -<p>What's that? Yeah, sure I am a jockey. Was. There is not no point in -giving you the old three and five. You look like a right guy. Why -should I kid you? I have not been up on a horse for four years. Six -months cold for a jock is a wide turn, but four years—say, four years -is—what the devil, I am washed up cleaner than a choirboy's ears.</p> - -<p>And this is not my fault. That is what gives me the burn. It is not my -fault. When Lady Luck smiles in the racing game she has got a grin so -broad you can count her back fillings, but, when she quits smiling, -brother, she just quits and you might as well go wrap your head in a -sweat blanket and forget it.</p> - -<p>You know, you is going along good, not winning no Champagne Stakes nor -nothing like that, but hitting the percentages and going along O.K., -see, when all of a sudden you finds that things begin to happen. And -they keeps right on happening and you can spit in the wind all you want -to and chew four-leaf clovers and take a horseshoe to bed with you -and it does not have no effect. Things just keeps right on happening -until after a while the trainers puts the double O on you and you can -not even get a leg up on a spavined brood mare and everybody takes to -calling you "Jinx."</p> - -<p>That is me, mister. Jinx Jackson.</p> - -<p>Oh, I am not beefing none. I manages, what with one thing and another. -But believe me, buddy, it is enough to give you the yelping wipes when -you stands there by the fence with the sun beating down on you, and the -crowd milling around excitedlike, and the bugles blowing, and the flags -waving, and the horses walking past—nervous—and the colors up with -their pants skintight and their shirts bellying out like silk balloons, -and then they are wheeling the barrier in, and you look at the track -and it is smooth and sweet and fast as a filly with bees in her ears, -and everything gets still except the popcorn peddlers, and there is -that awful minute when you is waiting and the shirt sticks to your back -and you gets that old, familiar, tight feeling on the inside of your -thighs, and your tongue is like a sponge bit between your teeth, and -then that cry—like a rising wind—"THEY'RE OFF!"</p> - - - -<p>That is when it hits you. Right here. As if somebody has yanked your -stomach out and let it go <i>wham</i> back at you, like a pair of -suspenders.</p> - -<p>That—and when you see a snipe getting hisself boxed on a inside turn, -or bearing out in the run through the stretch, or—aw, nuts with it. It -gets you, that is all. It gets you.</p> - -<p>Once you has got the feel of horses in your blood you is a goner. A -gone goner. It is there, brother, and there is not no use fighting it. -You cannot no more keep away from a paddock than you can stop blinking -your eyes.</p> - -<p>Jimmie Winkie used to say, "You can shake grief and sorrow, you can -bury remorse—but you can't never lose the feel o' a horse."</p> - -<p>Jimmie Winkie. Yeah, Wee Willie. That is the same.</p> - -<p>Good! Man, he had the magic touch. Why, he could add twenty lengths to -anything on four legs. Easy. Jimmie was tops. Why, I has seen him come -from behind the hard way and spot them a extra advantage by pulling out -and still win and there was not no photo finishes, neither. When he -won, mister, he won.</p> - -<p>He was a funny guy, he was. Had a kind of puckery face and big ears. -Walked springy, like a banty rooster. Used to use a special bridle when -he was up. Superstitious? It is not superstition exactly. It is just -a kind of a feeling you get about certain things. Lots of us jocks -are thataway. I know I would of had a hissy—four years ago—if I had -of mislaid a old wore-out crop I always carried. Moe Prentice had a -buckeye he would not of parted with for nobody. Jackie Watson had some -sort of a medal on a silver chain. Cry Baby Noolan would not no more of -thought of riding with his cap anyway but hind side to than he would -of thought of riding without any clothes on. In fact, if he would of -had to make a choice, I reckon he would of rode in his skin before he -would of changed his cap proper. And, like I said, Jimmie has this here -special bridle, though there is not much special about it except that -it is goldish-looking if you hold it in the right light. But seems he -takes a fancy to it and from the way he acts you would of thought it -is made from the tanned hide of a Derby winner. But it is not no such -thing, of course. It is just a bridle like any racing bridle only, like -I said, it is goldish-looking in a unnoticeable manner.</p> - -<p>He gets it one year when we is finishing up the circuit down in -Tijuana. This is before he hits his stride. When he is going along, -like me, not snaffling no tall money nor nothing but knocking off his -percentages. He is plain Jimmie Winkie then. The newspapers has not -tagged that there Wee Willie on to him yet and he is not endorsing no -leather jackets, nor saying as how he likes Puffie Wuffies because they -is superroasted and rolled on hoops.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>Well, as I was saying, we is down in Tijuana and it is nighttime and -we is walking down one of them crooked streets which is about as thick -in Tijuana as saddle sores is in a riding academy. We is walking along -with our hands in our pockets and not much else, being as how we has -inadvertently got mixed up in a game knowed as faro, the same which is -like being on the wrong end of a loco bronc, and which we would not of -got into if Jimmie had not of wanted to increase a five-dollar bill -into a ten-dollar bill so as to buy a real nice present for Ditsy. -Anyhow, like I said, we is walking along minding our own business when -there is—</p> - -<p>Ditsy? Oh, Ditsy was Jimmie's sister. Name was Dorothy, but Jimmie -called her Ditsy. He was crazy about her. Seemed like he had raised -her since she was knee high to a feed box. Guess they had some muddy -tracks, them two, and what with their not having nobody but theirselves -and her being crippled, why, one way and another, he set a lot of store -by her.</p> - -<p>Anyway, we is walking along, Jimmie and me, and I am thinking about -what we is going to eat for breakfast the next day, and lunch, and -supper, and Jimmie is thinking about how is he going to buy Ditsy -something when we hear a rumpus going on around a corner up ahead. -It increases graduallike and when we gets to the corner we meets it, -head-on you might say.</p> - -<p>There is about a dozen people who is all personal acquaintances of -John Barleycorn, and they is pestering a woman who looks like she is -on her way to a masquerade at a insane asylum. She has got on a sheet -all draped and wrapped every which way and her feet is laced up in -sandals and there is a wreath on her hair, only now it is setting -cockeyed on account of as how these here people has been chasing her, -and she is carrying a bridle. In fact, if I had of spent my money on -John Barleycorn instead of faro, I probably would of joined in on the -side of these here people who is laughing theirselves sick and grabbing -at this here sheet and having a big time, for which I cannot blame them -any as this woman is sure a curious sight.</p> - -<p>While I am thinking what a curious sight she is, Jimmie busts up the -party. He does this with very little fuss, hitting merely one guy who -goes down like a sack of wet oats and the rest takes to their heels as -I am doubling up my fists preparing to wade in.</p> - -<hr class="chap"> - -<div class="figcenter illowp60" id="illus1" style="max-width: 25.125em;"> - <img class="w100" src="images/illus1.jpg" alt=""> -</div> - -<hr class="chap"> - -<p>"Now, sister," Jimmie says, rubbing his knuckles tenderlike, "if I was -you I would vamoose. Tijuana is no place for a lady without as how she -has got company to see that she gets where she has started out for."</p> - -<p>Well, this woman straightens her wreath and breaks out in some kind of -a foreign language which sounds like nothing I ever heard unless it is -"Chopsticks" played on a piano which is out of tune and is minus some -of the keys.</p> - -<p>"Look, sister," Jimmie says, "vamoose while the vamoosing is favorable."</p> - -<p>The woman makes some motions and spouts some more of this here talk and -there is just one word I get and that is "grease." She says this over -and over, "Grease, grease," meanwhile gesturing for all she is able.</p> - -<p>"Grease?" Jimmie says, puzzled, and she nods violently and shakes the -bridle she is carrying and does a act like she is putting it on a horse -and then flaps her arms like she is flying.</p> - -<p>"Grease," she says.</p> - -<p>I begins to get uneasy. "Say," I says to Jimmie, sotto voice, "let's us -get out of here—this gal has got bats in her belfry."</p> - -<p>"I think she has lost a horse," Jimmie says slow.</p> - -<p>"Horse!" I says. "How is she going to straddle a horse in that getup? -She has lost her mind. Let's us get out of here. Loonies is not no -picnic."</p> - -<p>Jimmie does not pay no attention to me. He takes the bridle away from -her—gentle—so as not to scare her and <i>he</i> does a act like -<i>he</i> is putting it on a horse. "Horse?" he says.</p> - -<p>This looney looks at him a minute, then her face kind of brightenslike. -She points to the bridle Jimmie is holding and says, "Hippos."</p> - -<p>"She has got the D. T.'s," I cheeps. "She is talking about a -hippopotamus what flies or I will eat that there bridle. Come on," -I says, "this is not no place for—" But I do not get no further -because there is a faint whinny and this here woman shrieks joyfully -and—without so much as a kiss-my-foot—lams in the direction of this -here nickering which, judging from the sound, is a block or so to our -rear—though we has not seen no sign of no horse when we is walking by -thataway.</p> - -<p>We stands there gawking after this dame while she disappears in the -night and Jimmie, suddenlike, yells, "Hey, here is your bridle," and -starts after her and me after Jimmie, because I has not got no wish to -see Jimmie sucked in on something that is not kosher, and it is plain -that there is something here that does not meet the eye right off.</p> - -<p>I dope it that this here dame is a kind of a lead rein for some guys -which is laying low in a alley or some place figuring to roll whoever -she ropes in, and it is a unpleasant statistic that persons is often -beat up severe when it is discovered they has not got no wherewith to -make such a business profitable.</p> - -<p>When we gets down the street a ways I catches up to Jimmie and stops -him and I says, "Has you taken leave of your senses? This here is one -of them cul-de-sacs or I am a ring-tailed—" But I do not say baboon, -which I had intended, because somewhere I hears a noise like a lot of -pigeons taking off—like they has been shooed—and from way up, like -on a roof, I hears this woman laughing and it dwindles away and, then, -it is quiet and a little white feather drifts down and lands in the -gutter. It is all very weird and I do not like it.</p> - -<p>"I would of swore a horse nickered down here a minute ago," Jimmie says.</p> - -<p>"Shut up," I says, "and let's us get out of here before we is knifed in -the back."</p> - -<p>So we does and that is how Jimmie come by the bridle.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>Well, say, I do not mind if I do. There is this about beer. You do not -have to worry none the next morning about tying your shoes. Ever try -sticking a hot knife in it? Many's the time I has seen my old man heat -the poker until it is as red as the old Scratch hisself and then plunge -it into the pail. That was when you could get all you wanted for a dime -with boiled ham and cheese and bologna throwed in to boot and, like as -not, a slice of liver for the cat.</p> - -<p>Here's bumps, mister. And may you never tear up your ducats without -looking twice.</p> - -<p>Where was I? Oh, yeah, Tijuana. Well, here we is without a buffalo -between us. Broke as a skillet of scrambled eggs and up in the fifth -the next day, the same which dawns bright and early and finds me and -Jimmie nearly splitting a girth trying to trade that there bridle for a -plate of buckwheat cakes, but everybody gives us the zero gaze until I -begins to wonder if we is coming down with smallpox. So we hunts up a -dopester by the name of Stew Hatcher and he stakes us to a meal after -which we hangs around until he has got up his sheet and then we rides -out to the track with him and his girl. We asks Stew, just kidding, who -he is picking in the fifth and Stew says it is not us and he is not -kidding. For his money, he says, it is High Jinks, Admirella and Sky -Eagle. One, two, three.</p> - -<p>I am up on Black Boy and Jimmie he is up on Peajacket, so we thumbs -our noses at Stew and gives him the buzz and says as how we is pleased -to have met this girl he is with—which is a lie because she is very -snooty—and we goes on in.</p> - -<p>We gets into our colors and sets around with the fellows dishing out -a lot of bull about what we done in Tijuana and Jimmie gives me the -wink and says he has got hold of a nifty bridle he is willing to take -a loss on. And he gets this here bridle out of his locker and says if -anybody will give him a fin for it they can have it, though they will -be rooking him on the deal.</p> - -<p>Boy, does he get the laugh. Moe says he will give him a fin for it if -Jimmie will throw in Peajacket and shine his boots for a week, too. And -Cry Baby Noolan says if it is such a hot bridle why don't he bridle -Peajacket with it. And everybody starts gaffing Jimmie and I acts real -indignant and I says what is it worth to them if he <i>does</i> bridle -Peajacket with it, them being such sports. Jimmie, seeing the lay of -the land, plays up to me and says, "No," and everybody chimes in giving -him the merry ha-ha and when there is three bucks up he will not do it, -why, then Jimmie says O.K., he will do it, see.</p> - -<p>Does a holler go up when they catches on to how they has been taken! -But Jimmie says a bet is a bet and he is game enough to live up to his -end of the bargain if they is. "Of course, if they <i>isn't</i>—" -he says, inferring that anybody who reneges is a horse's patoot, so, -naturally, nobody reneges, though there is some grousing.</p> - -<p>I used to say to Jimmie, I would say, "Jimmie, remember the day at -Tijuana when we nicked Moe and them for three bucks?" And Jimmie, he -would say, "Yeah," and kind of draw in his breath like he was thinking -about it—hard. Remembering how Peajacket upset the bookies' apple cart.</p> - -<p>You see, Stew Hatcher is wrong. It is Peajacket, High Jinks and -Admirella. One, two, three. And the owner of Peajacket—I forget his -name, big loose-mouthed chap with a face like a side of beef—is fair -to be hobbled because he has not bet on his own entry on account of as -how it is a cinch to lose. It is a two-year-old he has picked up for -seven and a quarter at a public sale and he is just feeling him out and -damn if Jimmie does not bring in a win.</p> - -<p>Me? Oh, I comes in with the tailbearers. I could of got in a lame -fourth, but I am so whooper-jawed watching Jimmie go down the stretch -like a lighted fuse that I lets this here Black Boy I am up on bear -out—he was death on bearing out—and, of course, that puts the quietus -on us. There is not no percentage in whipping a horse over for fourth -place. A horse has got sense enough to know when you is making a fool -out of him.</p> - -<p>No, I do not guess you will recollect Peajacket. He turns out to be a -foozle, after all. He is entered a couple of more times, Saratoga, I -thinks, and Empire City—Syl Patton up—but he does not do nothing but -pick up a coupla pounds of mud.</p> - -<p>But he sure is not no foozle that afternoon at Tijuana.</p> - -<p>There is not no barrier. You just keeps back of the line as best you -can. That is one way to lose a race before the gun. I has seen them do -it on purpose. You know, too tight a rein, get your horse skittered, -make him break three or four times, and, when the gun goes, hold him -back just long enough to let him see that he is a cooked potato. Nine -times out of ten you can whip him raw and he will run, but he will not -run fast enough. But <i>your</i> nose is clean. The trainer cannot say -as how <i>you</i> did not try.</p> - -<p>Say, am I boring you with this? If I am—okke doke, any time you has -had a sufficiency, say so.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>Well, as I was saying, there is not no barrier. Outside of a little -tail flicking and head tossing, Black Boy is as calm as a Jersey cow. -High Jinks breaks once and Sky Eagle and some of the field prances -around a bit, but Peajacket he acts like he has been fed hopped oats. -In fact, there is some talk of it later on, but they cannot never prove -nothing. Anyway, this here Peajacket is taking on for a fare-you-well -with Jimmie trying to gentle him down and the starter getting mad and a -jock, name of Happy Slauderwasser—that is a moniker for you, nice guy -though—who is next to Peajacket swearing something fierce. Finally, -Jimmie gets this here Peajacket backed in and he is lathered up like a -ad for saddle soap, and the gun goes, and out of the tail of my eye as -me and Black Boy takes off I sees Peajacket rearing up and I thinks, -"Oh, Lordy," because it is a rule last one in has to pitch a buck in -the kitty. And it is plain to see, in a field of fifteen, Jimmie is -slated to be the last one in and then we will only have a buck apiece -instead of a buck fifty.</p> - -<p>I settles down and starts easing over to the inside track hoping for -a pocket. High Jinks is up ahead and he is not anywheres near let out -yet. There is three or four horses in between, then Admirella nosing -up, Sky Eagle alongside, doing like me, playing a wait, and Jimmie and -the rest of the field bunched in behind.</p> - -<p>I am not thinking about Jimmie no more, though. I am concentrating on -them three or four babies cutting off my view of High Jinks. I am not -worried about them none, but when there is a opening I wants to be -there instead of Sky Eagle. So I am concentrating, like I said, and I -hear this horse coming. You do not actually hear them as much as you -<i>feel</i> them. It is a mixture of both. It is like you got an alarm -system inside of you and all of a sudden it is ringing like who popped -Mollie and you know with a kind of a ... of a ... a kind of a awareness -that you got heavy competition.</p> - -<p>I remembers wondering who it could be. There is High Jinks and -Admirella in plain sight. Sky Eagle and me practically pat-a-caking at -each other, some of the field ahead, but they is giving by now and, so -far as I know, what is left in tow is not capable of doing nothing but -horse apples.</p> - -<p>I do not take my mind off this here opening, though. It is getting -ripe, I can see that, and I am bound I am going to be there when it is -due before it closes in and strings out.</p> - -<p>Then, I catches a glimpse of this here horse on the off side of Sky -Eagle. A kind of consciousness it is of this here third horse and I am -sort of cheered when I see it is not bothering none about no openings, -nor no inside track, nor nothing like that. And, while I am being -cheered and thinking what a smart guy I am, this here third horse -pounds ahead past Sky Eagle, a shoulder, half a length, a length, and -that opening I been hovering over swings wide as a barn door and Sky -Eagle is through it because I am yawping at Jimmie Winkie with his ears -skinned back crouched high on Peajacket, and if I had not of knowed -better I would of swore he was scared green, and while I am yawping, -Black Boy bears out so, as I said, that puts the quietus on us.</p> - -<p>There has been better races run and bigger ones has been won by darker -horses, but, off-hand, I cannot call any to mind that I got such a -thrill out of. I do not know whether it is because I am so cocksure -Jimmie is bringing up the rear, or because Moe Prentice—he is up on -High Jinks—is took down a peg or two, or maybe because there is a -certain something about the way that there horse runs with his nostrils -red and wide, and his tail streaming out behind him like it has been -starched, and his hoofs beating music out of that there track like a -crazy drummer, and Jimmie pasted to him close as a surcingle and with -a kind of a look about him like night wind sounds, if you know what I -mean. A kind of a queer, wild, blowy look. But most of all I guess it -is the horse.</p> - -<p>Jimmie says it is the horse and he ought to of knowed being as how he -was up on him. Jimmie says it is also a great surprise to him that -Peajacket wins, but, naturally, he does not say this out—but just to -me—as it is not a good policy to let on that you are surprised when -you bring in a winner.</p> - -<p>How does it feel to bring in a winner? Brother, you can have the -greatest symphony that was ever wrote; I will take the thunder of -a winner's hoofs coming down the straightaway. That is something, -brother. That is really <i>some</i>thing. It is like a ... like a ... -well, like I said, a kind of a awareness. Like you was conscious of the -noise and the feel all at the same minute. Take that there Peajacket. I -got it right away. The noise and the feel together, I mean. Like there -was two horses running. One on top the other.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>We bums a ride back after the seventh and gets out on the main drag and -flips a coin to see whether we eats or buys Ditsy something. It comes -out buying Ditsy something so we goes to one of these here shops that -has a window full of everything from jewelry to tablecloths and we -picks out a powder box that plays a tune when the lid is lifted off. A -thin, tinkly, sort of <i>plink, plink</i> tune, but pretty. Reminds you -of the way ladies used to rustle when they walked, if you know what I -mean.</p> - -<p>While the guy is wrapping it up, Jimmie goes over and picks up a vase -which is setting on a shelf with a lot of other vases. This here vase -he picks up is blue and has a lot of well-built dames on it holding -garlands of flowers. Jimmie kind of whistles.</p> - -<p>"Look at this here," he says.</p> - -<p>I agrees it is nice, but points out that we has got exactly twenty-nine -cents between us and the price is marked clear two fifty.</p> - -<p>"This is a strange coincidence," he says, more to hisself than me, and -I says it is not no coincidence it is a vase and if he is thinking -about switching over, why, there is a vase on the shelf above which is -better-looking on account of as how it has a scene painted on it and -the price is twenty-five cents cheaper.</p> - -<p>This guy comes up about this time and washes his hands in the air and -asks if we are interested in a vase.</p> - -<p>"No," I says.</p> - -<p>"Yes," Jimmie says. "Who is this here middle dame on this here vase?"</p> - -<p>"They represent the Muses," this guy says. "A marvelous buy for the -money."</p> - -<p>"This here middle dame is a Muse?" asks Jimmie.</p> - -<p>"They are all Muses," this guy says, "goddesses of the arts and poetry -and science. A very artistic vase. Only two fifty."</p> - -<p>"Did any of them have a horse?" Jimmie asks.</p> - -<p>"Horse?"</p> - -<p>"Horse."</p> - -<p>"I could not say. It is a very handsome vase, howinever, and I will -make you a special price of two twenty-five, if you are interested."</p> - -<p>"Where can I find out if any of them had a horse?"</p> - -<p>"I could not say, unless it is the library. Two dollars even I will -make it. Below that I cannot go."</p> - -<p>"Very well," I chimes in, being tired of Jimmie ribbing this here guy -about a horse, "we will take it in place of the powder box."</p> - -<p>With that this guy freezes over like the outside of a mint julep and he -says chillylike, "I have just remembered that this vase has been put -aside for another party."</p> - -<p>And I says, "That is very odd being as how you were so all fired set on -us having it at reduced cost."</p> - -<p>"Herman," this guys says.</p> - -<p>And another guy with a neck like a Percheron, shoulders his way through -a curtain in the back and stands there like as if he is itching for -somebody to say "When." So we takes our package and we leaves.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>I am in favor of hunting up a crap game and shooting our twenty-nine -cents and Jimmie says that is a splendid idea and for me to do so and -he will meet me at the pool parlor in a hour. I asks where is he going? -And he says the library. And as he has never been inside a library in -his life to my certain knowledge, I figure he is telling me in a nice -way to mind my own business. Which I does. And in a hour I has run the -twenty-nine cents into eight bits and a Masonic emblem.</p> - -<p>I meets Jimmie like he said and I can see right away he is exceptional -thoughtful. We go to a place called La Cucuracha where the second cup -of coffee is free and you gets gravy with your potatoes, although -Jimmie seems to have lost his appetite. He keeps transferring his food -from one side of his plate to the other until I outs and asks him -pointblank what is ailing him.</p> - -<p>"Did you ever hear tell of a horse called Pegasus?" he says by way of -answer.</p> - -<p>"No," I says. "Who sired him?"</p> - -<p>"He is out of Medusa by Neptune," says Jimmie.</p> - -<p>"I never heard of them, neither," I says shoveling in a mouthful of -potatoes and gravy. "What has this here Peg-whoit got to do with you?"</p> - -<p>"I am not certain for sure," he says, "but I has got a idea,"</p> - -<p>"Which is?"</p> - -<p>"Could be he got blowed off his course," Jimmie says, "or got scared by -another gadfly or some such, landed in Tijuana and this here Muse comes -after him and—"</p> - -<p>"Look," I says, "one of us has got a screw loose and it is not me. -Begin over and repeat slow and there is apple pie with the dinner and -if you do not want it I will eat your piece, if it is all the same to -you. Now what was you saying?"</p> - -<p>He shoves his plate back. "I am going to break the track record -tomorrow," he says, and there is something about the way he says it, -some quality in his voice that makes me sit up and take notice all of a -sudden.</p> - -<p>A kind of creepy sensation comes over me and I am reminded of when I -am a kid and the grandfather's clock in the hall would strike during -the night. It would go <i>bong—bong—bong</i> real slow and soft, but -filling the house, howinever, and making the air vibrate. I would lie -there and think, "It is just the grandfather's clock in the hall," but -that did not make no difference. My feet would get cold and my eyes -near bug out of my head, and I would not have no swallow and I would -lie there thinking, "It is just the grandfather's clock in the hall."</p> - -<p>I gives Jimmie one of them searching looks you read about, but it does -not tell me nothing except that he is a mite tightened-uplike and is -letting some fifty cents worth of food go to waste.</p> - -<p>"Thanks for the tip," I says. "Who you planning on being up on? -Man-o'-War?"</p> - -<p>"Ditsy has always wanted a grand piano," he says, "since she was not -bigger'n a boot-jack." And he says, "I will get her the best one money -can buy."</p> - -<p>It is obvious that he tightened up more than I think because there is -not enough space in that two-room flat in Cleveland to hold both Ditsy -and a grand piano at the same time.</p> - -<p>"That will be dandy," I says, "but I am afraid there will not be no -grand piano in it. Them things cost folding money."</p> - -<p>"Folding money," he repeats and the words sounds like a three-inch -sirloin the way he says them—thick and red and juicy. "You know what -I am going to have," he says, "I am going to have a pair of handmade -boots—them that laces at the ankle—and I am going to have a suit with -buttonholes under the buttons on the sleeves. Not just thread sewed to -look like buttonholes—<i>real</i> buttonholes I am going to have under -the buttons and a yellow chamois bag."</p> - -<p>"A yellow chamois bag under the buttons," I says and, recalling to mind -a chap named Joe Hankins who fought a bunch of Comanches all one night -in a psycopathic ward at a hospital in Louisville, I continues to smile -pleasantly while I eases my chair back.</p> - -<p>"Yeah," Jimmie says, "lined with flannel so as the bridle will not get -scratched up none."</p> - -<p>"Sure," I agrees, "flannel."</p> - -<p>"Saratoga," says Jimmie, "Havre de Grace, Narragansett, Hialeah, -Aqueduct."</p> - -<p>"Hawthorne, Churchill Downs, Empire City, Belmont Park, Thistledown," I -chimes in nodding like a Chinese laundryman who has lost your wash. I -holds my breath and gets to my feet praying that I will be able to ease -him out quiet.</p> - -<p>"Through?" Jimmie says, cool as a cucumber. "What say we see if we can -get a game of pool on the cuff?"</p> - -<p>The next day he breaks the track record.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>I has thought about it a great deal since then and do you know what I -figure? I figure it like this. I figure that Jimmie had got on to a -secret. There is a secret to doing everything. Like tight-rope walking, -or shooting par golf consistent, or whizzing a ball over a tennis net -so as it falls just so and dribbles off before it can be got up off -the ground. There is a secret to juggling plates and a secret to pole -vaulting higher than anybody else. The plates and the pole and the -rope and the golf clubs and tennis racquet is all the same. What I -mean is you could take half a dozen plates and throw them up in the -air and they would land behind the eight ball. But take these here -same identical plates and give them to a juggler and he will make them -perform without so much as mussing his tie. Why? Because he knows the -secret.</p> - -<p>Well, then, why can it not be the same way with horses? I am not saying -you can take a plow horse and make him win a race any more than that -there juggler can juggle plates made out of pig iron. But I am saying, -if you know the secret, you can take a <i>race horse</i> and make him -win a race. And, like I said, I has thought about it a lot and I figure -there is a secret and Jimmie has got on to it. I figure the secret -comes to him in a flash like when you know, in a sort of a burst of -knowing, that the dealer has aces back to back. Because from that day -on he never rides a loser. Except one. I will get around to that in a -second.</p> - -<p>Saratoga and Hialeah and Havre de Grace and all of them is not no pipe -dream. And neither is Ditsy's grand piano, though it is not in no -two-room flat. It is in a living room as big as from here to there. -One of them two-storied jobs that goes all the way up to the roof. -One of them studio living rooms. And done real classy with drapes and -hand-carved furniture and lamps with rose silk on the underneath parts -of their shades, and them black-and-white, pen-and-ink-looking pictures -on the walls, and a rug that feels like it will arch in the middle and -purr if you rub it, it is that soft.</p> - -<p>Of course, it does not happen pronto. It starts out gradual with -Jimmie's name in the papers—"Keep your eye on So-and-So up on -So-and-So"—and then it takes a up curve with the sports writers -pegging him with this here Wee Willie and first thing you know he is -appearing regular Sundays in the rotogravure, him and Ditsy, holding -a horseshoe or a shamrock or this here bridle or such as that, and -persons are talking about the "Winkie Technique" and children is eating -their weight in cereal because Wee Willie Winkie says as how it has got -Vitamin Q and for six box tops or reasonable facsimiles thereof the -cereal people will send you a handsome, autographed photograph of Wee -Willie on Martinique or Little John or Fireflow or some such as them. -And his stock is going up like a fever chart. And he is in the bucks. -But I mean <i>in</i>, brother.</p> - -<p>It changes him some. I do not mean he goes around putting out like -he has hung the moon and painted the blue sky; if anything, he -quietens down and kind of draws into hisself like. In fact, when he -is congratulated on his ability, which he is every time he turns -around, he acts like it is making him sick to his stomach. And when the -write-ups come out about how modest he is and shy and retiring and how -he always tries to give the credit for a win to the horse, why then he -acts like he is even sicker and getting no better fast.</p> - -<p>Naturally, while most of the publicity is along the lines of sweetness -and light, there is some of it as squeezes out a few lemons. Like them -that says as how Winkie rides a horse walleyed, and them as hints it -is mighty peculiar he does not never lose and a pity, furthermore, -because the odds on a horse what is toting Winkie is something to -behold in a new all-time low.</p> - -<p>Then there is the follow-up gang that always seems to heel to a celeb. -Whether he gets to be a celeb by riding horses or eating goldfish -or drinking thirty buckets of beer does not make no noticeable -difference—they follows. It gets so Jimmie cannot go nowheres without -getting the press took out of his pants and he is lucky if the pants is -not also took out with the press.</p> - -<p>People sends him alligators from Florida and salmon from Alaska. He -gets lariats made out of tail hair plaited, and high-heeled boots with -tooling. He gets silver spurs, and leather jackets, and saddles, and -gloves, and sombreros. He gets blankets and pipes and racks for this -and holders for that. He gets a sheep dog, a pair of love birds, a -coon cat, a baby leopard, a bearskin rug with the teeth still in it, a -stuffed owl, a collection of butterflies, and some twisty horns off a -mountain goat all set and glued on a wooden thing to hang on the wall. -He gets socks by the gross, handkerchiefs by carloads and one dame even -sends him a box of pink silk underwear with his initials stitched in -fancy in orchid embroidery.</p> - -<p>To give you the idea, one day he appears in the papers cutting a -piece out of one of them round coffee cakes and the next day there is -nineteen round coffee cakes delivered to his address and he does not -<i>like</i> round coffee cakes nor no kind of coffee cakes, but is -cutting this here piece to please the press photographer who wants a -homey touch.</p> - -<p>But for everybody what is giving him something there is two wanting him -to give <i>them</i> something. Jimmie used to say he got so he could -tell right off who was a givee and who was a gimme. Not that he does -not appreciate what is give him, even if he does not keep it, and not -that he does not hand out to the gimmes—it is just that he does not -want nothing off of nobody and does not want nobody to want nothing off -of him.</p> - -<p>But when you gets in the major brackets that is not the way things is. -So, like I said, it changes him some. Some way, he reminds me of a kid -what has eat a quarter's worth of jelly beans all one flavor.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>It changes Ditsy, too. Her hair is not loose-like and fluffy no more. -It is on the order of a cocker spaniel's, only precise, and her ears -has got earbobs in them, and instead of wearing print housedresses she -is all diked out in them dresses which is not referred to as dresses, -but as "creations." She has got a new wheelchair which is streamlined -and has more chrome on it than a limousine, and some bird with a -Vandyke and a accent you can spread like marmalade is giving her some -kind of underwater massage for her legs, so she should be very happy. -She is not, though.</p> - -<p>She puts on like she is happy and anybody what does not know her would -say, "My, she is happy," and they would be ninety-nine and forty-four -hundreds percent wrong because she is not happy by no means. She fools -Jimmie because Jimmie is so anxious for her to be happy that, when she -keeps saying she is happy, he believes she is happy and it does not -occur to him that when you are happy you does not go around saying, -"My, I am happy," like you was learning a lesson in memorizing.</p> - -<p>When a woman is happy she sings and brushes her hair a lot and says -stuff like, "I declare, it is four o'clock <i>already</i>, can you beat -that?" and she looks smily even when she is not actually smiling. So -it is obvious Ditsy is not happy because she is not doing none of them -things. When she smiles it is more or less of a lip movement going on -under her nose and not having nothing to do with the rest of her face, -and she does not sing spontaneous, though when she is in that two-room -flat the landlady has had to request her several times to pipe down. -And, instead of saying, "I declare it is four o'clock <i>already</i>," -she just says, "It is four o'clock," like you would say, "The dodo -is now become extinct," or, "I see where there in a population of -ninety-two in East Gleep, Nevada."</p> - -<p>So, as I said, it changes Ditsy, too. And it is pathetic to watch them -two, him and her, working so hard at being happy and pretending that -life is a bowl of cherries when it is plain life is a onion poultice.</p> - -<p>Some time passes and I am here, there, and yonder and word gets around -that Jimmie Winkie is hitting the paint which occasions me to be -surprised because Jimmie Winkie is never one to hit the paint even in a -mild manner. So I am not paying any attention to these here remarks and -I am once or twice very near smacking persons in the puss who say that -it is a fact that Ditsy is turned into a red-hot momma.</p> - -<p>What's that? Oh, that. Well, it seems that this here underwater massage -is the stuff and she is able to get around some—not good, understand, -but some.</p> - -<p>What! Her! Say, listen here, bub—well, all right, no offense taken, -but she is not that kind. O. K. O. K. Let it ride. Sure I will have -another beer, only do not make no more remarks like that, see. O. K. O. -K.</p> - -<p>Maybe I do not make myself clear. I mean she has gone in for -double-jointed cigarette holders and red fingernails and them -long-haired guys what paints a picture of somebody so as they have one -eye here and one here and clockwork springs for the top of their head -and maybe a spare tire for one hand and a fiddle for the other with a -bunch of carrots sprouting out of it.</p> - -<p>Anyway, that is what I am hearing and—here's bumps, brother. You know -I set and watched a glass of beer bubble from the bottom one night -and it bubbled for three hours and a half 'fore it got flat. That was -when Ditsy—But I will get around to that quick enough. Now and again -I still catches myself trying <i>not</i> to think about it. And it has -been a long time. A long time.</p> - -<p>What was I saying? Oh, yeah, Jimmie hitting the paint. He <i>is</i> all -right because I am setting in a place in Cleveland—having just got off -the train—and some fellow comes in and I does not pay no attention -until I see he is walking like a banty rooster which is sea-sick. And -I yells, "Jimmie!" And he looks up and focuses on me and I see it is -true he is hitting the paint and, if his present condition is a fair -example, he is hitting it with a capital H.</p> - -<p>I am not one to stick my nose in other people's business. I am one who -says other people's business is their own business and no business of -mine, having found that a nose stuck in other people's business usually -gets itself pinned up so as it does not look like a nose for quite a -while after.</p> - -<p>But this is different. First, it is Jimmie Winkie. Second, he is -running a race the next day I have seen by the papers. Third, it will -not put no shine on his shoes if somebody says, "Oh, look, is that not -Wee Winkie and is he not skizzled?"</p> - -<p>To make a long story short, I gets him out of there. I thinks about -checking into a hotel, but there is those somebodies again, so there is -not nothing to do but get a cab and take him home. The same which I -does.</p> - -<p>When I first sees Ditsy I also thinks it is true that she has turned -into a red-hot momma. She has done something to her mouth so it looks -like it has been swatted by a ripe plum, and she is wearing one of them -"creations" that does not leave but very little to the imagination, and -she is walking with two silver-headed canes, and her fingernails looks -like they has been dipped in calves' liver while it is still in the -calf.</p> - -<p>She is quite a sight for sore eyes until you remembers it is Ditsy -and, then your collar gets too tight and you say, "Hello, Ditsy," and -she does not say nothing. She just looks at Jimmie until you thinks -she does not know who it is and, then, she looks at me and her eyes -is the color of a horse's flanks after a workout—dark and wet and -velvety—and she says, "Bring him in, Jacks," and, some way, her voice -sounds like it is bleeding. And, all at once, you know that underneath -all this cover-up she has put on is the same old Ditsy. Worn finer, and -kind of tired, but Ditsy.</p> - -<p>She knows what to do, too. She does not put him to bed. She has me set -him up in the bathroom with his head over the basin and she feeds him -soapy water and as fast as one glass full comes up down goes another. -And when he says he cannot do it no more, she wheedles him into doing -it until his insides is as clean as a old maid's conscience, and his -head is woozy but not boozy. Also, I am under the impression this is -not the first time them two has underwent this here same procedure.</p> - -<p>Soapy water? Best thing on earth. Makes you feel like you has been -hollowed out and whittled thin, but it does not leave nothing in you -that you would want to wake up with the next morning. Of course, it is -not exactly a pleasant treatment while it is going on, but, after it is -done, although you could not fight no mess of apes, you could give them -a run for their money, if such become necessary.</p> - -<p>After some time, Jimmie says in a washed-out voice, "O.K., go ahead. -Tell me I am a louse."</p> - -<p>Ditsy does not say nothing and I does not say nothing, neither, being -busy examining my cuticles.</p> - -<p>"I know I am a louse," he continues. "Go on. Get it over with. Go on, -tell me I am a louse."</p> - -<p>So I says, "You are a louse, period," and I leaves off examining my -cuticles and takes up examining Jimmie like he is a rare specimen of -garbage that has got in among us while we are occupied elsewhere.</p> - -<p>"I was not asking <i>you</i>," Jimmie says, and he looks at Ditsy and -Ditsy looks at him and Ditsy does not say nothing.</p> - -<p>"I beg your pardon," I says, "I thought you was addressing the general -public of which there are several that says you has lost hold of your -senses."</p> - -<p>"Shut up," Jimmie says. "SHUT UP. I did not ask you to butt in, did I? -Why do you not go back where you come from?"</p> - -<p>"Sure," I says, "I will be delighted. But when you is handing out -your interviews tomorrow do not give the credit for the win to the -horse—give it to Ditsy, here. <i>If</i> you win."</p> - -<p>"What do you mean 'if'?" Jimmie says. "It is in the bag." He laughs. -"Literal," he says. "You and Ditsy need not worry none."</p> - -<p>"I am not worrying," Ditsy says toneless-like. "It does not matter -either way. Nothing does not matter. Any more."</p> - -<p>The way she tags that "any more" on to it is horrible to listen to. It -has a dead, flat, hopeless sound and I keep thinking, if I look down, -I will see it laying there on the bath mat spread out on its back with -its eyes rolled up.</p> - -<p>It gets Jimmie, too, because it is clear that if Ditsy had batted him -on the bean with a lead sock he would not be more took back.</p> - -<p>"What do you mean?" he says. "What do you mean?" like that, see, with a -up on the end.</p> - -<p>"I mean it is no good," Ditsy says. "I cannot stand it. You are not -Jimmie Winkie any more. You are somebody else. Somebody else I do not -know. Somebody else who I do not want to know. I hope you do lose -tomorrow," she says and her words bump into each other and bunch up, -like the field in a steeple-chase taking the first hedge. "I hope you -lose tomorrow," she says, "and the next day, and the next and the next -and next and next, and we can go back to that two-room flat and eat -beef stew and take turns washing the dishes and put toothpicks in the -windows to keep them from rattling, and play pinochle and watch the car -lights come over the Freeway and, maybe, have a pint of ice cream for a -treat and ... and ... be ... happy"—and her voice breaks in the middle -and she puts her face in her hands and starts crying.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>It is a awful experience to see a girl cry. It makes you feel like all -your joints has swelled and your ears and feet belong to a two-humped -camel.</p> - -<p>Jimmie says, "You want me to <i>lose</i>?" like he is suffering from -hallucinations.</p> - -<p>Ditsy keeps on crying.</p> - -<p>I gives her my handkerchief and wonders if I ought to pat at her or -something.</p> - -<p>"I cannot lose," Jimmie says.</p> - -<p>"Look," I says, "I think I has had sufficient. I am going."</p> - -<p>"I cannot lose," Jimmie says, "and, if I do, they will not call me Wee -Willie no more. Guys like Moe Prentice will give me the laugh. I got to -keep on winning. I cannot stop now."</p> - -<p>"You has not <i>got</i> to do nothing but die," I says, "and if what -guys like Moe Prentice says means more to you than Ditsy, here, I would -go on off and die if I was you."</p> - -<p>"What about your grand piano?" Jimmie says to Ditsy.</p> - -<p>"I hate it," Ditsy says through her fingers. "I would like a c-c-canary -b-b-bird."</p> - -<p>"But I cannot lose," Jimmie says, shaking his fist. "I -cannot—unless—" And he quits shaking his fist and uncloses it and -looks at it like he expects to find it has varicose veins. And he looks -at Ditsy setting there on the floor.</p> - -<p>"You mean what you said?" he says.</p> - -<p>Ditsy makes a kind of soft <i>oooooo</i>ing noise like a stable hound -what has been stepped on.</p> - -<p>"O.K.," Jimmie says. "O.K." He gets up and sort of wavers a minute -and then he goes out and Ditsy keeps on crying and I clears my throat -once or twice and wishes she is a horse so as I could gentle her and -then Jimmie comes back in and he is carting this here bridle.</p> - -<p>"From me to you," he says, plunking it on the floor. And there is a -long pause and then he adds, "Temporarily."</p> - -<p>Ditsy looks at the bridle, hiccuping slightly like a baby what has been -having colic.</p> - -<p>"I do not get it," she says, hiccuping again.</p> - -<p>Jimmie indicates the bridle. "Remember the time," he says, "that we was -in the Home and you found a four-leaf clover in a book what belonged to -Miss Watson? I had a toothache, so you snitched the four-leaf clover -to put in my shoe so as it would go away—the toothache I mean. Only -you said it was 'temporarily' because it was somebody else's four-leaf -clover and might have repre ... repercussions being as how it does not -actually belong to me. So I did—put it in my shoe I mean—and I got a -blind abscess and it was—well, you know how it was."</p> - -<p>"I still do not get it," Ditsy says looking at the bridle like she is -expecting it to turn into a four-leaf clover.</p> - -<p>"It is like this," Jimmie says. "That there"—he points to the -bridle—"is the same as the four-leaf clover. Maybe you got a toothache -now, but, if I lose, it might turn out to be a blind abscess. So it is -only temporary. I am not giving it to you. I am only letting you keep -it for me."</p> - -<p>"I <i>still</i> do not get it," Ditsy says, blowing her nose in my -handkerchief.</p> - -<p>"I do," I says. "He is saying you thinks you wants a canary bird when -what you really wants is a grand piano, which you have already got."</p> - -<p>"You stay out of this," Jimmie says.</p> - -<p>"Lay off Jacks," Ditsy says to Jimmie. "He is all right."</p> - -<p>"Jacks is a old lady," Jimmie says to Ditsy.</p> - -<p>"I am going," I says. Which I does.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>No. No more beer. I am not half through with this one. I do not like to -crowd them. And, speaking of crowding, that is what I think happens to -Jimmie.</p> - -<p>Lose? I reckon he does. He does not even get away from the post.</p> - -<p>What I mean about crowding, I figure this here horse Jimmie is up on -gets crowded quick. There is some crows slow, some easy, some quick. -Jimmie happens to be up on Beeknight and, the way I figure, I figure -Beeknight crowds quick. You know how it is, out of the barrier, -everybody trying for a inside track, some pushing maybe, though this is -not noticeable unless you is up. Now them that crowds slow gets out and -tries, and them that crowds easy falls in, but them that crowds quick -rears up and starts doing the Highland fling. There is not many. But -there is some. And, like I said, the way I figure, Beeknight is one of -the some.</p> - -<p>After it is all over, there is plenty who say there is something fishy -because Beeknight is never one to crowd slow, easy, <i>or</i> quick. -Jimmie has been up on Beeknight before and Beeknight has always came in -home free. In fact, before this here episode I am getting ready to tell -you about, Beeknight is being touted for the Jockey Gold Cup, so there -is plenty who say the atmosphere smells highly of cod.</p> - -<p>Jimmie pull him? You mean on account of Ditsy saying what she said? -Maybe. I thought about that angle, but I am almost sure for certain -that is not the case. I seen him right after it is over and, if he is -putting on a show, I am a snub-tailed bloodhound.</p> - -<p>No, I figure horses like I figure human beings. They is subject to -change. This here Beeknight might of slept restless, he might of been -overtrained, he might of been scary, he might of had gas, he might of -sensed Jimmie was not in no mood. Them things affects a horse. So I say -there is nothing off-color, but that this here Beeknight has underwent -a change and happens to crowd quick.</p> - -<p>It is like this, see. I avoided Jimmie like he has got the plague and -this is reciprocated on his part. I see he is jittery and keyed up, but -this is no mud on my boots, so I leave him be. Not that he is left be, -because there is many who do not think he has got the plague. It is -very sickening to watch.</p> - -<p>I wonder if Ditsy is in the stands, but I do not wonder long as -somebody asks him if his sister is in the stands and he says, "No, she -is home." And somebody says, "Don't she like horse races?" And he says, -"No." And somebody says, "Well, that is odd. Your own sister." And he -says, "How would you like to go bag your ears," which shows that he is -keyed up to a considerable degree.</p> - -<p>He is up in the first, again in the third, and again in the fourth. I -am not up at all until the next day. In fact, I am only there because -I cannot stay away, so I goes out and hangs over the veranda rail to -watch the first.</p> - -<p>It is a swell day. One of them high, blue ones. There is music -coming out of the announcing system and people is walking around and -everything is kind of stirred up like—like it is before the start. It -is a fast track and pretty to look at and Happy Slauderwasser comes out -and says, "Move over," and we both hangs over the veranda rail and just -look at how everything looks, if you know what I mean.</p> - -<hr class="chap"> - -<div class="figcenter illowp95" id="illus2" style="max-width: 39.75em;"> - <img class="w100" src="images/illus2.jpg" alt=""> -</div> - -<hr class="chap"> - -<p>Then the horses is mincing past, Jimmie about as big as a good-sized -pea, and then the barrier is in, and it is Beeknight in No. 6, and -everything gets quiet with a little murmur running through it like a -breeze with a lid on it, and you can hear the popcorn peddlers real -plain, and then there is that swelling cry, "THEY'RE OFF!" But it -chokes in the middle and there is a surge for the fence and the stands -rise up and cranes their necks and Happy says, "My God!" and I near -falls over the veranda rail because Beeknight is pawing the air and -kicking and acting in general like he is a prize exhibition at a rodeo -and for all them shenanigans he does not go nowheres. It is like he is -trying to kick his way through a wall or something. Jimmie is stuck -closer than a plaster, but not for long. Beeknight gives a lunge and -Jimmie goes over, and a sort of a soft, gusty sound goes up from the -crowd like a thousand breaths has been let out at once.</p> - -<p>By the time Jimmie has hit the ground, they is taking Beeknight out and -do you know that confounded horse is as calm as a June morning? Jimmie -gets out under his own power.</p> - -<p>Yeah. You see it coming, kick loose and roll with the fall and it does -not no more than scrape off the top fuzz.</p> - -<p>It seems like a hour at least has gone past, but it cannot be no more -than a handful of seconds because it is all clear when the field moves -into the stretch.</p> - -<p>Happy and me look at each other.</p> - -<p>Happy says, "Wow."</p> - -<p>I says, "It looks like somebody is going to get a bird."</p> - -<p>"Yeah," Happy says, "a Bronx one."</p> - -<p>"No," I says, "a yellow one with feathers what sings," and I go on down -to stand on the edge of the crowd what is surrounding Jimmie and listen -to what is being said.</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>What is being said is all the same color and cut equal. Howinever, I am -positive that Jimmie did not do no pull. He is white as death and keeps -shaking his head like there is lead shot in it and he is listening -to it rattle. He keeps saying, "I cannot understand it, I cannot -understand it," over and over. No, he did not do no pull. Spencer Tracy -cannot act that good and Jimmie Winkie is not no Spencer Tracy.</p> - -<p>I mosey on off and am popping my knuckles and thinking when it comes -over the announcing system that Winkie is not hurt none and will be up -in the third as scheduled.</p> - -<p>But this does not take place, as before the third, Gus Wever comes up -to me and he is pale and his Adam's apple is riding up and down on his -collar and he says, "Jacks, I got something for you to do."</p> - -<p>"Shoot," I says.</p> - -<p>"I want you should break the news to Winkie."</p> - -<p>"What news?" I says. "They is not going to disqualify him for falling -off a horse, I hopes."</p> - -<p>"No," Gus says. "Word has just came that his sister has met with a -accident."</p> - -<p>I says, "Ditsy," or I tries to, but it sticks in my throat and, some -way, I finds I am grabbing hold of Gus and there is guys endeavoring to -pull us apart thinking we is having a altercation.</p> - -<p>"Leave go," Gus says, shrugging them off—he is a big guy—"I am asking -Jacks, peaceful, if he will tell Winkie his sister has met with a fatal -accident. He is a friend of Winkie and if your sister is dead, it is -better it comes from a friend. That is all I am asking. I, myself, -cannot do it."</p> - -<p>So I does it.</p> - -<p>When we gets there everything is confusion. There is people everywhere -and a important-acting guy is asking the maid questions, only this does -not do no good as she is setting in a chair having hysterics. And there -is other men down on their knees examining the floor and blowing powder -on the doorknobs and there is a doctor putting his stuff away in a -little black bag.</p> - -<p>And there is Ditsy.</p> - -<p>It does not look like Ditsy. It does not look human even. It is just a -smashed-in, crumpled-up thing what is wearing Ditsy's clothes, and it -has blood all over.</p> - -<p>It reminds me of the way Tod Beemis looks when he is drug out and laid -on a shutter after he is caught in a stall with a crazy stallion. Kind -of ... kind of ... trampled-looking. It makes me feel kind of numblike, -like maybe I has got a scream in me that has froze solid before it can -get out.</p> - -<p>The important-acting guy, by now, has saw us and advances forward.</p> - -<p>"The maid, here," he says, "says she left Miss Winkie setting by the -window and holding a bridle in her lap. Mooning over it kind of, she -says. She goes downstairs, the maid does, and she has not no more'n got -good and down when she hears a racket and she runs back up fast as she -can and it is like this. We has not touched nothing. This," he, says -pointing to a scruffed-looking place on the rug, "I guess is where she -fell down and got up again, and this"—pointing to a spot where the -plaster has been gouged out of the wall—"this here is where whoever -done it must of swung and missed—and, from the evidence, whoever must -of done it was strong as a horse. And this here is the bridle she was -holding, which looks as if it was tore out of her hands and—" He -pauses and squints at Jimmie. "Hey," he says, "you do not look like no -coroner, who are you?"</p> - -<p>"He is her brother," I says, and my voice seems to come from some -far-off place and does not seem to belong to me at all.</p> - -<p>"Oh," the man says embarrassed. "I am sorry, buddy. I did not know -about you being related to the deceased. I am mighty sorry."</p> - -<p>Jimmie does not answer. He is looking at the bridle like it is Lazarus -arose from the dead and it is plain he is going to keel over.</p> - -<p>He puts out his hand, as if he is in a trance, and takes the bridle -from the man.</p> - -<p>"It is all right," I says, "it is his bridle. Leave him have it. I will -take him out of here." Which I do as they bring in a wicker basket and -set it down by this thing on the floor around which they draws a white -chalk mark before ... before they—</p> - -<hr class="tb"> - -<p>Guess I must be coming down with a cold. Yeah. Sure I will have another -one. Just to wet my whistle. I seems to be kind of dried up like. -Talking too much, I guess. There is times, though, when you has got -to get it out of your system—the cold, I mean. Yeah. Well, here's to -nothing, mister. If you got nothing, you got nothing to lose and, even -if you does, it stands to advantage.</p> - -<p>What did who win after what? Oh, Winkie. He does not win no more. And -does not lose no more. Because he does not ride no more. No, I mean -no more. Never. You see, he ... he bumped hisself off. I took it for -granted you knew.</p> - -<p>Yeah. Yeah. It was one of them things. After Ditsy—why, he kind of -went haywire. I tried talking to him. Thought if he got to riding again -it would take his mind off what it was brooding on. No, no, they never -did catch whoever done it. I wish they <i>had</i> of. If I could of got -just within reaching distance—</p> - -<p>No, Jimmie would not pay no attention to me. He would just set there -staring straight ahead and sometimes he would look at me like he could -see clean through my backbone and out the other side.</p> - -<p>"Do not bother none, Jacks," he would say. "You do not understand. It -was my fault. I should of knowed."</p> - -<p>And I would say, "Do not be like that. Them ... them kind of accidents -is figured out statistical. You could not of knowed in a million -years."</p> - -<p>"I was wrong. I was the one who had the blind abscess. Not Ditsy," -he would say. Morose, see. Only I thought he would snap out of it, -eventual. But he does not. When he snaps, he snaps the other way.</p> - -<p>I remember the night that he done it. I set up with him until midnight -talking up Parvalu, which Colonel Crandall wanted him to ride in the -Bay Shore. I says, "Look here, Jimmie, if you will just get out and mix -around some, you will be O. K." And I says, "Do not forget what you -always said: 'You can shake grief or sorrow, you can bury remorse—but -you can't never lose the feel o' a horse.'"</p> - -<p>"Yeah," he says, and he looks at me for the first time like he really -sees me. "Yeah," he says, straightening up, "you can shake grief or -sorrow, you can bury remorse ... bury remorse—"</p> - -<p>"But you can't never lose the feel o' a horse," I finishes for him.</p> - -<p>"Yeah," he says—slow. "Yeah, that is it."</p> - -<p>So I goes home brightened up, thinking I has at last got him squared -around and the next morning—it is in the papers.</p> - -<p>They was two thoroughbreds, them two was. Yessir, two thoroughbreds -that, some way, got boxed on a inside turn.</p> - -<p>What's that? Bridle? Oh, that. I had it buried with Jimmie. He had made -a will leaving everything he possessed to me. Can you beat it? That is -the kind of guy he was. Yeah. Oh, I could of kept it if I had of had a -mind to, but bridles is cheap and he had set such a store by that one -that it did not seem right to keep it. Besides, I could not ever of -used it and kept my mind on what I was doing. He ... he hung hisself -with it, see. He was out of his head with grief, that is all. He did -not think. Jimmie was not no coward to take the easy way out. I know -that. But I could not of had it around me just the same. So I buried it -with him. Holding the reins in his hand. I think he would of liked it -if he could of knowed.</p> - -<p>Well, bottoms up. I got to be going.</p> - -<p>Thanks, brother, and the same to you. It has been a pleasure. No, I do -not reckon you will be seeing me in no papers, unless it is the funny -papers. Did I not tell you? Horses has got a habit of slowing down when -I am up on them. Like they has got a dead weight swinging on the bridle -holding them back. They calls me Jinx. Yeah. Jinx Jackson.</p> - -<p>Well, so long, buddy.</p> - - -<p class="ph1">THE END.</p> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GOLDEN BRIDLE ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ -concept and trademark. 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