Argosy, Vol. 120, No. 1 — page 147: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A FALL FROM GRACE. wire! His desire now made him bold, though he ordinarily stood in much more awe of his usually silent grandsire than he did of voluble Granny. “Tm goin’, too, Pappy,” he snuffled. “The young ’uns can look after the stock. It ain’t fitten for me to stay, nohow. Gran- ny’s got down the Bible, an’ she says you-all have fell from grace agin.” The old man chuckled, got down, and cinched the saddle on the eager mare, and then, with Enos up behind him, clattered along the road toward the old race-track at Westhall. | There was a likely bunch of two and three year olds at the track, and a few horses like the major’s Breecher and Garry’s sor- Tel mare that already had some reputation. Most of the owners were breeders as well. They were here to get records for their horses and to sell the more promising ones to the big stables in the North. There were several nice little purses of- fered. And the greater the number of en- tries the bigger the purses and the larger slice for the association holding the meet, of which Major Blithedale and Mr. Garry were the principal backers. They were not in the racing game for their health. The free-for-all race without age limit which had interested Pappy from the start, promised the winner a juicy plum. The major and Garry were trying to fatten this purse by getting all the entries possible. “Come, Pappy, be a sport. Enter Rose for that race. It ain’t but three hundred dollars entrance fee, and you can withdraw when they come to the scratch if you don’t like the looks of the field; and ¢hen it ‘Il only cost you a hundred. “Tf it turns out to be only a scrub race, your Rose may stand as good a chance as any, and you might even pull down the purse. Half goes to the winner, you know, | and half to the association.” Pappy’s sporting instincts were already revived. And those of young Enos took fire. The latter wished he had money to _ put on the Rose colt. Despite the flirting of the young stock in tryouts around the track, and the bragging of the white and negro rubbers, Enos believed that the little gray mare was the best put together piece of horse-flesh in all Hanover, if not in Vir- ginia itself! There were several days before the races in which to work out the horses and get them familiar with the track. Pappy looked over the possible field for that free-for-all race with canny gaze, and aside from Breecher and Firefly there were few horses the old man really feared. _ If either of the favorites were not in good fettle at the time the race was called, Pappy knew their owners would scratch them. Neither the major nor Garry would risk having their entries beaten in a scrub race, save one by the other. So the old man allowed himself to be in- fluenced to enter the Rose colt, and put up the first hundred dollars’ guarantee of good faith. He went at once to work to prepare the little mare for the coming event. Most of the horses were “ winter-bound.” They had not been worked much for some months. Whereas, the little flea-bitten gray mare was toughened in sinew and wind by the farm work she had already done this spring. Pappy and Enos curried her until she be- gan to shine—in spots. They trimmed her tail and mane. Enos scarcely left her day or night. He even curled up and slept in her stall, and she often rolled him off her sweet hay-fodder with her soft nose. - “They goin’ to give you-all a chance to show your mettle, Rose,” the boy whis- pered to her. ‘“ Make a killin’! Make a killin’!” . The old man put Enos up on her for a tryout, and Rose ran away with him and went twice around the track like a crazy, horse before the boy seemed able to pull her up. Nobody timed her but Pappy him- self, with his old stop-watch, hidden in his palm. fs The few onlookers were immensely amused by this exhibition, and prophesied that the bookies—there were several of that gentry already on the ground—would make her a hundred-to-one shot. But Pappy 1387 only grinned and did not exercise her much _ after that. . Indeed, Pappy paid more attention to the Rose colt’s possible antagonists than he did to his own entry. He watched the work- = . IGOMMIGIOO S CO@