“It's over the pulling of Lucretia,” a man said, simply to relieve his strained feelings.
“It was the most barefaced job I ever saw,” declared another; “it's even betting the stable gets ruled off.” He had backed Porter's mare, and was vindictive.
“Not on your life,” sneered a Tout, wolfishly; “a big owner always gets off. The jock'll get it in the neck if they've been caught.”
“Why don't they pay?” whined the fourth. “What's the pulling of the mare got to do with it? The best horse won.” He was a backer of Lauzanne.
“Bet yer life the bookies won't part till the numbers of the placed horses an' riders are up on that board again. They've run them down, don't you see?” chimed in the Tout.
“I'll take two to one The Dutchman gets it,” said a backer of that horse. “There's a job on, and they'll both get disqualified. Porter's kid won ten thousand over Lauzanne, and that's why they stiffened the mare.”
“That's what the Public are up against in this game,” sneered the backer of Lucretia.
“And the jock'll have to stand the shot; I know how it goes,” asserted the Tout.
“You ought to know,” drawled Lauzanne's backer. The racing men within earshot smiled, for the Tout had been a jockey before his license had been taken away for crooked work.
“Hello! here it comes,” cried Lauzanne's backer, as a fat, red-faced man came swiftly down from the Stewards' Stand, ran to the betting ring, and pushing his way through the crowd, called with the roar of a gorilla: “Al-l-l right! Lauzanne, first! The Dutchman, second! Lucretia, third! They're al-l-l weighed in!”
A Niagara of human beings poured from the lawn to the ring; they ran as though the course was on fire and they sought to escape.
“They've broke McKay,” the red-faced crier answered; “suspended him.”
“What did I tell you?” sneered the Tout, maliciously; “it's the under dog gets the worst of it every time.”
A Celt, is an outspoken man when the prod of his hot temper has loosened his tongue, and Mike Gaynor was a Celt in excess.
The injustice that had come to his benefactor, John Porter, had stirred a tempest in his Irish soul. A fierce exclamation of profane wrath had gone up from him as he watched the bad start from over the paddock rail.
A misguided retribution led Starter Carson to pass from the Judges' Stand after the race, along the narrow passage between the Club Stand and the course, to the paddock gate. There he met Mike, who forthwith set to flailing him.