"None," said Archie B., as he put his two pieces of gold under his pillow.
"I can't see why that was," wailed Ozzie B. "I done nothin' an'--an'--got all--all--the--lickin'!"
"You jes' reaped my whirlwind," sneered his brother--"All fools do!"
But later he felt so sorry for poor Ozzie B. because he could not lie on his back at all, that he gave him one of his beautiful coins to go to sleep.
It was the last afternoon of the fair, and the great race was to come off at three o'clock.
There is nothing so typical as a fair in the Tennessee Valley. It is the one time in the year when everybody meets everybody else. Besides being the harvest time of crops, of friendships, of happy interchange of thought and feeling, it is also the harvest time of perfected horseflesh.
The forenoon had been given to social intercourse, the display of livestock, the exhibits of deft women fingers, of housewife skill, of the tradesman, of the merchant, of cotton--cotton, in every form and shape.
At noon, under the trees, lunch had been spread--a bountiful lunch, spreading as it did from the soft grass of one tree to that of another--as family after family spread their linen--an almost unbroken line of fried chicken, flanked with pickles and salad, and all the rich profusion of the country wife's pantry.
And now, after lunch, the grand stand had been quickly filled, for the fame of the great race had spread up and down the valley, and the valley dearly loved a horse-race.
Five hundred dollars was considered a large purse, but this race was three thousand!
Three thousand! It would buy a farm. It would buy thirty mules, and twice that many steers. It would make a family independent for life.
And to-day it was given to see which one, of three rich men, owned the best horse.
No wonder that everybody for miles around was there.
Sturdy farmers with fat daughters, jaded wives, and lusty sons who stepped awkwardly on everything on the promenade, and in trying to get off stepped on themselves. They went about, with broad, strong, stooping shoulders, and short coats that sagged in the middle, dropping under-jaws, and eyes that were kindly and shrewd.
The town people were better dressed and fed than the country people, and but only half way in fashion between the city and country, yet knowing it not.