Blister Jones Part 4

"Come on, Four Eyes," he said. "This ain't no place fur a minister's son."

"I'd like to stay and see the shoeing!" I protested, as he rose to go.

"What shoeing?" he asked incredulously. "You ain't meanin' a big strong guy like Chris manhandlin' a pore little filly? Come awn--I can't stand to see him abusin' her no more."

We wandered down to the big brown oval, and Blister, perching himself on the top rail of the fence, took out his stop-watch, although there were no horses on the track.

"What are you going to do with that?" I asked.

"Got to do it," he grinned. "If I was to set on a track fence without ma clock in my mitt, I'd get so nur-r-vous! Purty soon I'd be as fidgity as that filly back there. Feelin' this ole click-click kind-a soothes my fevered brow."

In a silence that followed I watched a whipped-cream cloud adrift on the deepest of deep blue skies.

"Hi, hum!" said Blister presently, and extending his arms in a pretense of stretching, he shoved me off the fence. "You're welcome," he said to my protests, and added: "There's a nice matched pair."

A boy, leading a horse, was emerging from the mouth of a stall.

The contrast between them was startling--never had I seen a horse with so much elegant apparel; rarely had I seen a boy with so little. The boy, followed by the horse, began to walk a slow circle not far from where we sat. Suddenly the boy addressed Blister.

"Say, loan me the makin's, will you, pal?" he drawled.

From his hip pocket Blister produced some tobacco in a stained muslin bag and a wad of crumpled cigarette papers. These he tossed toward the boy.

"Yours trooly," muttered that worthy, as he picked up the "makin's".

"Heard the news about Hicky Rogers?" he asked, while he rolled a cigarette.

"Nothin', except he's a crooked little snipe," Blister answered.

"Huh! that ain't news," said the boy. "They've ruled him off--that's what I mean."

"That don't surprise me none," Blister stated. "He's been gettin' too smart around here fur quite a while. It'll be a good riddance."

"Were you ever ruled off the track?" I asked Blister, as the boy, exhaling clouds of cigarette smoke, returned to the slow walking of his horse. He studied in silence a moment.

"Yep--once," he replied. "I got mine at New Awlins fur ringin' a hoss.

That little ole town has got my goat."

"When was this?" I asked.'

"The year I first starts conditionin' hosses," he answered.

I had noticed that dates totally eluded Blister. A past occurrence as far as its relation to time was concerned, he always established by a contemporary event of the turf. Pressed as to when a thing had taken place he would say, "The year Salvation cops all the colt stakes," or "The fall Whisk-broom wins the Brooklyn Handicap." This had interested me and I now tried to get something more definite from him. He answered my questions vaguely.

"Say, if you're lookin' fur that kind of info," he said at last, "get the almanac or the byciclopedia. These year things slide by so easy I don't get a good pike at one, 'fore another is not more'n a len'th back, 'n' comin' fast."

I saw it was useless.

"Well, never mind just when it happened," I said. "Tell me about it."

"All right," said Blister. "Like I've just said it happens one winter at New Awlins, the year after I starts conditionin' hosses.

"Things break bad fur me that winter. Whenever a piker can't win a bet he comes 'round, slaps me on the wrist, 'n' separates me from some of my kale. I'm so easy I squeezes my roll if I meets a child on the street. The cops had ought to patrol me, 'cause larceny'll sure be committed every time a live guy speaks to me.

"I've only got three dogs in my string. One of 'em's a mornin'-glory.

He'll bust away as if he's out to make Salvator look like a truck-hoss, but he'll lay down 'n' holler fur some one to come 'n' carry him when he hits the stretch. One's a hop-head 'n' I has to shoot enough dope into him to make him think he's Napoleon Bonyparte 'fore he'll switch a fly off hisself. Then when he sees how far away the wire is he thinks about the battle of Waterloo 'n' says, 'Take me to Elby.'

"I've got one purty fair sort of a hoss. He's just about ready to spill the beans, fur some odds-on, when he gets cast in the stall 'n'

throws his stifle out. The vet. gets his stifle back in place.

"'This hoss must have a year's complete rest,' he says.

"'Yes, Doc,' I says. ''N' when he gets so he can stand it, how'd a trip to Europe do fur him?'

"Things go along like this till I'm busted right. No, I ain't busted--I'm past that. I owes the woman where I eats, I owes the feed man, I owes the plater, 'n' I owes every gink that'll stand fur a touch.

"One day a messenger boy comes 'n' leans against the stall door 'n'

pokes a yellow envelope at me.

"'Well, Pierpont,' I says, 'what's the good word?'

"'Sign here. Two bits,' he says, yawnin'.

"I sees where it says 'charges paid,' 'n' I takes him by the back of the neck 'n' he gets away to a flyin' start fur the gate. The message is from Buck Harms.

"'Am at the St Charles, meet me nine a. m. to-morrow,' it says.

"This Harms duck is named right, 'cause that's what he does to every guy he meets. He's so crooked he can sleep on a corkscrew. When there ain't n.o.body else around he'll take money out of one pocket 'n' put it in another. He's been ruled off twict 'n' there's no chance fur him to get back. I wouldn't stand fur him only I'm in so bad I has to do somethin'.

"'If he takes any coin from me he'll have to be Hermann,' I says to myself, 'n' I shows up at the hotel the next mawnin'.

"Harms is settin' in the lobby readin' the dope-sheet. I pipes him off 'n' he don't look good to me fur a minute, but I goes over 'n' shakes his mitt.

"'Well, Blister, old scout, how're they breakin'?' he says.

"'So, so,' I says.

"'That right?' he says. 'I hears different. Fishhead Peters tells me they've got you on the ropes.'

"'What th' h.e.l.l does that ga.s.sy Fishhead know about me?' I says.

"'Cut out the stallin',' he says. 'It don't go between friends. Would you like to git a-holt of a new roll?'

"'I don't mind tellin' you that sooner 'n have my clothes tore I lets somebody crowd a bundle of kale on to me,' I says.

"'That sounds better,' he says. 'Come on--we'll take a cab ride.'

"'Where we goin'?' I asks him, as we gets into a cab.