Chapter VIII: Disaster

Skeeter Butts and Shin Bone stood in the crowd at one of the entrances of the grandstand and frowned and sneered at the importunate negroes who crowded around them.

“Lend us jes’ a dollar or two, Skeeter,” they pleaded. “Ef we could git a leetle start, mebbe we could win some of our money back.”

“I ain’t loantin’ no money,” Skeeter proclaimed. “I’s jes’ bettin’ money, an’ I done bet all I’m got an’ couldn’t loant none ef I wanted to.”

At that moment Pap Curtain joined the group, waving five twenty-dollar bills. He had wasted much time trying to locate Skeeter and Shin.

“Put up or shet up, Skeeter!” he howled gleefully. “Here am one hunderd dollars whut say dat Skipper wins dis race.”

“Bless gracious, Pap,” Skeeter grinned. “I figgered dat I had you bust. Ef I’d ’a’ knowed you had a single dollar lef’ I’d shore been to see you. Now I done bet all I’m got.”

“Put up de Hen-Scratch saloon!” Pap taunted. “I’ll bet you on anything you is got.”

“I got a race-hoss,” Skeeter grinned. “I’ll bet Nigger Blackie agin fifty dollars dat Skipper don’t win.”

“I takes it,” Pap said promptly.

“I’m got a Nigger Blackie race-hoss, too, Pap,” Shin Bone suggested with a loud laugh. “You seed me on him dis mawnin’.”

“I bets you ten dollars agin _yo’_ race-hoss,” Pap said promptly.

“I takes it,” Shin snickered.

Pap turned away with forty dollars, and found no trouble in placing it on Skipper, with odds against his horse of ten to one.

It was the last race of the day, and business was brisk. The losers were squealing and begging money, hoping for a chance to repair their fortunes. The winners were whooping and resorting to every means in their power to push their luck to the limit and add to their loot.

“Hurry up, niggers!” one of the bloated, dressy coons from the city whooped. “Git yo’ money on de race! Dey’s saddlin’ up! Ef you wants to git in on dis spec’lation now is de las’ an’ loudest call fer yo’ money! Git busy!”

“Put yo’ las’ dollar on de las’ race an’ don’t cry ef you bets it on de hoss dat comes in las’, niggers!” another darky bawled as he waved a handful of money. “You’ll be shore to git yo’ money’s wuth of dis race, fer dese three hayburners cain’t lope aroun’ dat track befo’ sundown!”

“Listen, Shin!” Skeeter said as he plucked at his friend’s sleeve. “I ’speck we better hunt up dat Whiffle Boone an’ make frien’s wid her over agin. ’Tain’t no use to bear her no grudge--us is winners!”

“Lawd, I done fergot dat sweet little gal offen my mind!” Shin exclaimed as he hastened with Skeeter into the crowded grandstand and pushed through the sweating multitude in his search for his girl.

“Dar she am!” Skeeter said, pointing. “You go up an’ set on one side of her, an’ I’ll set on de yuther side, an’ us’ll jolly her up!”

To their surprise, they found Whiffle as jolly already as she could possibly be. She made room for them, sat down between them and began to talk like the whirr of a flutter-mill.

The bell rang for the fifth race, and the three horses galloped up the track in front of the grandstand. Skeeter noticed that Skipper’s jockey was having the time of his life trying to keep his mount on the track. The animal acted like he had an insane desire to walk the fence, climb into the grandstand, or slide on his ear.

“Somebody is done hit dat Skipper over de head wid somepin an’ sot him crazy,” Skeeter commented.

“Don’t you slanderize Skipper now!” Whiffle warned him. “Dat hoss b’longs to my maw.”

“He’s a good hoss all right,” Skeeter said propitiatingly. “But of co’se he ain’t whut you mought call a race-hoss.”

“Oh, _ain’t_ he?” Whiffle sniffed. “He wus a race-hoss when we bought him, an’ I bet I knows mo’ about race-hossin’ dan you do!”

There was a loud whoop from the crowd and Skeeter Butts raised himself on tiptoe and looked with popping eyeballs.

“Bless _gracious_, whut a git-off!” Whiffle exclaimed.

It was indeed a very bad start. In a few moments the three horses were strung over a distance of a hundred yards, but well to the front and all alone a big gray named Skipper was skimming the rail and running like a wild fox, while Skeeter’s favorite bet, Peedee, was the last in the line.

“O Lawdy!” Skeeter sighed, his heart bumping against the base of his tongue. “Dis is awful, puffeckly awful!”

He sat down heavily and closed his eyes.

Shin Bone took one look and vanished.

Whiffle Boone stood without a tremor of excitement watching her horse.

“Run, you gray houn’ dawg, run!” she whooped in a clear, bugle call.

At the head of the stretch Skipper was far ahead, running like a high-powered automobile.

He passed under the wire and started around the track again. In spite of the frantic efforts of his jockey to stop him Skipper made the second mile in record time.

As he passed the grandstand the negro who operated the big bass drum brought down the drumstick on the stretched pigskin with a loud “Boom!”

Skipper promptly jumped the fence, ran far over in the field, bucked his jockey off, ran splashing through the little artificial pond in the middle of the green, and finally lay down in the water and rolled over and over like a muskrat, kicking and squealing and splashing the water and making waves like Pharaoh’s army drowning in the sea!

“Lawdymussy!” Whiffle whined, watching the antics of the crazed horse and wringing her hands in nervous distress. “I knowed Skipper was a hop-hoss, but I didn’t ax nobody how much tea to gib him. I figger dat I doped Skipper too high!”

The crowd was on its way home a long time before they rescued Skipper from the pond and persuaded the mud-begrimed winner to return to his stall and be cleaned off.

At the head of the homeward-bound procession walked Skeeter Butts and Shin Bone. Words cannot describe their distress.

“Dis is a sad an’ sorrerful day fer me, Shin,” Skeeter wept. “At de eend of de secont race I owned all de money in de worl’. But now----”

“Hush, Skeeter!” Shin said impatiently. “Yo’ mouf is jes’ like a gramophome--you sets it runnin’ an’ goes off an’ leaves it.”

“All right,” Skeeter snarled. “I’ll shet up. But fust I tells you dis, solemn an’ specific: I ain’t never gwine bet on nothin’ no more! Dis here expe’unce is done broke me from suckin’ eggs!”

“Hush, Skeeter!” Shin pleaded. “Lemme medjertate!”