Jacques Futrelle

“ There was no pretty riding by Mathers.
“Ride that hoss all the way, suh,” the Colonel had told him; “don’t do nothin’ but ride. He can stand it.”
And ride Mathers certainly did. In the first six lengths The Gray Ghost had gained two and was going away. Further and further ahead he drew and his eccentric action was forgotten in a yell of appreciation from the grand stand. On, on, positively flying away from the two horses behind him, on past the first-furlong post——
“Eleven an’ four-fifths,” said Batty, “an’ that’s a world’s record!” ”

“ You’re the main chunk. You see, though, I have a natural anxiety, considerin’ that I hocked me clock for forty plunks to invest on the nag. I ain’t been eating regular, and if that nag don’t win I reckon I never will eat no more.”
“You think The Gray Ghost will win, then?” I asked sternly. Batty’s change of front puzzled me.
“It’s a cincherino, if the Colonel says so,” he grinned cheerfully. “Say, Beau, I was just stringin’ you. It don’t do no good, you see, to climb on a rain-barrel an’ shout what you know about a horse to the gapin’ multitude, as it were. It don’t improve the odds any. ”

“ That’s what a horse runs with. Ev’y season a hoss will cut down the world’s record a fraction. The Gray Ghost represents, if I may say it, suhs, fifty years of these fractions. He is fifty years ahead of any hoss ever bred, the result of a development of hind laigs. I bred dozens of hosses, suhs, to increase their power in their hind laigs, and my hoss is the fouhteenth generation of hosses whose hind laigs have been properly attended to. ”

“ The Gray Ghost
By JACQUES FUTRELLE
I
“NO hoss cain’t run without laigs, an’ mostly hind laigs at that,” opined Colonel Wishard judicially. He relighted his corn-cob pipe meditatively, and I allowed an assertion so incontrovertible to stand unchallenged. “No-o, suh; cain’t run without laigs. Now that hoss thar can run some—fact is, Mistah, that hoss can run like hell; still, my idea of a real hoss—one that can run—is a hoss with long hind laigs and a wheel in front.” He puffed his recalcitrant corn-cob into vigorous action. “But, of course, they don’t build hosses that way.” ”

“ I put the question.
“No, Beau, much obliged,” he said. “I’m waiting for a man. I’ve got a chance to pick up a five-dollar William, and one o’ them right now would make me feel like Russell Sage. Fact is,” he continued, much embarrassed, “an old gazabe from Tennessee engaged me to pilot a nag in the Handicap, and now he’s taken a notion to run him in the first race, too. Ain’t that crazy? First mount I’ve had in five years. The old boy’s up with the stewards now, askin’ permission for me to ride overweight.”
“Two races in one day, and overweight? How much overweight?” ”

“ The Colonel says the horse ain’t never had a chanst yet, and next time he is going to let him run a race.”
Thus the situation two days later, when The Gray Ghost was again entered at a mile and a quarter. Immediately the other owners at the track scratched their entries.
“Not for them, Beau,” said Batty in explanation to the Colonel. “They see him run with all sorts o’ weight, they’ve felt of them hind legs of his’n—an’ not for them. They know he can run. Of course they scratched. Same with the bookies. I heard one say no more Gray Ghost for his’n—not one to a thousand ”

“ The greatest race-hoss ever growed.” Colonel Wishard was bellowing at the impassive Batty.
“Aw, don’t make me laugh. Me lip’s cracked.”
Colonel Wishard started for Batty, who didn’t move; then he thought better of it, turned, and made a motion to a solemn-looking negro who had followed The Gray Ghost to the track. The negro turned to mount.
“Say, Mister,” said Batty solicitously. “Don’t let that coon get on that thing; he’ll break it.”
Colonel Wishard snorted. Dummy threw a leg over The Gray Ghost and moved over to the furlong post, fifty feet away. ”

“ But that marked the end of The Gray Ghost in racing.
“They ain’t nothin’ to it, Beau,” Batty had advised. “It’s back to Tennessee for you. Your horse is too good. He’s put a crimp in the racin’ game fer keeps. You’ve got all the owners in ther hay-loft, an’ if you don’t take him away they ain’t goin’ to be no more racin’. Besides, they ain’t nothin’ in lettin’ your horse skate aroun’ the track fer exercise.” ”

“ I gasped.
“Yes, suh, race him,” said the Colonel tersely. “I wrote to the secretary of the Jockey Club an’ enclosed a check for five hund’ed dollars, suh, entrance fee for my hoss in the Long Island Handicap. Now, suh, I have just received a letter askin’ me the name o’ my hoss. I cain’t enter a hoss that ain’t got no name. What should I do, suh?”
“Name the horse,” I suggested feebly.
“A good idee, suh. I will. But what shall I name him?”
“But—Great Scott—that thing—I mean your horse is—er—er—fact is it’s very expensive to race horses at the New York tracks. ”

“ I glanced again at the Colonel, but the belligerent gleam was still in his eyes. I started on a diplomatic tack.
“Fifty years, Colonel?” I said. “Why, surely you can’t be fifty years old?”
“Fifty years old?” he "bellowed. “Do I look like a child, suh? ”

“ The Gray Ghost. That’s it. My hoss is gray, you know. The Gray Ghost it shall be. Thank you, suh, for the suggestion. I shall telegraph it to the secretary o’ the Jockey Club.”
“But, Colonel, are you sure your horse can run fast enough to——”
“Run fast enough, suh?” repeated the Colonel, with the merciless glitter of triumph in his eyes. “Run fast enough? You ain’t never seen no hoss run yit.”
II
Theoretically “Batty” Logan lived a methodical, well-regulated, orderly life ”