Part 12 (2/2)
”An' Curly shot him, down at Sonora, last year!”
”Ye-aw.”
”Well, I'll be--.”
The Race of the Shoestring Gamblers
VIII
”Judge not too idly that our toils are mean, Though no new levies marshall on our green; Nor deem too rashly that our gains are small, Weighed with the prizes for which heroes fall.”
--Bret Harte.
If dancing was the first form of amus.e.m.e.nt to emanate from prehistoric savagery, then racing must surely have come next. It may possibly have come first. However, we shall leave the ”theorizin”' to be settled by the lips of the first mummy whose centuries-old tissues shall be roused to full life by modern science. What has science not achieved? We have gone beyond wonder. We can only believe, and become blase!
Meantime there is still enough red blood in the modern effete productions of humans to enjoy a contest of stress and strain, and brain and brawn, and to gamble upon the outcome.
In the '49 days, racing was one of the most popular forms of chance, and it often reverted in bizarre tangents. This, then, is what happened at a golden fiesta during the week of races:
”Sweet Lady, are all my importunities to be in vain?”
”I must confess that I can not bring my mind to a decision, Mr. Saul,”
answered Mistress Patty Laughton, blus.h.i.+ng and curtsying prettily.
”It is surely not for your lack of worldly goods that you hesitate,”
persisted Slick-heels Saul. ”As for what your father is owing me, it shall, at the moment of your acceptance, be wiped entirely from the books.”
Patty was incensed at the hint of insolence in the gambler's allusion to her improvident father's financial condition.
”Believe me, Mr. Saul,” she said, with spirit, ”no ulterior motive for worldly advancement has the power to coerce my afflections.”
”But you will consider my proposition of marriage?”
Patty's honest gaze encountered the appraising glint in the coot grey eyes of the foppish scape-grace before her. She lowered her own eys quickly to hid a hunted look in their dark depths as she answered:
”Sir, after the week of races, you shall have your answer.”
”And then I shall give up my present means of gaining a livelihood, and, repairing to San Francisco, shall enter into a profession more fitting the social station of the lady who is to become my wife.” He bowed deeply and withdrew, leaving Patty with a sad face and tearfilled eyes.
At last she straightened her tall figure resolutely. ”I must not give way to tears. I can not! I will not! There must be some way to pay my father's debts beside this extremity, to which death is almost preferable. There is still a week's time. A week--only a week.” Panic overwhelmed her, and when someone gently took her hand, she cried aloud in terror.
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