That was the last day at Jamaica and a couple of his horses was in. We was all down on them and they both copped, though Mercer had to give one of them a dude ride to pull us through. Daley got maudlin about what a grand rider the kid was and a grand little fella besides, and he had half a notion to bring him along with us back to the hotel and show him a good time. But Kate said what was the use of an extra man, as it would kind of spoil things and she was satisfied with just Daley. So of course that tickled him and everybody was feeling good and after supper him and Kate snuck out alone for the first time. Ella made me set up till they come back, so as she could get the news. Well, Daley had asked her all right, but she told him she wanted a little wile to think.
“Think!” says Ella. “What does she want to think for?”
“The novelty, I suppose,” said I.
Only One was in the big stake race the next day, when we shifted over to Belmont. They was five or six others in with him, all of them pretty good, and the price on him was 3 to 1. He hadn’t started yet since Daley’d brought him here, but they’d been nursing him along and Mercer and the trainer said he was right.
I suppose of course you’ve been out to Belmont. At that time they run the wrong way of the track, like you deal cards. Daley’s table was in a corner of the clubhouse porch and when you looked up the track, the horses was coming right at you. Even the boys with the trick glasses didn’t dast pretend they could tell who’s ahead.
The Belmont national hymn is “Whispering.” The joint’s so big and scattered round that a German could sing without disturbing the party at the next table. But they seems to be a rule that when they’s anything to be said, you got to murmur it with the lips stuck to the opponent’s earlobe. They shush you if you ask out loud for a toothpick. Everywhere you’ll see two or three guys with their heads together in a whispering scene. One of them has generally always just been down to the horses’ dining room and had lunch with Man o’ War or somebody and they told him to play Sea Mint in the next race as Cleopatra had walked the stall all night with her foal. A little ways off they’ll be another pair of shushers and one of them’s had a phone call from Cleopatra’s old dam to put a bet on Cleo as Captain Alcock had got a hold of some wild oats and they couldn’t make him do nothing but shimmy.
If they’s ten horses in a race you can walk from one end of the clubhouse to the other and get a whisper on all ten of them. I remember the second time Man o’ War run there. They was only one horse that wanted to watch him from the track and the War horse was 1 to 100. So just before the race, if you want to call it that, I seen a wise cracker that I’d got acquainted with, that had always been out last night with Madden or Waterbury, so just kidding I walked up to him and asked him who he liked. So he motioned me to come over against the wall where they wasn’t nobody near us and whispered, “Man o’ War’s unbeatable.” You see if that remark had of been overheard and the news allowed to spread round, it might of forced the price to, say, 1 to a lump of coal, and spoiled the killing.
Well, wile the Jamaica meeting was on, the gals had spent some of their spare time figuring out how much they’d of been ahead if Daley had of let them bet more than ten to twenty smackers a race. So this day at Belmont, they said that if he liked Only One so much, he should ought to leave them raise the ante just once and play fifty apiece.
But he says: “No, not this time. I’m pretty sure he’ll win, but he’s in against a sweet field and he ain’t raced for a month. I’ll bet forty on the nose for the two of you, and if he looks good you can gamble some real money the next time he runs.”
So Ella and Kate had to be satisfied with $20 apiece. Daley himself bet $2,000 and I piked along with $200 that I didn’t tell the gals nothing about. We all got 3 to 1. A horse named Streak of Lightning was favorite at 6 to 5. It was a battle. Only One caught the Streak in the last step and win by a flea’s jaw. Everybody was in hysterics and the gals got all messed up clawing each other.
“Nobody but Mercer could of did it!” says Daley, as soon as he could talk.
“He’s some jockey!” yelled Kate. “O you Sid!”
Pretty soon the time was give out and Only One had broke the track record for the distance, whatever it was.
“He’s a race horse!” said Daley. “But it’s too bad he had to extend himself. We won’t get no price the next time out.”
Well, altogether the race meant $14,000 to Daley, and he said we’d all go to Town that night and celebrate. But when we got back to the Decker, they was a telegram for him and he had to pack up and beat it for Kentucky.
Daley being away didn’t stop us from going to the track. He’d left orders with Ernest, his driver, to take us wherever we wanted to go and the gals had it so bad now that they couldn’t hardly wait till afternoon. They kept on
