I and Ella didn’t wise up till about the third night after Daley’d went. That night, Kate took the train to Town right after supper, saying she had a date with Goldberg. It was a swell night and along about eight, I and Ella decided we might as well have a ride. So we got a hold of Ernest and it wound up by us going to New York too. We seen a picture and batted round till midnight and then Ella says why not go down to the Pennsylvania Station and pick Kate up when she come to take the train, and bring her home. So we done it. But when Katie showed up for the train, it was Mercer that was with her, not Goldberg.
Well, Mercer was pretty near out to the car with us when he happened to think that Daley’s driver mustn’t see him. So he said good night and left us. But he didn’t do it quick enough. Daley’s driver had saw him and I seen that he’d saw him and I knowed that he wasn’t liable to be stuck on another of Daley’s employs that was getting ten times as much money as him and all the cheers, and never had to dirty himself up changing a tire. And I bet it was all Ernest could do was wait till Daley come back so as he could explode the boom.
Kate and Ella didn’t know Ernest was hep and I didn’t tell them for fear of spoiling the show, so the women done their brawling on the way home in a regular race track whisper. The Mrs. told Kate she was a hick to be monking round with a jockey when Daley was ready and willing to give her a modern home with a platinum stopper in the washbowl. Kate told Ella that she wasn’t going to marry nobody for their money, and besides, Mercer was making more than enough to support a wife, and how that boy can dance!
“But listen,” she says: “I ain’t married to neither one of them yet and don’t know if I want to be.”
“Well,” says Ella, “you won’t have no chance to marry Daley if he finds out about you and Mercer.”
“He won’t find out unless you tell him,” said Kate.
“Well, I’ll tell him,” says Ella, “unless you cut this monkey business out.”
“I’ll cut it out when I get good and ready,” says Kate. “You can tell Daley anything you please.”
She knew they wasn’t no chance of Ella making good.
“Daley’ll be back in a couple of days,” says the Mrs. “When he comes he’ll want his answer and what are you going to say?”
“Yes or no, according to which way I make up my mind,” said Kate. “I don’t know yet which one I like best.”
“That’s ridic’lous!” Ella says. “When a girl says she can’t make up her mind, it shows they’s nothing to make up. Did you ever see me when I couldn’t make up my mind?”
“No,” said Katie, “but you never had even one whole man to choose between.”
The last half of the ride neither of them were talking. That’s a world’s record in itself. They kind of made up the next morning after I’d told Ella that the surest way to knock Daley’s chances for a gool was to paste Mercer.
“Just lay off of it,” I told her. “The best man’ll win in fair competition, which it won’t be if you keep plugging for Daley.”
We had two more pretty fair days at the track on Kate’s tips that Mercer give her. We also went on a party with him down Town, but we used the train, not Daley’s car.
Daley showed up on a Wednesday morning and had Ernest take him right over to the track. I suppose it was on this trip that Ernest squealed. Daley didn’t act no different when we joined him on the clubhouse porch, but that night him and Kate took a ride alone and come back engaged.
They’d been pointing Only One for the Merrick Handicap, the fourth race on Saturday. It was worth about $7,000 to the winner. The distance was seven furlongs and Only One had top weight, 126 pounds. But Thursday he done a trial over the distance in 1:22, carrying 130 pounds, so it looked like a setup.
Thursday morning I and Ella happened to be in Katie’s room when the telephone rung. It was Mercer on the other end. He asked her something and she says: “I told you why in my note.”
So he said something else and she says: “Not with no jailbird.”
And she hung up.
Well, Ella wanted to know what all the pleasantries was about, but Kate told her to mind her own business.
“You got your wish and I’m engaged to Daley,” she says, “and that’s all you need to know.”
For a gal that was going to marry a dude that was supposed to have all the money in the world, she didn’t act just right, but she wouldn’t been Kate if she had of, so I didn’t think much about it.
Friday morning I got a wire from one of the South Bend boys, Goat Anderson, sent from Buffalo, saying he’d be in New York that night and would I meet him at the Belmont at seven o’clock. So I went in Town from the track and waited round till pretty near nine, but he didn’t show up. I started to walk across to the Pennsylvania Station and on the way I dropped in at a place where they was still taking a chance. I had one up at the bar and was throwing it into me when a
