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Porter's irrelevant simile caused Allis to start, and Crane's relentless eyes came and peeped at her through the narrow-slitted lids. "All right, though, little girl; your faith may make Lauzanne win, and I think Lucretia's speed will carry her to the front, so you may strike a bit of luck at last." A few days later Mike Gaynor took the stable up to Gravesend.
Brain must be pitted against brain; so he studied his horses; and when Diablo came into his hands, possessed of a mind disease, he worked over him with considerable intelligent patience. This study of horse character was the very thing that had caused him to go wrong over Lauzanne.
And out of all this uselessness, this unthinking philosophy, the colt had come with a soured temper, a broken belief in his masters "Lauzanne the Despised." Porter's trust that his ill luck had been changed by a win was a faith of short life, for Diablo was most emphatically beaten in his race.
"She's got him. Lauzanne'll hold him if he doesn't quit," Carter muttered, as he dropped back, for Lucretia was blown. Past the finish post Lauzanne was a head in front, and Diablo was galloping like a tired horse. "He's beat!" ejaculated Carter. "Hello! that's it, eh? My word, what a girl!" He saw Allis reach down for the slack rein running from her father's hand to Diablo's mouth. "Missed!
"Mike thinks Lauzanne is a bad horse," the girl said, changing the subject, "but he'll win a big race this coming season. You just keep your eye on Lauzanne. Here's your carrot, old chap," she said, stroking the horse's neck, "and we must go if we're to have that drive. Will you hitch the gray to the buggy for us, Mike?" she asked of Gaynor, as they came out of the stable, "we'll wait here."
By chance, Mortimer observed a young man selling these race catalogues, as he innocently named them. He procured one, and the seller in answer to a question told him it was the third race he had just seen, and the next would be the Brooklyn Derby. There it was, all set forth in the programme he had just purchased. Seven horses to start, all with names unfamiliar except The Dutchman and Lauzanne.
Here's this Lauzanne runs like a dog the last time out last by the length of a street and now I've got it pretty straight they're out for the stuff." "They'd a stable-boy up on him that time." "That's just it," cried Dixon. "Grant comes to me that day you know Grant, he works the commission for Dick Langdon and tells me to leave the horse alone; and to-day he comes and " he hesitated. "And what?"
"Yes, you!" affirmed the other, looking him steadily in the eye. "You sold him Lauzanne, and Lauzanne was loaded." Langdon said nothing. What the devil was coming? "Well," drawled Crane, "Porter's badly hurt; he's out of the race for some time to come. They're friends of mine." "They're friends," mused Langdon; "who in thunder are they?"
This had perhaps frightened him, and being unfamiliar with the folly of such a course had backed two horses in the same race had put a hundred on Lauzanne at ten to one to cover his risk on The Dutchman, feeling this made him more secure. He would either win a considerable stake or have sufficient in hand to cover up his defalcation. The first thing to do was to find the note if possible.
So he had a possible means of identifying the man who had taken the money. Mentally he followed Mortimer during the day at Gravesend. From Alan he knew of his winnings over Lauzanne. Crane reasoned that Mortimer, having risked the thousand on his horse, had been told that Lauzanne might win.
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