“I never spent a dollar which I honestly earned.” This gave John Sparrowhawk a vast deal of vogue, and he was looked up to and revered by a circle which is always impressed by the genius of one who can rob his fellow-worms, and do it according to law.
It befell one day that the Brooklyn Jockey Club offered a purse for a running race, but demanded five entries. In no time at all, three horses were entered. Their names and capacities were well known to the sagacious John Sparrowhawk. He had a horse that could beat them all.
“He would run by them like they was tied to a post!” remarked John Sparrowhawk, in a chant of ungrammatical exultation.
It burst upon him that the time was ripe to pillage somebody. His latest larceny was ten days old, and John Sparrowhawk oft quoted the Bowery poet where he said:
“Count that day lost whose low, descending sun
Sees at thy hands no worthy sucker done.”
And John Sparrowhawk did business that way. If he might only get another horse entered, and then complete the quintet with his own, John Sparrowhawk would possess “a snap.” Which last may be defined as a condition of affairs much famed for its excellence.
At this juncture John Sparrowhawk had the idea of his career. The idea made “a great hit” with him. He had a friend who had a horse, which, while not so swiftly elusive as “Tenbroeck” and “Spokane” in their palmy days, could defeat such things as district messenger boys, Fifth avenue stages, and many other enterprises which do not attain meteoric speed. John Sparrowhawk's horse could beat it, he was sure. He would explain the situation to his friend, and cause his snail of a horse to be entered. This would fill the race, and then John Sparrowhawk's horse would win “hands down,” and thereby empty everybody's pockets in favour of John Sparrowhawk's, which was a very glutton of a pocket, and never got enough.
John Sparrowhawk's friend was lying ill at the Hoffman. John Sparrowhawk went into that hostelry and climbed the stairs, softly humming that optimistic ballad, which begins: “There's a farmer born every second!”
The sick friend took little interest in the deadfall proposed by John Sparrowhawk. He was suffering from a mass-meeting on the part of divers boils, which had selected a trysting place on his person, where their influence would be felt.