Pop stood teetering back and forth, plainly uneasy. “I'd rub him right good with liniment,” he advised Bud. “I'll git some't I know ought t' help.”
“What's the matter, Pop? You got money up on that cayuse?” Jeff laughed.
Pop whirled on him. “I ain't got money up on him, no. But if he wasn't lame I'd have some! I'd show ye 't I admire gameness in a kid. I would so.”
Jeff nudged his neighbor into laughter. “There ain't a gamer old bird in the valley than Pop,” Jeff cried. “C'm awn, Pop, I'll bet yuh ten dollars the kid beats me!”
Pop was shuffling hurriedly out of the corral after the liniment. To Jeff's challenge he made no reply whatever. The group around Jeff shooed Smoky gently toward the other side of the corral, thereby convincing themselves of the limp in his right hind foot. While not so pronounced as to be crippling, it certainly was no asset to a running horse, and the wise ones conferred together in undertones.
“That there kid's a born fool,” Dave Truman stated positively. “The horse can't run. He's got the look of a speedy little animal—but shucks! The kid don't know anything about running horses. I've been talking to him, and I know. Jeff, you're taking the money away from him if you run that race.”
“Well, I'm giving the kid a chance to back out,” Jeff hastened to declare. “He can put it off till his horse gits well, if he wants to. I ain't going to hold him to it. I never said I was.”
“That's mighty kind of you,” Bud said, coming up from behind with a bottle of liniment, and with Pop at his heels. “But I'll run him just the same. Smoky has favored this foot before, and it never seemed to hurt him any. You needn't think I'm going to crawfish. You must think I'm a whining cuss—say! I'll bet another ten dollars that I don't come in more than a neck behind, lame horse or not!”
“Now, kid, don't git chancey,” Pop admonished uneasily. “Twenty-five is enough money to donate to Jeff.”
“That's right, kid. I like your nerve,” Jeff cut in, emphasizing his approval with a slap on Bud's shoulder as he bent to lift Smoky's leg. “I've saw worse horses than this one come in ahead—it wouldn't be no sport o' kings if nobody took a chance.”