“All right, then; we’ll have a drink and go out to the track. You’ll want to see this race, because I win!”
They were naturally contemptuous of this view, even hilariously contemptuous, and they offered to lend Wallingford money enough, after the race, “to sneak out of town and hide.”
While they were taking the parting drink Blackie Daw slipped into Wallingford’s bedroom for just one moment “to get a handkerchief.” There he found, mopping his brow, a short, thick-set chap known as Shorty Hampton, a perfectly reliable and discreet betting commissioner.
“I was just goin’ to duck,” growled Shorty in a gruff whisper. “I’ve got two or three other parties to see. I’ve been suffocating in this damned little room for the last hour, waitin’.”
“All right. Here’s the money,” said Blackie, and handed him half the stakes which had just been intrusted to his care. “Spread this in as many pool-rooms as you can; get it all down on Whipsaw.”
“Three ways?” asked Shorty.
“Straight, every cent of it,” insisted Daw. “No place or show-money for us to-day.”
At the track they saw Beauty Phillips alone in the grand-stand, and joined her. Wallingford introduced Blackie, and they chatted with her a few moments, then Wallingford took him away. He did not care to have Jake Block see them with her until after the fourth race. As they moved off she gave Wallingford a quick, meaning little nod.
True to Pickins’ threat the quartet kept very close indeed to Daw, but, during the finish of the rather exciting third race, Blackie, manœuvering so that Wallingford was just behind him, slipped from his pocket the remaining half of the stake-money.