"That's him," said Blister. "Ole man Sanford. It ain't likely you ever heard of him, but everybody on the track knows him, if they ever hit the Loueyville meetin'. They never charge him nothin' to get into the gates. He ain't a owner no more, but way back there before I'm alive he wins the Kentucky Derby with Sweet Alice, 'n' from what I hears she was a grand mare. Ole man Sanford breeds Sweet Alice hisself. In them days he's got a big place not far from Loueyville. They tell me his folks get the land original from the govament, when it's nothin' but timber. I hears once, but it don't hardly sound reasonable, that they hands over a half a million acres to the first ole man Sanford, who was a grandaddy of this ole man Sanford. If that's so, Uncle Sam was more of a sport in them days than since.
"I don't know how they pry it all loose from him, but one mawnin' ole man Sanford wakes up clean as a whistle. They've copped the whole works—he ain't got nothin'. So he goes to keepin' books fur a whisky house in Loueyville, 'n' he holds the job down steady fur twenty years. The only time he quits pen-pushin' is when they race at Churchill Downs. From the first minute the meetin' opens till get-away day comes he's bright eyes at the rat hole. He don't add up no figgers fur nobody then. He just putters around the track. He's doped out as sort-a harmless by the bunch.
"After the Très Jolie mare wins the derby fur me, ole man Sanford makes my stalls his hang-out. I ain't kickin', all he wants to do is to look at the mare 'n' chew the rag about her. That satisfies him completely.
"'Of all the hosses, suh, who have been a glory to our state,' he says, 'but one otheh had as game a heart as this superb creature. I refer to Sweet Alice, suh—a race mayah of such quality that the world marveled. Not in a boastful manner, suh, but with propah humility, let me say that I had the honor to breed and raise Sweet Alice, and that she bore my colors when she won the tenth renewal of our great classic.'
"He tells this to everybody that comes past the stalls, 'n' it ain't long till he begins to bring people around to look the mare over. From that he gets to watchin' how the swipes take care of her. Pretty soon he begins to call 'em if things ain't done to suit him.
"'Boy,' he'll say, 'that bandage is tighter than I like to see it. Always allow the tendon a little play—do not impaieh the suhculation.'
"The boys eat this stuff up—it tickles 'em. They treat him respectful 'n' do what he tells 'em.
"'Everything O. K. to-day, sir?' they'll say.
"Ole man Sanford don't tumble they're kiddin' him.
"'Ah have nothing to complain of,' he says.