"'If I has a match I would,' says Sweeney. 'I kin smoke it easy, 'n' then back in ahead of them turtles.'
"I know then the colt's good enough fur the stakes, 'n' I writes Miss Goodloe to see if I can use the fourteen hundred he's won to make the first payments. She's game as a pebble, 'n' says to stake him the limit. So I enters him from New Awlins to Pimlico.
"I've had all kinds of offers fur the colt, but I always tell 'em nothin' doin'. One day a lawyer named Jack Dillon, who owns a big stock farm near Lexington, comes to me 'n' says he wants to buy him.
"'He ain't fur sale,' I tells him.
"'Everything's for sale at a price,' he says. 'Now I want that colt worse than I do five thousand. What do you say?'
"'I ain't sayin' nothin',' I says.
"'How does eight thousand look to you?' he says.
"'Big,' I says. 'But you'll have to see Miss Goodloe at Goodloe, Kentucky, if you want this colt.'
"Oh, General Goodloe's daughter,' he says. 'Does she own him? When I go back next week I'll drop over and see her.'
"Well, Salvation starts in the Crescent City Derby, 'n' when he comes under the wire Miss Goodloe's five thousand bucks better off. He wins another stake, 'n' then I ship him with the rest of my string to Nashville. The second night we're there, here comes Jack Dillon to the stall with a paper bag in his hand.