The crowd of hungry-eyed race-goers waiting below the box, and watching Carter’s every movement, distressed Dolly.
“I hate it!” she cried. “They look at you like a lot of starved dogs begging for a bone. Let’s go home; we don’t want to make any more money, and we may lose what we have. And I want it all to advertise the book.”
“If you’re not careful,” said Carter, “some one will buy that book and read it, and then you and Spink will have to take shelter in a cyclone cellar.”
When he arose to make his bet on Ambitious, his friends from the club stand and a half-dozen of Pinkerton’s men closed in around him and in a flying wedge pushed into the ring. The news-papers had done their work, and he was instantly surrounded by a hungry, howling mob. In comparison with the one of the previous day, it was as a foot-ball scrimmage to a run on a bank. When he made his first wager and the crowd learned the name of the horse, it broke with a yell into hundreds of flying missiles which hurled themselves at the book-makers. Under their attack, as on the day before, Ambitious receded to even money. There was hardly a person at the track who did not back the luck of the man who “could not lose.” And when Ambitious won easily, it was not the horse or the jockey that was cheered, but the young man in the box.
In New York the extras had already announced that he was again lucky, and when Dolly and Carter reached the bank they found the entire staff on hand to receive him and his winnings. They amounted to a sum so magnificent that Carter found for the rest of their lives the interest would furnish Dolly and himself an income upon which they could live modestly and well.
A distinguished-looking, white-haired official of the bank congratulated Carter warmly. “Should you wish to invest some of this,” he said, “I should be glad to advise you. My knowledge in that direction may be wider than your own.”
Carter murmured his thanks. The white-haired gentleman lowered his voice. “On certain other subjects,” he continued, “you know many things of which I am totally ignorant. Could you tell me,” he asked carelessly, “who will win the Suburban to-morrow?”
Carter frowned mysteriously. “I can tell you better in the morning,” he said. “It looks like Beldame, with Proper and First Mason within call.”
The white-haired man showed his surprise and also that his ignorance was not as profound as he suggested.
“I thought the Keene entry——” he ventured.