"Indeed? Why, how odd? But do come in, Jerry, and let's get on home. I'm so-o-o-o tired."
Mr. Jerry stifled his sentiment and shut the cab-door with a bang. Dan pulled Bonfire's head into position and lightly laid the whip over the all too obvious ribs. Bonfire, his head bobbing ludicrously on his thin neck and his stubby tail keeping time at the other end of him, moved uncertainly up the avenue at a jerky hobble.
And there let us leave him. Poor old Bonfire! Bred to win a ribbon at the Garden—ended as the drudge of a Tenderloin Nighthawker.
PASHA
THE SON OF SELIM
Long, far too long, has the story of Pasha, son of Selim, remained untold.
The great Selim, you know, was brought from far across the seas, where he had been sold for a heavy purse by a venerable sheik, who tore his beard during the bargain and swore by Allah that without Selim there would be for him no joy in life. Also he had wept quite convincingly on Selim's neck—but he finished by taking the heavy purse. That was how Selim, the great Selim, came to end his days in Fayette County, Kentucky. Of his many sons, Pasha was one.
In almost idyllic manner were spent the years of Pasha's coltdom. They were years of pasture roaming and bluegrass cropping. When the time was ripe, began the hunting lessons. Pasha came to know the feel of the saddle and the voice of the hounds. He was taught the long, easy lope. He learned how to gather himself for a sail through the air over a hurdle or a water-jump. Then, when he could take five bars clean, when he could clear an eight-foot ditch, when his wind was so sound that he could lead the chase from dawn until high noon, he was sent to the stables of a Virginia tobacco-planter who had need of a new hunter and who could afford Arab blood.