“This’n has got to have a racehorse for me to ride. Susie said we ort to have a lot of horses to make up the race, but—I dunno.”
“Yuh might use Tequila,” says I, and Hank kinda shudders. Tequila was a racehorse. I say “was,” meanin’ the present time. Hank bought him off a horse-trader for a hundred dollars. Fastest horse on earth for a hundred yards, and then crossed his front feet. Always crossed his front feet. Worked himself into a lather, looked like a racehorse, ran like a scared coyote for a hundred yards and then—well, Hank kept him.
“Might use him,” admitted Hank. “Got a lotta sense.”
Hank wouldn’t commit himself further, and went back to San Pablo. We don’t hear nothin’ more about it for a couple days, when cometh “Dog-Rib” Davidson, of Oasis. Dog-Rib almost runs Zibe Hightower a dead-heat, when it comes to bein’ mean, and if all the hate in his carcass was laid end to end, yuh could use it for a trail marker from New York to Honolulu.
“I’ve been laughin’ m’self hoarse for two days,” says Dog-Rib. “Them there San Pabloers are goin’ to put on a play-actin’ show, with Hank Boll-Weevil Potts as the big he buzzard of the flock. Calls it The Curse of Drink. Haw, haw, haw! Can yuh imagine it? I can’t. I’ve seen shows in my life, I have.”
“You look like yuh had seen plenty, but never had none,” says Peewee. “You shore look to me like a man who never had a show from the start.”
“I’ve allus got along,” says Dog-Rib.
“I reckon all of Oasis will be at the show,” says I.
“Oh, shore. Accordin’ to their epitaphs, every ticket will have a number on it, and the lucky ticket will win Hank Potts’s racehorse. The tickets are one dollar per each, and no questions asked. Alkali and Oasis has shore invested heavy in them tickets. But it’ll be a awful show.”