“Perhaps you would say so.”
“Farm first?”
“Yes——”
“And a father who misunderstood?”
“A good deal of the misunderstanding was my own bull-headedness, I see now——”
“And the mother, John Morning?”
“I was too little——”
“Ah——”
Morning found himself saying eagerly a little later:
“And then the city streets—selling newspapers, errands, sick all the time, though I didn’t know it. Then I got to the horses.... I found something in the stables good for me. I liked horses so well that it hurt. I learned to sleep nights and eat regularly—but read so much rot. Still, it was all right to be a stable-boy. A big race-horse man took me on to ship with stock. I’ve been all over America by freight with the racers—from track to track. I used to let the tramps ride, but they were dangerous—especially the young ones. I had to stay awake. An old tramp could come in anytime—and go to sleep—but younger ones are bad. They beat you up for a few dimes. I was bad, too, bad as hell.... And then I rode—there was money, but it went. I got sick keeping light. The pounds over a hundred beat me out of the game—except the jumps. I’ve ridden the jumpers in England, too—been all broken up. In a fall you can’t always get clear.... All this was before I was eighteen—it was my kind of education.”