"Once—which was continuous."
"And you thought there was a jackass strain in him, eh?"
"Pat looked good to me all the time, ears and all."
"Well, them sloppy listeners are a throw-back to Melbourne, he was like that. I've read he was a mean-lookin' cuss, with weak knees; but he was all horse: and ain't Waster got bad knees? And don't he get that buckskin from Spendthrift who was a chestnut, same's his dad, Australian?" This seemed a direct query for he broke off to cough.
"Go on, lad——"
"Excuse me, sorry"—Molly was speaking—"this is Billy MacKay. My old school chum, Bessie, his sister, wished him on me a month ago to see what God's country could do for that busted chest."
The little man was impatient over the switch to himself—the horse was the thing.
"If it wasn't for them dicky forelegs—Gawd! what a horse Waster'd been. And if his owner, Leatherhead Mike Doyle, had kept the weight offen him he'd've stood up anyway, for he was the truest thing. Say, Bulldog,—don't mind me, I like that name, it talks good,—Waster didn't need no blinkers he didn't need no spurs; he didn't need no whip—I'd as lief hit a child with the bud as hit him. He'd just break his hear tryin'. Waster was Leather-head's meal ticket, dicky knees and all, till he threw a splint. It was the weight that broke him down; a hundred and thirty-six pounds the handicapper give him in the Gold Range Stakes at a mile and a quarter; at that he was leadin' into the stretch and finished, fightin', on three legs. He was beat, of course; and Leatherhead was broke, and I never see Waster again. A trombone player in a beer garden would have known the little cuss with them hot-jointed knees couldn't pack weight, and would 've scratched him."
Carney put a hand caressingly on Jockey Mackay's shoulder, saying: "You stand pat with me, kid—your heart is about human, I guess. What was that hostile person's game?"
Molly explained with a certain amount of asperity: