Carney laughed. "You're a sure little bit of all right, kid; the horse first when it comes to grub—that's me; but I'll feed Pat when he's bedded for the night."
Inside the cottage Molly and Bulldog jaunted back over the life trail upon which they had met at different times and in divers places.
But Jockey Mackay had been thrown back into his life's environment at sight of Waster. He was as full of racing as the wine bottle was full of bubbles; like the wine he effervesced.
"You been here in Walla Walla before?" he asked Carney, breaking in on the memory of a funny something that had happened when Molly and Bulldog were both in Denver.
"Some time since," Carney replied.
"D'you know about Clatawa?"
"Is it a mine or a cocktail, Billy?"
"Clatawa's a horse."
"I might have known," Carney murmured resignedly.
Then the little man narrated of Clatawa, and the fatuous belief Walla Walla held that a horse with cold blood in his veins could gallop fast enough to keep himself warm. He waxed indignant over this, declaring that boneheads that held such crazy ideas ought to be bled white, that is in a monetary way.