bunch acts like somebody's dead. They whisper when they tell it.
It's got 'em dazed.

"In them days there's a little squirt called Micky that hangs around
the track. He ain't got a regular job; he just picks up odd mounts on
a work-out now 'n' then. He don't weigh eighty pounds, but he's
fresher'n a bucket of paint. His right name's Vincent Mulligan, 'n'
his mother's a widow woman. I learns that 'cause the old lady sends a
truant officer out to the track after him one day, 'n' the cop puts me
wise after Micky has clumb through a stall window, 'n' give him the
slip.

"'Why, you big truck hoss,' says Micky to the bull as he skidoos
through the window, 'you couldn't catch a cold at the north pole in yer
dirty undershirt!'

"'Why don't you go to school like you'd ought, Vincent?' I says to
Micky, when he shows up the next day.

"'Aw, you go to hell!' says Micky. 'Say, are you ever goin' to let me
work one of yer dogs out in place of that smoke?' he says, pointin' at
Snowball, my exercise-boy.

"'Who you callin' a smoke?' says Snowball, startin' fur Micky. 'I'll
slap the ugly I'ish mouth off you!'

"Micky picks up a pitchfork.

"'Go awn, you black boob!' he says. 'If I reaches fer yer gizzard with
this tickler, I gets it!'

"Snowball backs up. I grabs the fork from the little shrimp.

"'Now, you beat it!' I says to him.

"'Aw, you go to hell!' says Micky. He lays down on a bail of straw 'n'
pulls his hat over his face. 'If any guy bothers me while I'm gettin'
my rest,' he says, 'call a hearse. Don't wake me up till some guy
wants a hoss worked out.'

"One day I goes to lay a piker's bet in Ike Rosenberg's book.

"'All across on Tantrum,' I says to Ike.

"'Hello, Blister,' says Ike, when he goes to hand me the ticket. 'I
like that one myself. Go over 'n' lay me a hundred 'n' fifty the same
way,--here's the change.'

"When I bring Ike his ticket he tells me to wait a minute, 'n' pretty
soon he puts a sheet-writer on the block 'n' steps down.

"'Come over here,' he says, 'n' I trails him out of the bettin' shed.
'I've took a two-year-old for a thousand dollar marker of Seattle's,'
says Ike, swingin' 'round on me. 'You want him?'

"'To train, you mean?' I says, 'Is that it?'

"'Sure,' says Ike. 'You can have him on shares if you want.'

"'Tell me about him,' I says.

"'Well,' says Ike, 'he's a big little hoss made good all over. He
ain't never started yet, but he's been propped for two