"Eh?" Dad went on; "say sh'ain't? L'ere-ever y' name is--betcher pound
sh'is."
Then a jeering and laughing crowd gathered round, and Dave wished he
had n't come to the races.
"She ain't well," said a tall man to Dad--"short in her gallops." Then a
short, bulky individual without whiskers shoved his face up into Dad's and
asked him if Bess was a mare or a cow. Dad became excited, and only that
old Anderson came forward and took him away there must have been a row.
Anderson put him in the dray and drove it home to Shingle Hut.
Dad reckons now that there is nothing in horse-racing, and declares it a
fraud. He says, further, that an honest man, by training and racing a
horse, is only helping to feed and fatten the rogues and vagabonds that
live on the sport.
Chapter VII.
Cranky Jack.
It was early in the day. Traveller after traveller was trudging by Shingle
Hut. One who carried no swag halted at the rails and came in. He asked
Dad for a job. "I dunno," Dad answered--"What wages would you want?"
The man said he would n't want any. Dad engaged him at once.
And SUCH a man! Tall, bony, heavy-jawed, shaven with a reaping-hook,
apparently.
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