and yeh breeze about to make th' coin again. There's a lot of wise eggs
handin' out crooked advice--they take the coin and you th' big stick.
Yeh know, neither Crimmins or the Old Man was in on your deals, but yeh
had it all framed up with outside guys. Yeh bled the field to soak a
pile. See, Bill," he finished eloquently, "it weren't your first race."

"I know, I know," said Garrison grimly. "Cut it out. You don't
understand, and it's no good talking. When you have reached the top of
the pile, Red, you'll travel with as fast a mob as I did. But I never
threw a race in my life. That's on the level. Somehow I always get blind
dizzy in the stretch, and it passed when I crossed the post. I never
knew when it was coming on. I felt all right other times. I had to make
the coin, as you say, for I lived up to every cent I made. No, I never
threw a race--Yes, you can smile, Red," he finished savagely. "Smile if
your face wants stretching. But that's straight. Maybe I've gone back.
Maybe I'm all in. Maybe I'm a crook. But there'll come a time, it may
be one year, it may be a hundred, when I'll come back--clean. I'll make
good, and if you're on the track, Red, I'll show you that Garrison
can ride a harder, straighter race than you or any one. This isn't my
finish. There's a new deal coming to me, and I'm going to see that I get
it."

Without heeding Red's pessimistic reply. Garrison turned on his heel
and entered the stall where Sis, the Carter Handicap favorite, was being
boxed for the coming Belmont opening.

Crimmins, the trainer, looked up sharply as Garrison entered. He was a
small, hard man, with a face like an ice-pick and eyes devoid of pupils,
which fact gave him a stony, blank expression. In fact, he had been
likened once, by Jimmy Drake, to a needle with two very sharp eyes,