But just now he was thinking of Lucretia--Lucretia and her rival, the
golden-haired chestnut, Lauzanne.

He passed through the narrow gate leading from the paddock to the Grand
Stand. The gate keeper nodded pleasantly to him and said: "Hope you'll
do the trick with the little mare, sir. I'm twenty years at the
business, and I haven't got over my likin' for an honest horse and an
honest owner yet."

There was covert insinuation of suspicion, albeit a kindly one, in the
man's voice. The very air was full of the taint of crookedness; else
why should the official speak of honesty at all? Everyone knew that
John Porter raced to win.

He crossed the lawn and leaned against the course fence, to take a
deciding look at the mare and the Chestnut as they circled past the
stand in the little view-promenade which preceded the race.

His trained eye told him that Lauzanne was a grand-looking horse; big,
well-developed shoulders reached back toward the huge quarters until the
small racing saddle almost covered the short back. What great promise
of weight-carrying was there!

He laughed a little at the irrelevance of this thought, for it was not a
question of weight-carrying at all; two-year-olds at a hundred pounds in
a sprint of only five furlongs. Speed was the great factor to be
considered, and surely Lucretia outclassed the other in that way. The
long, well-ribbed-up body, with just a trace of gauntness in the flank;
the slim neck; the deep chest; the broad, flat canon bones, and the
well-let-down hocks, giving a length of thigh like a greyhound's--and