Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-12-03

OF happy prosperity that swathed her In
the other years had totally disappeared.
Through the mist of the flown time We
could see that woman as she had been In
her fleeing hour figurante. when the
very frou-frou of her silken skirts was the
Aeolian music to which men of mark de-
lighted to dance In that far time-not
so far in the matter of years as in that
thing we call the difference--we recall her
In her racing box, with men who had done
things in the world fumfng and fretting
near her for the Enerest capricfous glance
out of her eyes.
She would, in these days, wager a thou
sand dollars on any horse with starred
forehead, or. again, on any horse ridden by
q jockey whose hair looked cute" under
his cap And she would laugh gaily when
she would lose at these whimsical ventures.
and pat the hairpins in her real coil to see
If they still held true.
The bottom of her shabby black skirt
looked frayed and dusty when we saw her.
these few months ago. in the cheap field at
Sheepshead Bay. Her white waist not alb
solutely immaculate either, was of the SIM
plest imaginable design.
On that afternoon we saw her bet dol
lar on the chance that so sadly Incompetent
horse as Royal Window might run third.
Difference in Boo2makers.
There are plenty of bookmakers, and all
of them busy in the cheap field of the New
York tracks. and the cheap field book
makers are whole lot more amiahle, too,
than the layers in the main Enclosure. In
one of the New York cheap fields once we
saw a man with straw hat that looked
like a Formosa birds nest after typhoon
address a gum-eating layer. The cheap
field layer had to up on the favorite.
Hey, pal. lay US even. won't youse?"
said the man with the sad straw hat to the
layer. and he dumped three quarters. two
dimes and nickel into the bookmaker's
hand
You're on. Buck replied the good-na-
tured bookmaker. IF you'll promise to
stake yourself to a new straw lid with the
rake-down," and the sheet writer recorded
the bet.
Note the difference:
Once asked the famous man-eating
big-ring bookmaker of the New York tracks
he also books at Benning, and only went
away last night-to lay us even money for
$50 against a thing that he had chalked up
at 0 to 10. We thought he was going to
have us arrested. And there were enough
policemen surrounding him and guarding
him from careless persons who wanted to
slip him money to have arrested us several
times. So we hurried away, the man-eat-
Ing bookmaker pursuing us with rfbaldry
such as we had never tolerated before nor
thought to tolerate. We are going to get
hunk with that bookmaker some old day by
revealing his name, right out loud, in~type.
Maybe we shall even call conclave Of re-
spectacle persons whom he has berated and
Inundated, and hold him up to laughter
under a diapason Of sonorous resolutions.
Nobody is going to refuse to take our
money and jump on us for offering to give
1t to hir1. with impunity.
The imperfect angle for viewing finishes
prevails at the New York cheap fields, as
II does at the Benning cheap field. Higher
mathematician there are few or none in
any cheap field. That the usual cheap field
is situate about a sixteenth of a mile from
the finishing wire Is a matter that makes
no difference whatever to the cheap field
better who has horse running for him.
If his horse Is ir. front passing the cheap
field, he considers the matter at an end.
His horse has won. That's all there Is to
It. He stands ready to hazard his hearts
blood on the proposition that his horse got
there first when some other horses number
goes up. Don't you talk deceptive angle"
to him. He is liable to send you rocketing
to dentist or some other kind of a face
fixer If you have the temerity to do that.
Didn't he see his horse in front passing the
cheap stand?
Favorites Not Popular.
One of the great fixtures of the racing
game is almost entirely absent from the
cheap field. We advert now to the favorite
of the race. The cheap field doesn't
know the favorite-does not, at any
rate, ''see" the favorite. The favorite of the
ampler ring is anathema in the cheap field
ring. There they all have a steel loving
knife out for the favorite. They all take
a wallop meant to knock the favorite down.
II they catch you in the act Of falling
for one Of those 3-to-5 things, they SOL
EMMY suggest that you have your head ex-
amtned. They want something for their
money. even II it be only a run. But
few of them permit the favorite to do the
running for them. Thus 1t is that when the
favorite comes a-swlnging past the cheap
field, away Off in front, with a spread
eagled and dizzy field Intellectually clomp-
ing after him. there is no acclaim much
bigger than the buzzing of bees from the
cheap field. But what a blare as of brass
there Is In the cheap field when some idol
lied 20 or 30-to-1 thing. to which they
have all gone with the price OF the rag car
pet and the kitchen stove. comes rollicking
and registering down the stretch away in
front of his field.
Another battling thing about all cheap
fields Is the fact that all of the persons
congregated there are possessed of the firm
and immovable conviction that the horses
can't be beat.
They are saying SO to each other all dur
Ing the progress Of the dreamful, sun-laved
afternoon. You can't beat 'em'--that is
the lett motif that you hear on right and
left in the various voices of a thousand
beat 'em. There they are, fighting the old
thing There they were yesterday, day be-
fore yesterday, last week, last month,
year ago today, year ago day before yes
terday, and there they will be year from
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS, and the 50 bank roll
in hand.
Yet they never cease declaring that the
horses cant be beat"
!" all very strange
Still Sticking to It.
10 long a time as seven years ago we
spent mellow afternoon in the pursuit of
writing duty, in the cheap field at the
Gravesend race track There was very
sore-looking red-faced man there that after
noon. We took him to be dealer In
sausages at a market, and we rarely make
mistakes in these matters. His 50 or Sc
having been engulfed, he was animated and
impelled by Gargantuan wrath. He shook
his fist at the track that was still smok-
ing from the impact of the horses hoofs.
He was through with EN- for life, he tod
US all, although all of US were entirely I'M
acquainted with him. They couldn't be
beat. Any pinhead ought to know that they
couldn't be beat. 1t was a suckers game.
''Youse fellers may think that y can beat
EN- he blared at US. Indignantly, but
v can't. They Amt nobody what kin beat
tn ponies. They amt here t be beat.
Never ag'in fr mine!''
Last summer we were in that same
Gravesend cheap field again. once more in
the pursuit of duty. At the conclusion of
the third race we heard some bull-voiced
male person behind us inyeighing against