Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1908-09-13


ers. 1t was Race Day. Annually in
Stand Off came day of speeding horses
and correlative deviltry. Everybody
would be in town, and several hundreds
who we're nobody,-lndians, breeds, and
nomads of the plains. And-qu1ck
thought!-not a soul would remain UP
in the gorge of distillation. The joyful
ones would be f1attered by the preachers
absence Whisky and cards and horse
racing would atone in crCclS1S for dearth
of evangelical endeavor.
Kinnairds mind galloped, eating into
plan at speed He would intimate to
Mayo that he was going out to rehabi1tate
the disrupted nerves of the Honorable,
and Mavo. shrewd and foxlike of insight,
would take this as delicate elision of his
constraining presence. Well clear of
Stand Off, he would cut an ellipse in the
prairie, and before midnight read the con-
iectured secret of Mad Squaw Gorge.
VERY simple the program: but en-
tirelv voided by the fact that the
good citizens were at that very hour, with
exquisite drollerv, selecting the sky pilot
as Judge of the races. 1t had been the
highest civic honor in Stand Off since the
citys inception; and partly in the way
of atonement, and altogether because of
his neutrality, being the one man in the
gathering who would not have bet down,
it was now conferred on the preacher.
Kinnaird knew nothing of this till he
sought out Mayo casually to explain his
intended detection. Then it was made
clear to him that Stand Off, having done
itself proud in this magnanimous way,
expected a proper appreciation: Kim
naird yielded,-he couldn't help it with
out arousing suspicion, to
use the night for his GRAND.
There were multiplicity of races, varl-
able, extraordinary, unique, lnterminable,
and it was five o'clock when the great race
of the dav, the Stand Off Challenge Cup,
was called as the wind up. 1t was print
lively simple in its conditions: Chinook
Against ANY Horse in the World Chi
nook had never been beaten, and all
Stand Off had dollars to meet the dollars
O. anyone rash enough to attempt this
impossible feat.
Three DAYS previously a small parcel
of humanity done up in parchment had
listlessly drifted into Stand Off on the
back of leggy bay. And casually it had
transpired that the "locoed gopher as
Cayuse George tagged him, thought Pipe
stone could make Chinook look like an
effete mule The little man bad the tired,
resigned air of dweller in an arid desert;
but, viriled out of his parChed dependency
bv the quick whisky of Stand Off, he had
cheerfully welded dollar to dollar of
Chinook money that Pipestone could sure
tumpline the other package of boss flesh
over the half-nile course, or his name
wasn't Silent Eli
A Nd now, at FIVE clock, with start
of disnay, followed by a sense of
repugnance, Kinnaird saw Chris, mounted
on Chinook, pass down Broadway, which
was the race course, on her way to the
start, half mile deeper in the trail. The
girl had ridden past the preacher judge,
almost brushing against his shoulder
with averted face, as though she avoided
an expected look of disapproval But
this dual feeling of ethical sensitiveness
ramified not to the larger area of human
ity All Stand Off rose up on its hind legs
and cheered as the girl passed; even
potted at the complaCent sky in crack
ling fusillade of encouragement.
A sudden hush fell over the mosaic of
beaded blanket and buCkskin coat and
loud shirt that had noisily patterned in
and out where the judge lined his eye
from post to post across Broadway in
front of the Lone Pine
Craning his neck past Kootenay's bulk,
,~I 1,n