educational. I prefer to forgo interest for such preferred individuals when I can. Like you already know.
Sho is. Thank you, Mr. Two-Tie.
Edward, I would like to know more about that young man.
Hansel? Medicine Ed said again, in surprise.
Hansel. It’s a personal thing, a family thing. How does he get along with his girl?
So it was the young fool’s woman after all. But this was highly disputatious territory, for if blood run thicker than water, and which it always do, then even sensible Two-Tie will come down blind on her side.
Does he treat her right? Does he act like a gentleman? Two-Tie was inquiring.
Look to me like them two go pretty good together, Medicine Ed said carefully. When it come to training horses he look young but think old. You know he have old Mr. Hickok’s Pelter in his string.
You don’t say, Two-Tie said.
Medicine Ed saw himself laying down track away from Little Spinoza and felt a pierce of regret. If he get over on the old gentlemanit won’t be for long. Then he have to face him when at last he colly.
She crazy bout that old horse, he say. She care for him too. You be surprised. She can work like a man. You ought to see her haul them buckets.
Umbeshrien
, Two-Tie talk in his Hebrew language, not sounding all that pleased. A little thing like her? She’ll ruin her back.
Yet and still. You see what I’m saying. They gets along, Medicine Ed continued. She like them old classy horses and he like the old ways best.
What are they—twenty-five years old? Thirty? What do they know from old? Come on, Edward.
Toches
on the table. Is he a smart horse trainer or not? You know what I mean. We’re talking money coming in, regular money, per diems, like that. Does he get paid to train somebody else’s horses for them or is he in the business so he can sit in the track kitchen and cross his legs and tell people I’m a horseman?
He all right, Medicine Ed say darkly. He free-handed. I don’t know where he gets it.
He’s a bum. What does she see in him? What’s the girl like, anyway?
It was a note of genuine misery. Medicine Ed felt called on in some new way, for something he ain’t never have to dip out the well before in his life. He want to come up with it, but he don’t know where to look. He suddenly remembered Bernice, who worked in the kitchen at Whirligig Stables—her daughter Marie. Bernice had worked and worked for that girl. Not worked. Slaved. Marie was neat and quiet and never sassed and she had even started to college up at Coppins, but soon’s she meet that Diamond Doug in some club she want to throw herself away after him. Then the more you talked to her, even though she know youright, the more she felt the pull. The more she want to give herself up to the hot melt of that Diamond Doug dragging his net in the deep water. What it was—something strong and washed in the blood like religion done got her. Some old romance story. Then nothing work on her, not sense, not money, not nature feelings, not her mother begging her, not even the twenty-dollar spell from some root woman, nothing.
It ain’t him, Medicine Ed said. She caught in the net of romance. It’s a deep thing. Horses is part of it, he say, but she don’t have it like some. In my judgment it is a passing thing. I believe it pass off her afta while.
What is she like
. He had never in his life been asked a bald-headed question like that by a white man. She frizzly like old rope, Medicine Ed told Two-Tie. She like a old knot. She tie herself to this and that. She strong and hard to hold. She stronger than he is. You soon see.
It was dead quiet in the phone save for that deep down green-bottle buzz, then Two-Tie say, Don’t say nutting to her, you hear? She don’t know me. Just lemme know if she needs any help, you understand?
Sho is.
Thank you, Edward.
Thank you, Edward
. He felt pity for Two-Tie, and pity for the white man was rich and sweet. He hung up the phone and sat there, thinking of Bernice. Diamond
Sho is. Thank you, Mr. Two-Tie.
Edward, I would like to know more about that young man.
Hansel? Medicine Ed said again, in surprise.
Hansel. It’s a personal thing, a family thing. How does he get along with his girl?
So it was the young fool’s woman after all. But this was highly disputatious territory, for if blood run thicker than water, and which it always do, then even sensible Two-Tie will come down blind on her side.
Does he treat her right? Does he act like a gentleman? Two-Tie was inquiring.
Look to me like them two go pretty good together, Medicine Ed said carefully. When it come to training horses he look young but think old. You know he have old Mr. Hickok’s Pelter in his string.
You don’t say, Two-Tie said.
Medicine Ed saw himself laying down track away from Little Spinoza and felt a pierce of regret. If he get over on the old gentlemanit won’t be for long. Then he have to face him when at last he colly.
She crazy bout that old horse, he say. She care for him too. You be surprised. She can work like a man. You ought to see her haul them buckets.
Umbeshrien
, Two-Tie talk in his Hebrew language, not sounding all that pleased. A little thing like her? She’ll ruin her back.
Yet and still. You see what I’m saying. They gets along, Medicine Ed continued. She like them old classy horses and he like the old ways best.
What are they—twenty-five years old? Thirty? What do they know from old? Come on, Edward.
Toches
on the table. Is he a smart horse trainer or not? You know what I mean. We’re talking money coming in, regular money, per diems, like that. Does he get paid to train somebody else’s horses for them or is he in the business so he can sit in the track kitchen and cross his legs and tell people I’m a horseman?
He all right, Medicine Ed say darkly. He free-handed. I don’t know where he gets it.
He’s a bum. What does she see in him? What’s the girl like, anyway?
It was a note of genuine misery. Medicine Ed felt called on in some new way, for something he ain’t never have to dip out the well before in his life. He want to come up with it, but he don’t know where to look. He suddenly remembered Bernice, who worked in the kitchen at Whirligig Stables—her daughter Marie. Bernice had worked and worked for that girl. Not worked. Slaved. Marie was neat and quiet and never sassed and she had even started to college up at Coppins, but soon’s she meet that Diamond Doug in some club she want to throw herself away after him. Then the more you talked to her, even though she know youright, the more she felt the pull. The more she want to give herself up to the hot melt of that Diamond Doug dragging his net in the deep water. What it was—something strong and washed in the blood like religion done got her. Some old romance story. Then nothing work on her, not sense, not money, not nature feelings, not her mother begging her, not even the twenty-dollar spell from some root woman, nothing.
It ain’t him, Medicine Ed said. She caught in the net of romance. It’s a deep thing. Horses is part of it, he say, but she don’t have it like some. In my judgment it is a passing thing. I believe it pass off her afta while.
What is she like
. He had never in his life been asked a bald-headed question like that by a white man. She frizzly like old rope, Medicine Ed told Two-Tie. She like a old knot. She tie herself to this and that. She strong and hard to hold. She stronger than he is. You soon see.
It was dead quiet in the phone save for that deep down green-bottle buzz, then Two-Tie say, Don’t say nutting to her, you hear? She don’t know me. Just lemme know if she needs any help, you understand?
Sho is.
Thank you, Edward.
Thank you, Edward
. He felt pity for Two-Tie, and pity for the white man was rich and sweet. He hung up the phone and sat there, thinking of Bernice. Diamond
Similar Books
