The Next Sure Thing by Richard Wagamese

Author:Richard Wagamese [Wagamese, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, FIC050000, Crime
ISBN: 9781554699001
Publisher: Raven Books
Published: 2011-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TEN

I told Hardy to go big on a roan mare called Dizzy Flash. She came in at seventeen to one. A few days later I found a real sleeper in the third because it was raining buckets and the gelding really loved to run in the slop. There were no signs in actual races to show that, but I found great times in his workouts while the track was poor. He went off at sixty to one, and Hardy was over the moon at the results. Then, after a ten-day dry spell, I found him a last gasper. That’s a horse that’s almost ready for the pasture but has one last great race in him. He’d always been a come-from-behind thriller. I remembered him from his younger days and how exciting it had always been to watch him come flying from the back of the pack. Now, though, Falmouth Circuit was old. He hadn’t won a race in a long, long time. He was in a race against inexperienced youngsters who had only won one or two races by the time they were four. He was listed as a forty-to-one shot.

The day dawned bright and sunny. Hardy wanted to make an event out of it and arranged to pick me up and take me to the track with him. They picked me up at noon, and we drove to the track. It was crowded, and there was a buzz you could feel in the air. The crowd was alive with it, and the tote board for the second race reflected their excitement. The odds changed every minute as bettors laid down their money on five favorites. Each of them got bet down low. Falmouth Circuit sat unchanged at forty to one for a long time. Hardy kept his eyes on me. I could feel him watching me.

“We gonna do this thing?” he asked finally. There was a rumble of anger in his voice.

“Wait,” was all I said.

“Wait for what? You brought me here to play the odds and he’s there. He’s been there all friggin’ day.”

“Wait,” I said again.

Hardy fumed. Jerry and Vic shrugged their huge shoulders at the same time and rocked on the balls of their feet. We were standing in the throng and leaning on the rail as I watched the tote board, and I could tell that Hardy didn’t like being so visible. It was the first hint I got of him being rattled. It was three minutes to post time when the board flickered and the numbers changed. Falmouth Circuit shot up to fifty-five to one.

“Now,” I said and turned and headed for the window. The three gangsters fell in behind me. We got our bets down just as the horses were at the gate.

We walked quickly up the stairs to the second balcony, where we could watch the action in the backstretch. The field had already made the first turn and were bunched tightly coming onto the straight. Our horse lagged a good ten lengths behind.

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