All Hat (36 page)

“What the fuck—?”

“Keep the name calling to yourself,” Ray said.

“Jesus,” Dean said.

“He won't help you either,” Ray said. “We got a job for you. If you do what you're told, you might get off this horse-rustling charge without going to the hoosegow.”

“I don't have the horse,” Dean said sullenly. “Sonny stole him back.”

“Well, as far as the cops are concerned, you're still the thief,” Ray said. “You do what I say, and you might walk away from this.”

“What do I gotta do?”

Ray reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a pair of twenties and a ten and placed the bills on the table in front of Dean.

“Take this to Big Billy Coon's backroom totes,” Ray said. “Bet fifty to win on the three horse in the seventh race at Woodbine. And listen—you tell Billy Coon that you got the tip from Sonny. Billy has to hear that, okay?”

“What the fuck's Sonny up to now?”

“Even Sonny doesn't know that, not this time,” Ray said. “And you don't need to. All you gotta know is the three horse in the seventh race. Collect your money—'cause the horse is gonna win—and then make yourself scarce for a few weeks. I think I can square things with Jackson on the legal end. If he doesn't see your face for a couple months, he might forget about putting you in the hospital for whacking him with that shovel.”

“What's this about?” Dean asked.

“It's about you getting out of a bad situation,” Ray said. “Don't ask questions.”

“I wanna know—”

“You heard him,” Paulie said. “Don't ask questions.”

*   *   *

Chrissie and Pete had breakfast, and then they loaded the gelding in the old trailer and hauled him over to Woodbine and housed him in the barn there. It was her luck that Juan Romano was strutting around the barns, all puffed up because he was riding the Stanton gray in the big race, and he saw them installing the gelding in the barn.

“Is true then,” he said. “You are running this horse?”

“What's it look like?” Chrissie said.

“Estas loca,”
Juan said. “Look like to me.”

He walked away with his little smirk on his little face. The look never went away, even when she'd decked him. But his ass had been in full retreat at the time. Chrissie would have followed him now, but Pete grabbed her by her jacket collar.

“Get in the truck,” Pete told her. “We don't need trouble today.”

They drove back to the farm. Ray and Paulie were already back, and they had the stud in the corral where Etta had just finished turning the bay into a chestnut. The horse's mane had been cropped short and darkened, and now she was coloring the lower legs to match. The horse did indeed look like a genuine chestnut, at least at a glance.

Pete Culpepper glanced at Ray, and Ray showed him a gambler's smile, a look that said the time for second-guessing was past.

The hardest part was always the deciding anyway.

*   *   *

Ray drove to Woodbine by himself that afternoon, arriving just as the fifth race was finishing. He parked in the main lot and took his leather jacket from the backseat, put it on, and smoothed the collar down. He watched the sixth race from the rail and then walked to a high vantage point on the west end of the grandstand. From there he had a view of the main track as well as the saddling barn and the paddock, where the entries were preparing for the Stanton Stakes.

The mounts were already saddled when Ray took his position. All but one, that is. Pete Culpepper brought Fast Market to the saddling barn late. Ray watched as the identifier checked the identifying tattoo under the gelding's lip and then motioned for Pete to get the animal saddled. Still, Pete took his time. The other horses were in the paddock parade by the time Fast Market reached the saddling stall. Jackson Jones, wearing a blazer and slacks, spoke briefly to his jockey aboard the big gray colt and then slipped through the rails and headed for the clubhouse to watch the race.

By the time Pete led the gelding into the paddock, the other horses were filing into the tunnel that led to the track. Chrissie, wearing silks altered to boast Pecos River Ranch, was waiting for Pete in the paddock. As Pete gave her a leg up, he looked into the grandstand, directly at Ray. Ray nodded, and then he turned his attention to the main track.

The track ponies and their riders had been mingling just outside the tunnel, sitting their western saddles aboard quarterhorses and older thoroughbreds, and they were just now hooking up with the entries and leading them to the starting gate.

Ray saw that one track pony rider was a little removed from the rest. His mount was considerably bigger than the others, and it was wearing a western saddle of tooled brown leather, the cantle and horn pronounced after the Mexican style. Although the horse was chestnut brown, it looked a lot like the thoroughbred Jumping Jack Flash. And the rider, though he'd gone from a porkpie to a Stetson to a riding helmet, was a dead ringer for Paulie. Ray stood watching until Paulie looked up and found him.

Ray turned back to his right then. Chrissie and the gelding were still in the paddock, Chrissie sitting the horse while Pete Culpepper made a pretense of adjusting the girth strap. Finally, Pete straightened, and he looked up to where Ray stood. Ray glanced back to make sure Paulie was watching yet. Then he flipped the collar of his jacket up.

Pete stepped away, and Chrissie touched the gelding with her heel and headed him into the tunnel. Paulie, on the other side, moved the big chestnut to meet her.

Then it was clockwork. Ray watched as Chrissie rode a chestnut gelding into one end of the tunnel and a chestnut stallion out the other. Chrissie was still adjusting the just-switched saddle as she pointed the horse to the starting gate. She glanced up at Ray, and then he turned and made his way up the grandstand, where he intended to keep an eye on Jackson Jones.

*   *   *

Chrissie held the horse back, and when she reached the starting gate the other entries were already in. When the stallion balked going in, she told the starter to open the gate, and the horse fell for the ruse and walked right in.

A second later they were off.

The horses broke clean, and Chrissie settled her horse along the rail and saved ground. He was bound to run, and it took all her strength just to hold him in. She kept him tucked behind the one horse, giving him nowhere to go. The pace was lightning quick. Juan Romano had the big gray running third, and he too was holding the animal back. He had a lot of horse, Chrissie could see.

He just didn't have enough horse.

At the three-quarter post the field was still tight. Romano made his move in the clubhouse turn, moving the gray colt outside and running down the leaders with ease, taking a four-length lead heading into the stretch. When Chrissie came out of the turn she was maybe eight lengths behind Juan Romano and the gray. She stood in the stirrups, and she leaned forward and tucked her face between the ears of Jumping Jack Flash.

“Okay, brat,” she said to him.

She switched the horse to his right lead, and then she finally let the animal do what he'd been fighting to do for eight furlongs. She let him run.

She kept him hard to the rail, and she touched him just once with the whip. They flew by Juan Romano and the gray colt Rather Rambunctious on the flat, Chrissie hunched over the newly minted chestnut's neck, a smile on her face, the whip held lightly in her right hand. Chrissie had a fleeting glimpse of Romano's disbelieving face as she thundered past him, and she laughed out loud.

“
Vaya con dios,
shithead,” she called.

She actually pulled the horse up, and they still won by ten lengths. A couple hundred yards past the finish line, Chrissie jumped to the ground and lifted the horse's left front hoof up, as if in alarm. She turned and gestured excitedly toward the tunnel and then quickly popped the bubblegum and the ball bearing from her mouth into her hand and wedged both tightly into the frog cleft of the hoof.

Then she grabbed the horse's reins and led him off the track, still gesturing to some anonymous presence in the tunnel. The crowd, which had been screaming as the longshot had crossed the finish line, fell silent as the horse, limping badly now, was led away.

*   *   *

Ray watched from the clubhouse, where he had positioned himself about thirty feet away from Jackson Jones. Instead of watching the race, Ray had kept his eyes on Jackson. The first look of suspicion had crossed Jackson's face when they had to trick the horse to get him in the gate. Ray saw Jackson, binoculars in hand, looking down in puzzlement.

About the time that Chrissie and the chestnut left the big gray in their dust, Ray saw Jackson head for the escalator. He looked like a man who had come across some disagreeable and unidentifiable odor.

Jackson started down to the track, and Ray followed. They watched as Chrissie jumped off the chestnut and then led him limping away. When Jackson got to the rail, Juan Romano charged toward him on the gray.

“That no gelding, Mr. Jones. What the fuck goin' on?”

Jackson went over the fence and headed for the tunnel, his long legs covering ground. Ray followed, but he kept his distance.

Then Pete Culpepper walked out of the tunnel, leading his gelding Fast Market by the reins and watching in concern as the horse limped toward the winner's circle. Chrissie was walking alongside, carrying her saddle. In the tunnel Paulie had been sponging the gelding with a mixture of warm water and soap since the race began, and the horse appeared to be awash with sweat. As they arrived back at the finish line, Chrissie veered off and went to weigh in.

A moment later Paulie loped out of the tunnel aboard Jumping Jack Flash, the horse wearing the western saddle once more. He headed for the barns, where he loaded the still saddled horse onto Pete Culpepper's trailer and jumped behind the wheel of Pete's truck and was off.

Jackson had changed course by now, heading for the winner's circle, and never saw Paulie make his move. Chrissie weighed in and then returned to Pete and the horse in the winner's circle, where she made a show of examining the gelding's leg.

Jackson had looked on critically as the gelding had limped across the grass. The horse was pretty lathered up, but his breathing was easy. Now Jackson stepped through the rail and walked over, looked to see that the animal was in fact a gelding, and then ran his hand across the horse's withers.

“Get your fucking hands off the horse,” Chrissie snapped.

Jackson looked at her. “Why isn't this horse breathing hard?” he demanded.

“I guess he didn't have much competition,” Chrissie said.

Jackson touched his fingers to his nose, smelled the soap from the horse.

Pete walked around the gelding and stood in Jackson's path. “Something I can help you with?”

“This horse never ran that race,” Jackson said.

Pete nodded at the electronic board in the infield. “Tote board says he did. Matter of fact, tote board says he won.”

“This horse couldn't beat that gray in a hundred tries,” Jackson said.

“It would seem that way on paper,” Pete said, and he spit a stream of tobacco onto the manicured infield. “That's why you don't run horse races on paper.”

*   *   *

Sonny had arrived at the track shortly past noon and headed straight for the clubhouse lounge. He watched the card on the closed circuit, sitting at the bar and betting at the automated teller there. He passed the afternoon alone. He'd arrived expecting to meet Misty, but she hadn't shown. He'd been into the vodka since waking up at eleven.

After the sixth race he gathered his change and stood up, intending to head down to the paddock to see his horse off, and to let himself be seen doing it. When he turned, though, he saw Etta Parr sitting at the end of the bar. She was wearing jeans and a man's leather jacket, and she looked good. She looked damned good.

“Hello, Sonny,” she said when he saw her.

“Well…”

“Where you off to?”

“See to my horse,” Sonny said. He was taken aback by her friendly tone.

Etta indicated the television. “You can see your horse from here. Let me buy you a drink.”

“You want to buy me a drink?”

“It's time the two of us quit scrapping, Sonny. I think we can put it to rest today.”

Etta bought the drinks, and they sat side by side at the bar and watched the race together. Sonny was smiling as he saw the big gray leading the field at the turn, and then he stared in complete disbelief when his horse was caught. Etta sipped her drink and watched him in amusement.

“How'd your horse do?” she asked when the race was run.

“He got beat,” Sonny managed to say.

“Now that's a shame.”

“Sonofabitch.” Sonny watched as the winner limped back toward the infield. “Jesus Christ—that's the three horse.”

“I believe it is,” Etta said.

Sonny reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the tote ticket from the casino. He grinned at Etta. “Well, I just happen to have a thousand dollars to win on that particular horse. At a hundred to one.” Then he realized something else. “And … my gray finished second, so I get the place money on that. I'm a goddamn gambling marvel. Wait'll that snotty fucking Indian gets a load of me.”

“You know, Sonny. If you weren't such a despicable human being, I would kiss you right now.”

Sonny looked at her warily; then he smiled. “And why's that?”

“Because, I believe a man should get kissed when he gets fucked.” Etta stood to go. “And you just got fucked.”

*   *   *

When Jackson came out of the barn he still wore the confused look on his face. If any of the grooms or walkers had seen anything, they weren't talking. But they would eventually, Jackson knew. Whatever happened, he'd find out sooner or later.