Porter was an easy man with his horses. Though he could not afford, because of his needs, to work out his theory that two-year-olds should not be raced, yet he utilized it as far as possible by running them at longer intervals than was general.
“I'll start the little mare about once more this season,” he told Dixon. “The babes can't cut teeth, and grow, and fight it out in punishing races on dusty hay and hard-shelled oats, when they ought to be picking grass in an open field. She's too good a beast to do up in her young days. The Assassins made good three-year-olds, and the little mare's dam, Maid of Rome, wasn't much her first year out--only won once--but as a three-year-old she won three out of four starts, and the fourth year never lost a race. Lucretia ought to be a great mare next year if I lay her by early this season. She's in a couple of stakes at Gravesend and Sheepshead, and we'll just fit her into the softest spot.”
“What about Lauzanne?” asked the Trainer, “I'm afraid he's a bad horse.”
“He's stale. He's a bad doer--doesn't clean up his oats, an' mopes.”
“I guess that killing finish with The Dutchman took the life out of him. That sort of thing often settles a soft-hearted horse for all time.”
“I don't think it was the race, sir,” Dixon replied; “they just pumped the cocaine into him till he was fair blind drunk; he must a' swallowed the bottle. I give him a ball, a bran mash, and Lord knows what all, an' the poison's workin' out of him. He's all breakin' out in lumps; you'd think he'd been stung by bees.”
“I never heard of such a thing,” commented Porter. “A man that would dope a two-year-old ought to be ruled off, sure.”
“I think you oughter make a kick, sir,” said Dixon, hesitatingly.
“I don't. When I squeal, Andy, it'll be when there's nothing but the voice left. I bought a horse from a man once just as he stood. I happened to know the horse, and said I didn't want any inspection--didn't want to see him, but bought him, as I say, just as he stood. When I went to the stable to get him he wasn't worth much, Andy--he was dead. Perhaps I might have made a kick about his not standing up, but I didn't.”
“Well, sir, I'm thinkin' Lauzanne's a deuced sight worse'n a dead horse; he'll cost more tryin' to win with him.”