19
St Louis: Man versus Horse

Carl Liebnitz sat in the press tent, fingers poised on the typewriter keys. Man versus horses! What next? He smiled, scratched his ear, arranged his notes, then quickly began to type . . .

 

AMERICANA DATELINE 9 MAY 1931

 

Archaeologists have found evidence of trotting races in the Middle East dating back to as early as 1350 B.C. Modern American trotting dates from 1788 which was when the English trotter, Messenger, was exported to the United States. Messenger was a classic trotter who never infringed the rules, using the high-knee diagonal gait which separates the trotter from the pacer, who uses the legs on one side of its body at the same time.

 

Messenger appeared three times in the pedigree of another horse, Hambletonian, the most famous of all stud trotters. Hambletonian, who had never himself run better than a modest 3 minutes 15 seconds for the mile, foaled such champions as Dexter, Robert Fillingham, Shark and Goldsmith Maid. By the time of his death Hambletonian had sired 1300 foals, forty of whom trotted the mile in better than two minutes thirty seconds. By the end of the nineteenth century all but three of the 138 trotters who had run 2 minutes 10 seconds could be traced directly back to Hambletonian, who had richly deserved the $288,000 he had earned at stud for his owner, Rysdyk.

 

It was 1806 before the three-minute barrier for the mile was broken – by a horse named Yankee – and almost a hundred years later before Lou Dillon was to break the magic two minutes in running 1 minute 58.5 seconds. The essential difference between Yankee and Lou Dillon’s performance lay not so much in the horses themselves but in the nature of the sulkies they pulled behind them. The sulky was made in two sections: first, two long shafts running along either side of the horse, and attached at its shoulders and withers; then the bridge, joining the shafts behind the horse and on which there was a seat for the driver. In I806 Yankee had pulled a clumsy, ponderous sulky of 125 lb., plus its rider, while in 1903 Lou Dillon was pulling a rider and a light, flexible sulky of only 25 lb. By the turn of the century an arched axle had been invented, to prevent the trotter striking into the axle with its rear leg; earlier, in 1855, a roller-bearing axle had been introduced, while in 1892 the cycle-maker, Elliott, had invented a bicycle wheel which had reduced vibration, checked the tendency of the sulky to slew at bends, and reduced air resistance.

 

Thus in Coolidge stadium Flanagan’s runners tomorrow face, in Silver Star, a direct descendant of the great Hambletonian, a standard-bred stallion pulling a flexible, feather-light, 22 lb. sulky. Luckily for them it will also pull, not a 100 lb. professional jockey, but the solid 202 lb. of the undertaker Leonard Levy, and Silver Star, after facing McPhail in the sprint, will then have to haul its Falstaffian master over ten miles of rough country.

 

The two races take us right back to the roots of American sport, when men wagered on the jumping powers of a frog, when John L. Sullivan battled against a French foot-boxing champion, or when little “Sure Shot” Annie Oakley took on the world with a rifle. Thus for a few moments the world of the stop-watch, the world of certainty will be suspended, as Flanagan’s men pit themselves against one of the world’s fastest trotters. A distinguished colleague of mine, H. L. Mencken, once said that all life is six to four against. The odds against Flanagan’s runners are pitched a little higher, but I reckon that there will be more than a few long-shot bets on Messrs McPhail, Morgan and Thurleigh when they toe the line at Coolidge stadium tomorrow.

CARL C. LIEBNITZ

 

The heart of the city of St Louis, Olive Street Canyon, bristled with bookies from throughout the Union. At first came the men who normally made books on fighters, horses and greyhounds, but soon they were joined by ordinary God-fearing citizens, men who had never in their lives bet on anything more than horse-races like the Kentucky Derby or the Preakness. Even barber-shop bookies were offering ten to one against Flanagan’s runners in each of the races, a hundred to one against Flanagan’s men making the “double”. At first, no one knew who Flanagan’s runners were to be, but what did it matter? Goddamit, runners could no more beat horses than horses could outrun cars, or cars whip planes. Might as well say that Babe Ruth could chin Jack Dempsey. Still, at a hundred to one they were tempting odds, a good blind-shot bet . . . By the time – 8 May – that Flanagan’s runners reached Denville, about forty miles short of St Louis, St Louis seethed with excitement and anticipation.

Since Topeka Leonard H. Levy had not been idle. He had hired Coolidge stadium, a trotting park just outside the city, holding forty thousand spectators, for a mere five thousand dollars, and was charging spectators three dollars each for admission. Since most of the race was over country he had also rented a hilly area fringing on the stadium and planned to charge spectators two dollars a man for the privilege of watching the cross-country section. Popcorn, hamburger and drinks concessions had pulled in a further five thousand dollars, and he had hired General Fosdike’s Wild West Show to support Flanagan’s tatterdemalion circus. Financially, Leonard H. Levy could not lose; but his obsession still lay with his beloved trotter, Silver Star.

Men who themselves lack physical ability are prone to project their hopes and desires upon those who have that quality, be they animals or men. Thus they buy themselves a fighter, a baseball team, a horse, and live their fantasies through the successes of their purchases. Thus it was with the plump, balding Leonard Levy, a man who had, all his life, made up for his lack of physical prowess by the use of his wits. Levy would bargain for anything, from a Buick to a bag of popcorn, getting his kicks not from saving a few dollars or cents from the purchase, but simply from the pleasure of the hassle. So no smart-Aleck Flanagan from New York was going to make him look a jackass. Anyhow, it was nothing to do with money – Levy had plenty of that. No, out there at the Coolidge stadium Leonard H. Levy was going to show them all that he was an athlete.

“Charles H. Lindbergh,” exclaimed Flanagan. He, together with Doc, Willard and Kate, were standing with the runners in Coolidge stadium, in the cathedral-like silence of an empty arena, the evening before the competition. Levy had indeed done them proud. The 600-yard trotting track had been sifted, brushed and rolled to perfection, and the assorted flags of the nations of the world, which had lain unused in St Louis since the Olympics, fluttered around the stadium. Silver Star’s races against Flanagan’s men might well have originated in a Topeka speakeasy, but come 10 May all of St Louis, and spectators from nearly every state in the Union, would flood the Coolidge stadium.

“This track doesn’t interest me,” said Doc, as he was joined there by Morgan, Thurleigh and McPhail. “We lose time in here. It’s the country stretch I want to see.”

“Spoken like a true distance-man,” said Hugh, bending down to pick up a handful of the dirt-track. “Me, I’m interested in this.”

He rubbed the gritty brown dirt, then let it pass through his fingers and looked at Flanagan. “Soft for sprinting,” he said. “I’ll have to use my long spikes, the ones I used back at McPhee in the Highland Games.”

“Don’t talk to me about McPhee,” said Flanagan, kneeling to touch the surface of the track. “Those Scotch half-and-half pints of yours nearly did for me back there. But remember, Levy got me to agree to a three-race sprint series to give the crowd more for their money. You’ll have to be in top shape.”

Hugh looked up at the flapping flags and took a white handkerchief out of his pocket and watched it flutter.

“Get them to run the races into the breeze,” he said. “A horse and sulky has more wind-resistance than a man. And get them to put me down a sprint-lane, Mr Flanagan. Four feet of space. Something I can focus on.”

Flanagan jotted down some notes on the back of an envelope and nodded at Willard.

“Got it,” he said. “Now let’s have a look at the country.” They walked to the stadium exit, which led through the car park for fifty yards to a rough, rocky patch leading up a hill into bumpy grassland, on which Levy had already pegged a three-quarter-mile course. Levy’s workmen were hammering in fence-posts and stretching rolls of fence-wire as Doc and his men began their walk.

“This is where we’ve really got to make it count, out here in the country,” said Doc, turning to Thurleigh and Morgan as they walked up the hill. “You see, a trotting horse is a rhythm animal – take it out of its rhythm and it wastes energy, gets pooped.”

“What about our boys’ rhythm?” shouted Flanagan, raising his voice over the noise of hammering workmen.

Peter Thurleigh answered. “I’ve trotted horses,” he said, walking away from the noise. “And run cross-country. Doc’s right. We can keep rhythm over broken ground much better than any horse, particularly a trotter.”

“Okay, I suppose you guys know your business best,” sighed Flanagan. “So will you run a mile each in turn all the way?”

Thurleigh looked at Doc.

“Yep,” said Doc, nodding. “I reckon Mike and Peter here can run inside five-minute mile pace all the way, given five-minute rests between. Perhaps even better.”

“Jesus,” groaned Flanagan. “Levy’s horse can run inside two minutes. Back in Topeka, Levy prattled on about one minute fifty-six till the time rattled around in my head like a pea in a can!”

“Yeah,” said Doc. “But not one minute fifty-six seconds over rough, uneven ground like this. I reckon that Levy’s horse could run flat out, carrying a one hundred pound jockey, about three and a half minutes round this course.”

“And remember that Silver Star is a sprinter not a distance-runner,” said Thurleigh. “Tomorrow it’s got to keep up that pace for ten miles, non-stop.”

“I reckon that brings it up to over four minutes a mile,” said Doc. “If not more. So we’re getting closer.”

“But it still leaves you a minute a mile to find,” observed Kate.

“Not really,” said Doc. “Kate, just imagine you had to run ten miles with an extra hundred-odd pounds around your waist.”

“I’d die,” said Kate, laughing.

“Well then,” said Doc, “that’s precisely what Silver Star has to do, with our friend Levy providing that extra hundred pounds of lard. Our friendly undertaker may not know it, but he’s our first ace in the hole.”

“And do we have another?” asked Kate.

Doc winked and looked up at the blue, cloudless sky. “That, lady, is in the lap of the gods.”

 

The races were scheduled for two in the afternoon, with Hugh McPhail’s sprint series first in the programme, but by 1O a.m. the gates were closed, Coolidge stadium was already packed and General Fosdike’s Wild West Show and Flanagan’s circus were already in full and noisy flow in a field adjacent to the stadium. Even out in the country, before noon, families had set up picnics at the edge of Levy’s pegged track, and impromptu books were being made and bets laid. Betting was now down to nine to one against Thurleigh and Morgan, six to one against McPhail in his “best of three runs” competition. Over a million dollars had been laid on the race in the St Louis area alone.

 

With just over an hour to go Peter Thurleigh had never felt so nervous, not even at his first Olympics in 1914, when he had run against Nurmi in Paris. The Finn had run him ragged in the 5000 meters, lapping at a steady seventy-two seconds, at the end of each lap coolly checking his pace on the stop-watch he carried in his right hand. But the watch was superfluous. Nurmi ran to a deep inner clock set and held in motion by his cold Finnish will.

Even so it was in the cross-country event, run in the dry, torrid heat of a hundred and five degrees Fahrenheit, that had showed Nurmi at the peak of his powers. The Finn flowed over the parched, dusty course as if he were still on the track at the Stade Colombes, while the greatest cross-country runners in the world gasped and wobbled behind him. Peter had run himself into glassy-eyed delirium, and it was only in hospital in Paris the next day that he learned that he had finished a creditable fifteenth and that Nurmi had been holding interviews with journalists by the time the second runner had entered the stadium.

 

One o’clock, only an hour to go. Morgan lay parallel to Thurleigh as they were being rubbed down, on black, leather-topped massage-tables in the still, dark stone-floored dressing room. Above them, a naked bulb provided the only light. The room itself stank of horse liniment. Thurleigh smiled wryly and looked sideways at Morgan. Only a few yards away, they were probably rubbing the same stuff into Silver Star’s supple flanks.

Morgan lay with eyes closed, while Doc gently teased the belly of his bulging hamstrings. He had faced worse challenges: running against a horse was nothing compared with facing the bare fists of another man in an ice-cold warehouse. Morgan knew it was going to be tough, for running five-minute miles on his own, over rough country, was quite different from slogging across America in company some two minutes a mile slower. This would be a world of heaving lungs and oxygen-debt, with legs which already had in them two thousand miles of running. He looked above him at Kate, standing beside Doc.

“Nervous?” she asked, attempting to conceal her own anxiety.

“No.” He took her hand in his. “Perhaps a mite scared.”

“No problem, Mike,” said Doc, tapping him on the right knee as a signal to turn over on to his stomach. “You’re in great shape.”

“Sure,” growled Morgan. “But who’s rubbing the horse, and what the hell are they saying to it?”

 

Hugh McPhail stood in the tunnel below the main stand. At the end of the tunnel, the glare of the afternoon sun. Hugh could hear the bubble of the crowd, even here, deep beneath the stand. It was just like Powderhall again, like that bitter January day eight years ago. The crowd outside reminded him of the miners who had watched him run against Featherstone. They had laid their bets; now they waited to see the outcome. Three runs against a horse, with 40,000 people looking on . . . Stevie walked down the tunnel towards him, dressed in an over-large summer suit and a ludicrous Panama hat. Hugh still found difficulty in accepting that the little man from Glasgow was really here in America.

“Jist like the old days,” said Stevie, nodding behind him.

Hugh could not prevent a yawn, a sure sign of tension.

“Aye,” he said. “But back at the pit I hadn’t run two thousand miles for a warm up.”

“How fast do you think you can run now?” asked Stevie.

“Now . . . about ten point six for a hundred yards, eyeballs out.”

“That might be enough.”

“Against a horse?”

“Maybe,” Stevie went on. “The big thing is that you’ve got three runs – you can learn. I don’t think the horse will, and this man Levy, he’s no Olympic athlete, is he?”

“No,” said Hugh. “But I’ve been told he’s no fool, either.”

“You know the odds the Glasgow bookies were giving on you?”

“Ten to one against?” suggested Hugh.

“No,” said Stevie, walking up the dark tunnel with him towards the bright sunshine of the trotting track. “Four. And that’s because of old Wallace of Perth. Remember how he talked to you, back at the mine, before you ran against Featherstone? Well, he once ran against a horse himself, way back in 1901. Old Wallace’s been talking to the Glasgow bookies. More to the point, he’s been talking to me. This race will be won or lost at the start. So pin back your ears, my friend . . .”

 

1.30 p.m., 10 May 1931. In the gloom of the officials’ dressing room at the Coolidge stadium, Colonel Alan Cranston bent over the dressing-room table and carefully loaded a clip of blanks into his Winchester. There was going to be no hanky-panky this afternoon, not if he had anything to do with it. After all, he had his reputation to consider. He had ridden with Teddy Roosevelt and the Roughriders in the war against Mexico, and had been mentioned in dispatches. Not long after, in 1912, he had finished only one place behind that arrogant upstart, George C. Patton, in the Olympic modern pentathlon in Stockholm. In France, in the Great War, he had served with distinction with the fighting fifty-first, America’s most distinguished regiment.

Alan P. Cranston still considered himself an athlete even at the age of fifty-two. Every morning he took a cold shower, exercised rigorously to Bernarr McFadden’s callisthenics programme, then further purged and punished his body with a three-mile run. Cranston was not only a career soldier: he was a public figure. And when he had been approached by Levy to act as arbiter between himself and Flanagan in their crazy “man against horse race” his first impulse had been to refuse.

Then he had thought again. Cranston soon realized that this was going to be a big affair, discussed nationally, perhaps even internationally. Flanagan’s Trans-Americans were already household names. Dammit, his grandson had even asked him for “Iron Man” Morgan’s autograph, and his wife had begged to be introduced to the Sheridan girl after the race. Whoever acted as arbiter in the St Louis races would have to be someone of repute, of strong character: men against horses wasn’t like football or baseball – it was uncharted territory.

In short, he had accepted.

Now he yawned and stretched to his full six-foot four. He laid his Winchester down gently on the dressing-room table, then turned and faced Flanagan and Levy.

Pressing back his neat, crinkly grey hair with both hands, he began his prepared speech. “Gentlemen,” he said. “Let’s first establish some ground rules. Let me make it clear to both of you that I didn’t take on this job in order to look like a damn jackass in the eyes of the world. I remember all too well what befell General Douglas MacArthur when he managed the 1920 Olympic team. So first let me make it clear that I must be the final arbiter on all matters pertaining to these races. Otherwise, I open that door over there” – he pointed to the dressing-room door – “and leave you two to fight it out between you.”

The imperious Cranston, impeccably dressed in his khaki ceremonial army uniform, brooked no dissent. Levy, already bursting at the seams of his silk jockey pants, nodded. Flanagan followed suit.

“Now both of you know as well as I do that, though there are clearly prescribed rules for races between men and for that matter for races between horses, there is nothing in writing to cover the present situation in any of the rule books of either harness-racing or track and field. Nothing beyond what you have written here in your contract.”

Cranston picked up a sheet of paper, perched his glasses on his lean nose and held it in front of him. “Here are the rules to which both of you agreed. They’re mostly commonsense, but there is one which appears to me to be critical. Mr Levy, your horse Silver Star is a trotter. Trotter means exactly that- trotting. Any ‘break’ into a gallop during the sprint will mean automatic loss of that heat. And that decision must be mine and mine alone . . . Agreed?”

Levy again nodded.

“Now I fully realize that the sprint finish may be tight,” continued Cranston. “I have therefore asked Eastman Kodak to provide cameras at the finish. Film can be developed in ten minutes for scrutiny. These films, if required, will be the final arbiter.”

Cranston hoisted himself up to sit on the dressing-room table, allowing his booted legs to dangle loosely. “However,” he said, “the distance race presents greater problems. After all, I can hardly disqualify the horse during a ten-mile run for a single break in its trotting action on rough ground.”

“No question, Colonel,” said Flanagan, obediently, looking at Levy.

“So I propose the following,” said Cranston. “For a foul during a lap we immediately stop the horse for half a minute. These penalties will be signalled by the sound of a bugle, so that both the stadium crowd and Mr Flanagan’s helpers back at the track can be kept fully informed.”

“How many fouls are allowed before disqualification, Colonel?” asked Flanagan.

“Eight,” said the Colonel. “Agreed?”

Levy made to speak, but stopped himself. He had never even considered the possibility of Silver Star fouling.

Cranston raised both eyebrows. “You have something to say, Mr Levy?”

“No,” said Levy, fingering his whip. It was a negligible handicap: he would put such distance between Silver Star and the runners that even a few fouls would not matter.

“But how are you going to check for fouls, Colonel?” asked Flanagan. “After all, it’s a one-mile course, most of it out in the country.”

“I intend to have six judges, all army officers, posted at intervals round the course,” said Cranston. “Each one is a qualified trotting judge. Take my word for it, gentlemen, they’ll miss nothing.” He picked up a whistle and a clip of blanks and stuffed them into his top tunic pocket, then finally he looked down at his watch.

“Any further questions, gentlemen?”

“I think that we can both safely leave matters in your capable hands, sir,” said Flanagan. Levy nodded in agreement.

“That settles it then,” said Cranston, reaching over to shake Flanagan’s hand in a strong grip before doing the same to Levy.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “It’s a beautiful day out there. I think we’re going to see some fine sport. Teddy Roosevelt sums it up perfectly for me: a fair field and no favour, that’s what he always used to say. And that’s exactly how I see it too.”

Colonel Alan Cranston turned, picked up his shotgun, opened the door, and straightened himself to his full height, pulling down on his jacket and adjusting his tie. It was now 1.42 p.m. At the end of the dark tunnel he could hear the expectant crowd. Yes, it was going to be a great day.

 

One forty-five p.m. Thurleigh, Morgan and McPhail sat on the dressing-room bench in front of Doc. It was nearly time.

Doc was sweating hard, having just completed his massage of all three men.

“Right,” he said, clasping both hands in front of him and interlocking his fingers. “Up till now, most of the time we haven’t been racing in the Trans-America, we’ve simply been running, getting fifty miles under our belts every day. Running’s physical. But racing – that’s emotional. So you guys have got to dig real deep out there. The whole Trans-America’s riding on you. Win, and Flanagan can take about a hundred grand from here, enough to pay off most of his debts and take us beyond Chicago.”

He paced up and down restlessly in front of them.

“Hugh, in the sprint you know your business best, so there’s no point in me telling you what to do. You’re a pro. Dixie will be standing in the crowd twenty yards from the finish with a white handkerchief. Just sprint as if the devil’s behind you with a poker at your ass.”

Hugh nodded, smiling nervously, feeling the dampness of his palms, the thin trickle of sweat on his flushed right cheek.

Doc looked at Thurleigh and Morgan.

“In the distance run, the main thing is not to go crazy in the first couple of miles. By my reckoning you will be close on two minutes down on Silver Star by that time. You should be running steady at five minutes a mile or inside for the first six miles. Doc Falconer will be taking your pulse at the end of each mile to give us a guide on your condition, to let us know if we can safely push you harder.”

He turned his back, took a deep breath then turned to face them again.

“God knows how many words coaches have wasted at times like this. You’ll have a thousand Trans-Americans out there rooting for you every yard of the way, guys who know exactly how it feels to dig into your guts when your whole body is begging you to stop. In the end all that counts is that, win or lose, you don’t let them down.”

Hugh felt like a gladiator going out to face hungry lions. He blinked as he stepped out into the sunshine on to the soft dirt-track, his body still glowing from Doc’s rub-down.

On the in-field cheer-leaders were still at work. Levy had trained a hundred plump-thighed High School majorettes to prance about in the centre of the arena, singing his “Levy can’t lose” jingle to the off-key strains of John Philip Sousa. To this sheer volume of noise Flanagan had no real answer, but he had scattered a dozen Hawaiian dancers around the arena, to dole out kisses and Trans-America badges to the crowd, and had paid two hundred dollars to Rickenbecker’s Flying Daredevils to pull a Trans-America streamer a thousand feet above Coolidge stadium. A thousand lean, sun-blackened Trans-Americans had posted themselves in groups in each quarter of the stadium and throughout the crowd on the cross-country course. Already their self-appointed cheer-leaders were warming them up, to the amusement of the good-natured St Louis crowd.

Hugh stepped gingerly on to the trotting track.

“The world’s champion sprinter, five foot ten inches, one hundred and fifty pounds, Hugh McPhail from Glasgow, Bonnie Scotland!” boomed the announcer. There was sustained shouting, scattered applause, and rhythmic chanting from the Trans-Americans.

Hugh looked around him. He felt engulfed. The arena was packed to capacity, with children resting on the shoulders of sweating fathers, and popcorn and drink vendors finding it difficult to find channels in the vast, sticky, expectant crowd. Beyond the bleachers some intrepid youths had even settled in the trees. In the back stretch he could see massive improvised Trans-America banners: “Hugh, Hugh, we’re with you!” and “Go Morgan, go Lord, go!” they said. In the packed stand to his right the Trans-Americans had somehow devised a yellow Scottish flag, featuring the red lion rampant, and he could hear the wail of pipes, abominably played. He became aware of the whirr and click of cameras.

Again the crowd roared, drowning the announcer’s next statement. The cause was Levy, who had just entered sitting on a light sulky behind a superb black stallion. Silver Star’s glossy coat radiated the precise, controlled fitness of a champion trotter. Its movements were light, supple and rhythmic, and Hugh immediately recognized in the horse another sprinter, as he was. Or had been. For two thousand miles of running had taken more out of his legs than Doc’s probing fingers could ever replace. His throat was dry and again he felt the overwhelming desire to yawn. He wished himself ten thousand miles away.

Silver Star pranced fluidly round the 600-yard circuit, dimpling the track with its tiny hooves. The town loved this horse: Silver Star was St Louis, and they showed it in their applause. Hugh strode at half-effort in his spikes up the track, feeling smooth but ponderous. It was just as he had feared: the speed, the snap, the cadence, had vanished. His legs felt hollow. “Think fast” – those had been Stevie’s last words. He attempted a faster stride. It felt better, but worlds away from the real, blazing power which had once been his.

The roar of the crowd swelled as Silver Star slipped into full speed, pulsing down the back straight. Hugh looked left across the track. The animal could certainly shift, and he could see no way in which he could conceivably stay with it – short of holding on to the back of the sulky.

One fifty-eight p.m. Colonel Cranston blew his whistle for the first time. “Please prepare yourselves, gentlemen,” he said. Within seconds the crowd had stilled, the last sounds being the cries of peanut vendors echoing across the arena. Hugh felt his legs tremble as he walked towards the start. He handed his dressing-gown to Doc, then looked up the track at the single roped lane. Focus in. Silver Star trotted in on his left, snorting lightly, its supple shanks quivering.

“Get to your marks!” shouted Cranston.

Hugh’s world had slowed down now, the crowd reduced to a soft blur. He again felt a thin trickle of sweat on his right temple. His breath seemed to come from far off. He blinked. Yards away, down his lane, he could see the sharp white of Dixie’s handkerchief. Suddenly he was back in childhood, at the mine with Stevie, at winter Powderhall in four feet of space. As then, the space around his lane melted, as his lane became sharp and clear. Focus in.

He felt the roughness of the grit of the track on his right knee and through the tips of his fingers. Why in God’s name was the starter so slow?

“Get set . . .”

Hugh came up late, to lessen the pressure on his arms and shoulders. When the gun cracked he drove off with range and power, eating up the track with long surging strides. Levy was slow to react and Hugh was five yards down the track before his opponent had even put the whip to Silver Star and another two yards down before the horse reacted. Somehow, miraculously, Hugh’s body had remembered the thousand sprint drills of the past. He burnt through the space towards the white handkerchief, oblivious to the throbbing hooves behind him.

The trotter rushed up the track, its supple legs flowing underneath it. But the late reaction of its rider, coupled with the problem of moving from rest 200 pounds of rider and sulky, had in all lost Silver Star nearly twelve yards over the first fifty. The horse was closing fast, but not quickly enough. Hugh snapped the tape a good three yards ahead.

At the end of the straight he slowed down to a trot, his gaze fixed on the beaming Dixie, bobbing delightedly beside a radiant Juan Martinez. Above him the Trans-America banners were swirling crazily as the runners danced up and down with delight. Children were restrained from running on to the track to greet McPhail by burly, smiling policemen. For a moment there was chaos, as the announcer repeatedly tried to declare the result. He gave up, as wave upon wave of cheering and applause drowned his attempts. The St Louis crowd roared and kept on roaring. Although most of their money was on Silver Star somehow irrationally and against their own interests they wanted this Scot to win.

Levy glumly drew Silver Star to a halt, shaking his head, but was soon in close discussion with his trainers who had watched the race from the in-field. He listened to them intently, nodded, then started to smile. Hugh walked back through the applause, down the home stretch towards Doc, who put his dressing-gown back round his shoulders. “Great,” he said. “But keep warm, inside and outside. We ain’t home yet, not by a long way.”

A few moments later Hugh lay on his stomach on the massage-table, as Doc lightly stroked his calves. He felt a great stillness, and could hardly believe that only a few minutes before he had exploded down the track before forty thousand spectators. He wiped his forehead with his right hand, put his fingers to his lips and savoured the salt taste of his own sweat.

He heard a click as the dressing-room door opened behind him. It was Flanagan. Doc shook his head and put a finger to his lips. Flanagan nodded and closed the door gently, leaving Doc and Hugh alone together. Doc tapped Hugh on the back of his neck and the sprinter turned to sit, supported on the heels of both hands. Doc then gently drew a white hand-towel across Hugh’s forehead, as if he were drying a baby.

“You did good out there,” he said, then looked at his watch, which showed two-twenty. “Ten minutes to go. Plenty of time. Just do the same again and our money’s in the bank.”

Ten minutes later, at exactly 2.30 p.m. the crowd was again hushed. The second race was about to begin. Now only the cries of children and wheeling birds broke the silence. Colonel Cranston loaded his Winchester with two blanks. Hugh could hear the greased cartridges click into the gun’s barrels.

“Please prepare yourselves, gentlemen.”

Silver Star was already at its mark by the time Hugh reached the starting-line. This time there was no need for Hugh to focus in, for his lane was etched sharp and clear. He was ready. But now so was Levy, his whip poised only a foot or so from Silver Star’s flickering withers.

“Get set . . .”

The gun cracked and this time Levy smacked Silver Star’s rump at once, bringing the trotter into immediate movement. The horse still had yards to pick up at fifty yards, but it pulled Hugh in as if with a lasso, his prancing legs snapping underneath him like whips. The horse clawed back yard after yard in the last fifty as Hugh drove in desperately on the tape.

Hugh could feel Silver Star at his shoulder at ninety yards, knew instinctively that the horse was surging past him. Still, he did what he had always been trained to do – to drive remorselessly in on that tiny white handkerchief. But even as he dipped for the tape he could see out of the corner of his eyes that he was beaten, that the prancing trotter had taken him by at least a yard.

This time the Trans-America banners in the back straight were limp, but the roars from the crowd were the same, though they were now for Levy. The smartass had come back punching, and the St Louis crowd recognized it in their applause for him. Levy’s trainers rushed to his side and he leaned over grinning, the sweat streaming from his plump face, nodding as they pumped his hands. Hugh dared not look at Dixie, as she stood at the end of the straight, head down, Juan Martinez’ arm around her shoulder. He walked slowly back down the track towards Doc, who stood at the mouth of the tunnel holding Hugh’s dressing-gown in front of him. Doc’s face was grim, but he summoned a smile.

“One to go,” he said. “Still got a chance.” He put his hand round Hugh’s shoulders as the announcer boomed out the result over the babble of the crowd, and they walked together into the gloom of the tunnel.

“Result of second trial. First, Silver Star.” The announcement was drowned in cheers. “Time, ten point five seconds. Second, McPhail, ten point six seconds. The final trial will take place in twenty-five minutes, at three o’clock.”

Back in the darkness of the dressing room Hugh sat upon the massage table, weight on his hands, while Doc lightly rubbed his calves.

“How do you see it?” asked Doc, the anxiety showing in his voice. The Scotsman sat up, resting on his elbows, and shook his head as Flanagan entered the room. “Levy’s got the start taped,” sobbed Hugh. “I can’t find another yard, Doc. I don’t have an inch left in me. I can’t go any faster.”

“But the bloody horse can get slower,” came another Scots voice – from the door. It was Stevie, coming in behind Flanagan.

“Rules say that you’ve both got to be still on the mark, don’t they?”

Hugh nodded, and Doc stopped his massage.

“So just look at the bloody horse at the start – it’s moving all the time, particularly its head. I’ve been checking on trotters. They move their heads from left to right – that’s their natural action. So we’ve got to protest to Cranston – get Silver Star’s head held at the start, with its head to the right. That means that it will have to move its head left-right before it gets going. That’ll take time – it might even be worth that extra yard to you.”

Flanagan withdrew a pad from his pocket and scribbled down some notes. He looked up.

“I can’t see that Cranston can object to Silver Star being still at the start,” he said. “But a yard only puts us level at best. We need more. Anything else?”

Stevie reached into his pocket, drew out two pieces of cotton wool, and gave them to Hugh.

“We always used to talk about running in silence, in four feet of space, didn’t we?”

Hugh nodded.

“Well, one thing you don’t want to hear is that bloody horse thudding up behind you,” he said. “You’ve got to make this last run a pure run, with nothing distracting you. So stuff these in your ears and you can run in a world of your own. You’ll hear the start, ’cause Cranston’s right next to you with his ruddy Winchester. After that it’s just you and a hundred yards to be gobbled up.”

Doc looked at Flanagan, who nodded, then gulped, feeling tears come to his eyes. He lightly knuckled Hugh on the left shoulder.

“Do what you do best,” he said gruffly, pulling Stevie with him towards the dressing-room door.

“Finished,” said Doc a moment later, and tapped Hugh on the thigh.

Hugh stood up and together the two men walked through into the tunnel. At the mouth of the tunnel leading out to the track stood Thurleigh and Morgan. Neither spoke, but both put a hand on Hugh’s shoulder as if trying to transfer some of their own strength and energy to him. Hugh barely acknowledged them as he walked past out into the sharp sunlight of the arena.

This time the crowd was immediately silent when they glimpsed Hugh’s lean, slight figure at the entrance to the stadium. Even when Levy and Silver Star reappeared there was no applause – simply silence. Only the sharp flapping of the flags around the stadium could be heard as Colonel Alan Cranston summoned the contestants to their marks for the last time.

“Gentlemen, prepare yourselves.” Cranston’s voice broke slightly on the final word, his feelings reflected in the vast, still crowd that now hung on his next words of command. Hugh stuffed Stevie’s plugs of cotton wool into his ears and trotted to the start, followed by Levy and Silver Star.

Cranston had readily agreed to Silver Star’s bridle being held, and Levy, certain of victory, had made no attempt to protest.

Forty thousand people focused hearts and minds on the hundred yards through which Hugh and Silver Star would travel. Flanagan hardly dared look, and in the crowd Martinez and Dixie covered their eyes.

“On your marks . . .”

Hugh could hear Cranston’s command clearly, and knew that the thunder of Cranston’s Winchester would set him off, even if muffled by the ear-plugs. He settled himself in as Silver Star’s handler gripped the trotter’s bridle, holding the horse’s head to the right.

“Get set . . .”

Then it all happened with a rush. The gun released Hugh from his prison and he drove up the soft dirt-track like a man possessed. Behind him Silver Star jerked his head to release himself from the pressure on its mouth, swept it to the right and moved late to Levy’s sharp and urgent whip.

Hugh, in an eight-yard lead by forty yards, was solidly in the present, yet in the past, back in a perfect muscular memory of even-time sprinting. He rippled – flowed – legs sweeping under him in a blur. He could hear nothing, see nothing, but the white reality of the handkerchief out ahead of him. He was again a machine, a sprint-machine. Though he automatically threw his chest in on the tape as he had been taught he knew that he had won.

He pulled the cotton wool from his ears. But the roar of the crowd almost deafened him and, smiling, he put his hands to the sides of his head. Then children in the crowd broke the barrier created by the police and engulfed him, thrusting programmes and grubby scraps of paper up to him. He bent down to them, grinning, and had completed a dozen autographs by the time the St Louis police had regained control. He looked into the crowd for Dixie, who was weeping unashamedly on Juan Martinez’ shoulder. The Mexican raised his eyebrows and shrugged as

Hugh caught his eye.

Above the din the Trans-Americans in the crowd took up the chant “McPhail, McPhail”, soon picked up by their colleagues dancing excitedly on the cross-country course above the stadium. The commentator attempted to announce the result, but again it was impossible, for the crowd would not permit him. A man had outrun a horse, and they knew that the three ten-second snatches of conflict they had seen would remain with them for the rest of their lives. So the St Louis crowd cheered until they were hoarse and when they were too hoarse to cheer they started to applaud. Then, at the end of the finishing straight, a piper appeared, dressed in immaculate Black Watch tartan, and with Hugh jogging beside him they performed a lap of honour to the applause of the crowd.

“Third and final trial,” said the announcer, at last audible above the rantings of the crowd. “First, Hugh McPhail, ten point five seconds.”

Hugh finally reached the entrance of the tunnel where Doc, Dixie, Stevie and Flanagan awaited him.

“Give us a kiss,” said Doc, hugging him.

“Nae fear,” said Hugh, grinning. “Not until you’ve shaved, anyway.”

He looked at Dixie, standing in front of him, still weeping.

“Woman,” said Hugh, “I’m glad I won. God knows what you would ha’ done if I’d lost.”

Dixie smiled through her tears.

“And Stevie?”

“Yes?” responded the little Scot.

“Remember you told me before the race about Wallace of Perth running against a horse all those years back. Did he win?”

“Of course not,” said Stevie, unbowed.

 

Half an hour later the Coolidge stadium was again hushed in expectation. Out in the country another forty thousand spectators had gathered, pressing in on the pegged, bumpy, roped track which marked the circuit, which, added to the four-forty-yard track, made up the course to one mile, to be covered ten times.

Down in the dressing room beneath the single light bulb the Trans-Americans had regained their composure.

“Remember,” said Doc, flicking Thurleigh’s thighs from side to side with practised hands, “don’t get panicked when the horse picks up an early lead. It’s bound to happen. Think of Nurmi. Keep to your pace.”

A hundred yards away, in a dressing room at the opposite end of the stadium, Leonard Levy still smarted from his defeat in the sprint. He lay on his stomach as his masseur desperately tried to make contact with muscle under the layers of fat which covered the flabby back.

“Sulky checked?” he said, looking up at his trainer, Rafferty, standing above him.

“Yes, Mr Levy,” replied Rafferty obediently. “In perfect condition. Ready to start anytime you say.”

“And Silver Star?”

“No problems, sir. That sprint has warmed him up nicely for the big race.”

“The big race,” repeated Levy. “Yes, I reckon this is the big one. That sprint – no real test of a trotter.”

“Just so, sir,” replied Rafferty obediently. “In a sprint you blink an eyelid and it’s all over. No, Mr Levy, this is the real race. We’ll get our money back on this one. You can bank on it, sir.”

The masseur tapped Levy on the back and Levy turned round and lay, head cupped in hands, then checked his wrist-watch. Fifteen minutes to go.

 

At 3.30 p.m. the contenders had assembled at the start. On the infield stood Doc, Flanagan, Willard, Dr Falconer, Kate and the two runners, Thurleigh and Morgan. On the track Levy sat on Silver Star, adjusting the reins as his trainers and grooms put the finishing touches to the stallion and its sulky. Levy looked across at Flanagan. “The best of luck to you, Mr Flanagan,” he said, smiling.

“Yes,” replied Flanagan. “May the best man win.”

The smile left Levy’s face. He would put so much space between Flanagan’s men and himself in the first few miles that they would simply concede defeat.

“Prepare yourselves, gentlemen.” Cranston was quietly pleased at the way things had gone. He had come out well so far and he was going to see that the cross-country race was conducted in a similar sporting fashion. A fair field and no favour.

Peter Thurleigh took off his dressing-gown to reveal his now-familiar, if faded, Oxford silk vest and shorts. He had never run before in a continuous relay of this type and had no idea how his body would respond to five separate miles over country, each broken by a five-minute rest. He was, however, a horseman, and could see little likelihood of himself and Morgan dealing with a stallion of Silver Star’s calibre. He glanced to his left at Silver Star and Levy, poised, whip in hand.

“Get set . . .”

The gun cracked and Silver Star snapped off round the track, prancing with neat powerful action and leaving Thurleigh plodding behind. The crowd roared: this is what they had come to see. By the time Silver Star had passed the stadium exit at the beginning of the back stretch Levy was already over a furlong in the lead.

But the cross-country course was bumpy and uneven and Silver Star slowed as even the supple sulky creaked and slewed on the rugged ground. By contrast Thurleigh moved smoothly and easily over the course, passing the three-quarter-mile mark in three minutes forty seconds. Even so, Silver Star re-entered the stadium almost a quarter of a mile in front. Thurleigh had covered the first mile in four minutes fifty seconds; Silver Star in four minutes ten seconds.

“Great,” said Doc, as Morgan set off to start the second mile. “What’s his pulse?”

“One hundred and thirty-five beats a minute,” said Falconer. “Should be down well inside one hundred by the time Morgan comes in. That means he’ll be well recovered.”

Morgan knew no other way than to push himself hard, and came in at four minutes forty-eight seconds. Silver Star was one minute ten seconds ahead by now, already well into the country by the time Morgan had finished. “Same again, Peter,” said Doc, tapping Thurleigh on the thigh as Morgan raced in. Thurleigh ran a fast four minutes forty-five seconds for the third mile, with Silver Star now one minute thirty-five seconds ahead.

“It’s no race,” said Flanagan, raking his hands through his hair.

“You think so?” said Doc. “Take a look at the horse.” He pointed to the end of the track. Silver Star was still running well, but was lashed with sweat and beginning to foam at the mouth. “That horse is tiring. Look at the watch. We lost forty seconds in the first lap, thirty seconds in the second, and only twenty-five in the third. Man, we’re catching up!”

“But is there time?” said Flanagan.

Doc looked at the panting Thurleigh, who shook his head.

“Step it up, Peter,” he said, then turned to Falconer. “What was his pulse this time?”

“One hundred and fifty at the finish,” said Falconer. “Now, with a minute to go, one hundred and fifteen. It’s staying high, but he’s still in pretty good shape.”

Doc looked at his watch again and then across at Flanagan.

“Flanagan,” he said, “we can still do it. Silver Star is tiring, and a tired horse makes mistakes. And every time Silver Star breaks into a gallop we pick up half a minute.”

Flanagan shook his head. “I hope you’re right,” he said.

Morgan cut another five seconds from Silver Star’s lead on the fourth mile, running four minutes forty-three seconds, but it was clear that even the “Iron Man” was in trouble. Falconer checked his pulse at one hundred and eighty on arrival: close to maximum. The sweat gushed from Morgan’s body as he sat, gasping, at the finish.

Silver Star’s first foul, signalled by a bugle blast, came as Thurleigh left the stadium for the fifth mile, and a minute later there was a second bugle. Cranston strode over to Flanagan’s retinue.

“Two fouls by Silver Star,” he reported. “That means Silver Star has been stopped for a minute.”

Doc whistled. “That keeps us right in the ball park,” he said.

“How does that place us?”

This time Dixie answered. “We were two minutes behind at the fourth mile. We should have come in a total of two and a half minutes down at the end of the fifth. Take off a minute and that leaves us about a minute and a half to find in five miles.”

“And the horse is getting more tired by the minute,” said Doc. “Just as I thought it would. That animal is bushed.”

Doc was right. Out in the country Levy was having difficulty even in keeping Silver Star moving. His horse was essentially a sprinter, and sustained running over hilly, bumpy ground, dragging twice its normal load, was foreign to it. Soon Silver Star had dropped to a slow canter, occasionally breaking, under Levy’s whip, into a desperate, slow-motion version of its superb trotting action. During the fifth mile Peter Thurleigh seemed to be pulling it in on a long rope, eating up the three-quarters of a mile or so that lay between it and him. When Cranston’s bugle for a further foul sounded half way through the sixth mile, Silver Star was just over a minute ahead.

In the sixth mile Morgan ran like a machine, every stride eroding the gap between him and the now faltering trotter, and the runner’s breath seared through stretched lungs. The crowd sensed what was happening and were torn between concern for their beloved horse and admiration for the bravery of the men who had dared challenge it.

Then came tragedy. As Morgan bounded down the hill towards the race track at the end of the sixth mile a boulder slipped from under his foot. He struggled to regain balance, but his momentum was too great and he fell, hitting the rough ground with a dull thud. For a moment he lay still. When he rose he looked round like a prizefighter after a knockdown, blood gushing down the left side of his face from a gash high in his scalp, just above his ear. Morgan looked down the hill, saw Silver Star entering the stadium, and started on his way again, his bleeding legs buckling on each stride.

“Jesus wept,” said Doc, handing his binoculars to Falconer, who took one look and handed them back.

“Get my bag,” snapped Falconer to Willard Clay.

Doc looked at Peter Thurleigh as Morgan staggered down into the arena. “You said you wanted to prove yourself,” he said. “Nothing in the rules says you can’t run twice.” He walked over to Colonel Cranston, who listened for a few moments, then nodded agreement. “I want two five-minute laps out of you, college boy,” he said. “Meantime Doc here can patch up Mike. So you got your orders. Now get ready to run your nuts off.”

Thurleigh said nothing, but nodded, gulping.

Silver Star had passed the Trans-Americans at the exchange point and was into its seventh mile, slowing slightly as Levy, checking on Morgan’s position, saw that for some reason the Pennsylvanian had dropped back. Now was the time to regain control decided Levy, to get Silver Star back into her immaculate trotting rhythm, show a bit of class. The Trans-Americans were beaten. He would finish the race in style: show the crowd Silver Star at its best.

Morgan had now entered the stadium dripping blood, the groans and sighs of the crowd running ahead of him as they realized his condition. For a moment he almost ran in the wrong direction, into Silver Star’s path, then checked himself and set off round the track towards Thurleigh. He had somehow regained his rhythm, but he was down to a trot, holding his left hand to his forehead in an attempt to staunch the flow of blood.

As he reached the final stretch and saw Doc and the others, and Peter Thurleigh crouched waiting for the touch that would set him off, he dropped his hand from his brow and broke into a desperate sprint, blood spattering on to his vest and shorts. To Thurleigh, coiled at the end of the straight, it seemed as if Morgan was running in a dream, in some private world of his own. Finally, Morgan reached Thurleigh and for a moment they touched hands, setting Thurleigh off. Immediately Morgan collapsed into Doc’s arms, both eyes closed, limp.

Another bugle from the hillside indicated that Thurleigh had gained a further thirty seconds, so at the beginning of his seventh mile the Trans-Americans were only just over a minute down. However, they were bound to drop back, as Thurleigh had to cover two laps on his own without the normal lap rest.

As he left the stadium Thurleigh could see Levy’s sulky only a quarter of a mile away at the base of the hill, about sixty seconds from him. At best he could only hope to keep the gap from widening. His mind returned yet again to Paris 1924. That was how he must run, steadily, evenly, preserving exactly the balance between input and output.

He completed the first lap in just under five minutes, running straight past the Trans-Americans, his breath coming from him in deep gasps.

“Go, Peter!” screamed Doc, dancing on the grass as he receded from them, on his way up the hill into the country section.

Falconer looked up from stitching Morgan’s head and pointed to Thurleigh, now attacking the hill. “His pulse must be over one hundred and eighty now, just about maximum,” he said. “He’ll be lucky if he comes back in one piece.”

Morgan looked up at Falconer expectantly, as the doctor fumbled in his bag for a cleansing swab.

“Give me time, man,” Falconer snapped, cleaning round the spiky stitches. “I’ve just put eight stitches into you.”

“Have you patched him up?” asked Flanagan, missing the comment and impatiently standing over them.

“Yes,” said Falconer, testily. “But in my professional opinion he shouldn’t run. His pulse is still one hundred and fifty beats a minute and he must have lost nearly half a pint of blood. What kind of a man are you, anyway? These men have run two thousand miles, and now just because of a boozy bet you’ve got them killing themselves against a horse. Throw in your hand, Flanagan. These men have had enough.”

Doc ignored him and grabbed Morgan’s face in both hands, putting his face within a few inches of the Pennsylvanian’s. “Do you think you can make it, Mike?” he asked. “If you say no, then we give up now.”

For a moment Morgan said nothing. Then he nodded and got to his feet, the sweat dropping from his face on to the grass, his eyes on Kate Sheridan, who stood directly behind Doc, her eyes glistening.

Doc turned to Falconer.

“Falconer, you told me long ago that for you the Trans-America was like going back to school. Well, let me tell you, sir, today’s graduation day. I’m telling you that out there in the country the lord of the manor is pulling in that horse with every yard he runs. And I’m telling you that five minutes from now this patchwork quilt called Mike Morgan will get up and take another chunk out of that animal’s lead.”

Falconer said nothing but closed his bag, shaking his head.

“I can see Silver Star,” screamed Kate. The trotter had appeared on the brow of the hill above Coolidge stadium, trotting slowly, but with increased control, his body flecked with foam and gleaming with sweat.

“Check the second hand on your watch, Kate,” said Doc. The seconds flickered painfully away as they waited for Peter Thurleigh to appear.

Exactly fifty seconds later Thurleigh appeared on the crest of the hill. He had narrowed the gap, but at terrible cost. His breath came from him in deep groans and his body was drenched in sweat. His legs wobbled as he ran down the hill into the stadium and along the stretch, but at last he passed over to Morgan, to hit the ground beside Doc with a thump, his breath coming from him in deep, harsh wheezes.

Falconer checked his watch as he held Thurleigh’s wrist. “Two hundred and ten beats a minute,” he said. “The highest I’ve ever taken.” He turned again to Doc. “Thurleigh’s done,” he whispered. “His body’s full of waste – you could sell it by the barrel. He could lie here for another hour for all that it matters. He’ll never make that last lap for you. He’s finished.”

“Finished?” shouted Doc. “Finished? Maurice, he’s just started.” He pulled Peter Thurleigh to an upright position. The runner’s face streamed with sweat and his eyes were glassy and unfocused. Doc smacked him lightly on the cheeks.

“You said you wanted to join my team,” he said. “Well, sir, here’s your chance to pay your dues.” He pointed up the hill. “Mike Morgan’s out there, running his heart out for you after a tiring horse. And I’m telling you, we can take it. Peter, I can feel it in my water. I can taste it.”

Thurleigh nodded and got to his feet but immediately fell to the ground. He got up again, nodded, still gasping, and leant forward, his hands on his knees, as the crowd let out a roar. Silver Star had appeared in the stadium, its ninth mile almost completed.

When Morgan came into the stadium what seemed an eternity later the gap was only forty seconds. One mile to go.

“We’ll never make it,” groaned Flanagan. “Even Nurmi couldn’t make forty seconds a mile on a horse!”

But Thurleigh went off hard into the final lap, gasping even in his first quarter-mile round the roaring stadium. As he left the stadium he looked up the hill at Silver Star. The horse appeared to have stopped. What had happened was that the bumpy track had loosened the nuts on the right wheel of the sulky and it would no longer rotate. Levy looked down the hill at the toiling Thurleigh and cursed. He jumped clumsily from the sulky and fumbled for the spanner in the repair-bag on the back of the cart. Thurleigh plodded leadenly towards him, now only a hundred yards away and slowly closing. Levy was still struggling with the wheel-nut as the Englishman staggered past. By the time Levy had tightened the wheel-nut Thurleigh was over one hundred and fifty yards in front, with just over half a mile to go.

Ahead for the first time, with no clear idea of why Levy had stopped, Peter Thurleigh was in agony. Somehow he managed to maintain his running form, consciously keeping head and shoulders still, but his breath came in deep, rasping gulps. He wobbled down the hill to the stadium through a tunnel of noise, his mind just sufficiently alert to prompt him to watch for rocks. At the bottom of the hill, with almost a lap of the trotting track to go, he again ventured a look above him. Silver Star was at the crest of the hill, and gaining. Levy had brought back his fading stallion to something approaching its trotting rhythm, although the horse was now down to a sluggish twelve miles an hour. Levy in turn could see Thurleigh staggering down the rocky path ahead, but knew that he could not risk a foul or chance damaging a wheel by forcing Silver Star down the hill after him. No, he would have to pick Thurleigh up on the final circuit, on the track – where Silver Star would be back in his element.

As he entered the stadium Thurleigh had three-quarters of a lap to cover, counter-clockwise, to reach the finish. His legs had gone, his breathing was broken, and he knew that Silver Star was closing fast. He had completed a hundred yards on the soft surface of the track when he heard the shouts and cheers behind him. Silver Star had entered the stadium. On the smooth surface of the track the horse’s hooves thudded once more in perfect balance. Thurleigh again looked back: Levy and Silver Star were gaining fast.

Two hundred yards to go. For one final time Thurleigh dug deep inside himself and launched his stricken body into a grotesque parody of a sprint. Knees bowed and wilting, arms thrashing, he entered the home stretch. The air was now poison to him, but he was far beyond pain. He charged up the track, oblivious of the hooves behind him. The tape seemed to be receding, but still he kept running, his legs bowing on each stride.

He hit the finishing tape with his teeth, cutting his lips, and fell full length on the ground, the dry dirt spuming in front of him, Silver Star only a yard behind. He lay on the track, on his face, spitting blood and grit, until Doc pulled him to his feet, limp, like a rag doll.

“Congratulations, Peter,” he said. “I reckon you’ve paid your dues.”

 

All in all, the city of St Louis was well pleased with Leonard H. Levy. He had provided the citizenry with right royal entertainments: two circuses, and two man-versus-horse races about which St Louis men would spin yarns for many a year. Levy had lost $120,000 in bets, it was true, but every man in St Louis knew that he had cleared $200,000 from spectator fees, concessions and the sale of programmes. He might have lost the races, but he stood high in the respect of the citizens of St Louis: first, because of the entertainment he had provided. Second, because he had proved himself a real smart fellow.

The clink of champagne glasses therefore sounded throughout “Hambletonian”, Levy’s sumptuous house on King’s Highway, the Nob Hill of St Louis, as Levy entertained the Trans-Americans and over two hundred other guests. Hugh, Peter and Morgan, Dixie and Kate, splashed at each other in Levy’s kidney-shaped swimming pool, while the gentlemen of the press refilled their glasses and swapped “exclusive” interviews.

Levy looked on indulgently from the side of the pool, the sweat from his day’s driving still trickling down his face.

“Jesus,” he said. “Your boys sure did put up a show out there at Coolidge park today.”

“They assuredly did, sir,” said Colonel Cranston, at Levy’s right hand together with a beaming Flanagan. “I sincerely hope that you gentlemen feel that the proceedings were carried off with fairness and lack of prejudice?”

“Let me fill your glass, sir,” said Levy. “Indeed, Colonel, I do. Although I feel that if I had not sustained a mechanical breakdown I might well have won.” He paused for a moment, then looked up at Flanagan enquiringly.

“Tell me one thing,” said Levy, “and I promise that it will go no further. How in God’s name did you win the sprint? I thought I had it all sewn up after the second race.”

“Pigeons, cotton wool, and a little savoir faire,” said Flanagan.

“Pigeons?” said Levy, gulping down his champagne.

Flanagan related Doc’s story about the race between the greyhound and the pigeon and how Dixie had held the handkerchief upon which Hugh McPhail had focused.

“And there’s our pigeon,” he said, as Dixie stood, trim and golden in blue bathing suit, poised to dive into the pool.

“Some pigeon,” said Levy.

“Some greyhound we had to run against,” said Flanagan, raising his glass.

“And the cotton wool?”

Flanagan explained how Hugh had been told to shut out the noise of Silver Star’s hooves.

“Hell,” said Levy. “You boys had it all worked out. But you mentioned something about savoir faire.”

Flanagan grinned.

“That, sir, may have been the difference between fifty thousand dollars and a kick in the ass. We figured that since a trotter’s head moves from left to right if we could get Silver Star’s head held on the right that would lose you a yard at the start.”

Levy laughed and kept on laughing until he started to cough.

“Did I say something funny?” said Flanagan.

“You surely did, sir,” said Colonel Cranston, smiling.

“Silver Star is well known in the world of trotting as the only trotter who moves her head from right to left. Any advantage you gained was simply because the horse’s mouth was held, not for any other reason. No, sir, you simply had the better man.”

 

Hugh and the others at the pool looked up as they heard Levy’s guffaws.

“For a loser, Levy’s sure enjoying himself,” said McPhail.

“Yep,” said Doc, following his eyes. “I reckon all of this is worth about a hundred grand. Levy’s no loser. Guys like him never are.”

“Isn’t there something wrong when we have people like we’ve seen on the road, people with nothing – ” said Hugh.

“People like us,” interrupted Kate.

“ – and wealth like this?” ended Hugh.

“Nothing wrong with it, if you can get it,” said Doc.

“That all depends how many faces you have to smash in on the way,” said Morgan.

“Oh, I don’t reckon that our Mr Levy qualifies as a face-smasher,” said Doc, slipping into the pool. He nodded across at Flanagan, Levy and Cranston. “Looks like he’s cooking up some deal over there with Flanagan. Wonder what it is this time . . .”

 

At that moment Levy was pointing a stubby finger at Flanagan. “I rate you, sir, as a sportsman of the first rank,” he began.

“Wait for it,” said Flanagan, winking at Colonel Cranston. “The last time he said that back in Topeka I nearly lost my pants.”

“Seriously, Mr Flanagan – may I call you ‘Charles’?” continued Levy. “Last night I received a call from a friend of mine in Bloomington, a General Aloysius Honeycombe.”

“Honeycombe?” said Cranston. “Never heard of him. In the army?”

“An honorary title, I believe, Colonel,” said Levy. “He runs a travelling circus, and he’ll be in Springfield, Illinois in five days or so. When will your runners reach Springfield?”

Flanagan looked over at Willard. “Springfield?” he said.

“Down for 14 May, boss,” said Willard.

“Ideal,” said Levy. “My friend, General Honeycombe, has a proposition for you. He’s got a big circus and fairground just outside Bloomington for a week. He’ll offer you five hundred dollars a day for your circus, plus a slice of the profits.”

“Keep talking,” said Flanagan.

“What he really wants is some of your boys and Miss Sheridan to run a few exhibition handicap races,” continued Levy. “You know, with some of the local boys. He’ll give you five hundred for that as well.”

“Done,” said Flanagan.

“And Doc Cole,” said Levy. “He must have Doc Cole.”

“What for?”

“Not for running. But you know as well as I do that Doc’s a national figure now – look over at the pool: all the matrons of St Louis are after him. Well, my friend General Honeycombe wants Doc to put on a public appearance, giving some sort of lecture.”

“How much?” said Flanagan.

“Five hundred dollars,” said Levy.

“A thousand.”

“Seven fifty.”

“Done,” said Flanagan.

Levy smiled. “The way I see it, no hard feelings on my part. We both came out well today. We can do the same up in Bloomington.” He paused. “One final matter,” he said. “General Honeycombe would like one of your boys to take on a little fisticuffs.”

“Boxing?” said Flanagan, frowning. “My boys are runners, not prizefighters.”

“Well, the owner of the boxing booth at his carnival offers five hundred dollars if one of your boys can take his pug in four rounds.”

“Impossible,” said Flanagan, looking idly across the pool. “I told you, Mr Levy, my boys are runners.”

“Look, I owe Honeycombe some favours from way back,” said Levy. “And after today, I can afford to be generous. How does five grand at five to one sound to you?”

“It would take us to Newark,” said Flanagan quietly, still looking across the pool. “But I told you, Leonard, my boys aren’t fighters, so how can I get some guy who’s never boxed to go in against a trained fighter, and that after he’s run over two thousand miles?”

“Eight to one,” said Levy, pouting.

“I’m a fool to myself,” said Flanagan, his gaze now fixing firmly on Morgan. “But you just make it ten to one and I think we might have ourselves another little deal.”

Levy nodded. “Agreed,” he said. “I’ll be in Bloomington at the end of the week to arrange the final details.”

He turned to Colonel Cranston. “Have you had any experience in boxing, Colonel?”

“Army light heavy champion 1907,” said Cranston, pushing back his shoulders.

“Then might I ask you to make the trip to Bloomington to referee, to ensure that fair play is done? All expenses paid, of course.”

“It will be an honour, sir,” said Cranston, before adding to Flanagan, “I’m afraid that you may have bitten off a little more than you can chew this time, sir.”

“It certainly does appear that way, Colonel,” said Flanagan, waving idly at Mike Morgan, who was at that moment being drowned by Kate.

 

Flanagan had never seen Morgan so mad.

“You’re crazy,” he said. “Either that or pig stupid.” He shook his head and sat down on the downy divan in Flanagan’s lush caravan. “First you set us up against a horse and damn near kill us. Now you want me to take on a professional fighter. What next? Pitch against Babe Ruth, tackle Red Grange? Why not? I’ve got just as good a chance.”

“Have a beer, Mike,” said Flanagan easily. “Look, you know the trouble I’ve had keeping this show on the road. It costs me over five grand a day just to stay alive. If you guys hadn’t won today the Trans-America wouldn’t even have got as far as Bloomington. And don’t forget, if we don’t make New York then we’re all in the cellar.”

As he filled Morgan’s glass Kate entered the caravan, concern on her face as she saw Morgan, head down, elbows on his knees.

“What’s up? Just what have you asked him to do this time, Flanagan?” she asked suspiciously.

“Nothing much. Just another little deal I’ve set up,” said the Irishman, pouring Kate out an orange juice. “Levy offered me ten to one on one of our boys taking on some stumblebum in a booth in Bloomington. I’ve asked Mike here to deal with it.”

“Fighting? Mike’s no fighter,” she said stoutly.

“He knows, honey,” said Morgan quietly.

“I figured Mike for a fighter from the beginning,” Flanagan explained. “I’ve seen hands like his before, and I’ve seen eyes like his too.”

Morgan looked up. “So I fought in booths? I admit that. But Flanagan, last time I fought barefist I killed a guy. For all I know the cops are still looking for me.”

“But not in Springfield,” said Flanagan, his mind travelling back to his meeting with Bullard. “Look, I give you my solemn word, anything happens then I put up ten grand for legal expenses. I’ll get the very best – this time it’ll really be Clarence Darrow. What do you say?”

Morgan looked at Kate.

“What sort of fighter is he going to be up against?” she asked.

Flanagan rubbed his chin. “No way of knowing. Some palooka. Who cares?”

“I do,” said Morgan, standing up. “Flanagan, I know the booths – I’ve fought in them. There’re two kinds of fighter there, the guys on the way up and the guys on the skids. The ones on the way up will take on a gorilla for a dime. They don’t have much science, but they come out hitting like crazy. The ones on the skids have to take you if they’re going to earn their oats. They know all the dirty tricks – the thumb in the eye, the dig in the kidneys, the knee in the groin. They sap you with wrestling, stand on your feet, elbow you until your ribs are raw. Then, when you’re tiring, they straighten you up with a left and then right hook you into crazyland.”

Flanagan had never heard Morgan speak at such length. He was taken aback. “Then it’s impossible?”

“I’m not saying that. I’m saying that only one challenger in a hundred from the crowd ever lasts four rounds to pick up his ten bucks. As for winning against a booth fighter, I’d have to take in a machine gun.”

He sat down and sipped his beer. “First question, who referees?”

“Colonel Cranston, the man who umpired today. He was army light heavy champion.”

“That’s the first good news I’ve heard,” said Morgan. He paused. “Second question. Where can I get some gloves and a sparring partner?”

 

Hugh felt as if he had been hit in the face with a club. Morgan circled round him, crouching, his left constantly breaking through Hugh’s guard as if his arms were made of marshmallow. Hugh swung at Morgan with his right, hitting air, and received in return the full force of Morgan’s left in the stomach. Gasping, he went down on one knee.

Dixie banged the tin drum that was serving as a gong and rushed to Hugh’s side. He struggled to his feet and staggered to his stool, followed by Morgan.

“Had enough?” said Morgan, fingering the wound high on the scalp which he had sustained in the race.

Dixie answered for him. “Three rounds,” she said. “That’s enough.”

Morgan ruffled Hugh’s hair. “You did well,” he said. “Landed some good ones. Hell, let’s have a beer.”

Hugh had been the only Trans-American willing to spar with Morgan, as the other runners saw it as a certain exit from the race. He had fought before, not with gloves but bare-fisted, during his time as a miner at Shotts. It had never been clear to him why the fights had begun, but once they had been they were fought with savagery and bitterness.

It was odd. The miners would always insist that a winner should “finish” his man. “He’s entitled to the ground,” they would say. He was glad that he had never met Morgan on such terms. Even three rounds with gloves with him had left his head ringing.