Lochlin shrugged. “You can’t be seriously suggesting that that old nag could outrun a racehorse? You’ve got to be crazy, but if you’re serious I’ll lay twenty to one that Wade Hampton can beat him.”
“Twenty to one? I’ll take it!”
Sweeney hesitated. “Well now … See here. I don’t know if-“
“Going to welsh on it, Sweeney?” Bob Childers asked. “You said I was full of hot air, what about you?”
“I’ll be damned if I am! I said I’d bet and I will. Twenty to one … And I’ve got a thousand dollars says the milk-horse wins!” “A thousand dollars?” Morrissey spoke for the first time. “That’s serious money, Sweeney.”
“I’ve got it and I’ll bet it,” Sweeney said stubbornly. “Bob, you an’ Lochlin can put up or shut up.”
“Think what you’re doing, Sweeney. Bob has a racehorse. That old milk-wagon horse is stiff and old. Hell, if she ever could run, she can’t any more. I’d say forget it.”
“He made his bet,” Lochlin said, “and I’ve accepted. I will put up my money on one condition. That we run the race tomorrow.”
Lochlin turned to Childers. “Bob,” he spoke softly, “this will be the easiest money we ever made. I knew Sweeney was a damn fool, but I didn’t realize how much of a damn fool he was! This will be a cinch. I’ll pick up a cool thousand for an investment of twenty thousand, and all in a matter of minutes.” He paused. “How much are you betting, Bob? You can take him for plenty because he’s too bullheaded to back out, and you know Sweeney … he’s got it to bet.” “I don’t know,” Childers frowned. “I’ve got to think about it.” “He’s good for plenty, Sweeney is, and he’s that much of a damn fool. You’ll never have a chance like this again. I would guess he’s good for twenty or thirty thousand, and I can come up with another twenty. If you can come up with sixty thousand we can win it all. It’s a cinch.” “It’s a lot of money,” Childers muttered.
“Of course, but it will take you a year to clear that much … Hell, it would take three good years to clear that much in your saloon. If the man’s a fool, let’s get his money before somebody else does.” “Where does Morrissey stand? Is he in with us?” Lochlin shrugged. “He’s not involved, so far. You can bet if he sees what we’ve got, he’ll be in for a piece, but John was never much of a gambler. He operates the places but he doesn’t gamble.”
That was ten years ago or better! Shanaghy remembered the day of the race. He had been up on the Maid and they purposely tossed dust over her, and brought her on the track looking like the milk-wagon horse she’d been. But Shanaghy was nervous, for it was impossible to disguise the clean lines of her. Wade Hampton had started fast and well and was leading by three lengths when the horses rounded the back turn. Then Tom let the Maid go. Filled with joy at the chance, the horse began to run. When they came under the wire she was running easily and won by half a length.
Morrissey had cautioned him. “Lad, if you look to be winning, don’t make it by too much, understand? We can use this horse again.” The Maid won, and Sweeney, Lochlin and Morrissey split sixty thousand dollars among them.
Shanaghy told McCarthy about the race, and the old blacksmith straightened up from his work. “Aye, I heard of it, lad. And you were a part of that? You should be ashamed. It was a swindle. All of them should be ashamed; Ah, if their old mithers but knew of it!”
“But Mr. Lochlin lost money, too!” Shanaghy protested. McCarthy spat. “If you believe that, you’re more innocent than I believed. Did you see any of Lochlin’s money? Did anybody?”
“Gallagher was holding the bets. He said-“
“Aye, Gallagher! One of the same lot! Believe me, lad, Lochlin was the come-on, he was the pusher. Lochlin talked a good bet but he was in it up to his ears. And as for Morrissey, he was the brains of the lot-and seemed to be out of it all so he’d not be suspected. Old Smoke is a shrewd man, lad, and don’t you forget it. Running for the state Senate, he is, and he’ll be elected, too. You fight shy of that lot, lad, or you’ll end in jail!” Morrissey had given him five hundred dollars for tipping them off to a good thing and riding the horse. It was more money, Shanaghy reflected, than his poor pa had seen in his lifetime. With it, Shanaghy bought some new clothes and a better place to live. He put three hundred of it into a bank McCarthy suggested. He had ridden the Maid in three more races before he grew too heavy for riding. By the time he was sixteen he was five feet nine inches, as tall as he was ever to be, and he weighed an easy hundred and sixty but looked lighter. Sometimes he sparred with Old Smoke himself, but the iron-fisted Irishman was rough, with both height and reach on Shanaghy, who learned to ride and slip punches, to bob and weave and move in and away.
Although a middleweight in size, he had the shoulders and punching power of a heavyweight, and several times they rang him in on unsuspecting country fighters larger than he.
Of Bob Childers or his family he saw nothing more until several months later when, emerging from the Five Points, he came upon a man who looked like Bob Childers’s son standing on a corner with two other men. “There’s one of them now,” one of the men said, pointing at Tom. “He rode the horse.”
The burly young man who resembled Childers called out to him. “You! Come here!” Shanaghy paused. He knew he should keep going, but something in the young man’s tone irritated him. “You want to see me,” he said, “come to where I am.” “I’ll come, an’ be damned to y’!”
Shanaghy was convinced this was Bob Childers’s son. He was a powerful young man, yet too heavy. Shanaghy stood waiting, watching the other two men as well. When the young man was almost to him he saw the others start, and he knew it would be not the one but all three he must fight. The first one stepped up on the curb. “You’re one o’ that pack o’ thieves,” he said, “and I’m going to teach you!” “Your pa bought himself a horse race and he lost,” Shanaghy said to the young man. “That’s all. He asked for it with his loud mouth.” “Loud mouth, is it?” The young man lifted a ponderous fist threateningly. “I’ll teach … “
If you are going to fight, Shanaghy had learned long since, don’t waste time talking. As young Childers stepped up on the curb, Shanaghy went quickly to meet him. He smashed a left to Childers’s mouth; then swung a right into his belly. The punch caught Childers moving in and was totally unexpected. A strong young man, Childers knew little of fighting and always had much to say before he swung a fist. This time he never said it. His wind left him with an oof and he staggered and fell back into a sitting position. Shanaghy wheeled and dove into the space between two buildings, ran their length and, turning sharply, mounted the stairs to the upper story.
This was an area he knew well. Emerging on the rooftop, he ran along the roofs, jumping the walls that divided one from the other. Soon he was blocks away. Coming down from the final rooftop, he went to his room. A few days later he saw John Morrissey. “Aye,” John said, “we bought ourselves a packet, lad. Bob’s a beefhead himself, but some of the money was from his brother, Eben, and that’s another thing. Eben Childers is uncommon shrewd, and a mean, mean man. The one you hit was not Bob’s son but Eben’s, so you’ve made an enemy. Be on your guard, lad, for they’ll stop at nothing until you’re killed or maimed. He believed that big son of his was unbeatable and you felled him with a blow.”
Shanaghy shrugged it off. So he had made an enemy … Well, he had made enemies before this one. Yet it was little he knew of Eben Childers then, and he cared even less, for he had been fighting for half his life and knew nothing else. “He’s a hater, lad, and don’t forget it. He lost money, but worse than that he was made to appear a fool, and he’s a proud, proud man.” The word got around that Childers was recruiting men for an all-out war with Morrissey, and Childers had influence where it mattered. Unexpectedly, Morrissey found doors closed to him that had always been open, but Shanaghy knew little beyond the casual barroom gossip that he picked up. Then, one night, as he was coming up the Bowery, he was set upon by a gang of thugs who emerged suddenly from a doorway. “Break his legs!” somebody shouted. “Break his legs and his fingers!”