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If my uncle hadn’t insisted on his version of the miracle of the loaves and fishes, I would have been out of business. But he insisted.
“You’ve got to learn about things,” he’d tell me. “And the track is one of them.”
On the last day of my visit, we got to the track early and went down to the barns to take a good look at the horses who were getting set to run away with more of my money.
“I just wanted you to get a look at the competition,” my uncle said. “That’s the only reason we’re gazing at them, but I can tell you it won’t help us any. Horses are like bankers, Sonny. You can look em in the eye all you want but they’ll never tell you a thing until it’s too late.”
The horses might not have had much to say, but the jockey who’d ridden the half-blind horse a few days earlier, had a mouthful to get out. We bumped into him just as we rounded the corner, headed for the grandstands. Seemed he owed my uncle Walter some kind of favor and was anxious to do anything he could to square things up.
“Lookit,” he said, “The first race is a no go. It’s a claimer, but the only thing anybody in his right mind would claim is that those horses can’t run. Any of em. Whoever wins is the one who survives to the finish line. You can’t bet on something like that.”
“So who’s good?” my uncle asked.
“I don’t know much about the next couple of races. You want to wait until the fourth for anything real. Anything I’d bet much on, anyway.” He leaned in to whisper to us. “Here’s what you do. Watch for the scratch. If the number three horse, Rainbow’s End, doesn’t run, that means it’s happening and you want to bet the five horse, real quick. Got it?”
“Number four race. If the three horse scratches, then I bet the five horse.”
“Yeah, the five horse. Jimmy’s Boy.”
“And if the three horse doesn’t scratch?”
“Then you’re on your own, Walter. Cause that’s all I know.”
We didn’t hold off betting until the fourth race. As I’d learned at my uncle’s feet, it was impossible to be at the track and not bet. It would be the same as going to a fine restaurant and not eating.
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