The Black Stallion's Filly (15 page)

“Wintertime is strong and game, as he proved in many of his fine races as a two-year-old. Looking at him now you might think he is a small horse, but he isn't. He stands a little over fifteen hands.”

Alec turned again to Henry. “He looks like our filly,” he said.

“Except for the tail,” Henry replied, smiling. “You never saw a prettier tail than he's got.”

Alec resumed watching the screen. Wintertime's tail almost touched the ground, and as the colt went into a gallop, the tail flowed like a cloak behind him. The television cameras stayed on him.

“That's Billy Watts up on Wintertime,” the announcer was saying. “He's seventeen years old and one of the most promising young riders in the business. He's been with trainer Don Conover for over three years now and has measured up to all the flattering things said and written about him. It's a great tribute to his ability that a trainer like Don Conover has put the youngster up on his stable's top candidate for the Kentucky Derby.”

A few minutes later the horses were in the stalls of the starting gate. Alec's eyes were now on the jockeys, whom he could see behind the wire-mesh doors. He watched Steve Martin trying to soothe Lady Lee as she began acting up. Martin was an old hand. He'd been riding before Alec was born. He was a good rider, competent without being spectacular. He'd get the most out of the filly because he knew everything there was to know about his mounts.

In the number 4 stall, Ted Robinson sat quietly astride Eclipse. Neither he nor the great dark colt with the broad white blaze seemed to be anxious or ready to go. Robinson, still in his early twenties, was one of the great riders of all time, and had been for the past five years. Only the capable Dan Seymour, who had ridden Silver Jet to victory in the Flamingo, was as sought after for his riding services. Consequently Robinson, like Seymour, had his choice of the finest horses in any race. He was a hand-rider, yet polished, too, in the art of knowing when and how to use his whip. To Alec, Eclipse and Ted Robinson were as formidable a combination as Silver Jet and Dan Seymour. Could he and Black Minx compete with them?

But he was getting ahead of himself. There'd be time enough to think about the Derby. He focused his eyes on the outside stall, where Billy Watts sat astride Wintertime. The kid was almost lost behind the colt's red-hooded head. Yet Alec was able to see the paleness of the boy's thin face. He knew how Billy felt, up on a Derby colt, with so much to be gained or lost in this race and the big one to come. The kid was scared but obviously capable in the gate, for he was having no trouble with the colt.

The bell sounded and the gate doors flew open. There was a mad rush of horseflesh and pounding hoofs coming toward the cameras. Heads were pushed out and straining. Above all came the shrill cries of the riders. Alec could only make out Eclipse's white blaze in that great surge.

Then the picture shifted quickly to give a side view of the racing field. Lady Lee was in front by a head, her
long legs sweeping the track as her veteran rider, Steve Martin, used his whip in an effort to get clear of the inside horses and move to the rail. Before the first turn he had her out in front by a length. Then he moved over to the rail.

Behind Lady Lee came Eclipse, and Alec saw that there was nothing ponderous about him now, no more so than with Satan when he was in full stride. Ted Robinson, too, was using his whip. But he could not get Eclipse clear of the field and had to take the colt wide as he went around the turn. Alec's eyes left him for the red-hooded Wintertime, who was being bumped by another colt. Alec saw him falter, then pick up stride again. Billy Watts brought him outside and took the turn wide. Alec realized the kid had chosen to waste precious ground rather than chance being bottled up on the rail by older and trickier riders.

Alec watched the leader. Going into the backstretch, Lady Lee had opened two lengths between herself and Eclipse. She was moving easily and under no urging by her rider. Eclipse, too, had settled down and Robinson wasn't asking him for anything more just now. Wintertime came off the turn ahead of the remaining horses, but he was four lengths behind Eclipse and six behind Lady Lee.

“There it is,” Alec told Henry. “Our three-horse race!”

Henry only grunted. He was waiting, watching for the move he expected Eclipse to make in the backstretch.

With a half-mile still to go there was a sudden shout from the stands. Alec's eyes swept from Lady Lee
to Eclipse. There was no change, neither was being hustled. But four lengths behind, Billy Watts was urging Wintertime, and the blood bay colt was responding! He stepped up his strides, his long black tail trailing in the rush of wind he was creating.

Alec stood up in his excitement. “Come on!” he yelled. But before the words had left his mouth he saw that it would be a hopeless chase, for Lady Lee and Eclipse had begun moving faster too! Steve Martin was using his heels on the brown filly. Ted Robinson used his whip just once on Eclipse, and then urged the great colt on with hands alone.

The crowd shouted again. The race now was entering its final stage. The horses would extend themselves until they went under the wire. A quarter of a mile still remained.

Wintertime had managed to get two lengths nearer Eclipse by his early bid. But there he stayed, unable to move any closer to the husky brown colt. Lady Lee kept her two-length lead over Eclipse while rounding the back turn and entering the homestretch. Once again, Steve Martin asked his filly for more speed, using his hands and feet and whip. She responded quickly, courageously, her long, thin body stretching out to still greater length.

The screams of the crowd rose to a tumultuous roar, claiming the track and every room in the land where a television set was tuned in to this race. Here in the last furlong of the race was the filly's answer to those who had asked,
“We know she's fast but will she go on?”

But even as the crowd roared their acclaim at her
burst of speed in the stretch, there was movement behind. Eclipse and Wintertime were coming up on her! The shouts became more deafening. Seldom did race fans have the privilege of witnessing such a finish!

Alec and Henry were on their feet, their fists clenched and moving, their voices raised.

Wintertime was still two lengths behind Eclipse but moving with him, stride for stride, neither gaining nor losing ground. Together they narrowed the gap between them and the hard-running Lady Lee until Eclipse had his nose at the filly's saddle, then at her head,
then out front and under the finish wire!

Alec and Henry sat back in their chairs while Henry's old friend “Red” Dawson, trainer of Eclipse, was being interviewed.

“He's as good a three-year-old as I've ever seen,” the bald ex-jockey said. “Sure we'll get some stiff competition from Silver Jet, Golden Vanity and maybe a few others, but if my colt can carry his speed a mile and a quarter—and I don't see why he can't—they'll have to break records to beat him in the Derby.”

Henry wasn't interested in listening to anything his old pal had to say about Eclipse. He had just seen a great filly outrun
but not outgamed
.

During the following week there was no doubt that the Kentucky Derby was close at hand. One couldn't read the newspapers or magazines without being told in glowing terms of “America's greatest sports event in which the noble Kings and Queens of the Turf will race for fame and fortune. Out of this whirlwind mass of thunder and speed will emerge one thoroughbred whose name will be added to the long list of Derby champions which includes the great names of American racing—Exterminator, Zev, Reigh Count, Gallant Fox, Twenty Grand, Cavalcade, Omaha, War Admiral, Whirlaway, Shut Out, Count Fleet, Citation and Assault, to mention only a few.”

But Alec didn't need to be reminded that the Derby was less than three weeks away, for Henry began ordering longer and faster works for Black Minx.

“Show me you're a Derby horse and you'll go—only then will you go!” became Henry's attitude. Not that he said it in so many words. But Alec knew that
was what he meant. They had been friends too long for Alec not to know.

There were other things too that gave evidence of how close they were to the Derby. No longer did Henry display the slightest optimism concerning the filly's chances in the approaching classic. And Henry was a man of three distinct moods when it came to training.

In November, when he had brought the filly home, he had said, “I've got a Derby horse, Alec!” That had been mood number one, the mood of lofty optimism. It was understandable because Henry never took any horse unless he was enthusiastic over his prospects of developing a champion.

Since then, months of training had passed. Henry's face had become more settled, more grim, and his remarks more cautious. Number two mood had set in. “I
think
she'll be ready,” he'd said.

Now the Derby was upon them, and Henry entered his last mood. He was silent and unsmiling. He
demanded
of the filly and Alec rather than asked. He would send Black Minx up to a mile in her speed works; then he would have her galloped out for another half. And all during the last half mile he would shout to Alec not to let her gallop “so slowly!” Yet he knew as well as Alec how the filly would act as soon as the bit was taken from her. Henry was now the strict taskmaster, more trainer than friend. Yet it made him what he was, as good a man as there was around in getting a horse ready to win the first time out.

Understanding this, Alec ignored Henry's long periods of silence as well as his occasional tirades at the track during a work. He knew that Henry would not
permit the filly to be raced in the Kentucky Derby or the Kentucky Oaks
or anywhere else
unless she was ready. Nothing was certain for her or for them at this time.

Nevertheless, Alec continued to keep track of all new developments in the Derby picture. He knew that Wintertime and Lady Lee had left New York to go to Keeneland, Kentucky. They would race there, and then go on to Churchill Downs for Derby Week.

Henry said, “Lady Lee is a narrow-fronted, slab-sided filly but she's
game
. They haven't given her up yet as a Derby horse.”

Listening to Henry's terse comment on Lady Lee, Alec wondered if Henry had given up his own filly as a Derby horse. Certainly she displayed no gameness, and could any horse win the classic without it?

After Wintertime and Lady Lee had left New York, another top colt arrived there. Silver Jet was at the track, ready to meet Eclipse in the Wood Memorial Stakes on the following Saturday. It would be the most important preparatory race of all, for those two top colts of the year before would meet for the first time as three-year-olds. Furthermore, each was on his way to the Derby. Silver Jet had been given only light training since his brilliant February victory in the Flamingo, and he was reported to be in his finest shape. Both he and Eclipse would be carrying the same weight of 126 pounds, and the distance would be a mile and a sixteenth. Something just had to give in that race!

Saturday morning, the day of the Wood Memorial and two weeks before the Derby, Henry had Alec take the filly over a mile at top speed. He clocked her, and
when she was brought back to him his face was void of emotion.

Alec stroked the filly's sweated neck but his eyes studied Henry. There was no sign of satisfaction in Henry's face, yet disappointment wasn't there either. It had seemed to Alec that Black Minx had really moved along during her mile work. But only the watch would given him any conclusive evidence of her speed, and Henry held it closed tight in his big hand.

“Keep walking her,” the trainer directed. But he didn't let them go alone. He walked beside them in silence for a while, then he said, “Alec, don't you think you could do more to make her believe she's running away with you?”

“I'm doing everything I can, Henry.” There was a little resentment in Alec's voice as he added, “I keep moving the reins. I keep calling to her to stop.”

“Maybe if you got even more excited she'd—”

Alec interrupted, his voice sharp. “I
am
excited, Henry. If you think I'm not—”

“No. No, I'm sorry, Alec.” Henry continued walking alongside, then he said, “That last quarter-mile of the Derby is going to be tough. She's got to give more.”

“She'll have to give it herself,” Alec replied, still angry. “There's only so much we can do.”

Nothing more was said. Far up the track was the small mobile starting gate, which Henry had had rolled out from the barn a few days before. As they continued walking toward it, Alec asked, “You're not going to break her from the gate after her work, are you?”

“No, but I want her to stand in the gate to see how she reacts to it. I'll break her from it next week. One or
two breaks should be enough. Too much gate work does more harm than good.”

The gate was at the end of a chute extension leading from the track, and as they neared it, Black Minx became uneasy. Alec felt the quivering of her body and knew that she recognized the gate for what it was. She'd been schooled at the barrier, he knew, or she wouldn't have raced at all as a two-year-old. He stroked her neck in an attempt to quiet her but she swerved across the track. He straightened her out, and Henry took hold of her bridle.

She went forward but her flicking ears gave evidence of her nervousness. And when Henry had her behind the gate she began to fight him. She reared, came down and stood still, refusing to enter the gate stall.

Alec talked to her, trying to calm her down, but that was all he could do except, of course, to stick with her. The rest was up to Henry, the same as it would be in a race, where there would be an assistant starter to help if she began acting up at the gate.

Henry's face was grim but his hands and voice were quiet, gentle but firm. This was not his first experience with a horse who, for some reason, had an aversion to the gate. He went slowly, disclosing the patience that had enabled him to put so many colts under his spell.