“Oh, Kay, little girl, that horse is a peach.  I think I’d give a couple of toes for the fun of getting my old trainer Dan Leighton out here, training this animal quietly up here in the valley where nobody could get a line on his performances, then shipping him east to Saratoga, where I’d put a good boy on him, stick him in rotten company and win enough races to qualify him for the biggest event of the year.  And then!  Oh, how I would steal the Derby from John H. Hatfield and his four-year-old wonder.  I owe Hatfield a poke anyhow.  We went raiding together once and the old sinner double-crossed me.”

“Who is John H. Hatfield?” Don Mike queried mildly.

“Oh, he’s an aged sinner down in Wall Street.  He works hard to make the New Yorkers support his racing stables.  Poor old John!  All he has is some money and one rather good horse.”

“And you wish to police this Hatfield person, sir?”

“If I could, I’d die happy, Farrel.”

“Very well.  Send for your old trainer, train Panchito, try him out a bit at Tia Juana, Lower California, at the meeting this winter, ship him to Saratoga and make Senor Hatfield curse the day he was born.  I have a very excellent reason for not selling Panchito to you, but never let it be said that I was such a poor sport I refused to loan him to you—­provided, of course, Kay agrees to this course.  He’s her mount, you know, while she’s on El Palomar.”

Parker turned to his daughter.  “Kay,” he demanded, “do you love your poor old father?”

“Yes, I do, pa, but you can’t have Panchito until you do something for me.”

“Up jumped the devil!  What do you want?”

“If you accept a favor from Miguel Farrel you ought to be sport enough to grant him one.  If you ever expect to see Panchito in your racing colors out in front at the American Derby, Miguel must have a renewal of his mortgage.”

“Oh, the devil take that mortgage.  You and your mother never give me a moment’s peace about it.  You make me feel like a criminal; it’s getting so I’ll have to sit around playing mumbley-peg in order to get a thrill in my old age.  You win, Kay.  Farrel, I will grant you a renewal of the mortgage.  I’m weary of being a Shylock.”

“Thanks ever so much.  I do not desire it, Mr. Parker.  One of these bright days when I get around to it, and provided luck breaks my way, I’ll take up that mortgage before the redemption period expires.  I have resolved to live my life free from the shadow of an accursed mortgage.  Let me see, now.  We were talking about horse-racing, were we not?”

“Miguel Farrel, you’d anger a sheep,” Parker cried wrathfully, and strode away toward his automobile waiting in the infield.  Kay and Don Mike watched him drive straight across the valley to the road and turn in the direction of El Toro.

“Wilder than a March hare,” Don Mike commented.

“Not at all,” Kay assured him.  “He’s merely risking his life in his haste to reach El Toro and telegraph Dan Leighton to report immediately.”