Garrison, a small hell let loose, had risen from the turf for the third time!  His face was a smear of blood, venom, and all the bandit passions.  Waterbury, the gentleman in him soaked by the taint of a foisted dishonor and his fighting blood roused, waited with clenched fists.  As Garrison hopped in for the fourth time, the older man feinted quickly, and then swung right and left savagely.

The blows were caught on the thick arm of a tan box-coat.  A big hand was placed over Waterbury’s face and he was given a shove backward.  He staggered for a ridiculously long time, and then, after an unnecessary waste of minutes, sat down.  The tan overcoat stood over him.  It was Jimmy Drake, and the chameleonlike crowd applauded.

Jimmy was a popular book-maker with educated fists.  The crowd surged closer.  It looked as if the fight might change from bantam-heavy to heavy-heavy.  And the odds were on Drake.

“If yeh want to fight kids,” said the book-maker, in his slow, drawling voice, “wait till they’re grown up.  Mebbe then yeh’ll change your mind.”

Waterbury was on his feet now.  He let loose some vitriolic verbiage, using Drake as the objective-point.  He told him to mind his own business, or that he would make it hot for him.  He told him that Garrison was a thief and cur; and that he would have no book-maker and tout—­

“Hold on,” said Drake.  “You’re gettin’ too flossy right there.  When you call me a tout you’re exceedin’ the speed limit.”  He had an uncomfortable steady blue eye and a face like a snow-shovel.  “I stepped in here not to argue morals, but to see fair play.  If Billy Garrison’s done dirt—­and I admit it looks close like it—­I’ll bet that your stable, either trainer or owner, shared the mud-pie, all right—­”

“I’ve stood enough of those slurs,” cried Waterbury, in a frenzy.  “You lie.”

Instantly Drake’s large face stiffened like cement, and his overcoat was on the ground.

“That’s a fighting word where I come from,” he said grimly.

But before Drake could square the insult a crowd of Waterbury’s friends swirled up in an auto, and half a dozen peacemakers, mutual acquaintances, together with two somnambulistic policemen, managed to preserve the remains of the badly shattered peace.  Drake sullenly resumed his coat, and Waterbury was driven off, leaving a back draft of impolite adjectives and vague threats against everybody.  The crowd drifted away.  It was a fitting finish for the scotched Carter Handicap.

Meanwhile, Garrison, taking advantage of the switching of the lime-light from himself to Drake, had dodged to oblivion in the crowd.