Evan Hunter - A Horse’s Head

The electronically controlled figures changed as he watched.

1:39.

He had less than a half-hour to raise a stake.

He was delighted to see Lester Bohm in the crowd of gamblers walking up from the reserved grandstand seats, and more delighted when he realized Lester wasn’t tearing up any tickets but was instead holding in his hand two ten-dollar Win tickets on the 5-horse. The tote board had already posted the official results, and the price quoted on the 5-horse was $17.20, which meant that a bettor would get that amount of money for every two dollars he had invested. Lester’s ten-dollar Win tickets were each worth $86.00, so the possibility existed that perhaps he might be amenable to a small touch. Mullaney approached him confidently.

“Hello there, Lester,” he said.

“Oh, it’s you,” Lester replied.

He was a short red-faced man wearing a colorful plaid sports jacket and a Professor Higgins hat. He always carried a cane, and it was rumored here and there that the cane served as the sheath for a rapier, and that Lester had once used it on a Chicago bookie who had welshed out on him. Mullaney could not believe this, however, because Lester seemed to him to be a very pleasant and personable fellow who would never dream of cutting up anybody, especially when he was holding two ten-dollar Win tickets in his fist. Lester had been married and divorced five times and was now working on his sixth wife — “My own personal Russian roulette,” he was fond of saying with a grin. He was an excellent horseplayer in that he frequently won, but he also lost sometimes, though not often. He was a good man to meet at a track when you were in need of cash, or at least Mullaney hoped so; he had never asked Lester for a loan in his life.

“You’re off to a flying start, I see,” Mullaney said.

“Yes, I am,” Lester said. “What is it, Mullaney?”

“What is what?”

“What do you want from my life?”

Lester’s attitude puzzled him at first, until he remembered with something of a shock that Lester’s opening words had been “Oh, it’s you,” with the stress on the word “ you,” as if something unspeakably vile had crawled out onto a white picnic cloth. Mullaney had never thought of himself as something unspeakably vile, and could not think of himself that way now. He was simply a gambler down on his luck, a situation that could be completely reversed this afternoon with a bet on Jawbone. But Lester’s attitude brought him up short, physically, so that he had to run to catch up to him, and then felt somewhat foolish chasing this dumpy roly-poly little man toward the Cash windows. He almost gave up the chase then and there, almost said The hell with it, there’s nothing for me here, he’s not in a moneylending mood. But something else within him forced him to continue his pursuit, the knowledge that he was not a vile and horrid insect that had crawled out into the sunshine, and the desperate need to convince Lester that he was not (although he could not imagine why Lester thought he was). I’m a very nice person, Mullaney said to himself. I’m just a little down on my luck, for Christ’s sake, I just need a few bucks to bet on a horse that’s a cinch to win. Don’t, for Christ’s sake, treat me like a loser.

I’m not a loser.

“Listen,” he said, and Lester turned to him, lifted his face to Mullaney’s and pierced him with a cold, blue-eyed, frigid stare. “Listen, I’m not a loser,” Mullaney said, thinking he should not be telling this to a little shit of a man who had stabbed a Chicago bookie and made a mess of his life with his goddamn personal Russian roulette, why am I telling this to him?

“So you’re not a loser,” Lester said. He stood leaning on the cane, his round face turned up and blandly impassive. “So?” he said. “So what?”

“I have a winner in the second race,” Mullaney said.

“Everybody has a winner in the second race.”

“This is a sure thing.”

“Everything is a sure thing,” Lester said.

“Lester, I’ve never asked you for a nickel in my life,” Mullaney said, “have I?”

“That’s true, you never have.”

“I need five hundred. This is a sure thing, Lester.”

“Oh, all you need is five hundred, huh?”

“Lester, listen to me. I know I’ve been down on my luck lately, but believe me this horse is a winner, I know it is, and I think you know I’m good for the money.”

“Oh yes, sure,” Lester said.

“I’ve been down on my luck, that’s all. You’re a gambler, Lester, take the gamble.”

“Five hundred, huh?”

“Yes, five hundred. I’ll be paying you back in less than a half-hour, I’ll pay you the five hundred and another five hundred besides. You can’t ask for better than that, Lester.”

“No, I certainly can’t ask for better than that.”

“Will you?”

“Will I what?”

“Lend me five hundred. I hate to ask, but...”

“Yes, I know, you’ve just been down on your luck, that’s all.”

“That’s right, Lester. Lester, it hurts me to have to ask you for a loan, I mean it. Believe me.”

“Yes, it must certainly hurt you to have to ask loans from all the people you’ve asked loans from in this past year, mustn’t it?”

“It does.”

“Handouts is what you mean, not loans. To my knowledge, Mullaney, you’ve never paid back a cent you borrowed, that’s a very bad failing. I know a man in Chicago got stabbed for not paying the money he owed to someone.”

“Lester, I’ll pay back everybody I ever borrowed from, I’ve always intended to pay back.”

“But never have.”

“But will. Lester, what kind of person do you think I am?”

“Well now, I don’t know, Mullaney. Suppose you tell me what kind of person you are.”

“I’m...” He hesitated. He felt extremely foolish. “I’m a nice person,” he said.

“Yes, I’m sure.”

“Lester, lend me the five hundred.”

“I’ll lend you two dollars,” Lester said, and reached for his wallet.

“Lester, look, don’t kid around. Two dollars isn’t going to...”

“All right, I’ll make it four dollars. You can buy yourself two Win tickets, how’s that?”

“If you can’t go the full five hundred, make it four hundred, okay? I’ll be paying you back right after the second race, four hundred plus another four hundred besides, as commission on your investment.”

“My investment, huh? I’ll give you ten bucks, how’s that? You can buy yourself a real big ticket, Mullaney.”

“Three hundred, okay? With the same...”

“Twenty bucks,” Lester said, “and that’s my limit. I won’t go a cent higher.”

Mullaney stared at him silently for a moment, and then shook his head.

“No, Lester,” he said. “Never mind. Forget it.”

“Okay, we’ll forget it,” Lester said.

“I still have my pride,” Mullaney said, feeling more foolish than ever. “Don’t forget that, Lester. I still have my pride.”

“Yes, I’m sure,” Lester said, and walked away toward the Cash windows.

“I still have my pride,” Mullaney whispered after him.

He felt very small and very foolish. Oh, not because... well... no, no, not only because Lester had treated him like a beggar, had turned an honest request for a loan into a... a plea for a... a coffee-and-cake handout, like some wino coming up with an outstretched palm on the Bowery. God damn you, Mullaney thought, I once used to sell encyclopedias for a living, don’t you know that? I never once stabbed a person in my life, I never once carried a sword in a cane, I’ve only been married once , you bastard, and I didn’t divorce her because I stopped loving her, I divorced her only because I had to take the gamble, I had to get out here and live, don’t you treat me like a bum, Lester, don’t you ever dare treat me like a bum. But not only because of that, no, not only because Lester had swatted him flat on the picnic cloth causing him to ooze whatever dignity he had possessed until that moment — dignity, yes, and pride, yes — but also because he had come to Lester with a winner, had come with an absolute guaranteed winner, had come and said Look, I need five hundred, do you ask for five hundred on a loser? I’m going for the biggest prize, he thought, I came to you and asked for five hundred because this is my life on the line here, if I don’t make it today, if I... if I don’t make it, I’ll... I don’t know what I’ll do. Can’t you tell the difference between a simple loan when a guy only wants to win a few bucks on a horse, and a loan that is intended for a... a life?