C. Morgan - The Sport of Kings

That morning, Henry had called over to Claiborne and spoken with a manager. He said, “My mare is due to be covered on Thursday.”

“Yes, sir, we’ve got Hellcat on the books, and Big Red’s in good form.”

“I’d like to be there.”

“You’re welcome to bring her up, but—”

“I’d like to be in the shed.”

There was a polite and cursory silence on the line. “Mr. Forge, all due respect, we don’t permit owners in the breeding shed for safety reasons. I’m sure you understand. But everything will be videotaped, and you’ve got her insured to the hilt. You know we’ve got your interests in mind at all times.”

“Regardless, I’d like to be there, and I’d like to bring my daughter, who’s—”

“You— What? Your daughter?”

“My daughter is involved in our operation and I’d like—”

The curt laugh severed his sentence, followed by two words: “Mr. Forge.”

“If I can speak with Mr. Hancock, then—”

“Now, Mr. Forge.” The voice was louder, parental. “If you want to chat with Mr. Hancock, that’s fine. But I’m telling you right now you’ll get a no that’ll break the sound barrier. So let’s just get your mare up here to get her covered, and with a little luck and godspeed, we can meet your daughter at the Derby in three years’ time.”

Henrietta had never seen her father so angry, not even when her mother left. He was stiff-necked with fury when he steered her, one hard hand on her shoulder, out the kitchen door and toward their small black breeding shed, erected a quarter mile back from the broodmare barn.

“Where are we going?” she asked, craning her neck to see him, hot coffee splashing out onto the tender flesh of her hand.

His only answer was, “Those assholes have no right — no right — to tell me how to handle my own property, or what I should allow my daughter to see.”

“Who? Who did that?”

By way of answer, he drew up short and pulled her round, leaning abruptly at the waist so they stood eye to inherited eye. He tipped her chin up with one finger. “Breeding is the heart of this business and you are the heart of my operation,” he said. “You need to know how this business is run. I have no tolerance for these idiots and their ideas of what’s age-appropriate. I reject their shame — I reject it unequivocally. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” she said, drawing back slightly.

“Henrietta, listen to me,” he said. “The sex act is an amoral action of the body designed by nature to perpetuate the species. It should be harnessed and controlled for that purpose, not because it’s shameful. It’s not morally different from shitting or eating. What’s perverse is our attachment of religious mores to a simple, biological act! Be very careful, Henrietta,” he said, suddenly straightening. “The world is trying to turn you into a stupid, conventional woman. Don’t let it happen.”

“Okay,” she said, bewildered, because she didn’t recognize this strange and lofty tone, John Henry having died a long time before she was born. But she did as she was told; in an instant she rejected this thing, this shame she knew nothing about. She wouldn’t become that woman. But a new thought occurred to her: “Daddy, why don’t you ever have a girlfriend?”

The question took Henry by surprise. He looked around him suddenly at the brisk morning, considering the question. “Most men throw away their sperm on inferior women. An orgasm is a cheap thing; you can get one for free.” He tapped a finger to his temple. “But a wise man harnesses his energies and expels them in a manner designed to improve his line, not dilute it. That’s how I got you. Your mother, for all her faults, was a damn fine piece of property.”

Henrietta stared at the ground in consternation. “Can I ask you something else?”

“Of course.”

“Well, I was reading about linebreeding, and I read that it can produce weak horses, that incest—”

Henry waved his hand, dismissing the thought. “They overstate the case. Yes, you sometimes produce a genetically weak animal from inbreeding and linebreeding, but there’s no surer way to hit the jackpot. Breeding a line back to its own line can produce the perfect horse — and that’s worth every risk.”

“Okay,” she said softly, her face flushed. “Evolution by artificial selection. Darwin on pigeons.” But in her deepest mind, she asked: Who are you?

In the barn, three grooms were waiting beside a large, thick-legged mare with an ass as broad as the stern of a boat and a tail that swished gently. The men barely looked up as Henry strode into the barn, but all reared back in a collective startle when they noticed Henrietta following behind, her ponytail swinging. One blond man named Jonathan, who held the shank of the mare, actually hauled himself up on the withers of the placid creature to gaze wide-eyed at Henrietta. He said, “What the hell?”

“Good morning, gentlemen.” Henry’s voice was brisk.

“What’s she doing here?” Jonathan demanded, pointing accusingly with one hand and coming around the horse now with the shank still gripped in his fist. The brown-eyed mare turned too, peering through the tangled mass of her cob as if to see to whom he referred.

“My daughter will be joining us this morning.”

One of the other grooms spoke up now — Henrietta knew him only by the name Sandy — ducking his curly red head in a tentative, preemptive apology, saying, “Yeah, I don’t know, Mr. Forge—”

“That’s dangerous!” Jonathan barked, and passed off the shank to the third, silent man standing nearby, who stared resolutely at the ground as the tension in the room rose. Jonathan came at Henry with a wash of wondering disbelief on his face. His gaze slashed briefly through Henrietta, who snugged up instinctively against her father’s side. But that thing — that shame — she rejected. Her chin jutted out.

“This is no place for a girl!” Jonathan said with open disgust. “It’s barely a place for a grown man! Jesus Christ, you can’t ask us to do this thing in front of a kid.” He stood there with his hands on his hips, staring up at her father in a way Henrietta had never seen another man do. For an instant, she couldn’t breathe, afraid the confrontation would come to blows, or, worse, that her father would step down.

But Henry stepped forward instead, his voice steely, low, and final: “If any man is uncomfortable with the situation, he can leave my employ. Now.”

There was a heavy, hateful silence in the barn. Henrietta sensed rather than saw the other two men look at each other for a very, very long moment, speaking to each other with their eyes in the manner of the long married. Jonathan continued to stare at Henry with such force that Henrietta thought she could detect the spidery red veins brightening on the sclera of his eye. Then he took a single step backward without once breaking his stare, peeled off his old gloves, rough as gunny, and tossed them onto the wood chips at Henry’s feet. Then he snatched the Forge Run cap off his head and flung it at the barn wall behind Henry’s head with such ferocity that her father flinched, and Henrietta stepped aside, her heart banging. Then he stalked out of the barn in the direction of the equipment shed without another word.

“Jonathan!” Sandy called after him, “Jonathan! Hey!” and the mare tried to turn again.

But Jonathan was gone, and as Henry walked in their direction, Sandy shook his head and said in a voice barely audible, “Oh, man.” The other groom just continued to stare at the floor, mute as the mare.

“Forget about him,” Henry said. “I expect you boys to do your job and that’s all. If I want your opinion, I’ll ask for it.” Sandy nodded twice, three times, but the other groom said nothing at all and just stood there with his lower lip sucked in and his brow wrinkled.