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Show I GONE ARE THE DAVS By Oney Fred Sweet I u Juanita 99 Came On, Her H oofs Never Seeming to Touch the Track. 4TIFFEREXT folks Clve different I reasons why they don't hold county J fairs In Prairie Junction any more," reflected the town marshal as we sat together to-gether out in front of the Pioneer house. " But I know why the event that used to be held late every summer here began to be a tame proposition and then died out altogether. alto-gether. The county fair, ao far as thla community com-munity Is concerned, passed away with the horse the running horse. "You go out to the old grounds west of town now and it don't bring any lump in your throat to notice that the 'floral hall' where they displayed the patch quilts and the jellies has been torn down. You don't experience any particular pang in finding th pens whers they kept the prize stock dilapidated. dilap-idated. You can stroll over the barren site where the merry-go-round wheezed and the cream candy vender barked without ay tug at your heartstrings. But when you come to the sagging grandstand, and the Judges' stand with the morning-glory vines twined clear across the door, and the halt mile track all covered with pieplant and foxtail fox-tail and mullein weeds well, your eyes mist and its Auguat again with the band playing and the crowd aweatlng and the babies crying cry-ing and the aun ahlnlng and Jim Higgs' Juanita Jua-nita cornea tearing down the track. Gone are the days. m "Jim Hlggs waan't like most of the other farmers in the county. He didn't seem to hanker for a broad atretch of acres. He Had a passion for raising fast horses instead if raising corn. He'd come up from the nounUln district down south and he had attled in the woods along the creek twenty Bilea west of here There was only him H and his daughter We seldom saw them except ex-cept at county fair time and then they were sure to show up a gaunt, bent, big nosed man and a shy, sunburned girl. And always, al-ways, behind the rickety buggy they drove, Jim led Into town a frisky animal on which he had staked a year of hopea. " These hopes had a way of falling to materialize ma-terialize If Jim had possessed the youth and the weight to have ridden his horses himself, victory with its degree of fame and fortune might have fallen to him, but for years he had been double crossed and deluded de-luded and disappointed. He had become a pathetic figure Invariably, the De Mar boys from up northwest carried off tho running race honors. Stocky, swarthy, bow legged the De Mar boys were, and Jim Higgs had come to hate their tribe. For a generation they had prospered off his false hopes They had kept him poor. It was not so much the loss of the fruits of the year's toll that embittered. Jim suffered because of his pride Every horse that he raised from a colt or bartered for with passing traders seemed to him auch a wonder. "Then there came the year when Jim Higgs not only lost the annual running race but lost his daughter as well. He hunted me up and begged me to help him find her. And we searched all over the fair grounds. We talked with Alec Withers, who always took tickets at the gate of the weather beaten high board fence. I cross questioned the pale cheeked spindle wheel man who had something wrong with one eye that kapt it constantly half closed We watched the band go by on the way to the grandstand, thinking she might be In the crowd following along Bert Tomklns. who had been with a circus one season, was playing the tuba. Garry Walters foreman for the Weekly Sentinel, pounded the drum; Hamp Gilken. the new man at Gray undertaking parlors, was furnishing fur-nishing after beats on the alto. They seemed to bounce up and down with their lnstru- g ments as they jogged over the rough ground in a pretenso at military effect. Gone are the days. She wasn't tagging any of tho band boys " We looked for her at the pump. About the free oasis the masses were fighting for the two shallow tin cups Babies were crying, cry-ing, boys were shoving each other, and there was a splashing around In the muddy water formed by tho flowing water. But Jim Hlggs' girl wasn't among those present "The worldy looking strangers who sold squawkcrs and cream candy full of race track dust and red thirst quenching concoc tlons nono of 'em had seen a girl of her description. "The sun was getting low toward the willow wil-low windbreak on Sharer's farm, and shadows shad-ows wero beginning t6 creep over the grounds, and the men with the dust flavored cream candy were cutting prices in a frenzy to get rid of their stock, when we did find her. She was out on the roadway where th dust was thick from hurrying wheels. She had gotten back towards town as far as the Sol Gamble place where the house Is set far back among the maples There was a man with her "'I'll be back home, pa, as soon as him and I have made the rest of the fairs." she explained ex-plained hurriedly, as she turned around. ' We're going to get married as soon as wo get to town.' " 'Know anything about horses9' J!m Hlggs asked of Ins aspirant eon in-law ' I don't remember seeing you around the stable the last few days." " 1 No, of course he don't, pa,' the girl beamed ' Know who ho is? He's the balloon bal-loon ascension man Weil be back late In the fall.' Jim Higgs hardened. "If you go with this 'know nothing' you don't ome back to my place,' he flamed. If you go with him and ever dare to come back I'll meet you with a shotgun. You know me well enough to know that I'm a man of my word ' "Well, of course, you know how they always al-ways do she went away with the balloon ascension man. And Jim. ha went back home alone, leading, behind the rickety old buggy, the horse that had lost the race " During the year that followed we never saw Jim except nt county fair time. He must have dono his trading somo place closer to home But he never missed coming In to the county 'fair alone now. but always leading lead-ing along a horse that ho patted on the nose and counted on for getting even with the De Mar boys. Think of Jim Hlggs and I think of merry go round music and hot wieners and tho tattered tent that concealed tho two headed calf or the wild boy on exhibition ex-hibition Yet Jim, himself was always to be found over around the stables where the 'swipes' were exercising the blanketed and hobbled steeds of speed He lLved for that one race every year when the running tjses, once started after much delay, flerw tfWn the track like a flock of rabbits. Looked on, lean and gaunt and nervous while his ' Fancy ' or ' Bluebell.' or whatever her nam might be, failed through a poor start or from Jumping the fence or because of poor generalship gen-eralship In the saddle. " Always, he took the failure back to his heart, patted her nose, whispered consolation in her car waited for the next season And the De Mar boys pocketed the money he had bet and swaggered where he might Bee. " And then came the year that Jim confided con-fided to mo that he had a mare that could not lose. Her name was 'Juanita.' He got me to go over to tho stable to look at her. "'I'm sure this time.' he told me so sure that I've staked everything I've got the place and all ' You've been sura before, Jim,' I au-tioncdi " ' But I never had anyone that could ride before,' he explained " ' Are you sure this tlm?' I persisted. ' Are you sure you haven't got someone th De Mar boys have bought off? They've done it enough times before ' "'This fellow never heard of the De Mars,' Jim enthused. ' I questioned him plenty on that. Used to ride at the Hawthorne Haw-thorne track. Got the weight and the experience ex-perience and everything. "Thursday was always the big day, and I had my hands full keeping the women with kids from running back and forth across the race track. Big days wouldn't be big days without their accidents. Alec Withers predicted pre-dicted that the crowd In the grand stand would prove a record breaker You know how hard it is to get a running race started 'clang, clang' of the bell in the Judges' stand, calling "em back, just when you think they're surely ' off ' " It was easy enough to pick ' Juanita ' out of the bunch She was white and she was unusually alert and nervous. She was so nervous, In fact, that about the third time the bunch was called back for a new start by the Judges, she executed some sort of a quick maneuver that threw her Jockey off her back. He lay on tho ground as if he was stunned Maybe he really was hurt, but it's my hunch that he wasn't hurt as bad as he pretended. He'd been responsible for the poor starts, and If anybody'd asked me I would have said that tho De Mar boys were back of hi? fall " Poor old Jim! Ho was out in the middle of the track, turning first to the fellow on the ground and then to the prancing white mare, running risk all the time of being trampled down And the Judges were getting Impatient. And the oldest De Mar boy-standing boy-standing close by. was opining that ' It was too bad. but of course the race had to go on ' And the rest of the horses were getting ready for another start And 'Juanita ' was dancing around frothing and riderless. And then "And then from out of the crowd came kid with a face as black as night. Didn't ask any questions Just climbed on tha white mare's back, grabbed the rein", whirled her around a couple of times, ar.d in a minute the whole bunch was gone " You should have seen old Jim following I them when tho clatter of hoofs had grown faint and they were nearlng the quarter pole! Shut his eyes tight Just once when they reached the turn whero his 'Bluebell' had leaped the fence the year before. But 'Juanita' didn't Jump any fence. She came on like a streak of white, her hoofs never seeming to touch the track. And she eailed past us, a length ahead of them all, Ih the black faced kid, his knees up against f her at ' the weathers.' Jim Hlggs. after all those years, had a winner at last! 'The kid? Well, he'd been worklns all 3ay in one of those Joints you've seen em where you throw baseballs to make tha darkle drop from the rail they're sitting on Into the tank of water below Tha shebang was set up close to the track and the ld had been sitting up high enough where ha d seen everything Said he d hit town, broke, the night before, and had to do something some-thing even if it called for being blacked up. " ' Been ridln' all year every chance I go'-he go'-he told us, giving Juanita a pat on tha nose ' Been rldln' off and on ever since tM day the old man'a parachute failed to op up. Ma said I could come out here but rot , to go near the stables because I might run jjj onto Grandpap Higgs, and ahe aaya Grand-pap Grand-pap Higgs said ' " The sight of Old Jim right then was worth t the day's gate receipts. "'I guess I'm dreaming.' he Interrupted the boy confusedly, ' but If this ain't a dream you tell your ma that I can't drive out hem with you and meet you with a ahotgun tha aame time, can IT' |