Horse Tradin' by Ben K. Green

deposit it if I want to—and I can deposit it in your bank.”
    He brightened up considerably. He thought I had borrowed money to buy those mules. Well, I have borrowed money to buy thousands of mules, but it so happened that I owned these two carloads. And when I went for a coke the next day, Mamma Belle was a lot nicer.
    That weekend there was fall fair and Old Settlers reunion coming up. They were going to have it down on the creek, close to town in a big grove of pecan trees, and the town was busy getting ready. They were going to have a big program—speakin’s, dinner on the grounds, games, something for everybody—come one, come all. They were going to have some horseback riding, horse showing, and some harness racing. I had been hearing about this for several days.
    About two days before the reunion, Baby Belle asked me if I would enter a horse in the horse show. I had traded for some nice saddle mares and had been riding one of them around with the rest of the young set, so I told her I would enter the five-gaited class. That morning I went by horseback to get Baby Belle. She rode a beautiful chesnut mare—stocking-legged, flax mane and tail—that was a real jewel and a real saddle mare. Baby Belle looked good on her, and they moved off together like they should. We spent all day at the Old Settlers reunion.
    Visitors had come from far and near, but I was kindadifferent. I had on boots and a big hat, and of course I was by that time telling them a lot about the Lone Star state. It seemed like everybody was getting a big kick out of my conversation. They had a big feed on the grounds, and I bragged on their cooking. I bragged on their cake and their pies and their chicken. Everything they shoved at me, I would try a batch of it—and directly here would come another nice old Southern lady and say: “Mistah Green, I would just like for you to taste a bite of this …” And I just kept a-tasting, and I bragged on all of it. I guess I ate more cooking from strictly secret Southern recipes at that Old Settlers reunion than you ever heard of at any other gathering in the world.
    The political speakings were held in the morning and didn’t anybody pay much mind to them. They had a band that played all day, and people sat around on the ground and listened to the music. They had different kinds of contests and games, but the big feature of the day was the afternoon harness racing. There was a half-mile track, and they had some fast trotting horses and some fast pacing horses. Most of them were local horses with local people driving them, so everybody was interested in every race.
    We sat on our horses beside the track—a bunch of us young people—and watched the drivers score their horses, turn them around to their little two-wheeled driving sulkies, and bring them up to the starting line. When all of them were in place, the judge would fire his little gun and the race would be on. Of course if the horses weren’t lined up just right, the judge would call them back to rescore; then the horses would get hot and lathering and excited, and the drivers’ tempers would flare.
    The fifth race was for drivers over seventy years old. Colonel Bob was close to eighty, but when the six horses came up to score this race, there was Colonel Bob driving the Rebel Commander. The horse never fretted nor frothed nor got mad; he scored and came back with the most perfect manners.
    â€œMamma and I are scared stiff,” said Baby Belle. “We ah so afraid the Rebel Commandah is going to hurt Daddy Bob yet.”
    I said: “Well, I don’t see how. That horse seems perfectly mannered.”
    â€œHe has been a race hoss,” she said. “Daddy Bob bought him off the track, mainly to have him for this Old Settlers reunion and to win this race.”
    They had to rescore several times, but directly the judge shot the pistol and the race was on. When they passed the