The Dog Boy, a 39-year-old man child, is being forced from his home. He has nowhere to go. Charon's Crossing, a failed racehorse, will be put down unless she wins her next race, but she has lost each one of her previous 64 races. The worst is certai...
The voice as flat as Kansas never betrayed any expectations of fame on that day or on any other day. The man behind the voice was Thomas Woodhouse. Like every other day, Tom followed his usual script without wandering any distance away from the words that were handed to him that morning. Instinctively, he looked up at the countdown clock and saw that it read 0 Minutes to Post. Then in his usual flat voice, he called out, "The betting windows are now closed. All bets should be placed. All bets are final."
A long pause followed where the crackle of the public address system was all you heard. Finally, the race caller's voice came over the system. This second voice didn't sound like Kansas or Iowa or any of those other flat (flat) states hugging the Mississippi River. It was a lively voice. Almost happy. Though almost no one at the track realized it, the voice belonged to Tom Woodhouse. Tom was also the electronic voice calling out floors in the elevator and the voice reminding drivers to take their keys after parking their cars. Some days, Tom felt like he could run the track entirely on his own if he only knew how to ride a horse.
When the horses were all in the gate for the first race, Tom cleared his throat, so he'd be ready to speak in a blur for the next minute and a half. This was his favorite part of any day. What followed was 90 seconds of salad language to anyone unfamiliar with racing. The call included horses' names, split times, race positions, and a clear sense of who was moving up, back, out from the rail, or splitting horses to break free from the pack. It is a marvel that anyone can call a race with such clarity, but it happens nine times a day on every day of the meet.
In the first race that Monday, seven horses broke cleanly and maneuvered for position along the rail. They were bunched up in the first furlong but gradually separated into the natural divisions of those with early speed and those who hoped to pass tired horses and come from behind. Perky Kitten took the early lead, but she began to fade at the top of the stretch. Lambent, the betting favorite, ran along the rail from start to finish and won by three lengths covering the seven furlongs in just under 90 seconds.
The time for the race was unspectacular. It was several seconds off the record. Nothing unusual. Nothing strange. In fact, the order of finish was almost exactly in line with the betting odds. When it was official, the smart mice and the non-so-smart mice chattered in disjointed unison like waves crashing on a beach.
"Looks like the rail is alive today. I'm betting all favorites. All chalk. No big money, but everybody wins something."
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