The Big Race

When his horse, a favorite, loses in a big handicap, owner John Hamilton suspects that his son Bob, a gambler who bet and won on a long shot, and his trainer, Skipper O'Neal, who has just bought a race horse, doped his horse. Patricia, Bob's fiancée and Hamilton's ward, breaks off their engagement, because he had promised to stop gambling, and vows not to see him until he proves that he has given up betting. Pat and her friend Deborah, an author gathering information for a book, go with Hamilton by train to the West coast for the racing season there. Riley, one of Hamilton's employees, accuses another employee, Bill Figg, of drugging the horse and of spreading rumors that Skipper bet on the long shot winner. Figg then tells Riley that Hamilton said he should leave the train, and Riley departs at the next stop. Bob wants to prove to his father that Skipper was on the level and also hopes to beat him in a big race. He and Skipper take their horse, named "I Can't Tell," to the coast, where they locate a stable. However, they don't have enough money for rent or the entrance fee, and the owner only gives them until the next day to pay the rent. Skipper sweet-talks Jenney Hemingway, the widowed owner of a lunch room, into extending credit to him. Figg overhears this and then tells other stable men to credit their meals to Skipper's account. Pat, who has changed her mind about Bob, learns from him that he gave Skipper the money to buy his horse and they reconcile. Skipper convinces Ezra, the black, stuttering, stableboy, to become a partner for twenty dollars, and with the money, goes to pay Jenney, but she reveals that the bill for the other men is much higher. After Bob, troubled that he has not made good, avoids Pat, Deborah advises her that it is alright to pursue him. Pat overhears Skipper say that they are broke and need money for the entrance fee, and arranges for Mrs. Hemingway to offer money that she will secretly put up, but Skipper refuses to take it. Pat then asks Riley, whom Hamilton retired after he learned of Figg's subterfuge, to offer to gamble money for Bob. He then returns with money that he says he won, but which is really Pat's. After Ferguson, an investigator working for Hamilton, finds the drug that Figg used on his horse, they plan to trap Figg into attempting to drug the horse before the next big race. Skipper learns that Mrs. Hemingway's lunch room is mortgaged to Figg and that she has agreed to marry him if she loses her bet on Hamilton's horse, the favorite in the race. At the track just before the race, Hamilton sees Figg drop the contents of a vial into a pail of water for the horse. After Mrs. Hemingway bets money on "I Can't Tell" and Bob bets his watch, the horse comes in second. Skipper and Bob are upset that the jockey of Hamilton's horse, who won, used his bat on "I Can't Tell," but they have no pull to raise an objection. Hamilton, then apologizes and speaks to the judge, and "I Can't Tell" is declared the winner. Skipper punches Figg, and later on the return train, Skipper and Mrs. Hemingway kiss and plan to marry, as do Bob and Pat.