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Racetrack Higgins has many names. Racetrack. Race. Racer. Even further back, and used far more sparingly, Anthony, and Tony. To those who don’t know him, Higgins.
He is a man — a boy really — of many names, and one of mystery. The rumors swirl around him like smoke. He sold his mother for a box of cigars. He drowned in the East River, and then played poker against Death and won. He’s a dead man walking. Only some people believe this story. How could someone so obviously alive, so bright and vivid and burning, ever be dead? Race will never tell if it’s true or not, but some winter nights as he huddles by the gasping furnace, chair drawn close to its feeble mouth, one can almost see the river pulse beneath his skin, thin blue veins chilling him from the inside-out.
Racetrack Higgins has many names, and many stories. He is as multifaceted as the city of New York itself, rich in heritage and heralding from places unknown. An immigrant without parents, a newsie without a name, a riddle without an answer. His parents are never spoken about, like many of the other newsies. Some have families, and go home to them each night after a long day of work, but most make the trek back to the lodging house where they sleep in double beds, huddled close together for warmth. The only thing ever said about Race’s parents is the story of him, his mother, and a box of cigars, and even then, there’s only a splash of truth. As for his name, no one knows where it came from. Well, that’s not exactly true. It came from Sheepshead, where he started selling almost immediately after becoming a newsie. There was never an explanation for that either, but somehow, and for whatever reason, he pinpointed the races as his territory. And for some reason, even though it technically belonged to Brooklyn, Brooklyn let him stay. Spot Conlon let him stay. The other newsies, at a loss for any other explanation, assumed that’s how he got his name, because when he came back after his first week at Sheepshead, it was with a new story and a new name. Racetrack Higgins.
His relationship with Spot Conlon was yet another mystery. Many assumed Spot had given him the name, for after that week, the two could often be observed together. Their relationship went from strangers to acquaintances and then friends. And then they were practically inseparable, despite living and working in different boroughs. Despite Spot running the Brooklyn borough singlehandedly, and Race working under Jack as his second-in-command. That was another relationship that sprung up quickly, like a weed from fertile soil. Of course, no one meant anything by the way they talked about it, spreading rumors that raced like wildfire through the lodging house. Still, no one seemed to understand just why Jack, and Spot, and half the other newsies were so taken with the new kid. Even those who were friends with him could hardly wrap their heads around just why they liked him so much. There was just something about his smile, his easy laugh, his personality. He had charisma, and in no small supply.
In short, Racetrack Higgins was a mystery. He came from nowhere, with no family to speak of, no name that he stuck to, no reason for being. And yet he belonged. Through all the mystery, he formed the final piece of a family with the rest of the Manhattan newsies. They learned to forget their misgivings about him, to not ask questions that had no answers, to accept what they were given and no more. They took Race as he came, and with that, he was content.