by Dick Francis
Twice over Becher’s, Jerry thought, hopelessly; the Canal Tarn, the Chair, how in God’s name am I going to face it?
While Jerry sweated, Chief Superintendent Crispin, head of the local police, breathlessly considered an item of information just passed into his hands. He needed, he decided, to go to the very top man on the racecourse, if the most satisfactory results were to be achieved.
The top man on any racecourse, the Senior Steward of the Jockey Club, was lunching a party of eminent overseas visitors in a private dining-room when Chief Superintendent Crispin interrupted the roast saddle of lamb.
‘I want to speak to you urgently, sir,’ the policeman said, bending down to the Turf’s top ear.
Sir William Westerland rested his bland gaze briefly on the amount of brass on the navy-blue uniform.
‘You’re in charge here?’
‘Yes, sir. Can we talk privately?’
‘I suppose so, if it’s important.’
Sir William rose, glanced regretfully at his half-eaten lunch, and led the policeman to the outdoor section of his private box high in the grandstand. The two men stood hunched in the chilly air, and spoke against the background noise of the swelling crowd and the shouts of the bookmakers offering odds on the approaching first race.
Crispin said, ‘It’s about the Birmingham bank robbery, sir.’
‘But that happened more than a year ago,’ Westerland protested.
‘Some of the stolen notes have turned up here, today, on the racecourse.’
Westerland frowned, not needing to be told details. The blasting open of the supposedly impregnable vault, the theft of more than three and a half million, the violent getaway of the thieves, all had been given wider coverage than the death of Nelson.
Four men and a small boy had been killed by the explosion outwards of the bank wall, and two housewives and two young policemen had been gunned down later. The thieves had arrived in a fire engine. Before the crashing echoes died, they had dived into the ruins to carry out the vault’s contents for ‘safe-keeping’ and driven clear away with the loot. They were suspected only at the very last moment by a puzzled constable, whose order to halt had been answered by a spray of machine-gun bullets. Only one of the gang had been recognised, caught, tried and sentenced to thirty years; and of that he had served precisely thirty days before making a spectacular escape. Recapturing him, and catching his confederates, was a number one police priority.
‘It’s the first lead we’ve had for months,’ Crispin said earnestly. ‘If we can catch whoever came here with the hot money…’
Westerland looked down at the scurrying thousands.
‘Pretty hopeless, I’d have thought,’ he said.
‘No, sir.’ Crispin shook his neat greying head. ‘A sharp-eyed checker in the Tote spotted one of the notes, and now they’ve found nine more. One of the sellers remembers selling a ticket for a hundred early on to a man who paid in notes which felt new, although they had been roughly creased and wrinkled.’
‘But even so –’
‘She remembers what he looks like, and says he backed only one horse to win, which is unusual on Grand National day.’
‘Which horse?’
‘Haunted House, sir. And so, sir, if Haunted House wins, our fellow will bring his ticket with its single big bet to the pay-out, and we will have him.’
‘But,’ Westerland objected, ‘what if Haunted House doesn’t win?’
Crispin gazed at him steadily. ‘We want you to arrange that Haunted House does win. We want you to fix the Grand National.’
Down in Tattersall’s enclosure, Austin Dartmouth Glenn passed two hot bank notes to a bookmaker who stuffed them busily into his satchel without looking and issued a ticket to win on Spotted Tulip at eight to one in the first. In the noise, haste and flurry of the last five minutes before the first race, Austin elbowed his way up the stands to find the best view of his money on the hoof, only to see it finish lame and last. Austin tore up his ticket in disgust and threw the pieces to the wind.
In the changing-room, Jerry Springwood reluctantly climbed into his thin white breeches and fumbled with the buttons on his shiny red-and-white striped colours. His mind was filling like a well with panic, the terrible desire to cut and run growing deeper and deadlier with every passing minute. He had difficulty in concentrating and virtually did not hear when anyone spoke to him. His hands trembled. He felt cold. There was another hour to live through before he would have to force himself out to the parade ring, onto the horse, down to the start and right round those demanding four and a half miles with their thirty huge fences.
I can’t do it, he thought numbly. I can’t face it. Where can I hide?
The four stewards in charge of the meeting sat gloomily round their large table, reacting with varying degrees of incredulity and uneasiness to the urgings of Chief Superintendent Crispin.
‘There’s no precedent,’ said one.
‘It’s out of the question. There isn’t time,’ said another.
A third said, ‘You’d never get the trainers to agree.’
‘And what about the owners?’ asked a fourth.
Crispin held racing in as little esteem as crooked politicians and considered that catching the Birmingham mob was of far greater social importance than any horse finishing first. His inner outrage at the obstructive reaction of the stewards seeped unmistakably into his voice.
‘The Birmingham robbers murdered nine people,’ he said forcefully. ‘Everyone has a public duty to help the police catch them.’
Surely not to the extent of ruining the Grand National, insisted the stewards.
‘I understand,’ Crispin said, ‘that in steeplechasing in general, few stud values are involved, and in this year’s National the horses are all geldings. It is not as if we were asking you to spoil the Stud Book by fixing the Derby.’
‘All the same, it would be unfair on the betting public,’ said the stewards.
‘The people who died were part of the betting public. The next people to die, in the next violent bank raid, will also be the betting public’
Sir William Westerland listened to the arguments with his bland expression unimpaired. He had gone far in life by not declaring his views before everyone else had bared their breasts, their opinions and their weaknesses. His mild subsequent observations had a way of being received as revealed truth, when they were basically only unemotional common sense. He watched Crispin and his fellow stewards heat up into emphasis and hubbub, and begin to slide towards prejudice and hostility. He sighed internally, looked at his watch and noisily cleared his throat.
‘Gentlemen,’ he said calmly and distinctly, ‘before we reach a decision, I think we should consider the following points. First, possibility. Second, secrecy. Third, consequences.’
Stewards and policeman looked at him with united relief.
‘Jump jockeys,’ Westerland said, ‘are individuals. Who do you think is going to persuade them to fix the race?’
No answer.
‘Who can say that Haunted House will not fall?’
No answer.
‘How long do you suppose it would be before someone told the press? Do we want the uproar which would follow?’
No answer, but a great shaking of stewardly heads.
‘But if we refuse Chief Superintendent Crispin’s request, how would we feel if another bank were blown apart and more innocent people killed, knowing we took no action to prevent it?’
The meeting looked at him in silence, awaiting his lead.
Jerry Springwood’s head felt like a balloon floating somewhere above his uncoordinated body. The call of ‘Jockeys out, please’ had found him still unable to think of a way of escape. Too many people knew him. How could I run? he thought. How can I scramble to the gate and find a taxi when everyone knows I should be walking out to ride Haunted House? Can I faint? he thought. Can I say I’m ill? He found himself going out with the others, his leaden legs trudging automatically while
his spirit wilted. He stood in the parade ring with his mouth dry and his eyes feeling like gritty holes in his skull, not hearing the nervously henrty pre-race chit-chat of owner and trainer. I can’t, he thought. I can’t.
The Senior Steward of the Jockey Club, Sir William Westerland, walked up to him as he stood rigidly in his hopeless hell.
‘A word in your ear, Jerry,’ he said.
Jerry Springwood looked at him blankly, with eyes like smooth grey pebbles. Westerland, who had seen that look on other faces and knew what it foreboded, suffered severe feelings of misgiving. In spite of Chief Superintendent Crispin’s opposition, he had secured the stewards’ wholehearted agreement. The National could not be fixed – even to catch murderers. He came to the conclusion that both practically and morally, it was impossible. The police would just have to keep a sharper check on future meetings, and one day soon, perhaps, they would catch their fish as he swam again to the Tote.
All the same, Westerland had seen no harm in wishing Jerry Springwood success, but he perceived now that Crispin had no chance of catching his man today. No jockey in this state of frozen fear could win the National. The backers of Haunted House would be fortunate if their fancy lasted half a mile before he pulled up or ran out or refused to jump because of the stranglehold on his reins.
‘Good luck,’ said Westerland lamely, with regret.
Jerry made no answer, even ordinary politeness being beyond him.
Up on his vantage point in the stands, Austin Glenn watched the long line of runners walk down the course. Ten minutes to race time, with half the bookies suffering from sore throats and the massed crowds buzzing with rising excitement. Austin, who had lost his money on Spotted Tulip in the first, and a good deal more to bookmakers on the second, was biting his knuckles over Haunted House.
Jerry Springwood sat like a sack in the saddle, shoulders hunched. The horse, receptive to his rider’s mood, plodded along in confusion, not able to sort out whether or not he should respond to the crowd instead. To Austin and many others, horse and rider looked like a grade one losing combination. William Westerland shook his head ruefully and Crispin wondered irritably why that one horse, out of all of them, looked half asleep.
Jerry Springwood got himself lined up for the start by blotting out every thought. The well of panic was full and trying to flood over. Jerry, white and clammily sweating, knew that in a few more minutes he would have to dismount and run. Have to.
When the starter let them go, Haunted House was standing flat-footed. Getting no signal from the saddle, he started hesitantly after the departing field. The horse knew his job – he was there to run and jump and get his head in front of the rest. But he was feeling rudderless, without the help and direction he was used to. His jockey stayed on board by instinct, the long years of skill coming to his aid, the schooled muscles acting in a pattern that needed no conscious thought.
Haunted House jumped last over the first fence and was still last five fences later approaching Becher’s Brook. Jerry Springwood saw the horse directly in front of him fall and knew remotely that if he went straight on he would land on top of him. Almost without thinking, he twitched his right hand on the rein and Haunted House, taking fire from this tiniest sign of life, swerved a yard, bunched his quarters and put his great equine soul into clearing the danger. Haunted House knew the course, had won there with Jerry Springwood up, in shorter races. His sudden surge over Becher’s melted his jockey’s defensive blankness and thrust him into freshly vivid fear.
Oh God! Jerry thought, as Haunted House took him inexorably towards the Canal Turn, how can I? How can I? He sat there, fighting his panic while Haunted House carried him sure-footedly round the Turn and over Valentine’s and all the way to The Chair. Jerry thought forever after that he’d shut his eyes as his mount took the last few strides towards the most testing steeplechase fence in the world, but Haunted House met it perfectly and cleared the huge spread without the slightest stumble. Over the water jump in front of the stands and out again towards Becher’s with the whole course to jump again. Jerry thought, if I pull up now, I’ll have done enough. Horses beside him tired and stopped or slid and fell but Haunted House galloped at a steady thirty miles an hour with scant regard for his fate.
Austin Glenn on the stands and William Westerland in his private box and Chief Superintendent Crispin tense in front of a television set all watched with faster pulses as Haunted House made progress through the field. By the time he reached Becher’s Brook on the second circuit he lay tenth, and seventh at the Canal Turn, and fifth after the third last fence, three-quarters of a mile from home.
Jerry Springwood saw a gap on the rails and didn’t take it. He checked his mount before the second-last fence so they jumped it safely but lost two lengths. On the stands William Westerland groaned aloud but on Haunted House Jerry Springwood just shrivelled inside at his own fearful cowardice. It’s useless, he thought. I’d be better off dead.
The leader of the field had sprinted a long way ahead and Jerry saw him ride over the last fence while Haunted House was a good forty lengths in the rear. One more, Jerry thought. Only one more fence. I’ll never ride another race. Never. He locked his jaw as Haunted House gathered his muscles and launched his half-ton weight at the green-faced birch. If he rolls on me, Jerry thought… if I fall and he crashes on top of me… Oh God, he thought, take me safely over this fence.
Haunted House landed surefootedly, his jockey steady and balanced by God-given instinct. The last fence was behind them, all jumping done.
The horse far in front, well-backed and high in the handicap, was already taking the last flat half-mile at a spanking gallop. Jerry Springwood and Haunted House had left it too late to make a serious bid to catch them, but with a surge of what Jerry knew to be release from purgatory, they raced past everything else in a flat-out dash to the post.
Austin Glenn watched Haunted House finish second by twenty lengths. Cursing himself a little for not bothering about place money, he took out his ticket, tore it philosophically across, and again let the pieces flutter away to the four winds. William Westerland rubbed his chin and wondered whether Jerry Springwood could have won if he’d tried sooner. Chief Superintendent Crispin bitterly cursed the twenty lengths by which his quarry would escape.
Sir William took his eminent foreign visitors down to watch the scenes of jubilation round the winner in the unsaddling enclosure, and was met by flurried officials with horrified faces.
‘The winner can’t pass the scales,’ they said.
‘What do you mean?’ Westerland demanded.
‘The winner didn’t carry the right weight! The trainer left the weight-cloth hanging in the saddling box when he put the saddle on the horse. The winner ran all the way with ten pounds less than he should have done… and we’ll have to disqualify him.’
Forgetting the weight-cloth was done often enough – but in the National!
William Westerland took a deep breath and told the aghast officials to relay the facts to the public over the tannoy system. Jerry Springwood heard the news while he was sitting on the scales and watching the pointer swing round to the right mark. He understood that he’d won the Grand National, and he felt not joyful but overwhelmingly ashamed, as if he’d taken the prize by cheating.
Crispin stationed his men strategically and alerted all the Tote pay-out windows. Up on the stands, Austin Glenn searched for the pieces of his ticket in a fury, picking up every torn and trampled scrap and peering at it anxiously.
The ground was littered with torn-up paper by the truckful. The brilliant colours of the bookmakers’ tickets overshadowed the buff cards from the Tote, and made the search a haystack; and there was the detritus too not only of the Grand National’s ‘also-rans’ but also those of the earlier races. Somewhere there was his torn ticket from Spotted Tulip, for instance. Tearing up losing tickets and entrusting them to the wind was a gambler’s defiance of fate.
Austin Glenn searched and cursed until his b
ack ached from beading down. He was not alone in having disregarded the punters’ rule of not throwing tickets away until after the all-clear from the weigh-in, but to see others searching as hard as he was gave him no pleasure. What if someone else picked up his pieces of ticket and claimed his winnings? The idea enraged him; and what was more, he couldn’t stay on the course indefinitely because he had to catch his return train. He couldn’t afford to be late; he had to work that night.
Crispin’s men shifted from foot to foot as time went by and they were left there growing more and more conspicuous while the crowd thinned and trooped out through the gates. When the Tote closed for the day, the Chief Superintendent called them off in frustrated rage and conceded that they would have to wait for another opportunity after all, and never would such a good one come that way again.
In the weighing-room, Jerry Springwood bore the congratulations as best he could and announced to surprised television millions that he would be hanging up his boots immediately, after this peak to his career.
He didn’t realise he had ridden the bravest race of his life. When the plaudits were over he locked himself in the washroom and wept for his lost courage.
Austin Dartmouth Glenn travelled home empty-handed and in a vile mood, not knowing that his lost ticket had saved him from arrest. He cursed his wife and kicked the cat, and after a hasty supper, he put on his neat navy-blue uniform. Then he went scowling to work his usual night shift in the nearby high-security jail.
HAIG’S DEATH
What if? is the beginning of fiction. What if Haig died when he shouldn’t?
There could be a hundred intertwined ripples but, anyway, here there are three.
Unaware that it was for the last time, Christopher Haig steered his buzzing electric razor over the contours of his chin and watched its progress impersonally in the bathroom mirror.
Christopher Haig’s beard grew strong and black; unfairly virile, he considered, when his crown was mercilessly thinning. Sighing, he straightened the transition line between beard and hair beside each ear, and blew the shaved-off ends of whiskers carefully into a plastic bag always ready for the purpose.