Riders Down

by John McEvoy

  Members of the racing community and his fellow riders expressed shock and sorrow at Guerin’s death. “He was a good rider and an even better man,” said his younger brother, David, currently the leading rider at Elmont Park in New York. “I can’t believe this,” he added.

  Matt stared at the computer screen. “Damn it,” he said. “I can’t believe it either.”

  ***

  That afternoon Matt waved a greeting to Harry Schwartz, the elderly Heartland Downs paddock security guard, then crossed the rubber-bricked walking ring and walked across the carefully trimmed lawn to stall number two. He could just see Maggie’s wide-brimmed hat beside a gleaming dark bay colt whose halter was being held by groom Bobby Mendez. Maggie, dressed in a tasteful beige pants suit, was bent down, cinching the girth on the young horse, which stood passively. On either side of him, horses were pawing the ground, neighing nervously, shifting their bodies from side to side, rolling their eyes and sweating in anticipation of what was to be the first career race for each of them. In contrast, Maggie’s entrant, Kenosha Kid, was a model of decorum.

  “He looks like he’s about to fall asleep,” Matt said as he approached the stall. Maggie grinned up at him. “Wait till they ring the bell. He’ll wake up then. This baby can scoot.”

  Cinch on tight and saddle secured, Maggie stood up and introduced Matt to Kenosha Kid’s owners, Lou Romano Senior and Junior, a middle-aged man and his twenty-something son. Matt could almost hear their nerves jangling. They were new owners, and Kenosha Kid was their first horse. Maggie, whose training acumen was matched by her sense of public relations, assured the Romanos that “He’ll run well. Try to relax and enjoy this experience,” she urged, before turning to greet Kenosha Kid’s rider, Dean Kristufek.

  Matt stood silently with the Romanos as the horses paraded around the walking ring with their riders up, then turned into the tunnel beneath the grandstand that led to the track. He looked up at the dozens of fans on the grandstand balcony that faced the spacious paddock, at the hundreds more ringing the paddock fence. A slight breeze ruffled the leaves of the old elm trees that divided the flower beds from the lawn. The sun bounced off the dappled coats of the neophyte racers. “What a day to be alive and at the racetrack,” Matt said. The lovely scene served to temporarily take Matt’s thoughts off Mark Guerin’s death. The senior Romano smiled briefly and nodded in agreement. His son anxiously twisted his racing program into a sweat-stained cylinder.

  Matt’s thoughts went back to a similar summer day, two years earlier, when he had visited the paddock to see Maggie about setting up an interview with her. Maggie’s career was taking off. Matt wanted to give it a proper boost—both because he was interested in getting to know her as a person after their memorable meeting at third base, and because he prided himself on recognizing early on the talents of young, upcoming trainers and jockeys, then beating his competition in bringing those talents to the racing public’s attention.

  After agreeing to meet the following morning at Maggie’s barn following training hours, they continued talking. It was several minutes before the brightly clad jockeys would arrive to take their perches atop the horses. Trainers chatted up their owners, meanwhile keeping observant eyes on their equine starters and opponents. Horse people, Matt knew, were always eager to assess the competition. They were also ever on the alert when in the vicinity of these thousand-pound creatures. As one old horseman had pointed out to Matt years before, “They can hurt you without even trying.”

  While Maggie and Matt were talking that afternoon, a stumpy gray gelding was being led around the walking ring toward where they stood. “That’s the favorite in this race, old Fleet Argo,” Maggie said. “Doesn’t look like much, does he? He’s nine years old, but he’s still tough. Now,” she said, “watch this,” as she stared at the oncoming horse. As Fleet Argo walked past, he turned his head and looked at Maggie. In turn, Maggie looked the horse directly in the eye. Moving on, the old gelding looked back over his shoulder at Maggie.

  “What’s that about?” Matt asked.

  “Oh, it’s just kind of a game I play sometimes,” Maggie answered. “I learned early on that horses here are kind of used to being dismissed. Somebody leads them into the paddock, slaps a saddle and a jock on them, and then sends them out to the racetrack. Most of the time, nobody interacts with them. It’s almost as if they’re pieces of furniture.

  “Awhile back,” she continued, “I discovered I could make horses look me in the eye just by standing here in the paddock, not moving, but looking intently at them. I would pick one out and concentrate on him as he went around the walking ring, making eye contact. Not moving my hands or raising my voice, just looking at him. The horse would look back at me as if he was amazed by the attention I was giving him. Next time around, he’d be looking for me. He’d start to walk past and then look back over his shoulder to see if I was still watching him—just like Fleet Argo just did. This happened almost all the time. It makes you wonder what horses think of us,” Maggie had said pensively.

  Matt’s reverie was interrupted when he heard the paddock judge call out “Riders up,” the signal for the jockeys to get aboard their mounts. Lou Romano Senior said, “We want to go and bet our horse.” Maggie instructed them how to find her box located above the finish line. She told the father and son that she and Matt would meet them before the race started.

  As the Romanos moved away, Matt said, “You seem to handle these two greenhorns very deftly. Just as you do your horses. It makes me marvel even more at you, and what you do,” he smiled, putting an arm around her waist, thinking back to that paddock talk they’d had two years earlier, grateful it had led to this life they enjoyed today.

  Maggie quickly but gently removed his hand. “Please,” she said as they exited the paddock, “I’m a professional horsewoman engaged in the work of my profession. Can’t be fooling with the likes of you while I’m on the job.”

  ***

  It wasn’t until forty-five minutes after Kenosha Kid’s race that Matt had a chance to talk to Maggie about the jockey deaths. As Maggie had said, Kenosha Kid “could scoot,” and scoot he did to a three-length win for the delighted Romanos. They reacted as if they’d just won the Kentucky Derby, ordering champagne to be delivered to Maggie’s box, insisting that Matt stay and share it with them. Finally, after politely declining an invitation from the departing Romanos to join them for dinner at one of Chicago’s most expensive restaurants, Maggie and Matt were left alone in the box. The retreat of the late afternoon sun was beginning to lay shadows across the grandstand as the horses came out for the final race of the day.

  “So, Mister O’Connor,” Maggie said, “I get the impression you have something on your mind.” When Matt told her what it was, all of Maggie’s playfulness and post-victory jubilation quickly evaporated.

  “I’m sure you heard about Mark Guerin getting killed last night,” Matt began. She nodded yes.

  “Well, I’m wondering if Mark Guerin’s death is connected to the deaths of the two other riders who were shot to death recently. And I’d like your help in trying to find out.”

  Maggie gave him a puzzled look. “What could I do?”

  “I’d like you to let me know what the jocks here are saying about this. You know these guys better than I do—you work with them, you hire them, you hear things in the stable area that I never could.”

  Maggie said, “Nobody really knows jockeys, Matt, except other jockeys. Don’t kid yourself about that.”

  “Okay, okay. But what I’m saying is you have a much closer relationship with them than I ever will. What do they think is going on here? They must be talking about these murders.”

  Maggie took a small sip of her champagne. “Everybody’s talking about the killings. But none of the riders I know here seem to have any clue as to why these murders are happening. One of them—Sam Scollay, I probably have more dealings with him than any of them because he rides the majority of my horses—s
ays that the rumor is some riders at other tracks have been pressured by some mystery phone caller. That’s what some of the valets have told me, too. The riders involved aren’t saying anything, according to Sam.”

  Matt said, “Pressured to do what?”

  “Nobody knows. And it could be just one of those wild racetrack rumors. They sprout up like mushrooms in horse manure, you know that.”

  Matt took out his notebook and pen. “I just can’t see any common thread here. Carlos Hidalgo, killed for no known reason in Maryland. Same thing for Eddie Calvin in Indiana and Mark Guerin in Louisiana. Did these guys piss somebody off? Or did their friends or relatives? What the hell could it have been?” He absentmindedly started tapping the notebook with his pen. “I’ve got a call in to David Guerin in New York. I’ve known him since he first came on the racetrack. I’d like to see if he’s got any theories about his brother dying like that. It’s pretty rare that there’s two top athletes in the same profession who are brothers, and one gets killed under circumstances like these.”

  Maggie frowned before saying, “No, maybe not as rare as you think.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Let’s go back to poor Eddie Calvin.”

  “What about him?”

  “You know Randy Morrison? One of the leading jocks out in California?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well,” Maggie said, “a lot of people aren’t aware of it, but he is Eddie Calvin’s half-brother. Their mother was widowed after she had Randy. She later remarried a man named Calvin and had Eddie by that man. Randy just kept his real father’s name. Those boys were raised together. I was surprised we didn’t see Randy at Eddie Calvin’s wake. As I understand it, he couldn’t make a plane connection in time to be there that day. I heard he arrived late that night, then accompanied his brother’s body back to Arkansas the next day.”

  “I’ll be damned,” Matt said, drumming the pen on his pad. “So two of the three murdered jocks were related to very prominent riders.”

  Maggie said, “Yes, but what about the other guy? Carlos Hidalgo? He’s evidently an isolated case.”

  “Not if Hidalgo was used as an example—a warning that maybe wasn’t heeded. Which, because it wasn’t, led to the deaths of the other two.”

  Maggie stood and stretched. “It’s been a long day. I’ve got to get back to the barn for feeding time. But I’ll be happy to hash this out further with you over an early dinner.”

  As they exited the box Matt said, “Dinner it’ll be. But no more talk about these murders today. I need to get my mind around something else for a couple of hours.”

  Maggie smiled up at him as she stepped onto the escalator. “Let’s make it a couple of hours for dinner, followed by a couple of hours of adult gratification of a carnal nature.”

  “I wouldn’t complain,” Matt grinned.

  ***

  While Maggie and Matt were departing Heartland Downs that afternoon, David Guerin emerged from the showers in the jockeys’ room at Elmont Park in New York. He’d received word of his brother’s death early that morning. Still stunned, he nevertheless called his agent to say he would honor his riding assignments that afternoon, then leave for New Orleans in the evening. He had calls on promising horses from two prominent trainers and he didn’t want to risk losing his assignment on either of those mounts in the future.

  Minutes earlier Guerin had won the final race of the day aboard Higgins Hideaway. He was rapidly toweling himself off when he heard the voice of his agent, Ray Krantz. Ray was sitting on the bench in front of Guerin’s locker, reading the jockey’s mail. It was a function he performed daily, weeding out the junk and setting aside the pertinent missives and requests for autographs and personal appearances for his celebrated client. David Guerin was a New York favorite, receiving dozens of letters and postcards each day.

  “Davie,” Krantz said, “come over here.”

  Guerin finished carefully combing his blond hair with one of his small, strong hands, slipped into his briefs, jeans, and tee-shirt, and walked to where Krantz was seated. There was a stricken look on Krantz’ usually cheery face. “I don’t want anybody hearing this,” Krantz said in a low voice, “but there’s a telegram here you better look at right away.”

  “Who from?” said the puzzled jockey.

  “Some guy signs himself Professor. That’s all. Damned if I know who he is,” Krantz said. “But whoever he is, he claims he killed your brother.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  On a Saturday afternoon two weeks after jockey Mark Guerin’s funeral, Jimbo Murray looked up from his large, leather-bound menu, then placed it on the linen-covered table in the Heartland Downs Turf Club. There was a look of disgust on his face. Vera Klinder continued to read her menu, pausing occasionally to sip from her cranberry-flavored vodka cocktail and look around the beautifully appointed room, crowded with well-dressed patrons who were eating, drinking and discussing how they might wager on the next race.

  Jimbo shook his head. “Damn,” he said, “I didn’t know we were coming to a place where they charge you thirteen bucks for a damn hamburger.”

  Vera reached across the table to pat his hand.

  “Honey, we should be able to splurge a little. If things work out in this race, we’ll be taking home a bunch of money.” She nodded toward the twelve-inch television set, a standard feature on every table in the upscale Turf Club. The set was tuned to Elmont Park in New York, where horses were approaching the starting gate for the final leg of that day’s National Pick Four. There were nine of them, but to the bettors, both at Elmont and at the hundreds of simulcast sites around the nation, only one seemed to matter: Number Five, Sena Sena, winner of his last five races and favored today at 2-5.

  The Elmont track announcer, commenting when the camera concentrated on the prancing, gleaming-coated Sena Sena and his rider, David Guerin, referred to the horse as “the prohibitive favorite.”

  Jimbo said, “I don’t get it. They’re calling this horse the prohibatable favorite, or whatever. That’s like prohibition, when they outlawed booze, right? But it don’t look like anybody’s been prohibited from betting on this son of a bitch. Look at those little odds on him.” He smiled as he re-examined the Pick Four ticket in his hand. “He’s not on our ticket,” Jimbo said. “And I’m pretty goddam sure there’s a reason for that.” He clinked his Budweiser bottle against Vera’s upraised cocktail glass. Then he motioned for the waiter and ordered the $13 hamburger. Vera opted for the fruit plate, “and an order of French fries on the side.”

  ***

  Some forty minutes later, Oily Ronnie Schrapps sauntered up to the $50 window on the third floor clubhouse side of Heartland Downs. He was feeling relaxed on what was a “day off” for him—no old broads to snooker, no naïve prospects to impress, just a regular day at the races, trying to make some money with his bets.

  With fifteen minutes to post time for the ninth and final race on the program, Oily Ronnie had plenty of time to bet. He knew what horse he was going with, one he had followed for weeks, so he had time to schmooze with Toby Mullins, the veteran mutuel clerk who had manned this $50 window for as long as Ronnie could remember.

  “One race to go, Toby,” Ronnie said. “Give me two hundred win and place on the five horse.”

  Mullins adroitly punched out the ticket. Then he leaned forward across the counter and beckoned Ronnie closer to him. “See that redheaded guy over there with the duffel bag?” he whispered.

  Ronnie turned to his right. He spotted a redheaded man who was talking on one of the public phones on the west wall. There was a maroon duffel bag at his feet, a large beer in one hand, and a broad smile on his freckled face.

  “What about him?” Ronnie said.

  Mullins said, “Guy came to me with a winning ticket on the National Pick Four. One of only ten in the country.”

  Ronnie’s eyebrows raised. “That had to be a good score,” he said. “What’d it pay? Ne
arly $200,000, right? I sure as hell didn’t have it,” he added, “not when Sena Sena flopped in the final leg at Elmont. I was only alive on my ticket to that pig.”

  “That Pick Four paid just over $245,000,” Mullins said, “but that’s not the interesting part. The guy insisted on cash, no check, all $20 bills. Couldn’t be talked out of it. That’s the second time this summer that’s happened. Some broad hit the National Pick Four awhile back for well over four hundred grand. She wouldn’t take anything but cash, either.”

  Schrapps frowned. “That’s got to be a hell of a big bundle of money, right?”

  Mullins reached for a pen and applied it to a piece of scrap paper. “No, not all that heavy,” he said after finishing his calculations. “Each bill, like every piece of U.S. currency, weighs one gram. There are 454 grams in a pound. So, this guy was only lugging a little under twenty-seven pounds.

  “They tell me that when the broad cashed in the 460 grand and took cash, she had a couple of security guards carry it out in shopping bags to a car in the parking lot. Know what she tipped the guards? Two bucks apiece. That was it,” Mullins said disgustedly.

  “For this redheaded guy,” Mullins continued, “Terry Dart, the mutuel manager, spent ten minutes counting out the money for the guy down in his office. Very unusual,” the clerk added. “Most people naturally want a check. Who wants to be walking around carrying that kind of bread on him? And the guy refused an escort from track security, just like the woman before.”

  “You know this guy?”

  “Never saw him before today. He won that bet with a pretty small ticket. And he left the big favorite, Sena Sena, completely off it, if you can fathom that. I guess I’d better keep my eyes open for him next time, see who he’s betting,” Mullins added with a laugh.