“Well done, everybody,” said Derek. “Production meeting tomorrow morning at Folkestone at eleven. And Iain, can you come to the scanner before you go home?” Derek flicked off his microphone and leaned back in his chair, stretching his arms high above his head. He yawned loudly. “God, I’m tired.”
So am I, I thought, yawning in sympathy, but, unlike him, I hadn’t done a stroke of work all day. In my case it was probably something to do with not having had any proper sleep for the past three nights.
Derek twisted around in his chair to face me. “What do you think about tomorrow?”
I was scheduled to present from Folkestone. “I’ll be fine if you want me.”
“I actually think we should stick with Iain for the rest of this week,” he said. “It might be construed as somewhat insensitive on your part to return too soon. But how would you feel about doing a full tribute piece about Clare for broadcast on Saturday from Newmarket?”
“Channel 4 have already asked me,” I said. “I’m filming it on Thursday, and it’ll be shown on The Morning Line on Saturday, and also during the afternoon. I think I’d better check with them before I do another.”
“It’s all right,” said Derek. “I’ll ask Iain to do ours.”
Iain, it seemed to me, was being asked to do far too much.
“You could always ask Channel 4 if you can use the same piece.” Cooperation between the broadcasters was rare but not completely unknown.
“Maybe. But using Iain will give us a slightly different slant.” He paused. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that to sound how it did.”
“It’s OK,” I said. “That’s sensible.”
And it was. I’d have done the same thing in his position.
“Do you think it’ll it be OK for me to use the RacingTV database in Oxford for my tribute piece?” I asked.
“I’m sure it will,” said Derek. “You know we’ve had that new indexing system installed.”
“That’s exactly why I want to use it.”
“It’s really fabulous. Just put in Clare’s name under ‘Jockey’ and then click on ‘Winner’ and it will list all the races that she’s won, together with the other runners, the prize money, the distances, the prices, everything. Then you just have to click on any entry in the list to play the VT straight back. It’s absolutely brilliant.”
“Great,” I said.
“But you don’t have to go all the way to Oxford, you know. You can access everything just as easily from the scanner. Not now, of course, because the link will be down, but tomorrow from Folkestone. The link will be up by about ten and there’ll be about three hours clear before racing.”
“Thanks,” I said. “But I still think I’ll go to Oxford. Then I’ve got all day.”
“Suit yourself,” Derek said rather dismissively. He obviously thought that I surely could find the videos I needed of Clare winning races in three hours and he was well aware that my home in Edenbridge was a lot closer to Folkestone than it was to Oxford.
That was all true, but I didn’t really want Derek looking over my shoulder all the time I was accessing the video database because I was actually far more interested in searching for races that Clare had purposely lost.
6
It was a bit like the searching for the proverbial needle in the haystack.
During the past four months, the height of the flat-racing season, Clare had ridden almost every day, often four or five times in an afternoon, and sometimes at an evening meeting as well.
According to the database, since the beginning of June there had been four hundred and twenty-nine races run in which Clare had been one of the jockeys and she’d been on the winner in thirty-seven of them, including her last-ever ride at Lingfield the previous Friday on Scusami.
What was it that Clare had said when I asked her how often she had stopped a horse from winning? Three or four times, maybe five. And what had she written in her note? I don’t know what has been happening to me these last few months.
I assumed, therefore, that the three or four races, or maybe five, would have been in the last few months. I had better start at the beginning of the four hundred and twenty-nine and just go through them all, ignoring only the ones she had actually won. That left three hundred and ninety-two races to watch. I settled myself into the studio chair for a lengthy session.
But first I watched again her ride on Bangkok Flyer the previous Friday to remind me of exactly what I was looking for. The more I saw it, the more obvious it seemed. I was sure that I’d have no trouble spotting it again in a different race. All I really needed was to watch the final eighth of a mile.
I also looked to see who trained Bangkok Flyer. I knew most things about the horses that I watched regularly, including their owners and trainers, but Bangkok Flyer was a two-year-old maiden, and Friday had been the first time I’d seen him run.
According to the database, he was trained in a Newmarket stable by Austin Reynolds, for a long time the “nearly man” of British flat racing. Austin was now in his mid- to late fifties, and he had never quite fulfilled his potential in the sport.
Perhaps too much had been expected of him because he’d enjoyed such phenomenal success very early, winning the Derby, the Oaks, and the St. Leger in only his second year as a young trainer. Since those heady days of more than twenty years ago, he had never again saddled a Classic winner, and he’d precious few other big-race victories to his name either.
Nowadays he mostly sent his horses north to race on the Yorkshire circuits, marketing himself to businessmen from the area—prospective owners who might appreciate his fashionable Newmarket address.
Bangkok Flyer had raced three times prior to his run at Lingfield, once each at Redcar, Catterick, and York, finishing second on all three occasions. But Clare hadn’t ridden him in any of those previous outings.
Nevertheless, I watched the VTs of all three. There was nothing untoward in any of them, at least there was nothing that I could spot. In fact, the colt had run exceptionally well last time out at York, beaten only half a length by a good horse that had itself recently gone on to win one of the major two-year-old races of the season. No wonder Bangkok Flyer had started as a red-hot favorite under Clare. According to form, he should have won the race at Lingfield with ease, as he surely would have without Clare’s untimely intervention.
—
EVEN WITH ME watching only the final eighth of a mile of each race, the first two hundred took me more than three hours to review. In them I found three “definites,” as well as a further two “possibles.” Perhaps Clare had been understating reality when she had said she’d “stopped” a maximum of only five.
By this stage, I had watched so many race finishes that the horses were beginning to dance before my eyes. I took a break for a coffee.
I felt absolutely wretched.
In a way, I suppose, I should be pleased to have found something, but I was seriously dismayed to have had it confirmed that her irregular riding of Bangkok Flyer had not been an isolated incident.
The phone vibrated in my pocket. It was Sarah.
“Hello, my darling,” I said, answering it.
“Where are you?” she asked in a slightly pained voice.
“Oh God, I’m sorry. I’ve been so busy I forgot.”
I looked at my watch. It was twenty past twelve, and we’d agreed to meet at noon in a pub overlooking the River Thames just west of Oxford.
“I’m on my way. Order me a glass of rosé. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
I told the database technician I’d be back later and skipped out to my car. I was still excited every time I was on my way to see Sarah. If I wasn’t, I suppose, I’d have moved on by now.
The lunchtime traffic was bad, and it was a good fifteen minutes before I turned into the pub parking lot and pulled my batte
red old Ford into the space alongside Sarah’s brand-new BMW.
I hurried inside.
“What was making you so busy in Oxford that you forgot to come and meet me?” She wasn’t really cross, just curious.
“I’ve been at the RacingTV studio.”
“Doing what, exactly?”
“Oh, bits and pieces. Sorting out my work schedule for the coming months.”
I wondered why I hadn’t told her the truth.
“And I’m also looking at some past races that Clare rode in for a tribute that I’m making on Thursday for Channel 4.”
“Well, in that case you’re forgiven.” She patted my hand. “How have things been?”
“Pretty awful,” I said. “I seem to be wandering round in a daze. Nothing seems real.”
“Have you fixed a date yet for the funeral?”
“Monday, at three,” I said. “But that’s another thing I’m not very happy about.”
“Why?” she asked.
“I spoke to my brothers last night. The coroner has given us the go-ahead, but my father wants it to be immediate family only, and near Oxted where he lives.”
“Why is that a problem?”
“Because Clare didn’t really get on with her immediate biological family. Racing was Clare’s world. They were her real family, and I think she would have preferred it if her funeral was held at Newmarket, where she lived, and all her racing friends could be there.”
“Darling,” Sarah said, turning to me, “you can always have a memorial service in Newmarket later. And, in all honesty, it isn’t really what Clare would have wanted that’s important now.”
“I know.” I sighed. “And my father can be very obstinate. But for some goddamn reason my brothers and sister seem to agree with him. I’ve tried my best but I’ve been voted down on this one. Personally, I think they only want a small quiet funeral because they’re embarrassed by the manner of her death.”
She took my hand in hers and squeezed it. There was nothing to say, so we sat there in silence for a while. As always, I couldn’t get the image out of my head of Clare falling fifteen floors. I was again close to tears.
“Where’s Mitchell?” I asked, purposely changing my pattern of thought.
“At Newton Abbot races, thank goodness.” She shivered. “God, he was so horrible to me this morning before he went. He can be such a bully.”
“Why don’t you just leave him?”
She didn’t answer, and I tried to read her mind. Perhaps she was afraid of him. Or had Clare been right and Sarah simply couldn’t afford to leave?
“When will he be back?” I asked in the silence.
“Not for hours. He’s got a runner in the last, so he won’t be home until well after eight at the earliest.” She paused. “I don’t suppose you fancy coming back with me for a while?”
In spite of everything, I was tempted.
“How about Oscar?” I asked. Oscar was the youngest of her stepchildren, the only one that still lived at home.
“School play rehearsal. He won’t be home until ten. Please do come.” She was almost pleading. “I need you. It’s been really dreadful knowing you’ve been in such pain and not being able to comfort you.”
I sighed. “I’ve got to go back to the RacingTV offices to finish what I’m doing. It’ll take another two or three hours at least.”
“I’m only twenty minutes down the road. Come if you can.”
“The offices close at six, and the technician told me he wants to be gone by half past five, so I’ve got to be finished by then. I could come after that for a little while, as long as you’re sure it’s safe.”
“Safe as houses. I’ll watch Newton Abbot on the television just to make sure Mitch is still there for the last race.”
So would I.
Having been slightly irritated with me for arriving late, she now tried her best to hurry me away, so much so that I was back at the database studio, reviewing more of Clare’s races, well before two o’clock.
—
IN ALL THE RACES that Clare had ridden in and not won since the beginning of June, I found what I was pretty sure were seven examples of her purposely trying to lose, even though in one of them she didn’t really have much of a chance to win anyway. And there were a further four races where I thought she’d not been doing her best to win when she might have, although I couldn’t be sure that she was actively “stopping” the horse.
I used the database system to copy the eleven races in question on a DVD, together with the information about all the horses that had run in each one.
There didn’t seem to be any factors in common.
Of the seven definites, there was one pair that had the same trainer, but the five others were all different. Nine of the eleven had been trained in Newmarket, with one in Lambourn and the other at a stable near Stratford-upon-Avon. And all had different owners.
In addition to Bangkok Flyer, there was one other horse from the Austin Reynolds string, Tortola Beach, an exciting two-year-old prospect that Clare had ridden into third place at Doncaster in August when he had looked certain to win with just an eighth of a mile to go.
One of the others was from the Newmarket stable of Carla Topazio, a large, domineering lady trainer of Italian descent who loved to sing operatic arias at every opportunity, mostly in the winner’s enclosure whenever her horses had won.
In another of the eleven, Clare had ridden a three-year-old filly called Jasmine Pearls, trained by our own cousin Brendan, which had finished a close fourth in the City Plate at Chester after having led comfortably into the final eighth of a mile.
The only common thread I could see was that in none of the eleven suspect races had Clare been riding a horse trained by Geoff Grubb, her principal employer. Perhaps she had thought it would have been too great a risk. She had so much to lose if Geoff, for whatever reason, became unhappy with her riding—not just her stable-jockey job but her home as well. Even though she had mocked me, at that final dinner, for not buying a house of my own, she hadn’t either, choosing to live in Geoff’s rented Stable Cottage.
I stared at my list of definites and possibles, hoping that some other common denominator would leap out at me.
It didn’t.
Six of the eleven had started as the favorite, three at a price less than two-to-one, but two of the other five had been relative outsiders, with odds greater than eight-to-one.
I looked up the trainers of the race winners, but they were mostly different as well. As were the jockeys and the owners. Surely the eleven horses were not simply a random selection? Was there some shared characteristic that I wasn’t spotting? Maybe it was because I didn’t yet have all the necessary information to look at, and I needed to look at races earlier than June.
Perhaps Clare had been playing the “Race Fixing Game” for much longer than just these last few months.
I glanced at my watch. It was ten past five, and the technician was hovering and clearly itching for me to go. Any further searches would have to wait.
I quickly made another DVD, with four of Clare’s big race victories on it, as well as her final race on Scusami. Sadly, I couldn’t find a VT of her first-ever ride or even her first winner, but I still had more than enough to make the tribute piece for Channel 4.
I collected my two DVDs, thanked the technician, and left the studio.
The one thing that was certain about every TV company I had ever known was that in the reception area you would find a large-screen television showing the current output, and RacingTV was no exception.
I stood next to the office security desk and watched the sixth, and last, race from Newton Abbot. Mitchell Stacey’s horse won it easily at a canter, and the happy trainer was shown beaming from ear to ear as his victorious animal was led into the winner’
s enclosure.
Newton Abbot racetrack to East Ilsley was about a hundred and sixty miles. Even taking into account that most of the journey was on freeways, and also allowing for the excessive speed at which Mitchell Stacey regularly drove, there was absolutely no way he could be at home within the next two hours.
I climbed excitedly into my old Ford, sped the twenty minutes down the road, and jumped straight into bed with Sarah.
—
“MY POOR DARLING,” Sarah said as we lay together after lovemaking, “this is such a horrid business.” She lightly stroked her fingertips across my bare chest, causing shivers to go right down my legs. “It’s so unbelievable.”
Indeed, it was unbelievable, and I still hoped that I’d soon wake up from this nightmare and everything would be all right. Somehow it felt wrong that I could go on eating, sleeping, breathing, and even lying here with Sarah. Should I feel guilty for that too?
“What I can’t understand,” I said, “is what she was doing in London anyway. She told me she was going straight home.”
“But people do change their minds,” Sarah said.
I shook my head, not because I didn’t believe Sarah but in distress at what Clare had done. “She also told me she would be riding at Newmarket on Saturday morning. How was she going to do that if she was staying in London?”
“Which hotel was it?” Sarah asked.
“The Hilton. You know, that tall one at the bottom of Park Lane.”
Too tall, I thought.
Sarah suddenly sat bolt upright in bed. “But Mitch and I were at the Hilton on Friday night for that big Injured Jockeys dinner. We had a table of our owners.”
“Didn’t you see anything?” I asked. “An ambulance or something?”
“No. Nothing at all.”
“What time did you leave?” I asked.
“Not very late. You know what racing people are like about going to bed early. The dinner started at seven, and it was over by half past ten.”
“Clare fell round eleven-thirty.”
Dick Francis's Bloodline (9781101600931) Page 7