Decider - By Dick Francis Page 0,35

doctor.

Dr Livingstone? No, Dr Jones. Oh, well.

He bent down by my head, which I’d tired of holding up.

‘Can you squeeze my hand?’ he asked.

I squeezed his hand obligingly and told him I wasn’t much hurt.

‘Good.’

He went away.

It wasn’t until much later, when I watched one of the video tapes, that I learned he hadn’t totally believed me because, except for the collar and sleeves, my white shirt showed scarlet and had been ripped here and there like bits of skin underneath. In any case, when he returned it wasn’t to expect me to stand up and walk out: instead he brought what looked to me like a sled, not a flat stretcher that one could easily fall off, but with raised rails down the sides, better for carrying.

One way or another, with one of the fireman levering the last chunk of timber off my legs and the other two pulling me forwards by the harness, with me tugging myself forward handhold by handhold, I slithered along face down onto the offered transport. When my centre of gravity was more or less onto the safe walkway, and I was supported from the thighs up, the ominous creaking started again in the building, this time worse, this time with tremors.

The fireman behind my feet said ‘Christ’ and leaped onto the walkway, edging past me with infectious urgency. As if rehearsed, he and the others abandoned slow care, caught hold of the side rails of my sled-stretcher and yanked it with me hanging on like a limpet across the narrow path to the windows.

The building shuddered and shook. The rest of the Press room – by far the largest part – toppled up high, broke loose, smashed down lethally through what was left of the ceiling right onto the place where I’d been lying, and with its weight tore the whole landing away from its walls and, roaring and thundering, plunged horribly downwards. Grit, dust, bricks, chunks of splintered plaster and slivers of glass fog-filled the air. Mesmerised, I glanced back over my shoulder and saw Toby’s hiding place, the small sideboard, topple over forwards and slide to oblivion. The floor of the Stewards’ box subsided and left the cantilevered safe walkway protruding inward from the sill of the window, life-saving still but now with nothing beneath. My legs, from above the knees, stuck out over space.

Incredibly, the policeman, now just outside the window, went on filming.

I gripped the rails of the stretcher, my hands fierce with the elemental fear of falling. The firemen clutched the harness round my shoulders, lifted the stretcher, hurled themselves and me towards safety, and the whole lot of us popped out into sunshine, an untidy group, disorganised, coughing from dust, but alive.

Nothing even then proved simple. The concrete viewing steps of the stands reached only as far as a storey below the Stewards’ box, and to bring the rescue equipment up the last nine or ten feet had demanded many struts ingeniously bolted together. Below near the racecourse rails, where crowds on race days cheered the finishes, the asphalt and grass viewing areas were packed with vehicles – fire appliances, police cars, ambulances – and, worst, a television station’s van.

I said that it would be much easier and less embarrassing if I simply stood up and walked down, and no one paid any attention. The doctor reappeared talking about internal injuries and not giving me any chance to make things worse, so rather against my will I got covered with a dressing or two and a blanket and was secured to the stretcher with straps and slowly carried step by careful step to the ground and across to where the emergency vehicles waited. I thanked the firemen. They grinned.

At the end of the journey five boys stood in a row, frightened and terribly strained.

I said, ‘I’m fine, chaps,’ but they seemed unconvinced.

I said to the doctor, ‘They’re my children. Tell them I’m OK.’

He glanced at me and at their young distressed faces.

‘Your father,’ he said with commonsense, ‘is a big strong fellow and he’s quite all right. He has some bruises and cuts which we’ll stick a few plasters on. You don’t need to worry.’

They read the word ‘Doctor’ on the front of his bright green jacket and they decided, provisionally, to believe him.

‘We’re taking him to the hospital,’ the man in green said, indicating a waiting ambulance, ‘but he’ll be back with you soon.’

Roger appeared beside the boys and said he and his wife would look