Proof - By Dick Francis Page 0,52

out there, trying to raise a smile. Found the smile came quite easily when I saw who it was.

Flora stood there, short, plump and concerned, her kind eyes searching my face. Beside her, tall and elegant, was the woman I’d seen fleetingly with Gerard after the horsebox accident: his wife, Tina.

‘Tony, dear,’ Flora exclaimed, coming down the shop to meet me, ‘are you sure you should be here? You don’t look well, dear. They really should have kept you in hospital, it’s too bad they sent you home.’

I kissed her cheek. ‘I wouldn’t have wanted to stay.’ I glanced at Mrs McGregor. ‘How’s Gerard?’

‘Oh dear,’ Flora said. ‘I should introduce… Tina, this is Tony Beach…’

Tina McGregor smiled, which was noble considering that her husband’s predicament was my fault, and in answer to my enquiry said Gerard had had the pellets removed that morning, but would be staying one more night for recovery.

‘He wants to see you,’ she said. ‘This evening, if you can.’

I nodded. ‘I’ll go.’

‘And Tony, dear,’ Flora said, ‘I was so wanting to ask you… but now I see how dreadfully pale you look I don’t suppose… It would be too much, I’m sure.’

‘What would be too much?’ I said.

‘You were so frightfully kind coming round the stables with me, and Jack’s still in hospital, they still won’t let him come home, and every day he gets crosser…’

‘You want me to visit Jack too, after Gerard?’ I guessed.

‘Oh no!’ She was surprised. ‘Though he would love it, of course. No… I wondered… silly of me, really… if you would come with me to the races?’ She said the final words in a rush and looked of all things slightly ashamed of herself.

‘To the races…’

‘Yes, I know it’s a lot to ask… but tomorrow… we’ve a horse running which has a very awkward owner and Jack insists I must be there and honestly that owner makes me feel so flummoxed and stupid, I know it’s silly, but you were so good with that horrible Howard and I just thought you might enjoy a day at the races and I would ask you… only that was before Tina rang me and told me about last night… and now I can see it wouldn’t be a pleasure for you after all.’

A day at the races… well, why not? Maybe I’d feel better for a day off. No worse, at any rate.

‘Which races?’ I said.

‘Martineau.’

Martineau Park, slightly north east of Oxford, large, popular and not too far away. If ever I went to the races it was either to Martineau Park or to Newbury, because I could reach either track inside forty minutes and combine the trip with shop hours, Mrs Palissey graciously permitting.

‘Yes, I’ll come,’ I said.

‘But Tony dear… are you sure?’

‘Yes, sure. I’d like to.’

She looked greatly relieved and arranged to pick me up at one o’clock the next day, promising faithfully to return me by six. Their runner, she explained, was in the big race of the day at three-thirty, and the owner always expected to talk for hours afterwards, analysing every step and consequence.

‘As if I can tell him anything,’ Flora said despairingly. ‘I do so wish the horse would win, but Jack’s afraid he won’t, which is why I’ve got to be there… Oh dear, oh dear.’

The Flat racing season was due to end in two or three weeks and none too soon, I judged, from Jack Hawthorn’s point of view. No stable could long survive the absence of both its main driving forces, left as it was in the hands of a kind unbusinesslike woman with too little knowledge.

‘Listen to the owner with respect and agree with everything he says and he’ll think you’re wonderful,’ I said.

‘How very naughty, Tony dear,’ she said, but looked more confident all the same.

I took them out to the yard, as Flora had chiefly brought Tina to retrieve Gerard’s car. It appeared that Tina herself had the ignition key: Gerard had given it to her the previous evening. Tina gazed without comment for a while at the shattered windscreen and the exploded upholstery and then turned towards me, very tall and erect, all emotions carefully straitj acketed.

‘This is the third time,’ she said, ‘that he’s been shot.’

I went to see him in the evening and found him propped against pillows in a room with three other beds but no inmates. Blue curtains, hospital smell, large modern spaces, shiny floors, few people about.

‘Utterly boring,’ Gerard said. ‘Utterly impersonal. A waiting room