Proof - By Dick Francis Page 0,63

of a length, to definite possibles and positive losers. The young colts stuck out their necks and strove to be first as they would have done in a wild herd on an unrailed plain, the primaeval instinct flashing there undiluted on the civilised track. The very essence of racing, I thought. The untamed force that made it all possible. Exciting, moving… beautiful.

Breezy Palm had the ancient instinct in full measure. Whether urged to the full by his jockey or not he was straining ahead with passion, legs angular beneath the immature body, stride hurried and scratchy, the compulsion to be first all there but the technical ability still underdeveloped.

The trick of race-riding, my father had once said, was to awaken a horse’s natural panic fear and then control it. My father, of course, had had no doubt at all that he could do both. It was I, his son, who couldn’t do either. Pity…

Breezy Palm’s natural panic, jockey controlling it to the extent of letting it have its head and keeping it running straight, was still lustily aiming a shade beyond his ability. Orkney watched in concentrated silence. Flora seemed to be holding her breath. Isabella behind me was saying ‘Come on, you bugger, come on, you bugger,’ continuously under her breath, her most human reaction to date. Breezy Palm, oblivious, had his eyes fixed on the three horses still in front of him and over the last hundred yards ran as if the great god Pan were at his very heels.

Horses can only do their best. Breezy Palm’s best on that day couldn’t overhaul the winner, who went ahead by a length, or the second, who left clear space behind him, but he flashed over the line so close to the third of the leaders that from the angle of Orkney’s box it was impossible to tell the exact placings. The judge, announced the tannoy, was calling for a photograph.

Orkney, still silent, lowered his glasses and stared up the track to where his hepped-up colt was being hauled back into the twentieth century. Then still saying nothing he turned and hurried away, again leaving his companions to fare for themselves.

‘Come on, dear,’ Flora said, tugging my sleeve. ‘We must go down too. Jack said to be sure to. Oh dear…’

The three of us consequently made the downward journey as fast as possible and arrived to find Breezy Palm stamping around in the place allotted to the horse that finished fourth, the jockey unbuckling the girths and Orkney scowling.

‘Oh dear…’ Flora said again. ‘The jockeys always know… He must have been beaten for third after all.’

The result of the photograph, soon announced, confirmed it: Breezy Palm had finished fourth. Distances: length, two lengths, short head.

Flora, Isabella and I stood beside Orkney, looking at the sweating, tossing, skittering two-year-old and making consoling and congratulatory remarks, none of which seemed to please.

‘Ran extremely well in a strong field,’ I said.

‘The wrong race for him,’ Orkney said brusquely. ‘I’ve no idea why Jack persists in entering him in this class. Perfectly obvious they were too good for him.’

‘Only just,’ Isabella said reasonably.

‘My dear woman, you know nothing about it.’

Isabella merely smiled; fortitude of an exceptional nature.

It struck me that she herself was totally unco wed by Orkney. He treated her rudely: she ignored it, neither embarrassed nor upset. Subtly, somewhere in their relationship, she was his equal… and both of them knew it.

Flora said bravely, ‘I thought the horse ran splendidly,’ and received a pityingly glance from on high.

‘He fought to the end,’ I said admiringly. ‘Definitely not a quitter.’

‘Fourth,’ Orkney said repressively, as if fourth in itself bespoke a lack of character, and I wondered if he cared in the least how graceless he sounded.

The signal was given for the horses to be led away and Orkney made impatient movements which everyone interpreted as his own type of invitation to return to the box. There at last he busied himself with removing the wrappings from the overdue sandwiches, but without much method, finally pushing the plates towards Isabella for her to do it. Orkney himself poured fresh drinks as unstintingly as before and indicated that we might all sit down round one of the tables, if we so wished. All of us sat. All of us ate politely, hiding our hunger.

As a post-race jollification it would have done a funeral proud, but gradually the worst of Orkney’s sulks wore off and he began to make comments that proved he had at least