Bolt - By Dick Francis Page 0,73

or on Monday,’ I said, ‘probably worse than before.’

‘Oh …’ The prospect affected her almost as much as Col’s death. ‘I will not add to the pressure on my husband,’ she said fiercely. ‘He cannot sign this wretched contract. He will die, you know, if he does. He will not survive the disgrace in his own mind. He will wish to die … as all these years, although his condition is such a trial to him, he has wished to live.’ She made a small gesture with her gloved hand. ‘He is … very dear to me, Kit.’

I heard in my memory my grandmother saying, ‘I love the old bugger, Kit,’ of my pugnacious grandfather, an equal declaration of passion for a man not obviously lovable.

That the princess should have made it was astonishing, but not as impossible as before the advent of Nanterre. A great deal, I saw, had changed between us in the last eight days.

To save his honour, to save his life, to save their life together … My God, I thought, what a burden. She needed Superman, not me.

‘Don’t tell him about Col,’ she said again.

‘No, I won’t.’

Her gaze rested on Beatrice.

‘I won’t tell other people,’ I said. ‘But it may not stay a secret on the racecourse. Dusty and the lads who came with Wykeham’s horses all know, and they’ll tell other lads … it’ll spread, I’m afraid.’

She nodded slightly, unhappily, and switched her attention from Beatrice to Helikon, who happened to be passing. She watched him for several seconds, turning her head after him as he went.

‘What do you think of him?’ she asked, her defence mechanism switching on smoothly. ‘What shall I expect?’

‘He’s still a bit hot-headed,’ I said, ‘but if I can settle him, he should run well.’

‘But not another Kinley?’ she suggested.

‘Not so far.’

‘Do your best …’

I said as usual that I would, and we rejoined the others as if all we’d been talking about was her hurdler.

‘Have you noticed who’s still staring?’ Danielle said, and I answered that indeed I had, those eyes followed me everywhere.

‘Doesn’t it get on your nerves?’ Danielle asked.

‘What nerves?’ Litsi said.

‘Are you talking about Mr Allardeck?’ Beatrice demanded. ‘I can’t think why you don’t like him. He looks perfectly darling.’

The perfectly darling man was projecting his implacable thoughts my way from a distance signalling unmistakable invasion of psychological territory, and I thought uneasily again about the state of mind that was compelling him to do it. The evil eye, I thought: and no shield from it that I could see.

The time came to mount, and hot-headed Helikon and I went out onto the track. He was nervous as well as impetuous; not a joy to ride. I tried to get him to relax on the way to the start, but as usual it was like trying to relax a coil of barbed wire. The princess had bought him as a yearling and had great hopes for him, but although he jumped well enough, neither Wykeham nor I had been able to straighten out his kinks.

There were twenty or more runners, and Helikon and I set off near the front because if he were bumped in the pack he’d be frightened into stopping; yet I also had to keep a tight hold, as he could take charge and decamp.

He went through the routine of head-tossing against the restraint, but I had him anchored and running fairly well, and by the third flight of hurdles I thought the worst was over, we could now settle a little and design a passable race.

It wasn’t his day. At the fourth flight the horse nearest ahead put his foot through the obstacle and went down with a crash, slithering along the ground on his side. Helikon fell over him, going down fast, pitching me off: and I didn’t actually see the subsequent course of events all that clearly, though it was a pile-up worthy of a fog on a motorway. Five horses, I found afterwards, hit the deck at that jump. One of them seemed to land smack on top of me; not frightfully good for one’s health.

SIXTEEN

I lay on the grass, assessing things.

I was conscious and felt like a squashed beetle, but I hadn’t broken my legs, which I always feared most.

One of the other jockeys from the mêlée squatted beside me and asked if I was all right, but I couldn’t answer him on acount of having no breath.

‘He’s winded,’ my colleague said to someone behind me, and