the country, hidden by a clump of trees and a small building where the stable lads camped out. Any moment Killer was going to ram an elbow into Amber’s ribs and hoist her over the rail: ‘You’re going hurdling, you bitch,’ and Amber would have no strength in her right hand to tug Bullydozer back. To his horror, Rogue realized the wings of the next fence were hurtling towards her. She was going to crash into them.
Killer was drifting back to the right so no one could blame him. Amber had lost her balance, and her saddle – hadn’t Michelle tightened the girths sufficiently? – was slipping to the left.
Picking up his whip, Rogue thrust History Painting forward, forcing their way between Amber and Killer, reaching up because Bullydozer was so much bigger, grabbing Amber’s wrist so she screamed in agony, tugging her upright, grabbing her reins with his other hand, holding her until she managed to right herself, as somehow, taking most of the brushwood with them, they survived the next fence.
‘You stupid, stupid bitch, what have you done?’ yelled Rogue, then glancing down he saw the wrist brace and vet wrap. ‘Jesus.’
‘Let me go, go on,’ gasped Amber, whiter than the daytime moon, as they hurtled round the bend into the home straight.
Fortunately Bullydozer had realized the race was longer than the Derby and decided to pull himself up. So Rogue, mindful of his two hundred wins, beetled off, made one of his spectacular last-minute runs and mugged an enraged Killer and Playboy on the line.
Killer and an even angrier Harvey-Holden called for a stewards’ inquiry. Amber had cut across Playboy and bumped him several times. Without this he’d have been several more lengths ahead and Rogue would never have caught him.
‘Neither Marius nor Shade will ever put you up again,’ gloated Harvey-Holden. He didn’t want to make too much fuss in case Rogue reported Killer for intimidating Amber.
Amber sorted things by fainting in the middle of the inquiry and the strapped-up wrist was discovered.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she stammered when she came round, ‘I had a fall on the gallops this morning. I thought it was OK to ride. I was wrong, I couldn’t hold him up, he barged into Playboy.’
An X-ray revealed a broken wrist and broken thumb.
The stewards agreed there wasn’t much point suspending her. According to the course doctor, the wrist would have to be pinned and she wouldn’t be riding for at least three months anyway, so they put it down to unintentional interference.
‘You’ve been very stupid,’ the Stipendiary Steward, who was a friend of her father’s, told her sternly. ‘If it doesn’t heal right, you have only yourself to blame. And I hope you’ll be suitably grateful to Rogue, who saved your life or at least your riding career. He not only pulled you straight but managed to pull up your horse – one of the most spectacularly brave pieces of—’
‘The horse was tired. He pulled himself up,’ said Amber sulkily.
‘Don’t be so ungrateful,’ snapped the Stipe.
97
Amber spent a week in Larkminster hospital and in a lot of pain after an operation to set and pin her wrist and thumb. But the pain in her heart was worse. No matter how many flowers and cards poured in from friends and from the public – ‘Please get well soon, Mrs Wilkinson needs you’ – she kept thinking of how she had put her life on hold, determined to make it as a jockey, and if she were off for at least four months, as the doctors now forecast, everyone would forget her. She was suicidal.
Marius, though delighted History Painting had won the Edward Thring Cup, was not going to forgive her for riding for Harvey-Holden. Nor was Shade:
‘How dare you ride with a broken wrist, making me look a prat.’
‘Special’ Donaldson had cancelled lunch, and who was now going to ride Mrs Wilkinson?
No matter how much Tommy and Rafiq and her sweet father, Billy, tried to reassure her this was just a blip in her career, Amber sank into despair.
Matters weren’t helped by Rogue all over the papers and television winning Ride of the Week for his gallant rescue, or when Amber’s unprincipled, scoop-crazy mother, Janey, interviewed Rogue for the Daily Mail. THE BRAVE SIR GALAHAD WHO SAVED MY AMBER’S LIFE was accompanied by sexy photographs of Rogue, stripped to the waist, flaunting his six-pack, highlighted brown hair tousled, kingfisher-blue eyes flashing.
Having just clocked his one hundred and thirtieth winner, Rogue was quoted as