see you so relaxed,’ she shouted.
They were all out. ‘Are you ready, jockeys?’ called the starter. The flag fell, the tapes flew, they were racing.
As Bullydozer, a lunatic front-runner, set off, binoculars leapt to eyes, race cards were scoured, as despite competing with two ex-flat horses, Lusty and Julien, he shot fourteen lengths clear. After the first circuit he showed no sign of letting up.
‘Bloody hell,’ muttered Joey, ‘Josh told me to back him to lose.’
Rogue, as usual, chose to hover at the back and join the leaders at the last fence, particularly as it once again gave him the bittersweet pleasure of admiring Amber’s graceful haunches, lust riding Lusty.
Gradually, Julien Sorel, Ilkley Hall and Internetso reduced the gap between themselves and Bullydozer.
Tommy, knowing what was at stake, watched the race through her fingers. Marius, in the last-chance saloon, was smoking with his back to the course. Mrs Wilkinson, mid div, was bustling along easily.
‘Lovely girl,’ cajoled Amber.
In front of her, Internetso, Julien Sorel and Ilkley Hall were toughing it out up the hill, turning the turf black with their hoofprints, white plumes of breath rising from their nostrils as they overtook Bullydozer, who’d run a gallant race.
‘Go for eet, Amber,’ yelled Rafiq as now in fourth place she passed him.
But there was no room for a little one.
‘Go back to the Pony Club, snotty bitch,’ yelled Killer, glancing around. ‘We’re not letting you through.’
Mrs Wilkinson thought different. The crowds at Cheltenham remember it to this day. Glimpsing back through her legs, realizing Rogue was about to swoop, Amber, using Ilkley Hall’s plump quarters as a guideline, jinked Wilkie at a right-angle right, then right-angle left like a polo pony, then right-angle left again, three sides of a square, before putting on a phenomenal burst of speed and drawing away from the leaders.
Heartened by the crowd bellowing her name, their cheers driving her forward, Mrs Wilkinson belted up the home straight, somehow escaping her pursuers.
That same moment Bullydozer, like Count Romeo, seeing his dear mentor and protector surging ahead, responding to Rafiq’s whip and pounding heels, caught the leaders on the hop, scorned Rogue’s late run and passed the post hardly a length behind Mrs Wilkinson.
Marius fought back the tears but Joey had no such reserve. One had wagered £1,000 he couldn’t afford on each horse, the other £500.
Pocock’s hand slipped joyfully into Painswick’s, Alan’s into Tilda’s and Woody hugged Niall. ‘Thank you, dear, dear God.’ Etta jumped up and down, up and down, clutching Dora, both yelling at the tops of their voices, drowned by the ecstatic roar of the crowd. Once past the post, Mrs Wilkinson slowed to a walk. Amber, delirious with joy, turned to shake hands with Rafiq.
‘We did it, we did it, we beat the buggers.’
Next moment Rogue had caught up with them.
‘Well done, darling, bloody good,’ he told Amber, ‘and as for you, you little tinker,’ leaning over, he hugged Mrs Wilkinson, ruffling her mane and pulling her ears. The crowd, loving a generous loser, roared even louder.
‘Thank God Rupert isn’t here,’ said Rogue. ‘I’d be Campbell-Black and blue for getting beat.’
For a divine second, he and Amber smiled at each other, then Dare Catswood, who’d come fifth, cantered up. ‘Well done, Amber,’ he shouted. ‘Bloody good show, Bolly’s on you tonight.’
Fuck, fuck, fuck, thought Amber as Rogue’s face closed up and he trotted off.
But as Wilkie, led by Dora and Tommy, entered the noisily appreciative winners enclosure, Marius noticed they were practically holding her up. For once her ears weren’t pricked but flat against her hung-down head, her white face black with mud, her sides heaving, and with a lurch of guilt and gratitude he realized she’d given her all to save him and his yard.
As they posed for photographs, he put his arms round her and kissed her on her forehead. ‘You’re a mare in a million.’ Then he kissed Amber, ‘Well done.’
‘You shouldn’t get rid of your cast-offs so casually,’ Dora taunted a hopping Harvey-Holden, who’d only managed fourth place with Ilkley Hall.
‘Glad we took the informed decision to give Mrs Wilkinson another chance,’ said the Major pompously.
‘Oh ye of little faith,’ murmured Niall.
Chisolm was less restrained. Resenting such disloyalty to Mrs Wilkinson, she lowered her head and butted a posturing Major on his posterior.
‘That’s why they’re called buttocks, because they get butted,’ said Dora to howls of laughter, as a furious Major picked himself up from the mud.
Marius was on his mobile, grinning like a lottery winner.
‘It’s Valent,’ he said.