to suggest his horses were going to win and felt that admitting what tactics he intended to use would be giving the game away.
Previews were all the same: trainers, jockeys, journalists, so called experts, talking dickheads, going on and on about which horses were likely to win over the four days of the Cheltenham Festival. Going round and round the mulberry bush when in fact in each race one horse crossed the line before the others – end of story.
120
The preview consisted of a dinner held in a big room at the Shelbourne, with the panel of pundits seated at a long table across the end and everyone else at tables round the room. Those attending were mostly men, mostly in dinner jackets, some without ties, mostly drinking champagne. Marius had put on a dress shirt but not bothered to brush off the mud that covered his dinner jacket from kneeling beside Bullydozer.
Shade, at drinks before dinner, was in his element. ‘Bafford Playboy’s missing Cheltenham so he’ll be fresh for Aintree,’ he was telling everyone. As was the Major, who looked about to pop: ‘I manage Willowwood. Yes, Mrs Wilkinson, pity she missed her prep race today.’ Neither man realized that the charming men hanging on their every pompous word were only interested in selling them horses.
Phoebe, who had muscled her way in with Debbie, was boasting, ‘I run the Willowwood syndicate. You should see Wilkie’s fan mail. Yes, she’s only five hands.’
Everyone was provided with notebooks to record pearls dropped by the panel.
Then Amber sauntered in from an interview with RTE, and the room went quiet. Television make-up had lengthened her yellow eyes and emphasized her big mouth. Piled-up gold hair showed off her lovely bone structure and long, slender neck. She was wearing high-heeled brown boots and a short, flesh-coloured shift with a big butch leather belt. She’d already had several glasses of champagne. Suddenly, every man in the room wanted to know how this ravishing young jockey rated Mrs Wilkinson’s chances.
During dinner, after a first course of smoked salmon, the microphone was brought over to her and Marius’s table.
‘Tell us about Mrs Wilkinson.’
‘Every time she stands up, she wins,’ replied Amber proudly. ‘Everything I ask her, she gives. She’s a street fighter. At Cheltenham, there’ll be enough horses breathing down her neck to gee her or rather gee-gee her up. She’s absolutely gorgeous.’
‘That’s enough,’ snapped Marius.
‘There’s a cloud over Mrs Wilkinson,’ volunteered one of the panel. ‘She’s never won over three miles.’
‘She won the King George – that’s three miles,’ protested Amber.
‘Do you want to tell us about Furious?’ the interviewer asked Marius, who shook his head.
‘Furious is like an Alsatian,’ chipped in Amber. ‘One doesn’t take liberties. He’s like Liam Gallagher. He may not come out of his dressing room, but if he does – wow!’
The audience were captivated. A great Irish racing journalist got up and dismissed both Furious’s and Mrs Wilkinson’s chances.
‘Furious is too edgy: never take an edgy horse to Cheltenham. Mrs Wilkinson has a wonderful jockey,’ he raised his glass to Amber, who could now be seen on the big screen coaxing Wilkie over the vast Kempton fences, ‘but she’s too small and carrying too much weight. It’s too big an ask.’
‘Boo,’ yelled Amber.
‘Eat up your dinner,’ chided the Major.
Another panellist announced that he wouldn’t look beyond Ilkley Hall. Shade smirked.
‘Which of your horses will win?’ the interviewer asked Dermie O’Driscoll.
‘Squiffey Liffey is not slow,’ said Dermie carefully. ‘He’ll go out and run a big race. Hopefully he’ll be thereabouts.’
There was also a wonderful drunk on the panel who kept interrupting and getting lost: ‘That happened where we were last week, somewhere up north, the winner was called – it’s slipped my memory.’
Amber, who had gone off table-hopping, was having a heavenly time.
‘I’ve met Willie Mullins, Tom and Elaine Taaffe, and Michael Hourigan, who’s going to send me a picture of Beef or Salmon, and JP, who’s got such merry eyes. I’ve always slagged off handicappers but I met a sweet one who showed me the way to the Ladies but wouldn’t follow me in in case he got arrested,’ she babbled to Marius, as she collapsed giggling on the chair beside him. ‘And I met Ted Walsh who’s so nice but he said such a spooky thing about Wilkie, that she was like Kicking King, who was so brave and competitive he raced his heart out, literally. I’d hate that to happen to Wilkie.’