It stops me lifting my arm up.’
‘Do you wear it always?’
I nodded. ‘Mm.’
‘Even in bed?’
‘Not this one. A softer one.’
‘Isn’t it a nuisance?’
‘I’m so used to it I never notice.’
She looked up at my face. ‘Couldn’t you get it fixed? Isn’t there an operation?’
‘I’m allergic to scalpels.’
‘Reasonable.’
She stretched for a cigarette and I lit it, and we sat side by side talking about her job, and mine, her childhood and mine, her tastes in books and places and people, and mine.
Exploration, not conflagration.
When the time was right I kissed her again. And went home.
7
I spent most of the next week in Newmarket, staying with a trainer friend for the sales and the races.
Crispin, sober and depressed, had sworn to stay off drink in my absence and find a job, and as usual I had assured him he had the willpower to do both. Experience always proved me wrong, but to him the fiction was a prop.
Sophie had worked awkward hours all week-end and Monday but said she would come down to my house for lunch the next Sunday, if I would like. I could bear it, I said.
The whole mob was at Newmarket. All the bloodstock agents, big and small. All the trainers with runners, all the jockeys with mounts, all the owners with hopes. All the clients with their cheque books ready. All the breeders with their year’s work at stake. All the bookies looking for mugs. All the Press looking for exclusives.
I had commissions for eleven yearlings if I could find good ones at the right price, and in most cases my clients’ money was already in my bank. I should have been feeling quietly pleased with the way business was expanding but found instead a compulsive tendency to look over my shoulder for Frizzy Hair.
The fact that nothing else had happened over the weekend had not persuaded me that nothing would. The attacks still seemed senseless to me, but someone somewhere must have seen a point to them, and the point was in all likelihood still there.
Crispin had sworn on everything sacred from the Bible to his 2nd XV rugger cap that he had found the bottle of whiskey standing ready and uncapped on the kitchen table,and had smelled it as soon as he went through the door. At the tenth vehement repetition, I believed him.
Someone knew about my shoulder. Knew about my brother. Knew I kept horses in transit in my yard. Knew I was buying a horse for Kerry Sanders to give to Nicol Brevett. Someone knew a damn sight too much.
The Newmarket sale ring would have suited Kerry Sanders: a large enclosed amphitheatre, warm, well lit and endowed with tip-up armchairs. At ground level round the outside, under the higher rows of seating, were small offices rented by various bloodstock agents. Each of the large firms had its own office, and also a few individuals like Vic Vincent. One had to do a good deal of business to make the expense worth it, though the convenience was enormous. I would have arrived, I thought, when I had my own little office at every major sale ring. As it was I did my paperwork as usual in the margins of the catalogue and conducted meetings in the bar.
I turned up on the first day, Tuesday, before the first horse was sold, because often there were bargains to be had before the crowds came, and was buttonholed just inside the gate by Ronnie North.
‘I got your cheque for River God,’ he said. ‘Now tell me, wasn’t that just what you wanted?’
‘You should have seen it.’
He looked pained. ‘I saw it race last spring.’
‘I shouldn’t think it had been groomed since.’
‘You can’t have everything for that money.’
He was a small whippet of a man, as quick on his feet as in his deals. He never looked anyone in the face for long. His eyes were busy as usual, looking over my shoulder to see who was arriving, who going and what chance of the quick buck he might be missing.
‘Did he like it?’ he asked.
‘Who?’
‘Nicol Brevett.’
Something in my stillness drew his attention. The wander ing eyes snapped back to my face and he took rapid stock of his indiscretion.
I said, ‘Did you know it was for Nicol before you sold it to me?’
‘No,’ he said, but his fractional hesitation meant ‘yes’.
‘Who told you?’
‘Common knowledge,’ he said.
‘No, it wasn’t. How did you know?’
‘Can’t remember.’ He showed signs of having urgent business elsewhere and edged three steps sideways.
‘You just