Riders

43

“How many miles to Coventry?” sighed Fen.

“Threescore miles and ten.

Will I get there by candlelight?

Yes — but don’t come back again.”

It was the last night of the three-day East Yorkshire show. Fen lay in bed with Lester the teddy bear slumped beside her, listening to the rain irritably drumming on the roof of the lorry. Sleep had evaded her again, and even the new Dick Francis had failed to distract her. She put it down and reached for her diary with the tattered photograph of Billy tucked in between September and October. He was laughing, his eyes screwed up against the Lucerne sun.

Next week was Wembley. It had been a desperate six weeks for Fen. After Crittleden, as good as their word, the British riders had sent her to Coventry. At every show she attended people who’d been her friends cut her dead or deliberately turned their backs. She knew Rupert was behind it. He’d gone out of his way to be kind to her after she’d split up with Billy, and she’d defied him publicly and humiliatingly, which had been a terrible blow to his ego. As the majority of riders were either frightened of Rupert or jealous of Fen’s meteoric rise, they were only too happy to follow his lead.

Things were not all Campbell-Black, however. Jake’s leg was mending at last; he was expected to be out of hospital soon after Wembley and riding again by the spring. And if the Crittleden victory had enraged the riders, it had enchanted the public. News of the victimization had reached the press, who were all on Fen’s side. Overnight the telephone started ringing, with newspapers, magazines, and television companies clamoring for interviews. Invitations flooded in for her to speak at dinners, open supermarkets, address pony clubs, donate various items of her clothing to raise money at charity auctions. Everywhere she was mobbed by autograph hunters. Her post was full of fan mail from admiring men and little girls, who wanted signed photographs or help with their ponies.

For a public, hungry for new idols, Fen fitted the bill perfectly. With her slender, androgynous figure with its suggestion of anorexia, jagged cabin-boy hair, and gamin, wistful, extraordinarily photogenic face, she was a true child of her time. Just as the public was drawn to Jake because he was mysteriously enigmatic, they loved Fen because she couldn’t hide her feelings. She was either furious or suicidal or ecstatic, and her naturally friendly nature endeared her to everyone.

Fen was flattered by the fame and adulation, but all her energies were centered on the horses; all she cared about was Billy.

The horses were going superbly, except for Hardy, who was growing more ungovernable. He was too strong and fly, and ever since he’d run away with her at the Royal and Lancaster early in the month, jumping right over two rows of girl guides sitting quietly by the ringside, Fen had been frightened of him, and he knew it. If he got any worse, he’d be a serious danger to Jake when he started riding again.

The horses occupied her more than full time, and it was only on the endless drives, or when she fell into bed, usually long after midnight, that she allowed herself to think of Billy.

Rumors filtered through on the groom grapevine that all was not well in the Lloyd-Foxe household. Tracey told Dizzy, who told Sarah, who told Fen, of endless rows into the night, of Janey opening Billy’s suitcase on the motorway and throwing all his clothes out of the window, because she thought he was driving too fast, of Janey storming out of a BSJA party because she heard Fen was coming, of Billy looking white and strained, and uncharacteristically snapping at the grooms.

So Fen lived on the crumbs of hope. She knew Billy would make every effort to save his marriage, but she couldn’t help counting the days to Wembley in October, when they would all be under the same roof for a week.

The following evening a very tired Billy arrived home from the Lisbon show. It was the first show to which Janey had not accompanied him since they got back together. She had stayed at home to write a piece on international polo players. At first, Billy found it a relief to be away from the rows and hysterics, but it was not long before the old demons started nagging him. He had forgiven Janey totally for going off with Kev, but he couldn’t stop the sick, churning fear which overtook him when he rang home and she wasn’t there. He hated the idea of her being closeted with handsome polo players. He remembered how she’d first interviewed him. He could hear her now: “In the last chukka, how amazing! You are brilliant, and what amazing right arm muscles. Let me feel them. You have to be so brave to play polo.”

He and Rupert had reached Penscombe as a great red September sun was falling into the beech wood. The trees had hardly started to turn, but there was already a ring of lemon-yellow leaves round the mulberry tree in the center of the yard and a wet leaf smell of autumn in the air. Having supervised the unloading and settling-down of his horses, Billy decided to walk the half-mile home through the dusk. He needed a few minutes to prepare himself for Janey. What sort of mood would she be in? Would she have missed him? Would she have ransacked his drawers, frenziedly searching for evidence? He dreaded Wembley, because Fen’s presence would trigger off more abuse.

Dew was already whitening the grass, the blue smoke from a hundred bonfires was blending with the damp vapors rising from the stream at the bottom of the valley. A blackbird was scolding as he approached the cottage; the golden dahlias in the front garden were already losing their color in the fading light. The sick feeling of menace overwhelmed him once more. There were no lights on in the cottage.

Oh God, where was she? She knew he was coming home this evening. He broke into a run, slipping on the wet leaves and the mud. He banged the gate noisily behind him. That should give the polo player a chance to leap for his breeches. He mustn’t think that. Next moment Mavis hurtled down the path, greeting him in ecstasy. The front door was open. Janey must have gone out in a hurry. Despairingly, he dropped his case on the yellow flagstones in the hall, so he had two hands free to stroke Mavis’s joyful, wriggling body.

“Billy, darling is that you?” called Janey.

Overwhelmed with relief, he could only croak out, “Yes.”

“I’m in the drawing room.”

He found her sitting at her typewriter, wearing only his sleeveless Husky and a pair of scarlet pants.

“I thought you weren’t here,” he muttered.

She got to her feet and ran to him.

“Oh, darling, I’m sorry. The piece was going so well, I couldn’t be bothered to put the light on.”

“You’ll ruin your eyes,” said Billy. “Sorry to interrupt. Why don’t you keep on working?”

“ ’Course not, now you’re back. How d’you get on?”

Billy unzipped the holdall, produced a handful of rosettes, and chucked them down on the table.

“Brilliant,” said Janey, sorting them out. “Two firsts, three seconds, a third, a fourth, and two fifths.”

“The first was the Grand Prix, and there’s lots of loot, a lovely kitchen clock and a television set and a very obscene china bull with a huge cock. I left it at Rupert’s. I’ll bring it down in the morning.”

Watching her poring over the rosettes, her breasts falling forward, strands of bush escaping from the red satin pants, Billy felt his own cock rising and wished he didn’t always want her so much. Sex had not been brilliant lately because Janey had so often fallen asleep drunk, but if they could avoid a row before they went to bed, he might get to screw her tonight.

Janey looked up, misconstruing the expression on his face.

“Sorry I look so awful, but I took Mavis for a walk in the woods at lunchtime and my trousers got drenched, so I took them off and couldn’t be bothered to find any more.”

“You look lovely.”

“I’ve been a good little wife,” Janey went on. “There’s a casserole bubbling in the oven. I’ve ironed all your shirts; not very brilliantly, I’m afraid; some of the collars curl worse than Mavis’s tail, and I’ve got your dinner jacket back from the cleaners.”

Billy was pleased she was in high spirits; then he felt a lurch of fear. The last time he’d seen her in this manic mood, floating-on-air, that inner-directed radiance that had nothing to do with him coming home, was when she was starting her affair with Kev. He desperately wanted a huge drink to blot out the terrors.

Janey read his thoughts. “Let’s have a drink.”

He followed her into the kitchen, which looked amazingly tidy. Janey got down two glasses and, instead of reaching for the vodka for herself, got a carton of orange juice out of the fridge. Filling the glasses, she handed one to him.

“Aren’t you drinking vodka?”

“Nope. I’ve got something to celebrate.”

“You’ve sold the book in America?”

“Nope, I’m coming off the booze for a few months.” She chinked her glass against his. There was no mistaking the sparkle in her eyes. Billy couldn’t bear to look at her anymore. He went to the dresser and started flipping through his pile of mail.

“Seven and a half months, in fact,” said Janey.

“What?”

“That’s the time I’m giving up booze for.”

“Whatever for?” said Billy wearily.

“I’m going to have a baby.”

Billy dropped the pile of letters.

“Your baby,” said she softly. “Our baby.”

“How d’you know?” he muttered. There had been so many false alarms.

“James Benson confirmed it today.”

“Is he sure?”

“Absolutely.”

Billy turned incredulously.

Then she ran to him, flinging her arms round him, burying her face in his shoulder.

“Oh, Christ,” he said, “how wonderful. Oh Christ, how wonderful. Where can I hug you that I won’t hurt it?”

“Anywhere you like. It’s only six weeks old.”

“Why didn’t you tell me you were going to Benson?”

“I didn’t want you to get too excited. I told myself if I could manage to keep my trap shut until I’d had the test, it’d be all right. It’s like you not drinking until all the bills are paid off.”

“They are now. Lisbon wiped out the lot. Oh, angel, I’m so happy.”

“Are you sure?” she said in an uncertain voice. “You don’t f-feel,” she stumbled over the word, “I’ve done it to trap you into staying with me?”

She took his face in her hands and found it was wet with tears.

“I was so miserable about the low sperm count,” he muttered. “I felt such a shit not being able to give you a baby. Oh, darling, I’m so happy. It’s the best news I’ve ever had. Can we ring my mother and tell her? She’ll be beside herself.”

“D’you think?” asked Janey doubtfully. “She hasn’t paid the subscription to my fan club for a long time.”

“ ’Course she will.”

“Oh, and I told Helen,” said Janey. “She rang this afternoon, and I was so excited I had to tell someone.”

“Was she pleased?”

“Ish. You know Helen,” she said, “ ‘It’ll be a real positive experience for you, Janey. After all, you’re still just at prime child-bearing age.’ The silly cow.”

Billy grinned. “I still can’t take it in. God, it’s wonderful.”

The telephone went. Billy leapt on it.

“Hi. Guess what? Oh, you know,” he said, sounding a little deflated. “Helen must have told you. Isn’t it? I haven’t come down to earth yet.”

“Rupert is terribly pleased,” said Billy as he put down the receiver. “He wanted to bring a magnum of Krug over, but I said it’d be wasted on us, so he suggested some extra strong grass that Guy had sold him.”

Janey giggled. “No, that’s all behind us. We’re responsible parents-to-be now. Let’s go and have a fuck instead.”

Fen and Sarah arrived at Wembley just before midnight on Sunday. Fen was utterly shattered. She hadn’t eaten or slept properly for weeks. Jake could only help so much, as though by remote control. She’d had a bad fall from Hardy and her back still ached. The very thought of jumping the four horses all week, in big classes that went on late into the evening, filled her with exhaustion.

Next morning, on her way to declare, she looked through the red curtains and saw Billy walking the course for a novice class. He was wearing old green cords and a tweed coat and laughing at some crack of Rupert’s. He looked so happy and carefree and so much younger. Her heart twisted with longing. I’m not cured, she thought in panic. In the secretary’s tent she found Humpty and Griselda, who both turned their backs on her. Oh, God, how long was this stupid pantomine going on?

Early in the evening, when she was least expecting it, she bumped into Billy. He was very friendly, but shifty somehow, not meeting her eyes and firing questions about Jake and the yard, asking after Laurel twice and congratulating her in a hearty, most unBillyish way. He seemed almost in a hurry to get away from her, which left her far more uneasy and depressed than the other riders shunning her.

She wandered down to the stables. Macaulay’s top door was shut to stop his adoring public feeding him and tugging souvenir hairs out of his mane. She slid into the box and shut the doors quickly behind her. Macaulay whickered with pleasure but didn’t get up, so she sat down on the straw beside him, stroking his mane, still crinkly from the afternoon plaits.

There were two classes that evening — a fancy dress pair relay and then the Sunday Times Cup, worth £10,000. She hadn’t entered the relay because she was scared no one would want to be her partner. Outside, she heard shrieks of laughter. Standing up, she peered through the crack in the box and saw Billy and Rupert teetering past wearing fishnet stockings, three-inch heels, and coats and skirts with coconuts heaving in their twin-sets. Rupert, immaculate in a blond wig, was Mrs. Thatcher; Billy, wearing a mop on his head, was Shirley Williams. Then they were gone, and next door she could hear Sarah getting Hardy ready for the Sunday Times Cup. Fen sighed and sat down beside Macaulay again. She was just nodding off when she heard hoofs clattering outside, and an excited voice saying: “Guess what? Gossip, gossip, gossip.” It was Dizzy.

“What?” said Sarah, coming to the door.

“Where’s Fen?” asked Dizzy.

“In the lorry, I think. I haven’t seen her for some time. Come on, out with it.”

“Janey Lloyd-Foxe is pregnant.”

Fen’s hand tightened convulsively on Macaulay’s mane.

“Jesus,” said Sarah. “When did you find out?”

“Well Count Guy, Billy, Rupert, and Driff were all declaring. And Count Guy was ribbing Billy, saying he’d heard some très interessant rumors, and Billy went all scarlet and pleased and admitted Janey was having a baby. Count Guy was tickled pink, of course. He didn’t like Billy being separated from Janey, in case he started running after Lavinia again. Anyway, they were busy congratulating each other when bloody Driffield said, “Who’s the father? Kevin Coley?” The next minute Billy let him have one on the jaw — wham — sending Driff flying across the tent. Then Billy jumped on Driff with his hands round Driff’s neck, howling, ‘Take it back, you effing bastard,’ and other pleasantries.”

“Golly,” said Sarah.

“Rupert and Count Guy dragged Billy off and Driffield said he’d get Billy suspended. ‘No, you won’t,’ said Rupert. ‘There’s nothing in the BSJA rules about eliminating a competitor before an event, only during.’ ”

Both grooms started to giggle.

“Anyway,” Dizzy went on, “Malise made Driffield apologize. Driff said it was only a joke and Billy, Rupert, and Guy turned on their booted heels and stalked out undeclared, and had to come back five minutes later when Driffield had gone. So it looks as though Driff, not your poor boss, is going to be the next candidate for Coventry.”

“Christ,” said Sarah, “Fen’ll go bananas when she hears. He must be mad about Janey to punch Driff. I’m glad someone has at last; he’s such a poisonous little toad.”

“I thought Billy couldn’t have kids,” said Dizzy. “Do you think it is Kev’s?”

Like a sleepwalker, Fen came out of Macaulay’s box.

“Fen,” gasped Dizzy, backing into the patiently waiting Arcturus. “We didn’t realize you were there.”

“Obviously not,” said Fen, “or you wouldn’t keep Rupert’s horse hanging round in the cold. All you bloody well do all day is gossip.”

Not even bothering to close Macaulay’s door, she walked unsteadily away from them. “Billy’s going to have a baby,” she muttered over and over again through trembling lips. She had no idea where she went, but she ended up in the lorry, locking the door behind her.

A few minutes later she heard pounding on the door.

“Fen, it’s Sarah. They’re walking the course.”

“I don’t care,” sobbed Fen. “Leave me alone.”

“Please — I’m sorry about your overhearing everything, but Hardy’s all ready and I know you wanted to jump him in this class.”

“Go away, for Christ’s sake.”

“Let me in. I want to look after you.”

Fen didn’t answer. She lay on her bed, sobbing convulsively, shuddering like a palsied dog. She couldn’t cope anymore. There was no future, nothing, nothing. The light had gone out at the end of the tunnel; both ends were blocked up; there was no hope. “Oh, Billy, oh, Billy,” she groaned.

Then she heard someone fiddling with the door handle, then voices, then more fiddling and the door was forced open and the inside of the living area was flooded with light.

“Go away,” Fen screamed. “I can’t take it. I simply can’t take it.”

Then she saw a man’s figure framed in the doorway.

“Billy,” she croaked, in an insane moment of hope. “Oh, Billy.”

“Afraid not, sweetheart,” drawled a voice. “You’ll just have to put up with second best.”

It was Dino Ferranti.

Fen slumped back on the bed. “Leave me fucking alone.”

“You can’t fuck alone. It’s a physical impossibility,” said Dino, sitting down on the bed and drawing her close to him. “There, honey, hush, hush.” He stroked her hair, damp with tears, feeling her drenched shirt and jersey against him, horrified by the fragility of her body.

“I love him so much I don’t know what to do.”

“Hush, don’t try to talk.” Gradually he managed to calm her.

“What am I to do?” she repeated shakily.

Dino pulled off a piece of paper towel, dried her eyes, and held out another piece for her to blow her nose with.

“There are still twelve riders to jump before you. You’re gonna get dressed and jump that course.”

“I am bloody not.”

“Sure you are. Just figure if this had happened in L.A. You couldn’t just not jump. Every round’s a dress rehearsal for that day, right?”

“Los Angeles is ten months away,” snapped Fen. “I’m having difficulty getting through the next five minutes.”

She was shivering violently now.

Dino poured her a glass of brandy.

“Have a slug of this.”

“I don’t want it.”

“Yes, you do. Open your mouth.” He almost forced it down her throat.

“Bastard,” said Fen, but she drank it.

“Now get out of those clothes.” Like a father, he removed her shirt and tie, which were streaked with lipstick and mascara.

“That’s my lucky shirt and tie,” moaned Fen, covering her breasts with her arms.

“Haven’t brought you much luck today,” said Dino. “Try another combination.” He held out a clean shirt for her.

“I am not going to jump,” said Fen mutinously. “Not on Hardy. He’s a nightmare and I haven’t walked the course.”

“You’ve got time to watch the last three rounds,” said Dino. “Come on, put your jacket on and borrow my shades.”

“I hate you,” said Fen. “I truly, truly hate you.”

For a moment, as he stood behind her while she checked her appearance in the mirror, she was struck by the contrast between her waiflike figure, white face, and swollen eyes, and Dino, brown as peanut butter, ridiculously elegant in a black silk shirt and pale gray suit. He’d streaked his hair pale gray since she’d last seen him.

“Talk about Beauty and the Beast,” she said.

News of Janey’s pregnancy and Billy punching Driffield had spread rapidly around the showground.

Fen came out of the lorry to find the place swarming with reporters. Dino dispatched them ruthlessly. No, Fen couldn’t speak to anyone, nor could she sign autographs. With his arms round her, he forced a gangway through the crowd.

“Who’s that with her?” asked the man from the Express. “Face is familiar.”

“Think he’s an actor,” said the girl from the Mirror.

By some miracle they had time to watch a couple of rounds.

“Watch the wall,” warned Sarah. “There’s been a lot of mistakes there, and the combination’s on a funny stride. People have been taking three strides, then changing their minds and asking the horses off too early, then hitting the third element.”

“I suppose you know all about it,” snapped Fen at Sarah.

“I’m awfully sorry, Fen,” said Sarah in an undertone. “I’m so glad you made it.”

“I wouldn’t have,” said Fen, casting a venomous glance at Dino, “if Mussolini here hadn’t come jackbooting round. Why can’t I go into a decline in peace?”

Mary Jo Wilson, the number one American girl rider, auburn-haired and extremely attractive, was in the ring. She took a brick out of the wall and had a pole down at the second element, then crashed through the third. The crowd gave a groan of sympathy.

“What did I tell you?” said Dino. “Hi, Mary Jo,” he shouted as she came out of the ring.

“Dino!” Her face lit up. “I didn’t know you were in Europe.”

“How many clears?” Fen asked Sarah.

“Only four.”

Dino removed his dark glasses from a protesting Fen.

“But my eyes are still red.”

“Just fantasize you’re a white rat.”

She rode through the cherry red curtains into the brilliantly lit arena.

“And here comes Fenella Maxwell,” said Dudley Diplock, in ecstasy. “Hot from her brilliant second in the Crittleden Gold Cup, on Hardy.”

The crowd, who’d been bitterly disappointed when Fen hadn’t appeared at her appointed place in the class and had assumed she’d scratched, gave a cheer of delighted surprise.

“Bloody unfair,” grumbled Griselda. “Why should they waive the rules for her?”

“Because she’s a star,” said Billy. “She’s the one they’ve come to see.”

It is the mark of a great athlete that the mind can transcend adversity, and somehow heighten the performance. After two shaky jumps, which had her fans gasping and nearly stripped the paint off the poles, Fen clicked into automatic pilot. Hardy, given his head and showing his true quality, went clear. The crowd went berserk. Their idol hadn’t failed them. Crittleden wasn’t just a flash in the pan.

“Thank God I didn’t walk the course,” said Fen as she came out. “I’d have been so terrified I’d never have crossed the starting line.”

“You made a cock-up at the first two fences,” said Dino.

“Don’t come on like Jake,” said Fen icily. “I’m going back to the lorry.”

“No, you’re not,” said Dino, catching her by the scruff of her neck. “You’ve got to jump off.”

He took her up into the riders’ stand to watch the first rounds. From all sides people hailed him.

“Where are zee horses?” asked Hans Schmidt.

“Arriving the day after tomorrow. I might jump Manny in the Victor Ludorum.”

At that moment Billy’s number was called. Behind Fen and Dino, Janey Lloyd-Foxe was holding court, looking ravishing in a red wool Laura Ashley smock.

“You’d think she was eight months pregnant,” muttered Fen savagely. Janey was talking to Doreen Hamilton, speaking more slowly than usual so that Fen could hear every word.

“Yes, Billy is absolutely over the moon. The night I told him, he couldn’t sleep for excitement. It’s going to be a terrific incentive to his career. He says he’s jumping for two now. He’s treating me like glass. Won’t even let me pick up a duster.”

Never been her forte anyway, said Fen to herself, her knuckles white where she clutched her whip.

“When’s it due?” asked Doreen.

“June. Billy’ll be at the Royal and the International, but he says he’ll probably cancel both.”

The jump-off course was a blur before Fen’s eyes.

“Oh, here comes my darling,” said Janey as Billy, the first to jump off, cantered into the arena, a huge grin spread across his face. “Don’t you think prospective fatherhood suits him?”

Dino put a hand on Fen’s knee. “Ignore her,” he said. “She’s only trying to wind you up.”

Bugle put in an incredibly fast time. Janey went into noisy ecstasy.

“Never seen him ride before,” said Dino. “He’s bloody good. No one’s going to be able to cruise after that.”

He was right. Both Ludwig and Wishbone clocked up slower times. In came Rupert to the usual ecstatic, schoolgirl screams. The whole of the pony club stand, hopeful of losing their virginity in such a glorious cause, rose to their feet to cheer.

“Extraordinary that someone so good-looking should be such a bastard,” said Dino. “Like a blackbird singing the most exquisite song and dumping on you at the same time. Jesus, look at that acceleration. He ought to have starting gates.”

As Snakepit stampeded the course, the jumps hardly seemed to exist. He skimmed them effortlessly like a pebble flicked in ducks and drakes.

“He’s improved a whole lot since the World Championships,” said Dino, as Rupert thundered home two seconds faster than Billy. “Pow, you can’t help admiring him.”

“I can, only too easily,” said Fen.

Joyously raking his hand down Snakepit’s steel gray plaits, Rupert shot out through the red curtains, sending Hardy flying.

“Why don’t you look where you’re going, clumsy oaf?” snarled Fen.

“Because I don’t like what’s in my way,” snapped Rupert, “and if Svengali Lovell can tell you how to beat that time, I’m a Dutchman.”

“Unfair to Dutchmen,” Fen shouted back over her shoulder. “Some of them are rather nice.”

“Remember, if you’re going too fast, accelerate,” Dino called after her.

Suddenly, Fen remembered Rupert in Rome sneering at her disastrous performances in the Nations’ Cup, saying that women always crack under pressure.

To hell with Rupert, she said to herself, to hell with Janey Lloyd-Foxe and her beastly baby. If I’m going to commit suicide this is as good a way as any.

Having bowed briefly to the Princess in the Royal box, she turned Hardy round and thundered through the start at a gallop. Hardy, who was used to being checked all the time and fighting for his head, was puzzled for a minute, then rose to the challenge. Over the first fence she was up on Rupert’s time, throwing herself over, her hands nearly touching Hardy’s noseband. Over the parallel bars and, with an amazing flying change, she jumped the gate almost sideways.

God, thought Dino, suddenly terrified, she’s taking me literally. Scorching over the upright, bucketing over the walls, Fen was already looking ahead to the combination. She was coming in too fast; she was going to crash. She knew a terrifying moment of fear, then Hardy took over and executed a trio of perfect jumps and hurtled Fen through the finish. From the earsptitting cheers of the crowd, who had risen to their feet, she knew she had beaten Rupert’s time. The problem now was stopping. At the side of the arena a bank of blue hydrangeas came to meet them. Hardy skidded to the right, sliding along on his back legs for five seconds before coming to a halt.

Fen sauntered out of the ring, pleased that for once even Dino seemed shaken out of his customary cool.

The next moment Ludwig clapped his hand on her back.

“Brilliant. I haf never seen a round like zat.”

Count Guy followed suit, and suddenly all the British riders, except Rupert and Griselda, were shaking her hand and hugging her. She was home from Coventry at last.

Was it all worth it? wondered Fen, as she accepted her red rosette from the Princess, with the huge, silver cup sparkling even more dazzlingly as it reflected the lights. Was it worth the lack of sleep, the setbacks, the heartbreaks, for this moment of glory? She admired the Princess’s perfect ankles in flesh-colored tights as she walked back to the Royal box. Then there was a terrific roll of drums which nearly sent Snakepit and Rupert into orbit, leaving a gap between Fen and Billy, who was third. Turning, Fen looked him straight in the eye. With a supreme effort, far greater than winning the cup, she managed to smile. “I’m so pleased about your baby,” she said.

Then, before he had time to answer, the arena was plunged in darkness and Fen and the dappled gray Hardy were illuminated by the spotlight. She was aware that no one was leaving, there was no crashing of seats or banging of exit doors, or feet running down the concrete steps, just a long silence followed by the most almighty cheering, and, as the band struck up “I want some red roses for a blue lady,” everyone started singing and clapping in time. Then the other riders filed out and she was alone and spotlit in the ring, sending Hardy into his wonderful, effortless, long striding gallop, and the crowd cheered so loudly that she went round again. Billy may not love me, she thought, but they do. Why can’t I go on riding around this ring for the rest of my life?

Dudley captured her in the collecting ring, brandishing his microphone like a furry, black iced lolly: “Se-uper, absolutely seuper. You sorted out the girls from the boys today.” He roared with laughter. He’d had too many in the whisky tent. “And Harvey went seuperly. You must be pleased.”

“He did, and I am.”

“Must be a cert for L.A. now.”

“You can’t look beyond tomorrow with horses,” said Fen.

“Must be difficult to choose between him and Esmeralda.”

Fen looked broodingly at Dudley for a second.

“She’s called Desdemona, and he’s called Hardy, and why don’t you remove your silly hat when you’re talking to a lady, Dudley. Although, knowing you, you probably think I’m a gentleman.”

Oh, Christ, she thought, I shouldn’t have said that.

Out of the corner of her eye, beyond the Shetland ponies and the famous ex-racehorses who were lining up for the personality parade, she could see a pack of reporters hovering.

“Well done, Fen, wizard round. Let’s have a jar later in the week,” bellowed a voice, and there, leering above her, almost sending Dudley flying, was Monica Carlton bowling past with her Welsh cobs.

“One door shuts, another door opens,” said Fen, giving Monica a weak smile. Dudley was flapping around saying good night to the viewers and reminding them to switch on tomorrow for the puissance. Fen tried to dive behind a coster’s van, but the reporters were old hands. Next moment they’d ringed her like a lasso, blocking her escape on all sides.

“What d’you think about Billy Lloyd-Foxe’s wife having a baby?”

“I’m very pleased for him.”

“Nothing else to say?”

“If it grows up like Billy, it’ll be a wonderful child.”

“But not like Janey?”

“I didn’t say that.” Fen looked desperately round for help. “I hardly know Janey.”

“You were very fond of Billy, weren’t you?”

“It’s difficult not to be,” said Fen, bursting into tears. “He hasn’t an enemy in the world.”

All she could see was their avid searching eyes and their frantically scribbling pens.

“Why can’t you leave me alone?” she sobbed.

A shadow fell across the notebooks.

“Pack it in,” said Dino coldly and, taking the couple nearest Fen by their coat collars, he yanked them out of the way. “Bugger off and fuse your own typewriters with your lousy copy. You heard what the lady said — leave her alone.”