Blind Beauty (24 page)

“Grow up, Tessa. I thought you were well on the way, until now.”

“You don't know what it feels like!”

“I do, Tessa. Believe me, I do. And for a man, not a horse.”

Tessa was silent. Where did that leave her now? Sarah's secret, private life that none of them knew about. Sarah, who was so beautiful and marvellous, never seemed to have a man. It must be by choice. Gilly, who was far from beautiful and not marvellous at all, seemed to have them by the dozen.

“I'm sorry,” she said miserably.

“I do know what it feels like and it's truly awful but you just have to be patient.”

Well, that wasn't one of her virtues, for sure.

But, late, late in the afternoon when she was in the depths of despair, the man himself rang up, very jovial, and said the deed was done, everything looked promising, no hitches, the horse was fine.

“Give us a few days. We'll keep in touch.”

“Champagne!” shouted Jimmy, and brought out two bottles of beer. Everyone cheered. Tessa couldn't believe it was over.

“Give or take complications, of course,” Jimmy added.

“Complications?”

“Oh, come on, Jimmy, think positive,” Sarah said. “Give the girl a break. Here's to Buffoon winning the Grand National!”

They all roared with laughter, save Tessa. A little knot of her inside gave a lurch. They wouldn't laugh, if she had anything to do with it! She was mad, of course, they were always telling her.

Were there complications? If there were, they didn't let Tessa know. But Buffoon didn't come home for a long time. The bill got bigger every day. They kept telling her he was fine, but what they said to Jimmy she never knew. On a Saturday, almost at the end of the season, she got a ride at Sandown in a modest two-mile chase, from a trainer whose horse only liked women.

“We'll give it a try,” he said. “You're good for a girl.”

Not really patronizing, just honest, Tessa thought. The horse behaved perfectly, and down at the start a fellow jockey, surprised, said what a pig it was as a rule.

“What's your secret?”

“Trainer says it only likes women.”

“Just like me,” the jockey grinned.

But the piggy horse came second, and the trainer was pleased, and Tessa knew he would ask her again. But second! Only wins counted and she was tired of seconds.

When she got home, tired, her eyes turned as usual to the empty box in the yard – to see the big chestnut bonehead looking out. Buffoon saw her and whickered in recognition. He
saw
her! His eyes were dark and shining again, as if he were a two-year-old.

“Buffy!” she shrieked, and ran towards him.

Lucky's nose inched over the door, whinnying to be noticed, and Tessa threw her arms round their necks, ecstatic.

It was the best day of her life, even better than her first win.

B
uffoon was put out to grass to recover, along with Lucky and the horses that stayed at the yard for their summer holidays. The season was over. Tessa paid Peter for Buffoon's grass keep, a modest amount, and sent off the enormous cheque for Buffoon's operation. The money behind the hot water boiler just covered it.

“Next season, Mum, I'll give you all my riding fees. All my winnings! I'll pay you back in no time.”

Myra was still worried Maurice might find out. Tessa could see that she was afraid of him now. Did he knock her about? His temper was growing worse all the time, and Tessa thought he did, although Myra denied it. But she would.

After a few weeks on the lush valley grass Buffoon looked like a different horse. His fine summer coat shone like polished copper, the flesh filled out over all his prominent bones and high-sprung ribs. Tessa feasted her eyes on him, leaning over the gate. He would come to her out of pure affection when he saw her, not just for a bucket of food, quite a rare thing in a horse. He had the sweetest, friendliest nature of any horse she had come across. The others even agreed with her in this.

“Soft as butter,” Sarah said.

“I'm going to start riding him again,” Tessa said. “Get him fit.”

There was time now, in the summer, with no racehorses to exercise. Sarah, Wisbey and Gilly were going to other jobs for the summer, and there was just her and Arthur to look after the at-grass horses and keep the place tidy. Buffoon was no longer convalescent, and Tessa longed to be on his back again.

The first time, Jimmy rode out with her, to be on the safe side.

They saddled up and went off up the track towards the gallops, Walter loping ahead. It was only walking, for Buffoon was totally unfit. Tessa knew it would take hours of walking and then slow trotting to get him back in shape. In shape for what?

Tessa could not shake off her ambition to have him back in racing.

Jimmy guessed it, although Tessa said nothing.

They rode up the grass track on to the down in silence, feeling the spring breeze on their faces with its smell of distant hawthorn blossom and sweet-flowering grass. The clouds sailed serenely over the hill. Two hares ran away ahead of them, big as dogs, luring Walter. He chased them but they jinked and he lost them, too big to turn as fast as they could. By the time he had stopped and turned they were almost out of sight.

“He'd never have won the Waterloo Cup,” Jimmy said.

“Good. I love hares.”

It was wonderful riding her dear horse in this lovely place. If one turned one's eyes from the ugly blot of Goldlands on the ridge, this valley was pure paradise. Tessa thought, I really do belong here. It's all because of Shiner. Finding out that Buffoon was her son made me stay. She had hated it, she remembered, until then.

Buffoon remembered the gallops and pulled to go up the hill, thinking he was there for a workout, but Tessa told him otherwise, and they gained the top at a walk. They pulled up there, and sat for a moment taking in the blue distance.

“You needn't have come. He's as good as gold,” Tessa said.

“I like it. What we all need more of. Pure pleasure.”

“I'm going to ride him every day.”

Jimmy didn't say anything, but on the way back he said, “What are you planning for Buffoon?”

“Just to get him fit, happy.”

“What for?”

“To ride.”

“Ride where?”

Tessa didn't answer.

“He's too old now, Tessa, to race.”

“Horses win when they're old! McVidi, Eastern Emperor – sixteen!”

“Freaks. And not turned away during their prime years, and starved.”

“A little race or two, why not?”

“Tessa, think it through. Peter can't train him for nothing. It's not fair to ask him. Registering him in your name, getting your colours, all the extras – it costs a mint before you've even started. Why is it only rich people have racehorses? Or have them in syndicates, a share of six or twelve? You will never, never be able to afford it.”

“Peter can have all my wages, every penny! And my riding fees, everything!”

She had given away her private plans now. Jimmy had guessed them anyway. This thing at the back of her mind, to ride Buffy on the racecourse, to ride him over the big jumps with the roar of the crowd in her ears … She had seen enough, done enough, to make the ambition a realistic proposition, drawing a veil over all the problems Jimmy was describing. And the money was owed to her mother… the money she was so glibly promising to Peter.

“I only mention it,” Jimmy said, “because I know the way your mind works. And how fierce you are when you want something. It's called nipping it in the bud.”

Tessa was silent. Whatever he said, she knew the dream would not go away.

“Enjoy what you've got. You've got him safe and happy, more than any of us thought possible.”

“You said put him down!”

“I know.”

“Now you say… it's the same, not thinking it can be done – it can be!”

“At Peter's expense. It's hardly fair.”

“Not if I earn the money.”

“No, but such a lot of money. You've no idea.”

“But if I train him myself, ride him in the afternoon, in my spare time… Peter needn't spend any time on him.”

She had thought about it such a lot, all her waking time, how she could do it.

“If he runs under Peter's name, Peter's got to take a hand in it. Don't be stupid, Tessa. I just want you to see sense.”

“You always said to me, about being a jockey, if you want something enough you can do it. I want this.”

“Fine, being a jockey. But putting Buffoon in training will
cost
Peter. You will never have enough to pay for it. And he's a soft guy. He'll fall for it if you keep on at him, the way you are.”

“I'll get him fit, whatever you say.”

Jimmy laughed, looking at her set, angry face.

“Poor Peter,” he said.

But he was wise enough to know that his argument would go home, for Tessa's independence was total. She had never expected favours.

After that Tessa rode Buffoon alone, every day, in her hours off. She never took him out in her working time, even when there was little to do. Quite often she took him out late, in the long summer evenings, returning in the dusk or near-dark. She loved the evenings, with the fall of the dew bringing the scents out of the ground and the first stars shining over the roofs of the farm below. Buffoon went kindly, as if he too was enjoying his come-back to health and work, and riding alone was a peculiar pleasure, quite different from the exercising in a string of horses that they had known before.

After a month or so she was trotting, and then cantering, as the muscle came up under the shining golden coat. She was never happier, feeling the horse's returning strength as he stretched out up the long hill. How she loved him! And how nearly she had lost him! And now he was truly
hers
, not just her horse to do, to look after for someone else. Sometimes the happiness rose up in her so that she thought the top of her head would blow off.

 

One evening as she rode home down the long valley she sensed that something was wrong in the yard below. The lights in her caravan were shining, but no one would go in there, surely? Even a burglar wouldn't turn the lights on.

She trotted on, curious, and noticed that there was a long trail ahead of her in the dew, as if someone had run down the valley. No one came that way but herself.

She went through into the yard and rode Buffoon over to the field gate where she quickly slipped off his saddle and bridle and let him loose. Leaving the tack hanging on the gate she turned and ran to her caravan. The door was open.

“Who is it?”

Rather tentatively she entered.

Myra was lying on the bed, face down.

“Mum!”

Tessa ran to her and knelt down, putting her hand on her mother's shoulder.

“What is it? It's Maurice, isn't it? Oh Mum, what has he done to you?”

Myra was too far gone to weep, to have hysterics in her usual way. Her lips were cut and bleeding, her eyes swollen and half-closed, and she was moaning softly. When Tessa went to turn her on her side towards her, Myra screamed in pain. Tessa guessed that her ribs were broken.

“Did he do it?”

“Yes. He found out–”

“About the money?”

“What it was for.”

Myra could scarcely make herself understood through her bleeding lips.

“Mum, stay here. I'll go and get some help.”

She ran to the house and hammered on the door. A surprised Peter came out.

“What's wrong?” Alarm came into his face as he saw Tessa's distress.

“What is it?”

“Please come! It's my mother! Maurice has half-killed her!”

Peter shouted for Jimmy and they both came running. When they saw the state Myra was in Peter said, “She needs an ambulance.”

But Myra screamed out, “No! No!”

“They'll get the police in, a case like this,” Jimmy said.

“I won't go!” Myra sobbed. “I won't! I'm all right here.”

Tessa could see her point. She wouldn't want public interference either. The hospital would get the police, surely? Peter and Jimmy understood too.

“She can't stay here though. We'll take her into the house, in the spare bed. Get the doctor to her.”

“Not the doctor!”

“Let's get you comfortable at least.”

She couldn't argue about that. Peter and Jimmy were used to treating accidents, and helped her skilfully to make the journey across to the house. Their mother was alerted, and in the kitchen Myra's face was bathed, the blood cleaned off, strong hot tea administered. Tessa hung over her mother, who suffered the pain stoically. It was only the idea of going public with her injuries that made her shout and scream. She made no murmur at the sting of the antiseptic and the agony of the broken ribs.

Peter said, “We'll get the doctor in the morning to strap up your ribs. We'll tell him you fell off a horse.”

This caused some amusement. Even Myra almost laughed. But Jimmy said quickly, “No laughing! That's what hurts the most.”

“You're not going back, Mum. Not ever,” Tessa said.

“She can stay here till she's better,” Mrs Fellowes said. “No hurry to move out.”

Remembering Jimmy's words about exploiting Peter's kindness, Tessa said quickly, “She can stay in my caravan. I'll look after her.”

“She's better here for now.”

Tessa did not argue. The solid walls of the old farmhouse compared with her tacky caravan were more inviting by far. The guest room was large and homely (when had it ever had guests before? Tessa wondered) and Peter and Jimmy got Myra up the stairs and into the bed without hurting her too badly.

“I'll stay with her,” Tessa insisted. “I can sleep in the same bed. It's big enough.”

They agreed with that, and Tessa went out and put Buffoon's tack away and got her things. She was seething with rage against Maurice, working out ways to get even with him – how to hurt him in the way he hurt others. She was too much improved to think about another knife attack, but the desire to get revenge flamed inside her. This, above all his displays of cruelty and arrogance, was the worst yet. And she had seen it coming, and – worst of all – it was her fault. It was a part of what Jimmy had warned her against: that her own crazy ambitions were starting to impinge on other people, the people she was closest to. She felt very disturbed, hating her part in it. And yet…

“He did you a good turn,” she said to Myra. “You'd never have left the place otherwise. You're not going back.”

“He wouldn't have me back! He said so! What shall I do? Oh Tessa, what shall I do?”

“Live your own life!” Tessa said fiercely.

And even as she said it she knew her mother had no one to turn to but herself. It was now her turn to take on other people's troubles, instead of giving other people the burden of her own. Her world was turning upside down all of a sudden and she didn't like it.

Jeez, what am I getting into? she thought as she lay on the edge of the big bed. And yet she had wanted her mother to leave Maurice for years.

The next day the doctor was called to Myra (who had fallen off a horse) and he strapped up her ribs. He knew who she was and they all knew that he knew how she had come by her injuries but nothing was said, only the grim remark on leaving, “This ought to be reported, you know.”

“Yes,” they said.

Myra with her tough upbringing recovered quite quickly and it was decided she could live in Sarah's caravan for the time being. She was welcome to go on staying in the farmhouse, but she didn't want to put upon the Fellowes. Now she had left Maurice she had turned back to her old independent self. She cried a lot and kept saying, “Whatever shall I do?” but between these bouts of self-pity she made herself quite busy round the place, tidying the grass round the caravans, sweeping the yard, cleaning out the tack-room. She stopped wearing her layers of make-up and changed into the old jeans she found in Sarah's caravan.