Meanwhile an ecstatic crowd were yelling, ‘Go on, go on, go on,’ like Mrs Doyle in
Father Ted,
as Killer eased Voltaire Scott first past the post.
Amber was so distraught about Bullydozer it was a few seconds before she realized Shade had his hand round her waist, his fat fingers massaging her breast.
‘Come and have a glass of bubbly to celebrate,’ he purred.
‘Celebrate what?’ exploded Amber.
‘A great win and another chance to teach Throstledown not to pinch other people’s horses.’
‘No!’ Amber would have screamed at him to eff off if the ‘It is, isn’t it?’ brigade hadn’t moved in again:
‘Amber Lloyd-Foxe! Do tell us about Mrs Wilkinson. We specially came to see her.’
Amber managed to be charming for a minute, then she stammered, ‘I’m so sorry, a friend’s horse has just been killed.’
Turning back to the course, she could see Rafiq walking back clutching his whip, saddle and Valent’s purple and ivy-green quartered hat. He was now standing: tall, slim and absolutely motionless, the brilliant sun casting his long black shadow across the deserted track as he watched the rerun of the race, including the hideous fall, on the big screen. He stayed so long, tears washing the mud from his face, that an official ran up saying he was so sorry about the horse but Rafiq had better move on, as the runners would soon be coming down for the next race. When Rafiq gazed at him in bewilderment, the official took his arm and led him back to the weighing room.
Marius loved Ireland and the Irish, who put him at his ease. Trust him to have given up drink in February, quipping it was the shortest month, only to be confronted with such a tragedy.
Bullydozer had been such a sweet horse, so grateful for kindness, so full of promise and Valent’s pride and joy. His body would now be on the way to the nearest hunt kennels, but there was something especially poignant about a horse dying abroad. And there was still the empty box to be faced when he got home, and Valent in China to be rung.
Not an unkind man, Marius was just ham-fisted in his dealings with people. He had found Rafiq sobbing uncontrollably in Bully’s box but had been unable to comfort him. The horse had looked wrong from the off; tomorrow he’d study the video.
Marius was also very fond of Billy Lloyd-Foxe, who had often helped him in his career. Painswick had confided that Billy had terminal cancer, so Marius wanted to comfort Amber. But he had been so burnt by Olivia, he was unprepared to risk a serious relationship. Michelle had been sex with no affection, but he was finding himself increasingly attracted to Amber and knew he was foul to her in an attempt to conceal it.
Now there was this ghastly preview to be got through, when everyone would be clamouring for information about his Gold Cup chances and what tactics he was planning to use. He was far too superstitious 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.
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.’
Amber had table-hopped in an attempt to avoid Shade, who with an evil, knowing smile on his big lips, seldom took his heavylidded eyes off her. She felt like a baby bird being eyed up by a big greedy tomcat while its mother was off searching for worms. Marius was hardly a mother bird but she stayed close to him, knowing Shade wouldn’t try while he was around.
The panel was winding up. Amber was ashamed she’d written so little about the Gold Cup in her notebook. Marius had written nothing.
‘Have you rung Valent?’ she asked him.
‘I lost my mobile at the races. It’s got Valent’s number; it’s got everyone’s number. I can’t even ring Painswick.’ He was ashamed what a relief it was.
‘I’ve probably got it,’ said Amber. ‘I found one in my bag when I got back to the hotel. You must have dropped it when Bully, when Bully, oh Christ—’ Her voice broke. ‘He was such a sweet horse – so sort of humble. My father had a horse he adored like that called The Bull.’
‘Let’s go,’ said Marius. ‘They’re about to start the auction, and I don’t want to bid five thousand for a visit to Dermie O’Driscoll’s yard. I’ve spent quite enough this weekend. Don’t say goodbye to anyone, just go.’
Amber caught a glimpse of Shade’s outraged face, the tomcat deprived of its baby bird, as Marius whisked her out of a side door.
‘Come and pick up your mobile,’ she said idly, ‘and see my amazing suite.’
‘Christ,’ said Marius, as he followed Amber into the Parnell Suite.
There were flowers everywhere, champagne on ice, a sitting room with sofas and chairs, a desk, two minibars to mock him when he wasn’t drinking, and a television set which welcomed Miss Amber Lloyd-Foxe to the Shelbourne.
On the wall, beside watercolours of rolling hay bales and distant mountains, was a picture of Parnell: dark, balding, one slanting eye bigger than the other.
‘The only thing it says on his grave is “Parnell born 1846”; isn’t that cool?’ said Amber. ‘That’s fame for you. Nice name for a horse, Parnell, bound to be taken. Here’s your mobile. I must ring and check up on Dad,’ she added, going towards the telephone.
Marius knew he ought to ring Valent, but instead he prowled round the huge room. Amber was a star like Parnell. He was proud and grateful to her for talking up his horses this evening. She had mellowed and was so much less arrogant than she used to be.
‘Dad’s sleeping,’ she said, putting down the telephone. Immediately it rang.
‘Go to bed, Awesome,’ she said, hanging up. ‘He’s having a sauna with Michelle and Tresa,’ she told Marius.
Marius laughed when she told him about the Viagra.
‘Help yourself to the minibar,’ she said, ‘and can you open that bottle of champagne?’
‘You’ve had enough.’
Amber escaped to the loo and found herself cleaning her teeth, then spraying on buckets of Madame to hide the smell of toothpaste, then powdering her nose. Returning, she found
herself a glass and flipped through her messages. Two newspapers and a radio station were confirming interviews for tomorrow. She mustn’t be late or get too hammered.
Suddenly she wanted Marius to kiss her, but turning she saw he’d opened his briefcase and was studying Monday’s schooling lists to check which lad would be schooling which horse over fences or hurdles, and flipping through the DVDs of horses he might buy. He was flying straight to Leeds tomorrow, then on to Wetherby where he’d meet Josh and Tommy, Oh My Goodness and Romeo.
‘Don’t you ever let up?’ she said sulkily.
She had kicked off her boots, losing five inches. Wandering towards the window, she opened the curtains a fraction. Below her, bare trees tossed like a silver sea. A horse clopped past, taking someone home in a cart. On the corner of the square, a floodlit statue of a soldier cast an ebony shadow over the pale steps behind. Amber shivered, reminded of poor Rafiq, transfixed with horror by the sight of Bullydozer’s fall on the big screen.
‘Weren’t you pleased everyone was taking Wilkie and Furious so seriously?’
She looked at Marius who looked at her, both their resolves weakening. It seemed such a waste of a splendid bed.
Marry-us, marry-us.
‘Must have a pee.’ Marius took his briefcase with him, which contained a toothbrush. He used it as well as Amber’s toothpaste.
But then, just as she heard the lavatory flush, there was a hammering on the door. ‘Bugger!’ she groaned.
Assuming it was Rafiq, who she’d told to call her if he got too miserable, she opened the door a crack and was asphyxiated by horribly familiar rich, sweet aftershave as Shade forced his way in.
Amber tried patter. ‘Why didn’t you ring first? You know I’m allergic to droppers-in. What do you want?’
‘Another ride.’
Oh Christ, they were in the passageway leading to the sitting room. She prayed Marius couldn’t hear; he’d never forgive her.
Shade had taken off his tie and his dinner jacket, his white silk shirt was predictably undone to the waist. He looked so devilish she expected flames to burst from his waxed nostrils and his black eyebrows to shoot up at the corners like Mephistopheles.
‘I’m tired, Shade. Very tired. I’ve got interviews first thing. Please go.’
‘Not like you. You used to be much more friendly.’ Barging into the sitting room, Shade whistled.
‘Nice place, get it gratis? Who did you sleep with to get this?’
As she chucked Marius’s coke tin in the bin and put the champagne bottle back in the ice, he slid his hand under her dress, fingering her bottom, exploring it intimately. ‘Lovely arse.’
‘Don’t,’ said Amber furiously.
‘Don’t be silly. You could be a very lucky lady and have some really exciting rides. I’d use you in all ways.’
Oh God, if Marius knew she’d shagged Shade, such was his pathological hatred, and Valent’s too, they’d never forgive her. She’d be jocked off Wilkie.