Matt grinned. 'If it carries on raining like this, we'll all weigh heavier when we come back than when we set out.'
'Better bloody not.' The clerk frowned. 'The job's a bugger to keep up to scratch as it is. You lot always try and pull flankers.'
Matt was still grinning when he reached the changing room. It was bedlam as ever. Twenty jockeys in various stages of undress called ribald greetings. He and Charlie always tried to get changed first. It saved fighting for space later. The valet was already laying out the colours for the second race, and hanging the postage – stamp-sized saddles – some only weighing as much as a bag of sugar – on the hook allotted to each jockey, along with all the tack, and checking at the same time that each of the weight-cloths was exactly right.
Matt reckoned the valets had the worst job in racing – toting all the equipment from course to course, taking it home covered in mud after a meeting, and producing it in pristine condition all ready for the next day. It was the behind-the-scenes people like this that kept racing going – and very few people realised it. He always gave his valet large tips.
Charlie was sitting slightly apart from the other jockeys, leaning his head against the utilitarian green-painted wall, his eyes closed. Matt slid beside him, ignoring the surrounding elbows and knees and half-naked bodies. 'What's up?' He had to shout. The noise level was unbelievable. The jokes were blue. The language even more so.
'I'm bloody starving.' Charlie opened his eyes and gazed wistfully at the ceiling. 'And that bugger Liam Jenkins down there has got a bar of chocolate.'
'Bastard.'
Matt felt sympathetic. Naturally chunky, he spent the entire jumping season starving himself. It was one of the drawbacks of being a jump jockey – and another area where Charlie had always seemed to score points over him. While he had to watch his weight continually, Charlie was renowned for gracing picnics and barbecues, fork suppers and dinner parties, throughout the area, eating Falstaffian meals, and still managing not to tip the scales the following day. Matt, who had a season ticket to the sauna, seemed to gain half a stone if he even sniffed a pizza.
'Weighing out for the first race!' The voice echoed through the changing room.
Like schoolchildren leaving everything until the last minute on a Monday morning, there was a further burst of invective and a final mad scramble for saddles and cloths, whips and bridles.
Clutching all his gear, Matt followed Charlie on to the scales. He'd been allowed ten-and-a-half stone including his saddle and tack. It had taken a week of starvation to get there. All jockeys were generously allowed an extra pound for their body protector. The needle flickered up past the half-stone mark, wavered, and settled down. Dead on. Matt exhaled.
'Garside. Ten eight! Next!'
Ducking his head down against the penetrating drizzle, Matt ran to the parade ring. Kath Seaward, with raindrops studding her maroon beret like incongruous pearls, nodded to him. 'Okay? Up for it? This one and the rest of the card?'
'All six.' Matt nodded. 'It's a bit now-or-never.'
This meeting in far-flung Norfolk was one of the last of the jumping season. Flat-racing was well into its stride, Epsom had been and gone, and dreams and aspirations were now centred on Newmarket and Ascot – not the hazy distance of next year's Grand National.
Kath pulled the maroon beret round her ears and turned up the collar of the ground-trailing trench coat. 'Hopefully the racing press haven't read too much into Dragon Slayer being in the fourth. Fakenham is hardly Aintree trial status. Drew's remaining tight-lipped about us running him. He's turning into a right dour bugger these days. What's Somerset said about it? You must have had bloody hours to discuss things on the way up.'
Matt had travelled to Fakenham in Charlie's Aston Martin. The conversation during the convoluted journey had had very little to do with Dragon Slayer.
Matt shrugged. He knew, as Kath knew, about Drew's financial troubles. He admired Drew and was fond of Maddy. It seemed wrong to gloat. 'Charlie's main preoccupation at the moment seems to be more with his new girlfriend than why the hell we're sending out a champion chaser at a minor meeting.'
'Ah. Knocking her off in Tina's absence, is he? Dangerous business. Ms Maloret will probably castrate him when she finds out. Bloody good job, too. What's she like – this latest tart? Will she distract him well into next season?'
'I've no idea. And she's no tart. She's from St Hilda's.' Matt grinned. 'And I gather she's giving him a bit of a run for his money. She's playing it very cool. He's slightly miffed that she keeps standing him up to do her A-level revision.'
Kath chuckled. 'Camping outside the classroom, is he? Doing his usual naff trick of delivering ice-buckets of Moet and tons of red roses?'
'I don't think so. For once he seems to be planning a different strategy.'
'As long as it keeps his mind off race-riding it'll be all to the good. Silly bastard.' Kath snorted her approval of Charlie's testosterone-led conversation level, patted Matt vaguely on the shoulder and stomped off towards the saddling boxes.
The first three races were over. The rain had eased away to no more than a fretful drizzle, and the diehard Sunday-afternoon punters were hauling their delayed picnics from the boots of their cars. There was always a relaxed, point-to-point atmosphere at Fakenham and the jockeys enjoyed their visits there, despite the lengthy travelling time.
Matt stood in the parade ring beside Kath and watched Dragon Slayer plod round, completely unperturbed. Charlie had won the first race while he'd finished a close second, and the positions had been reversed in the next. The third had been a bit of a disaster, with Liam Jenkins and Chris Maude stealing their thunder, leaving them scrabbling for the minor placings.
'Four double gin-and-tonics down the drain,' Charlie had muttered as they'd lugged their saddles muddily back to the weighing room. 'Thought we were going to keep a clean sheet. One of us had better head the field in the next or we'll be on Aqua Libra tonight.'
Kath was assessing Dragon Slayer with a professional eye, and Matt alone knew why she'd chosen to send him out on this seemingly easy course. The ground was always good due to the natural drainage of the sandy subsoil, the half-dozen fences were far from testing, and the tight, square track had little in the way of problems.
'Keep him up front,' Kath advised from under the damp rim of her beret. 'I want a start-to-finish lead. This is the ideal place to find out if maybe our tactics were wrong at Liverpool. This course is a dream for front-runners, and that little hill on the run-in will still give him a stamina test. Maybe – just maybe – I was wrong to cover him up in the National. And this is the best place to find out – away from too many prying eyes. Okay?'
Matt touched his cap. Charlie, again in the dark-green colours, was talking to Drew. How different they looked, he thought, to him and Kath. Drew Fitzgerald and Charlie Somerset looked like every film director's dream of racing superstars: tall and handsome. Kath was right, though, Drew seemed less affable than usual. Charlie hadn't elaborated on the problems at Peapods – but then he wouldn't. Whatever other faults Charlie had, disloyalty wasn't one of them.
Still, Matt thought, as he hauled himself high off the ground and into Dragon Slayer's saddle, all trainers had problems: if it wasn't lack of money, it was lack of good horses, or the threat of some virus wiping out a season's work.
'Remember,' Kath was looking up at him. 'Go for it. Right from the start. I want to see if he can hold it.'
They bucketed off side by side, Matt on Dragon Slayer and Charlie on Drew's Moonstone. It was only slightly more taxing than the gallops at home, and Matt eased into a gentle stride, keeping Dragon Slayer's nose just ahead of the other five horses in the field.
'What's the plan?' Charlie yelled across the rhythmic thumping. 'He's not a front runner.'
'He's not a faller either,' Matt grinned, easing up a notch for the first hurdle. 'Watch and learn, Charlie. Watch and learn.'
They were still steadily ahead at the start of the second circuit. Dragon Slayer was moving easily, hardly having to make any effort at all to clear the hurdles. The rest of the field weren't far behind, Matt knew, but they
were
behind – and that was good enough.
Two fences to go. Dragon Slayer was, without doubt, the best horse he'd ever ridden. The long striding motion was assured, the pricked ears indicated his sheer enjoyment, the pleasure he was experiencing transferring itself to Matt. He was a winner. Better than anything Charlie could hope to ride. Here at least he'd got the beating of Charlie.
He had been desperately upset not to have been fit enough to ride him at Aintree, and it had driven him mad to see this great horse dumped so unceremoniously out of the Grand National. Dragon Slayer could have done so much better.
The muted sounds of the commentator were growing louder, and the roar from the stands swelled in his ears. Dragon Slayer spurted forward with a burst of speed that was totally instinctive, and cleared the final hurdle with feet of daylight between his black flanks and the top of the fence. It was like sitting on air. Matt had nothing to do except steer. Dragon Slayer sailed past the winning post, hardly sweating.
Standing up in the stirrups, punching the air with his whip as though he'd just cleared the hill at Cheltenham, Matt looked over his shoulder. The remainder of the field was still labouring up the incline some twenty lengths behind him. Charlie and Moonstone were battling to stay in contention. Matt grinned in delight. Kath's instincts had been right: Dragon Slayer was a natural front-runner. They'd wipe out the field at the next National! It was what he wanted most in the entire world. He was pretty sure he'd kill to achieve it.
'Bloody superb!' Kath gave him an uncharacteristic hug in the winner's enclosure. 'We're right-on for next season. He's proved that he knows better than me – and now he's going to have a good holiday and eat his head off before we get down to the hard work after the summer. This baby,' she kissed Dragon Slayer's nose, and Matt was amazed to see tears in her eyes, 'is going to be the next star of Aintree – and so, Matthew Garside, are you.'
Charlie was silent for most of the journey home. He had hardly spoken at all by the time they'd left the flat landscape behind them and hit the first motorway.
'We didn't do that badly.' Matt was slouched down in the Aston Martin's passenger seat. Give him half a ton of horse hurling itself at a mile-high fence and he wouldn't blink. Charlie Somerset's Aston Martin on a kamikaze mission with a forty-ton lorry was something altogether different. 'We've got enough in the kitty for a reasonable piss-up.'
'Yeah.'
Matt tried again. 'Tina will be pleased with the way Dragon Slayer went today. Kath's going to ring her tonight. In Italy.'
'She's not in Italy.' Charlie clenched his hands on the steering wheel and overtook a line of boy-racers. 'She's gone on to LA. Some premiere thing or other.'
'Missing her, are you?'
Still travelling at over a hundred, Charlie stabbed a CD into the player. 'What do you think?'
They continued in silence – apart from the eardrum-shattering accompaniment of Aerosmith – until they pulled off the M25.
'Is everything okay with Drew?' Matt realised that he'd been gripping the edge of the seat for the last half-hour and tried to unfurl his fingers. 'He's seemed a bit – well – off lately. It's all round the village that he's going bankrupt.'
'Bollocks.' Charlie squeezed even more out of the accelerator. 'It's a bit of a blip, that's all. All yards get them, you know that. And he's completely knackered. Since Alister left to go to Mr Thornton's it's all been down to him. There's no let-up in a mixed yard – and his flat runners have been a bit of a disaster recently, haven't they?'
The understatement of the year, Matt thought. 'Er – so, under the circumstances – is their picnic still on next week?'
'As far as I know. Maddy's invited the world. You know what she's like. Who are you taking?'
'No one.' Matt eased himself up in his seat, took one look through the windscreen and slid down again. 'What about you? Will Tina be back in time?'
'Doubtful. I'll have to call on my reserve team.' Charlie screamed the Aston Martin past three cars and grinned across at Matt. 'You might not have much luck with the ladies, but you've certainly got one hell of a horse. Pity you can't take Dragon Slayer to the picnic, eh? So, what was that all about? Running him today? Kath planning a change of tactics for next year?'
'Nah. It was just a muscle-stretcher before his summer break.' Despite the pallor of his passenger-seat terror, Matt knew he was blushing. 'I mean, Drew entered Moonstone this afternoon. He's not coming on for the National, is he?'
'I fucking hope not.' Charlie indicated to leave the motorway. 'Tailed off last of six at bloody Fakenham. Hardly the stuff of Aintree dreams, is it?'
Even the Cat and Fiddle seemed rather subdued tonight, Matt thought. Sunday evening, the light just fading with June dampness, and only the ever-thirsty stable staff lining the bar, eager as always to celebrate their one day of almost-rest.
Charlie had dropped him off at his two-up two-down house in the back-streets of the village and agreed to meet him later. The hands on the clock had already ticked away two gins. Matt, unsure whether to stay or wander off home for the delights of a thinly sliced breast of chicken and a tomato – opted for another drink. At least the gin acted as an antidote to fluid retention.
'Sorry I'm late.' Charlie crashed in through the door. 'Tina rang. Kath had told her about your incredible success this afternoon. She says well done, by the way – and she can't see why l couldn't have done that at Aintree.'
'I trust you told her that skill and judgement on the racecourse sometimes takes precedence over all-night performances in the bedroom?' Matt pushed a double gin-and-tonic across the table. 'I've divvied up our winnings. We should have enough to be satisfactorily plastered by closing time.'