Citizen

7

Red was straight away in harmony with Tipper and making good progress, until the day she had to re-acquaint herself with the starting stalls. This is always an ordeal for temperamental animals. Each stall is fitted with two sets of gates. The back gates are shut individually behind the horses as the handlers load them; the ones in front are instantaneously flipped open by the starter, to release an explosion of horseflesh as the race begins. The practice drill should have involved Red merely walking up to, into and through the stalls, with both sets of gates open. It looked like a simple task, but it wasn’t for her. Tipper presented her to the stalls and a group of handlers—the same handlers that assist at every course on race day—crowded round her back end to heave her in, while one of them led her by a rope threaded through the bridle. They got her half way in and then she baulked.

‘Go gentle, go gentle lads!’ pleaded Tipper, perched up on her back.

Like hell they would. The handler at her head, Eamonn, yanked hard, while one of the others gave her a whack on the quarters. She immediately plunged backwards out of the stall, then reared, pulling the rope from Eamonn’s hand and almost flipping over backwards. Tipper slithered perilously to the ground beneath her. As he lay there, expecting any moment to be trodden on, he heard the men’s curses.

‘The dirty cow,’ snarled Eamonn. ‘Gimme that fuckin’ hood.’

Picking himself up, Tipper saw him brandishing the blindfold that would go over Red’s eyes, and prevent her from seeing where she was going.

‘Leave off that!’ Tipper yelled. ‘Let me do this. Give us some space, lads.’

When it came to dealing with Red, Tipper could assert himself in a way he would have never have done in any other situation. Momentarily abashed the men shuffled backwards and ducked under the rails that enclosed the loading area. Tipper removed Red’s bridle and took a length of leading-rope, which he looped around the horse’s neck. He attached this to the end of a ball of string he got out of his pocket. The handlers, leaning on the rails to watch, sniggered.

‘If this one gets loose, boy,’ called Eamonn, ‘you’ll be stacking fuckin’ shelves at the supermarket for the rest of your life.’

Tipper paid no heed. He allowed Red to go back as far away as she liked from the line of stalls. Then he went into one of them and knelt down. Oblivious to the derisive snorts of his audience, he reeled in the string and, slowly and hesitantly, Red began moving towards him. It was like that time in the barn at Fethard when he’d first won her confidence. A couple of times, as she got to within ten feet of him, she spun away in panic and he had to start all over again. The handlers grew bored with taking the piss. They left the rail and, sitting down in a ring on the turf, got a card school going.

Six hands of brag later, they didn’t notice that Red had found the courage to get her nose into the stall, where she was nibbling Tipper’s coat. Tipper now turned and carefully slid out of the front of the stall. He sat on his heels ten feet away, with his back to his filly. His eyes remained fixed on a spot down the track, where by the trick of perspective the two white rails seemed to intersect. But all the time his mind was on what Red was doing behind him. At first she did nothing. A long time passed. The laughter and curses of the card players drifted towards them on the wind. Then, infinitesimally at first, Tipper felt the horse’s warm breath on the nape of his neck, and the hesitant prod of her velvet nose.

Eamonn looked up from his hand of cards.

‘Christ Jesus, will you look at that, lads?’ he shouted. ‘The kid’s only bloody done it. She’s walked all the way through by herself.’

The others swung round to look.

‘It must be love,’ said one of the others.

‘Well if it is, that’s the only fuckin’ pull he’ll be making,’ Eamonn retorted.

But the second man might almost have been right. Red had done this difficult thing of her own free will, because she trusted Tipper, and she wanted to be with him.

When the time came to try her at last on the race track, Thaddeus Doyle was in a quandary. He wanted to put up his retained stable jockey, his son-in-law Dermot Quigley, who’d been champion jockey five times. Doyle had seen Stella Maris on the gallops, ridden by Tipper, make mincemeat of prized members of his string, and he asked himself what on earth she would do with a real jock on her back. In the event, he never found out. When they tried working Red with Quigley up, she carted him three times round the yard and threw him sprawling to the ground. As he picked himself up in front of Doyle’s staff Quigley tried to hide his humiliation with anger.

‘That one’s not temperamental. She’s mental. I’d rather ride a barrel over the Niagara bloody Falls.’

So it had to be Tipper on Stella Maris; no one else could get near her.

8

Shug Shaunsheys, bloodstock agent, was sitting in front of his computer screen, his watery eyes transfixed by what they saw. Every now and then, his long pink and grey tongue slid out to moisten his lips. Shaunsheys always licked his lips when he was surfing the net. He clicked the mouse to bring up a new picture. He lived alone. There was no one else in the flat to disturb him, no one to stop him enjoying himself. The prospect of a long, self gratifying evening stretched pleasantly ahead of him. Until his phone rang.

His ringtone was The Teddy Bears’ Picnic. With a muttered curse he groped for it, pressing the receive button and interrupting the tone as it got to ‘in for a big surprise’.

‘Shaunsheys,’ he grunted.

‘Shug. It’s Johnny the Fish. You busy?’

‘No. Just, erm, watching telly.’

‘Then I suggest you get your arse out to the Partridge double-quick. There’s someone important been asking for you.’

Shaunsheys was still distracted by the screen in front of him.

‘Oh yeah?’ he said. ‘What about?’

‘Horses, you mug. What else would it be about?’ Johnny said.

Shaunsheys clicked the mouse to advance the online slideshow. His eyes widened, then blinked. Jesus Christ!

‘Oh, look Johnny,’ he mumbled as he shifted on his chair. ‘I don’t think tonight—’

‘Don’t be a prat, Shug. There’s a Russian punter in town. So if you know what’s good for you get your arse over here now.’

The Partridge was a large pub and restaurant that stood some two miles outside Newmarket on the London road. Johnny the Fish, its licensee, was the town’s premier racing information exchange. In his time he’d had a spell in the army, and another managing a stud farm. Now he was a genial Mine Host to the trainers, jockeys, and work riders of Newmarket, matching them drink for drink and in the process gathering the kind of intelligence certain people will pay good money for. The Partridge had the look and feel of a club rather than a pub. Deep leather chairs huddled round the fire in the main bar. The walls were festooned with pictures of local heroes; human and equine. And fresh lilies stood proudly in a vase on the end of the bar.

When Shaunsheys walked into the bar fifteen minutes after the phone call, Shelley was the only sign of life, aimlessly polishing glasses. Shelley was sexy and she knew it. She was wearing a tight white T-shirt that didn’t quite reach her waist. It accentuated her breasts which were the perfect size for going without a bra. Shelley was born and bred in Newmarket. By the time she was sixteen she’d been around a bit in more senses than one. But she was of no interest to Shaunsheys.

‘Johnny around?’ he asked abruptly.

‘Probably,’ she replied in as unhelpful a tone as she could muster. Shelley expected men to have a good look at her. She liked that. Shaunsheys didn’t even make eye contact.

‘Well where is he?’ Shaunsheys asked bluntly.

‘Office probably,’ Shelley countered.

‘Well can you tell him I’m here then?’

Shelley tottered off to find the Fish.

Shaunsheys was on the whole a loner who had no proper friends. He’d been sniffing around the bloodstock world for most of his adult life, and was now formally operating as a freelance bloodstock agent, matching buyers with sellers and vice versa. But he lacked the social skills that would ensure real success in this role, and much of the time he was forced to make ends meet as a stooge in the sales ring. Shaunsheys would help bid up lots on occasions when there would be only one prospective buyer and, consequently, the danger of a low sale price. In return for a substantial ‘drink’ he would take up a prominent position at the side of the ring and call entirely fictional bids, if necessary against an accomplice posted elsewhere. They would only go up to an agreed level and then drop out, leaving the genuine bidder paying an artificially inflated price.

The trick was to know how far you could push it, and that meant knowing the market, and the target buyers. Shaunsheys was a natural spy. He spent a good deal of time shadowing prospective bidders around the sales grounds, overhearing their comments and counting how often they came back ‘for just one more look’ at a yearling.

Technically illegal though all this was, the bloodstock world pretty much turned a blind eye. Shaunsheys was, after all, an agent; his fake bids could plausibly be passed off as those of a confidential client; and it all added up to more currency trickling onto racing’s cash carousel.

Johnny the Fish appeared behind the bar, smart in brass-buttoned blazer and yellow bow tie, with matching silk handkerchief overflowing his breast pocket.

‘Glad you could make it, Shug,’ he said rather condescendingly.

Shaunsheys was not his type but the Fish nevertheless had a feeling, however reluctantly, that they were going to be confederates; that they would be playing on the same team with this one. He picked up a glass and put it to the whisky optic.

‘So what’s this all about, Johnny?’ asked Shaunsheys plaintively. ‘I was just putting my feet up for a quiet night in.’

In a swift single movement, Johnny the Fish drained his glass and applied it to the optic again. Then he turned back to Shaunsheys.

‘Come through to the office. You never know who’s going to walk in to this place.’

Shaunsheys picked up his pint and followed the landlord to a small untidy room dominated by a big knee-hole desk, whose surface was littered with unpaid bills, files and form books. Johnny the Fish sat down in his revolving leather-covered chair and beckoned to Shaunsheys to sit opposite.

‘It’s like this, Shug,’ he began. ‘I had a call from our old friend the Duke.’

Shug fingered his pint glass.

‘I hope you haven’t got me out here to meet him.’

‘No. I told you. There’s a Russian guy that wants to meet you. He’s been sent our way by the Duke. He’s called Nico. He’s the side kick of some Russian oligarch.’

‘And?’

‘They want to buy some horses. The Duke has put you in.’

Shaunsheys took a considered pull on his pint.

‘What sort of oligarch? Roman Abramovich?’ Shug asked patronizingly.

‘Look are you interested, or not?’ Johnny was getting the hump with Shaunsheys’ abruptness.

‘Obviously I’m interested. But how did my name come up in the first place? I mean, it’s been a while since I had anything to do with the Duke; not since he froze my account, the bastard.’

‘He’s probably hoping you’ll make enough out of this to pay him.’

‘So how will I do that, exactly?’

Johnny the Fish bent forward confidentially.

‘This guy wants to place a couple of good horses with a Newmarket trainer, but that’s just to test the water. He’s got more long-term plans. You mentioned Abramovich. Nico—the side kick—he reckons this guy wants to be the next Abramovich, but in racing instead of football. And if that’s right, I don’t have to tell you he’ll be thinking very big. Big string. Big breeding operation. Big brown envelopes. They’ve already picked a trainer—David Sinclair—but they want an agent.’

Shaunsheys was still puzzled.

‘Okay, I’m with you so far. But it’ll be Sinclair who’ll buy him his horses, or produce a couple from his yard that he hasn’t sold on. He won’t particularly want to work with me.’

‘No, you’re getting me wrong, Shug. Your role’s nothing to do with Sinclair. The thing is, they also want a top-class brood mare. That’s where you come in…’ Johnny stopped in mid-sentence as the door swung open.

‘There’s a bloke in the bar, Johnny. Wants to see you,’ Shelley mumbled in her monotone voice. Shelley liked the Fish but she wasn’t a bloody messenger girl.

‘That, if I’m not mistaken, will be Nico. One thing Shug. You’ll need to look after me in this deal.’

‘Yeah. Of course,’ Shaunsheys concurred with a wave of his hand. In your fucking dreams, he thought, as they walked back to the bar.

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