Mount!

by Jilly Cooper

  ‘Not all Qatari on the Western Front,’ grinned Rupert. As he sprinted towards the weighing room, he noticed how white were Isa’s knuckles as he gripped Tarqui’s muscular arm.

  ‘That’s the last horse,’ Isa was telling him, ‘you’ll ride for me till you learn to behave.’

  ‘What about the Leger?’

  ‘Roman can have your ride, and you can bloody well apologize to Sheikh Baddi.’

  ‘For not shifting a yak? Not bloddy likely.’

  And Tarqui stalked off into the weighing room.

  Rupert had only seconds to pull on breeches, boots and body protector.

  ‘You need a body protector down to your ankles to guard you from those ravening women, dearie,’ quipped his valet.

  As he helped Rupert on with his blue and emerald silks and tied his hat ribbons, he reflected that Rupert had the perfect lean features for a helmet.

  Pleased to weigh out at eleven stone, Rupert handed his saddle to Gav. Huge cheers greeted him as he sprinted down to join Gala, Bao and Marketa, who’d been leading up Safety Car, who was revelling in almost more applause than Rupert.

  ‘I can’t give myself instructions,’ Rupert told them, ‘so I’ll leave it to Safety.’

  Isa, having finished roasting Tarqui, was being legged up on to the magnificent dark brown Eumenides.

  Only when Rupert mounted did he realize that the breast girth was missing. This was a second strap attached to the saddle and running round the horse’s chest above his front legs to stop the saddle slipping back.

  ‘Christ, where is it?’ Rupert asked Marketa.

  ‘I put it in the spares bag. I saw it there,’ said Gala.

  ‘So did I,’ said Bao.

  ‘Where the hell is it now? Someone must have stolen it.’

  ‘Come on, Rupert,’ said a steward, ‘you’re holding everyone up. We’re running five minutes late.’

  The other Legends had in fact got down to post earlier than usual because their calmly parading horses had leapt out of their skins when Dame Hermione launched into ‘Here’s to the Heroes’.

  ‘Use her instead of starting stalls,’ growled Tommy Westerham, desperately trying to stop his mare, Auntie Depressant, carting him. ‘Put that horse whisperer Gary Witheford out of business.’

  To watch the race, Gav and Gala decided to go down to the rail near the finish. From here they could see it on the big screen. To not lose her as he led her through the huge excited crowd, Gav took her hand. It felt nice, thought Gala, and a good way to make a first move. She was so nervous for Rupert, and Gav was such a calming influence on everyone.

  Without the breast girth, feet out of the stirrups, Rupert hunted Safety down to the start. Irritated to be kept waiting, the other Legends were circling.

  ‘Come on, Rupert,’ yelled Tommy Westerham. ‘You in the next race?’

  ‘That’s why they call him the “bank robber”, because he holds everyone up,’ sneered Brute.

  Nerves had finally got to Rupert: mouth dry, legs trembling. As they lined up he could feel Safety also trembling, his heart pounding through his ribs.

  ‘It’s OK, boy, I’ll take care of you,’ and they were off.

  Rupert kept as motionless as possible, but found it hard to balance on the little racing saddle at high speed. Safety Car’s dinner-plate feet were soon raking up the divots. Like Quickly, not liking mud in his face, he surged forward, enjoying powering through other horses, overtaking first Tommy and then Brute, and Gay Kelleway, Mick Kinane, and Kevin Darley.

  Isa and Eumenides were still ahead. Rupert gave Safety a pause as they turned the corner so the horse could take a big gulp of oxygen, and as they surged into the long home straight he could hear an explosion of cheering. The sun was in their faces but they were gaining on Isa’s black shadow.

  Rupert picked up his whip.

  ‘Come on, Safety, we can do it, mustn’t make our run too late.’ Down came the whip again and again. As he drew level with Isa, he leaned forward, hissing in Safety’s donkey ear. He must push harder and harder, helping Safety with the thrusts of his body. Whack, whack, thrust, thrust … they had left Isa behind.

  The post loomed. ‘Go for it, Safety. Bugger!’ He’d lost an iron and with no breast girth to secure it, the tiny racing saddle lurched backwards and sideways. Safety’s body seemed to give way beneath him like an earthquake, then as he tried to cling on, the girth itself appeared to snap. As the ground came up like a knock-out punch, he could hear the horrified screams of the crowd. Winded, utterly exhausted, he lay motionless, only aware, as the field came thundering past, of the smirk on a leading Isa’s face.

  ‘No, no,’ screamed Gala, about to scramble over the spiky little hedge and rail and run to Rupert, when Gav grabbed her arm and slapped a hand over her mouth. When she tried to bite him, crying ‘Lemme go!’ he said in her ear, ‘Shut up, just shut up. The press are everywhere. He’s a married man, he’s not free,’ and clamped her against his body.

  Then, as she wriggled to get away, kicking backwards, she was pre-empted by Safety Car who, having skidded to a halt, leaving great tracks of mud on the course, trotted back to nudge his master, gently breathing in his face, his white face splattered with mud. ‘Please be OK.’

  The crowd’s screaming stopped instantly. ‘Ah, ah, ah, how adorable.’ There was a collective sigh of relief, as Rupert put his arms round Safety’s neck and struggled groggily to his feet, clinging on as his knees gave way. The ambulance roaring up was followed by Taggie racing down the course.

  ‘Darling, are you OK? You poor thing.’

  ‘No, I’m bloody not. Someone stole my breast girth and must have cut the girth – this was a new saddle. I’m going to object. I’m perfectly OK,’ he snapped as ambulancemen took both his arms.

  Refusing any help, deathly pale, he insisted on walking a nudging Safety Car back to the parade ring, receiving ten times the applause of Isa the winner.

  Applause which nearly drowned the ding, dong airport sound indicating a stewards’ enquiry, orchestrated, horror of horrors, by his old enemy Roddy Northfield.

  The race replayed in slow motion at the enquiry was like some danse macabre. As Rupert overtook Isa, his saddle unravelled and he crashed to the ground.

  Roddy then had colossal pleasure in chucking any objection out of court.

  ‘It’s not the racecourse’s fault you forgot your breast girth, and there’s no indication the main girth’s been cut. It just snapped.’

  Then, as Rupert was about to argue his corner: ‘I’m afraid we’ll have to suspend you anyway, because you hit that poor old horse ten times. That’s two over the limit. Such a pity, when he’s been such a good servant to your yard.’

  ‘I hardly tapped him,’ said Rupert furiously. ‘He didn’t look very upset when he trotted back to me, did he?’

  ‘There’s nothing more to be said,’ Roddy took a long drink of water, ‘except at your age you ought to be a better loser.’

  ‘I hardly tapped him,’ repeated Rupert, adding, as he went towards the door, ‘you must be fucking blind.’

  ‘What’s that, Campbell-Black?’ called out Roddy.

  ‘Fucking deaf too,’ added Rupert.

  Meanwhile a triumphant Cosmo bore Bao off to meet Dame Hermione, who was reading Fifty Shades of Grey for the third time.

  ‘I have many fans in China,’ she said, scribbling on Bao’s race card, before dwarfing him in a selfie.

  Having urged Cosmo to bid for Lester Piggott’s whip, she was thrilled to hear that Rupert had got a whip ban.

  ‘Has Rupert got any exciting new horses in his yard?’ she asked.

  ‘Only a Trojan one,’ purred Cosmo. ‘The enemy is within the gates.’

  59

  The only other casualty in the Legends race was Brute Barraclough, who was stretchered off with a broken finger.

  ‘Must be the one he puts in the till,’ observed Cathal.

  Unaccountably, the envelope of £20 notes had disappeared from Brute
and Janey’s table.

  Despite Taggie’s pleas for him to come home and take it easy, Rupert insisted on flying straight off to the foal sales in America, saying he’d be back to watch Quickly in the St Leger.

  Returning to Doncaster’s Robin Hood airport on Saturday morning, he found a crowd hanging round a communal television watching a clip of himself on The Morning Line. This clip was followed by one of the Stubbs of Rupert Black – what in hell was that doing there? – followed by a clip of new poster boy, go-to jockey Eddie Alderton, winning on Delectable. The programme was being transmitted from Doncaster Racecourse, now empty but which would be filled to bursting in a few hours.

  By the time Rupert had sprinted into earshot, the camera had switched to Young Eddie in a sky-blue shirt lounging on a purple sofa. He was giving a history lesson to Nick Luck, Mick Fitzgerald and David Williams, Media Director of Ladbrokes, who sponsored the Leger and – good God! – Sauvignon in the shortest orange shift. She’d been placed at the end of the sofa, so her glorious Saluki legs were not hidden by that console at which presenters kept jabbing away to pick out individual horses.

  Anyone would be consoled by Sauvignon’s legs. But Rupert was singularly unamused that Young Eddie hadn’t shaved and was wearing a Master Quickly baseball cap on the side of his head. Perhaps he was trying to look like a teacher as he carried on his history lesson.

  ‘My Great-great-great-quadrupled-grandpop and great trainer Rupert Black won the St Leger with a fantastic horse, Third Leopard, back in the Dark Ages. Today I’m gonna try and win the same race for his descendant, my grandfather, and an even greater trainer, Rupert Campbell-Black, with an even more fantastic horse, Master Quickly,’ followed by a clip of Quickly looking goofy with a mouthful of geraniums.

  There was a pause, as Nick Luck was momentarily distracted by Sauvignon’s slo-mo uncrossing of her legs. Then he asked: ‘You fancy Quickly’s chances?’

  ‘You bet. If Quickers gets out of bed the right side nothing’ll beat him.’

  Mick Fitzgerald, also dragging his eyes away from Sauvignon’s legs, was jabbing at the console. Up came a clip of I Will Repay, surging out of a pack of horses.

  ‘Quickly saw off Repay in the Guineas and the King George,’ went on Eddie, ‘quite different trips. He likes Yorkshire. One of his owners, Valent Edwards, is very well known here. Quickly’s beautifully bred. His mother won the Grand National.’

  Nick Luck turned to Sauvignon.

  ‘I’m sure no one knows I Will Repay better than Sauvignon Smithson, who looks after him.’

  ‘Lucky I Will Repay,’ sighed Eddie.

  The Panel tried not to laugh.

  ‘How is he?’ asked Nick Luck.

  ‘He’s well,’ drawled Sauvignon, who’d obviously been coached, ‘a pleasure to look after – a real gentleman; he looks great in his skin.’

  ‘So do you,’ said Eddie.

  ‘Hush,’ smiled Nick Luck.

  Such were the impeccable manners of the Morning Line team, they didn’t pull Sauvignon up when she then produced one howler after another, saying I Will Repay was ‘six hands’, the height of a Shetland pony and that he might run in the National next year.

  ‘My governor, Isa Lovell,’ she continued, ‘who beat Eddie’s Guv in the Legends race …’

  ‘Because his saddle slipped,’ snapped Eddie, then relented. ‘The only reason Repay might beat Quickers is because he can’t bear to be parted from Sauvignon, and will race like mad to get back to her.’

  Sauvignon smiled slightly. God, she was sexy. With her dark shiny hair drawn back in a pony tail, you could appreciate the mesmeric heavy-lidded yellow eyes, and the full sensual lips. Eddie suddenly realized Nick Luck was speaking to him.

  ‘That was a nasty fall. Is Rupert OK?’

  ‘I guess. He flew straight off to the States. He is so tough.’

  ‘Must be pleased – you’re having a great season.’

  ‘Who do you think are the greatest challenges to I Will Repay?’ asked Mick Fitzgerald.

  Sauvignon hadn’t a clue, so Eddie came to her rescue. ‘Quickly, of course. Geoffrey, Mobile Charger, Nuit de Josephine – that filly’s tougher than Grandpa. But you don’t tell mares what to do, you ask them.’ He smiled at Sauvignon, who at the end of the programme turned to him and said there was a party after the Leger, and would he like to come?

  Eddie hardly had time to be excited to be invited, particularly because Rupert, after the drubbing he’d got after the Legends race – ‘Rupert Tumble-Black’ – was refusing to talk to the press. Eddie therefore was interviewed all morning and found it hard to concentrate on the race ahead.

  Quickly, Bitsy and Purrpuss had travelled up to Doncaster in the morning, so Quickly wouldn’t have the stress of sleeping in a strange box. The lorry left at 6.30 a.m. and arrived at 9.45 a.m. so it was like any other day.

  The trees, less advanced and greener as they drove north, seemed to bend over the road and kiss each other. Willowherb feathered, bracken browned, docks reddened on the verges. Bao and Marketa slept, Cathal and Bobby, who was driving, raved on about Sauvignon, Gala thought about Gav and how he’d stopped her racing out to a fallen Rupert. Dora regaled everyone with snippets.

  ‘Did you know there was a horse that ran in the Leger called Sweet But Naked? Never get that past Weatherbys today.’ Then as they drove through a town called Coleshill she went into fits of laughter. ‘This is the origin of my favourite limerick:

  There was a young lady of Coleshill,

  Who sat herself down on a molehill.

  An inquisitive mole put his nose up her hole,

  Miss Coleshill’s all right, but the mole’s ill.’

  Everyone laughed, but Gala found she couldn’t stop – and then she started to cry.

  ‘Oh God,’ she said as Gav put an arm round her. ‘I’m sorry, I’m just so desperate for Quickly to win. Rupert needs a boost after the Legends and Valent’s so keen to succeed in his own county.’

  She wanted to look good when she led Quickly up, but how, after a sleepless fretting night, could she ever compete with Sauvignon?

  A vast crowd of 50,000 had gathered for the St Leger. They know how to party in Yorkshire. Sitting round gold tables which glittered in the sunshine, the women dressed up, showing off a glorious amount of tanned flesh.

  ‘Sweet When Half-Naked,’ observed Dora.

  Red oblong Ladbrokes flags fluttered in the breeze, and as race followed race, the cheering grew more raucous, with huge heartening applause for each winner. In the weighing room, sixteen jockeys were getting ready for the oldest and final classic. Jealous perhaps of his starring with Sauvignon on The Morning Line, the other jockeys except Meerkat, who was riding Bitsy, ignored Eddie.

  Etta and Valent had a quick drink in the bar before the race.

  ‘The horse that comes last in the St Leger has frost on its tail,’ quoted Valent, ‘because it signifies the beginning of winter.’

  ‘How romantic,’ sighed Etta. ‘I wonder if I should have brought the geraniums in. Oh dear, we’re into Christmas already,’ she added as Santa Claus rode by on an ostrich.

  ‘He’s got more chance than Quickly,’ sneered a passing Cosmo.

  In the parade ring, the band played as lads in suits and ties led up the runners. I Will Repay and Sauvignon in the tightest black jeans and a cream silk shirt were followed by a chorus of wolf whistles. Geoffrey, slopping along beside Rosaria, looked half asleep, unlike Quickly who was leaping all over the place, snatching Valent’s carnation, flashing his cock as he again tried to mount the French filly Nuit de Josephine.

  ‘Why don’t you give her your card, Quickers, and say you’ll meet her next year in the covering barn,’ chided Gala, as the crowd admired the white rose of Yorkshire she had brushed on his quarters.

  ‘That’s a nice touch – thank you, Gala,’ said Valent.

  The crowd, having enjoyed Eddie on The Morning Line, were disappointed when he missed the parade and to stop Quickly getting more h
et-up, took him down early to the start.

  Here it was very quiet and rural. Only after a furlong or two could you glimpse a house. A lot of spectators, however, had gathered there – including a man with a Collie.

  ‘Nice dog,’ observed Eddie, as he walked Quickly round.

  ‘Concen-fucking-trate,’ snapped Gav. ‘If you don’t beat I Will Repay, you’ll have to walk home. Win it – and Love Rat’ll take over Leading Sire.’

  And once again Eddie realized the magnitude of his task, how much it meant to Gav and Gala, Rupert and all the yard who’d backed him. If he won, Sauvignon might even come out with him. He mustn’t screw up.

  The St Leger takes no prisoners. It is played out on a big open galloping track with a long, long straight. By 3.40 the ground had been cut up by earlier runners, and the crowds were getting rowdier. Soon Meerkat and Bitsy, whickering with joy to see Quickly, had joined them.

  ‘If Quickly’s on his own at the end,’ Gav told Meerkat, ‘try and keep up with him, so he’s got something to race.’

  Now in the stalls, Eddie was raking Quickly’s lustrous mane; Geoffrey next door was so relaxed he was nodding off. Eddie caught a whiff of aftershave from Manu de la Tour, riding Josephine on the other side … and then they were off to a massive roar, gallant Bitsy setting a cracking pace as Quickly streaked after him. They were soon leading the field by six lengths, scorching past the row of conifers, past the rain-darkened woods, down Rose Hill – quite a steep slope – swinging round the corner. Eddie knew they were on a roll. Quickly had never felt better. Ahead lay the long, long straight.

  ‘C’mon, Quickers.’ Eddie didn’t even need to pick up a whip as they overtook Bitsy. Glancing round, he saw Repay was challenging but couldn’t get near him. Eddie gave a Tarzan whoop: ahead lay the line and a multitude bellowing him home.

  ‘Oh my God!’ screamed Gala, hi-fiving Marketa. ‘He’s going to do it!’

  Eddie was so overjoyed he stood up in his stirrups 100 yards from the post, punching the air with one hand, the other brandishing his whip. Next moment, something so scared Quickly, he leapt to the left in panic, as though he’d seen a ghost or been bitten by a snake, and Eddie, losing his balance, crashed to the ground. The deafening roar stopped like a power failure in utter silence, followed by screams of horror as a terrified Quickly hurtled round the track again, past the conifers, and a sobbing Gala chased after him.