Field of Thirteen - Dick Francis [76]
‘On your capital gain: the difference between five thousand and nineteen.’
His smile vanished and he looked away from her. He felt trapped and angry and ashamed, and he wished above all things that she would go away.
‘How much of it,’ Angela said slowly, ‘was your share, and how much was Clement’s?’
There was a stretching silence of more than a minute. Then he said, ‘Half and half.’
‘Thank you,’ Angela said. She got to her feet, pushing back the chair. ‘That’s all, then. I just wanted to hear you admit it.’
And to find out for sure, she thought, that she was cured; that the fever no longer ran in her blood; that she could look at him and not care any more – and she could.
‘All?’ he said.
She nodded. ‘What you did wasn’t illegal, just… well, horrid. I should have been more businesslike.’ She took a step away. ‘Goodbye, Derek.’
She’d gone several more steps before he called after her, suddenly, ‘Angela… Mrs Hart.’
She paused and came halfway back.
‘Please,’ he said. ‘Please listen. Just for a moment.’
Angela returned slowly to his bedside.
‘I don’t suppose you’ll believe me,’ he said, ‘but I’ve been thinking about that race at Stratford… and I’ve a feeling Magic may not be so useless after all.’
‘No,’ Angela said. ‘No more lies. I’ve had enough.’
‘I’m not… This isn’t a lie. Not this.’
She shook her head.
‘Listen,’ he said. ‘Magic made no show at Stratford because nobody asked him to – except right at the end, when I shook him up. And then he fell because I’d done it so close to the fence, and because when I gave him the signal he just shot forward as if he’d been galvanised.’
Angela listened, disbelieving.
‘Some horses,’ he said, ‘won’t gallop at home. Magic won’t and so we thought… I thought… that he couldn’t race either. But I’m not so sure now.’
Angela shrugged. ‘It doesn’t change anything. But I’ll find out when he runs in the Whitbread.’
‘No.’ He squirmed. ‘We never meant to run him in the Whitbread.’
‘But he’s entered,’ she said.
‘Yes, but… well, Mr Scott will tell you, a day or two before the race, that Magic has a temperature, or has bruised his foot, or something, and can’t run. He… we… planned it. We reckoned you wouldn’t quibble about the price if you thought Magic was Whitbread class…’
Angela let out an ‘Oh’ like a deep sigh. She looked down at the young man who was pleating his sheets aimlessly in his fingers and not meeting her eyes. She saw the shame and the tiredness and the echo of pain from his leg, and she thought that what she had felt for him had been as destructive to him as to herself.
At home, Angela phoned Clement. ‘Dear Clement, how is Magic?’
‘None the worse, Angela, I’m glad to say.’
‘How splendid,’ she said warmly. ‘And now there’s the Whitbread to look forward to, isn’t there?’
‘Yes, indeed.’ He chuckled. ‘Better buy a new hat, my dear.’
‘Clement,’ Angela said sweetly, ‘I am counting on you to keep Magic fit and well-fed and uninjured in every way. I’m counting on his turning up to start in the Whitbread, and on his showing us just exactly how bad he is.’
‘What?’
‘Because if he doesn’t, Clement dear, I might just find myself chattering to one or two people… you know, press men and even the tax man, and people like that… about your buying Magic for five thousand one day and selling him to me for nineteen thousand the next.’
Angela listened to the silence travelling thunderously down the wire, and she smiled with healthy mischief. ‘And Clement dear, we’ll both give his new jockey instructions to win if he can, won’t we? Because it’s got to be a fair test, don’t you think? And just to encourage you, I’ll promise you that if I’m satisfied that Magic has done his very best, win or lose, I won’t mention to anyone what I paid for him. And that’s a bargain, Clement dear, that you can trust.’
Clement put the receiver down with a crash and swore aloud. ‘Bloody old bag. She must have checked up.’ He telephoned to Yorkshire and found that indeed she had. Damn and blast her, he thought. He was going to look a proper fool in the eyes of the racing world, running