Дик Фрэнсис - Rat Race

‘No, look, no kidding, sport,’ he said to Goldenberg with his first sign of seriousness. ‘You want to get yourself signed up with this outfit. Best fiver I’ve ever spent...’

Several of the fifty onlookers edged nearer to listen, and Nancy and I filtered towards the outside of the group. I put down the tasted beer on an inconspicuous table out in the hall while Nancy dispatched the bottom half of her coke, and from there we drifted out into the air.

The sun was still shining, but the small round white clouds were expanding into bigger round clouds with dark grey centres. I looked at my watch. Four twenty. Still nearly an hour until the time the Major wanted to leave. The longer we stayed the bumpier the ride was likely to be, because the afternoon forecast for scattered thunderstorms looked accurate.

‘Cu-nims forming,’ Nancy said, watching them. ‘Nasty.’

We went and watched her brother get up on his mount for the last race and then we went up on the Owners and Trainers and watched him win it, and that was about that. She said goodbye to me near the bottom of the steps, outside the weighing room.

‘Thanks for the escort duty...’

‘Enjoyed it...’

She had smooth gilded skin and greyish brown eyes. Straight dark eyebrows. Not much lipstick. No scent. Very much the opposite of my blonde, painted, and departed wife.

‘I expect,’ she said, That we’ll meet again, because I sometimes fly with Colin, if there’s a spare seat.’

‘Do you ever take him yourself?’

‘Good Lord no.’ She laughed. ‘He wouldn’t trust me to get him there on time. And anyway, there are too many days when the weather is beyond what I can do. Maybe one day, though...’

She held out her hand and I shook it. A grip very like her brother’s, and just as brief.

‘See you, then,’ she said.

‘I hope so.’

She nodded with a faint smile and went away. I watched her neat blue and white back view and stifled a sudden unexpected inclination to run after her and give her a Chanter type farewell.

When I walked across the track towards the aeroplane I met Kenny Bayst coming back from it with his raincoat over his arm. His skin was blotched pink again with fury, clashing with his carroty hair.

‘I’m not coming back with you,’ he said tightly. ‘You tell Miss Annie effing Villars that I’m not coming back with you. There’s no bloody pleasing her. Last time I nearly got the push for winning and this time I nearly got the push for not winning. You’d think that both times I’d had the slightest choice in the matter. I’ll tell you straight, sport, I’m not coming back in your bloody little aeroplane having them gripe gripe gripe at me all the way back.’

‘All right,’ I said. I didn’t blame him.

‘I’ve just been over to fetch my raincoat. I’ll go home by train... or get a lift.’

‘Raincoat... but the aircraft is locked.’

‘No it isn’t. I just got my raincoat out of the back. Now you tell them I’ve had enough, right?’ I nodded, and while he hurried off I walked on towards the aeroplane puzzled and a bit annoyed. Major Tyderman had said he had locked up again after he had fetched his Sporting Life , but apparently he hadn’t.

He hadn’t. Both the doors on the port side were unlocked, the passenger door and the baggage locker. I wasn’t too pleased because Derrydowns had told me explicitly never to leave the aircraft open as they’d had damage done by small boys on several occasions: but all looked well and there were no signs of sticky fingers.

I did all the external checks again and glanced over the flight plan for the return. If we had to avoid too many thunderclouds it might take a little longer to reach Newmarket, but unless there was one settled and active over the landing field there should be no problem.

The passengers of the two Polyplane aircraft assembled by ones and twos, shovelled themselves inside, shut the doors, and were trundled down to the far end of the course. One after the other the two aeroplanes raced back over the grass and lifted away, wheeling like black darts against the blue, grey and white patchwork of the sky.

Annie Villars came first of my lot. Alone, composed, polite; giving nothing away. She handed me her coat and binoculars and I stored them for her. She thanked me. The deceptive mild brown eyes held a certain blankness and every few seconds a spasmodic tightening belied the gentle set of her mouth. A formidable lady, I thought. What was more, she herself knew it. She was so conscious of the strength and range of her power that she deliberately manufactured the disarming exterior in order not exactly to hide it, but to make it palatable. Made a nice change, I thought ironically, from all those who put up a big tough front to disguise their inner lack.

‘Kenny Bayst asked me to tell you that he has got a lift home to Newmarket and won’t be coming back by air,’ I said.

A tiny flash of fire in the brown eyes. The gentle voice, completely controlled, said ‘I’m not surprised.’ She climbed into the aeroplane and strapped herself into her seat and sat there in silence, looking out over the emptying racecourse with eyes that weren’t concentrating on the grass and the trees.

Tyderman and Goldenberg returned together, still deep in discussion. The Major’s side mostly consisted of decisive nods, but it was pouring out of Goldenberg. Also he was past worrying about what I overheard.

‘I would be surprised if the little shit hasn’t been double crossing us all the time and collecting from some bookmaker or other even more than he got from us. Making fools of us, that’s what he’s been doing. I’ll murder the little sod. I told him so, too.’

‘What did he say?’ the Major asked.

‘Said I wouldn’t get the chance. Cocky little bastard.’

They thrust their gear angrily into the baggage compartment and stood talking by the rear door in voices rumbling like the distant thunder.

Colin Ross came last, slight and inconspicuous, still wearing the faded jeans and the now crumpled sweat shirt.

I went a few steps to meet him. ‘Your sister Nancy asked me to check with you whether you had remembered to bring the present for Midge.’

‘Oh damn...’ More than irritation in his voice there was weariness. He had ridden six hard races, won three of them. He looked as if a toddler could knock him down.

‘I’ll get it for you, if you like.’

‘Would you?’ He hesitated, then with a tired flap of his wrist said, ‘Well, I’d be grateful. Go into the weighing room and ask for my valet, Ginger Mundy. The parcel’s on the shelf over my peg. He’ll get it for you.’

I nodded and went back across the track. The parcel, easily found, proved to be a little smaller than a shoe box and was wrapped in pink and gold paper with a pink bow. I took it over to the aeroplane and Colin put it on Kenny Bayst’s empty seat.

The Major had already strapped himself in and was drumming with his fingers on his binocular case, which was as usual slung around him. His body was still stiff with tension. I wondered if he ever relaxed.

Goldenberg waited without a smile while I clambered across into my seat, and followed me in and clipped shut the door in gloomy silence. I sighed, started the engine, and taxied down to the far end of the course. Ready for take-off I turned round to my passengers and tried a bright smile.

‘All set?’

I got three grudging nods for my pains. Colin Ross was asleep. I took the hilarious party off the ground without enthusiasm, skirted the Manchester zone, and pointed the nose in the general direction of Newmarket. Once up in the sky it was all too clear that the air had become highly unstable. At lower levels, rising pockets of heat from the built-up areas bumped the aeroplane about like a puppet, and to enormous heights great heaps of cumulo-nimbus cloud were boiling up all round the horizon.