‘How about Orion’s Glory?’ I asked. ‘How many races has he had?’
‘Two last season and only one so far this term. His next race is the Derby, isn’t it, my boy?’ He again patted the taut muscular neck of the horse. ‘Should have a damn good chance too, now that Prince of Troy won’t be there.’
How convenient, I thought.
Declan and I made it down to the far end of the yard where two workmen were busy laying a new floor in the last box.
‘How’s it going?’ Declan asked.
‘Nearly done,’ said one of the men. ‘Just sticking the last few mats in place. All finished by this afternoon.’
‘Good,’ Declan said. ‘Well done.’ He turned to me. ‘I’m trying rubber. It’s meant to cause fewer injuries than concrete, and be more thermally efficient. And it had better be at this price.’
‘Only the best for the Sheikh’s horses,’ I agreed.
Declan shook his head. ‘His two will be in the main part with the other fillies. These will be for colts. They’re the ones that usually do themselves damage by kicking the floor.’
There was no doubt in my mind that Declan knew his business. He was polite but firm to his staff and he showed a genuine affection for his horses, patting each one in turn and dispensing carrots from a seemingly never-ending supply in his coat pockets.
‘Here,’ he said, offering me a carrot outside one box. ‘You give him one.’
I hesitated and Declan must have seen the look on my face.
‘Not frightened of him, are you?’ he said, with a mixture of amusement and mischief.
‘No, of course not,’ I replied. It was not so much ‘him’ that I was frightened of, just his teeth, a row of huge white tombstones that were noisily crunching a carrot into a pulp. I had no desire to look any horse in the mouth, gift or otherwise, but Declan wasn’t giving up that easily.
‘Hold your hand flat with the carrot resting on it and the horse will take it.’ He demonstrated. ‘Go on, now. You do it.’
He clearly wasn’t going to take no for an answer so I held out a carrot as instructed and forced myself to move my right hand closer to the beast while leaning the rest of my body away from it at the same time.
I could feel the horse’s breath on my skin as it placed its muzzle down onto my hand, providing a ticklish sensation. The carrot was swept up into the animal’s mouth more by the actions of its lips rather than the tongue as I had expected, leaving my hand dry and empty.
Declan laughed.
‘Have you not been with horses before?’ he asked, the incredulity thick in his tone.
‘Never,’ I said, silently counting my fingers to ensure that none had gone the same way as the carrot.
‘Not even with a pony as a child?’
‘No,’ I said.
In truth, I had always been terrified of horses, ever since I was six and had witnessed one go berserk during the annual Totnes town carnival. The rider had been thrown onto the road and then dragged along, his foot still caught in the stirrup. The vivid mental image of the poor man’s head bouncing on the tarmac all the way down Fore Street remained with me even now.
‘I’m slightly allergic to horses,’ I said. ‘Asthma.’ And I did my best to wheeze a little.
It wasn’t true, but it was the white lie I had employed for many years to keep me away from them. It usually worked.
‘Sorry,’ he said, although for what I wasn’t sure.
We continued along the line of stables.
One we passed was empty, the door hanging wide open.
‘Jackbarrow,’ Declan said, by way of explanation. ‘He runs this afternoon at Beverley. Left at dawn this morning.’
‘Are you going?’ I asked.
‘No way,’ he said firmly. ‘I sent my travelling head lad instead.’
‘Is that usual?’
‘I go to the local Newmarket tracks and all the big meetings, of course — Ascot, York, Epsom, Chester, Goodwood and so on — but that’s mostly for exposure and PR. My job is to train the horses, not sit in a car for three hours each way just to put on a saddle. I’m better employed here.’
‘Don’t you have to give instructions to the jockey?’
‘Did that last night on the telephone. And I’ll be watching the race on TV, to make sure he follows them.’ He smiled broadly at me and I was certain he’d said the same thing to the jockey in question.
‘Another coffee?’ he asked.
‘Lovely.’
He didn’t, however, lead me back to the house but into his yard office, a space clearly converted from the end two stalls of one of the stable blocks.
Outside the door was a large blue plastic barrel half full of carrots.
‘Bella’s brother is a carrot farmer in Norfolk,’ Declan said. ‘These are the ones too bent to make it to the supermarkets.’
He leaned down and replenished his coat pockets before going in. I followed.
‘Hi, Chrissie,’ he said. ‘This is...’ He paused. ‘Sorry.’
‘Harry Foster,’ I said.
Chrissie was a large woman of about fifty who was sitting behind one of the three desks. She stood up and we shook hands as Declan put on the kettle and spooned instant coffee into mugs.
‘Don’t be offended,’ Chrissie said. ‘He often forgets who I am too. Never forgets a horse’s name, mind. I often think he’s half horse. Speaks to them in some language or other that they seem to understand.’
She smiled broadly and glanced admiringly at Declan before going back to the task in hand, placing coloured magnetic strips on a plastic-covered metal board. Each coloured strip had a name printed on it in black capital letters.
‘What are you doing?’ I asked her.
‘Tomorrow’s lots,’ she said. ‘Who rides what, where and when. The blue strips are our lads plus the work riders. The reds are the two-year-olds, white are the threes, and the yellows are older horses.’
There were far more red and white strips than yellow ones.
‘What happens when the horses get older than three?’ I asked.
‘I keep a few good ones in training aged four,’ Declan said, ‘and one or two might go straight to stud, but the rest get sent to the horses-in-training sales. Most are sold to race in Europe and some go to jump yards. Flat racing here in the UK is mostly about the two- and three-year-olds.’
‘So you’re always having to find new ones.’
‘Absolutely,’ he said. ‘Nearly half my yard turns over each year. Hence I spend a huge amount of my time at the yearling sales finding the next crop. It’s perhaps the most important part of the job.’
I watched as Chrissie continued to position the strips in place. The blue human name labels were down the left-hand side and then there were three distinct vertical groups across the board representing the three lots of equine partners.
‘Some trainers now do it on a computer,’ Declan said, handing me my coffee. ‘But I prefer the old-fashioned method. No horse gets left off by mistake as it’s dead easy to see if a strip hasn’t been allocated to a rider.’
‘Do all the horses go out every day?’ I asked.
‘Every day except Sunday,’ he said. ‘If you can’t do it in six days, you’re not going to do it in seven.’ He laughed. ‘Our runners for Monday and Tuesday will get a pipe-opener on a Sunday morning but that’s it. Day of rest for the remainder.’
‘Do the horses ever go out in the afternoons?’ I asked.
‘I occasionally have horses out later in the day. Often depends if there’s someone available to ride them or if I want to avoid the touts.’
‘The touts?’
‘Newmarket is a Mecca for betting tipsters — the touts. They stand and watch the horses on the gallops — they learn them all by sight — and then they sell tips to gamblers on premium phone lines. The place is crawling with them, especially on Wednesday and Saturday mornings.’