I stared up into Sandy 's face. There was the familiar wide gap-toothed grin, the false incisors removed for safety; there were the devil-may-care expression. The sunshine bathed his face in light. And what I saw as well was the same face looming towards me in pouring rain, with cruel eyes and a grim mouth. I heard a voice say, 'You nosey bastard, perhaps that'll teach you to mind your own business;' and I threw up my hand to shield my cheek against the kick which was coming-
My sight cleared and steadied, and Sandy and I were looking straight into each other's eyes as if a battle were being fought there. He dropped the hand outstretched to help me, and the friendliness went out of his face with the completeness of an actor shedding a role when the play is over.
I found my palm was still pressed against my cheek. I let it drop away, but the gesture had told its tale. I had remembered what had happened by the fence at Bristol, and Sandy knew it.
Strength returned to my limbs, and I stood up. The starter, consulting his watch in barely concealed annoyance, asked if I was all right. I replied that I was, and apologized for holding up the race. Some way down the course someone had caught Forlorn Hope, and as I watched he was turned round to be led back to the starting gate.
Sandy, showing no haste to remount, stood his ground in front of me.
'You can't prove a thing,' he said, characteristically taking the bull by the horns. 'No one can connect me with Penn. '
'Fletcher,' I said at once.
'He'll keep his mouth shut,' said Sandy, with conviction. 'He is my cousin.'
Uncle George's racing venture, I now saw, had not been inspired solely by the availability of a shaky book-making business. The existence of an easily recruited ally on the racecourse might have been the very factor which decided him, in the first place, to buy L. C. Perth.
I mentally reviewed the rest of the gang.
'How abut Fielder?' I suggested after a short pause.
'I'm a voice on the phone to him. A voice called Smith. He doesn't know me from Adam,' said Sandy.
Temporarily, I gave up. I said, 'What did you do it for?'
'Money. What else?' he said scornfully, clearly thinking the question foolish.
'Why didn't you stop the horses yourself? Why let Joe collect the big fat fees for losing?'
Sandy seemed perfectly willing to explain. 'I did stop a couple myself. The Stewards had me in over the second one, and I got off by the skin of my bloody teeth. I saw the red light, mate. I tipped the boss to try that little bastard Joe instead. Let him lose his licence, not me, I told him. But mind you, I was on to a bloody good percentage every time he strangled one.'
'Which made you all the more angry when he won against orders on Bolingbroke,' I said.
'That's right.'
'Then Joe didn't tell you in the washroom he was going to pull Bolingbroke. You knew already.'
'Proper little Sherlock,' mocked Sandy.
'And you put him over the rails at Plumpton, I suppose?'
'He bloody well deserved it. He lost me fifty quid on Leica as well as my bonus from the boss.'
'Did he deserve to die, as well?' I asked bitterly.
The man leading Forlorn Hope back was now only a hundred yards away.
'The stupid little sod couldn't keep his mouth shut,' said Sandy violently. 'Waving that brown paper at Liverpool and yelling for you. I saw what was written on it, and told Fielder, that's all. I didn't know what it meant, but it was a ton to a tanner the boss wouldn't like it. Joe was asking for it.'
'And after he'd got it, you rang Fielder and told him the job had been bungled, and Joe had lived long enough to talk to me?'
'Yes,' said Sandy morosely. 'I heard you telling every bloody body in the weighing-room.'
I couldn't resist it. I said, 'I was lying. Joe died without saying a word.'
As the full significance of this slowly dawned on him, his jaw dropped, and I saw him waver in some secret inner place as if an axe had hacked into the roots of his colossal self-confidence. He turned on his heel, strode across to where the starter's assistant held his horse, and swung abruptly into the saddle.
I went to meet Forlorn Hope, thanked the man who had brought him back, and remounted. The starter's patience had run out.
'Get into line, please,' he said, and the circling horses began to straighten out across the course. I came up from behind and took a place alongside Sandy. I had one more question to ask.
'Tell me,' I said, 'why on earth did you get Penn to try to bribe Major Davidson? You must have known he wouldn't have stopped Admiral winning for all the money in the world.'
'It was the boss's idea, not mine,' said Sandy roughly. 'I warned Fielder to tell him it wouldn't work, but the boss knew bee-all about horses and was pig-headed besides. Fielder said he wouldn't listen, because he thought if he fixed a cert it would be worth a fortune. He made a packet out of it, all right. He thought up the wire himself. And I'd be a ruddy sight better off if the wire had killed you too,' he added, with a sudden spurt of venom.
The starter's hand swept down on the lever. The tape flew up, and, five minutes late, the horses bounded forwards towards the first hurdle.
I don't know exactly when Sandy decided to put me over the rails. Perhaps the thought of all the money he would not be getting overwhelmed him, and perhaps I had brought it on myself by recalling that he had done it to Joe when Joe, as he saw it, had cheated him.
In any case, as we approached the second hurdle, he swerved his horse towards me. We were both in the group just behind the leaders, and I was on the inside, with the rails on my left.
I glanced at Sandy 's face. His slitted eyes were concentrated on the jump ahead, but with every stride his horse drew nearer to mine. He wasn't leaving me much room, I thought.
Only just in time did I realize that he intended to leave me no room at all. He was aiming to crowd my horse so closely that I would be thrust into the six foot high wing leading up to the hurdles. A crash through the wings, I had been told, was one of the most dangerous of all falls. The time had clearly come for rapid evasive action if I were not to find this out for myself.
I literally hauled on the reins. Forlorn Hope lost impetus dramatically, and as soon as the quarters of Sandy 's horse were past his shoulder I pulled his head unceremoniously to the right. It was only just in time. The hurdles were beneath his feet before he had time to see them, and he knocked one flat with his forelegs. The horse following us, going faster, bumped hard into the back of him, and the jockey yelled at me to mind what I was doing.
Forlorn Hope was too much of a novice to stand this sort of thing, and I decided that if I were not to rin his nerve for good, I would have to keep him out of Sandy 's way for the rest of the race.
But Sandy was not content with that. Along the straight in front of the stands he gradually worked himself back to my side. He was a better jockey than I and his horse was more experienced. When I tried to go faster, he kept pace, and when I slowed down, he slowed too. I could not shake him off. In front of the crowds, apart from keeping pace with me, he rode fairly enough; but round the next bend lay the long curved leg out into the comparatively deserted country, and what he might do there I hated to think.
I did consider pulling up and dropping out of the race altogether, but that seemed an even more ignominious defeat than being put over the rails.
As the field swept round the bend in a bunch, Sandy tried again. He closed his horse tight up against mine and very slightly behind. On my left I was jammed against Dane. He glanced across and shouted, 'Get over, Sandy. Give us some room.'
Sandy did not answer. Instead I felt his knee slide along under my thigh until he was pressing fiercely on my hamstrings. Then he gave a sudden violent jerk forwards and upwards with his whole leg.
My foot flew out of the stirrup and I lost my balance completely. I swayed wildly over to the left, my head tipping down beside my horse's neck, my fingers clutching frantically at his mane. I looked down and saw the blur of hooves pounding tight-packed round the bend, and I struggled to prevent myself slipping off among them. But all my weight was too far forward, and the jolt of the horse's galloping stride tended to tip me farther forward still. I knew that in a few seconds I would be off.