‘Of course,’ he said with a smile, but there was something about the way the smile failed to reach his eyes that slightly worried me.
The celebrations by the other syndicate members were still going on when I came out with the trophy in its box.
‘Everyone is invited to join me in car park for a victory party,’ Nick Spencer said loudly.
There were still three races to be run, but I reckoned that none of this lot would see any of them. And I couldn’t blame them.
‘How about you, Chester?’ Nick asked. ‘Are you coming?’
‘I’ll be there a little later,’ I said. ‘I need to secure this first.’ I held up the trophy box.
‘Bring it with you,’ Bill Parkinson said loudly with a laugh. ‘We can fill it with champagne and pass it around.’
‘Best not to,’ I said. ‘It’s survived more than a hundred years, and I’d hate for us to be the ones who lost it.’
‘But it’s ours for now,’ Bill said quite belligerently. ‘We’re the owners of the horse.’ He turned to the other members. ‘Come on, let’s have a vote. Who wants the trophy taken to the car park?’
‘Bill, stop being naughty,’ I said sharply. ‘You know perfectly well that, although prize money is shared, trophies remain the responsibility of Victrix.’
‘Spoil sport.’
Was I?
Once in the past, I had taken a trophy out to a celebration in a racecourse car park, only for it to get run over by a reversing car. This one was far more valuable — and I was the one who’d just signed for it.
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘But just for a little while.’
Before they all get too drunk, I thought.
Owen was still standing there with them.
‘Are you coming?’ I asked him.
‘I may later,’ he said. ‘But I doubt it. I have a runner in the last anyway. And there’s usually a drinks party in the trainers’ car park after racing. I normally go to that for a single beer before heading home. It’s far too long a week for me to get plastered on the first day.’
I agreed. Like him, I would be here every day. There were two more Victrix runners to come, one on Thursday and the other on Saturday, although neither was trained by Owen, and I also had a possible new Victrix trainer to meet, as well as some prospective new syndicate members. Potassium’s win should now make those conversations a little easier.
I’d already spent many hours on the telephone speaking to bloodstock agents and breeders about their yearlings that would be going to the sales in the coming autumn. I’d even been to see quite a few, and I had started making up my list of interest.
Potassium’s Derby win, plus his one today, might allow me to raise my sights somewhat, perhaps to spend a little more money on a horse at the sales than I had in the past, in order to secure the ones I really wanted for next year.
Provided, of course, that Squeaky Voice hadn’t destroyed my business by then.
Chapter 20
The St James’s Palace Stakes hundred-year-old silver trophy was indeed filled with champagne and handed around, each of the twelve syndicate members, including me, taking it in turns to raise it up like the winning captain of the FA cup, and then drinking from it, as everyone else cheered.
Nick and Claire Spencer had broken out the reserve bubbly from the boot of their car, but there was no sign of the American trio.
‘Where are your American friends?’ I asked Nick casually after the trophy drinking had finished.
‘They’re having afternoon tea with the American ambassador in one of the private boxes. He’s also from Kentucky and is a good friend of theirs. Seems he’s regularly bought horses from their farm. But they’ll be along later. Herb told me the ambassador has to leave before the last to get back for some sort of diplomatic function this evening.’
‘How did you meet Herb and Harriet?’ I asked.
‘I acted for them when they bought an apartment in a lovely new block in Knightsbridge, overlooking Hyde Park. About six years ago now. We became friends, and Claire and I have since been out to their place a couple of times.’
‘Do you think it’s worth me talking to them about joining a syndicate?’
Victrix Racing already had several overseas members, including two that lived in the United States.
‘You can if you like, but I doubt that they will. They have a whole string of racehorses in the U.S. And they breed most of them themselves.’
‘But you can never have too many racehorses,’ I said with a laugh.
The phone in my trouser pocket beeped and vibrated once.
‘Excuse me,’ I said to Nick, taking the phone out. ‘I need to take this.’
I walked a short distance away so that no one else could see the screen.
There was just one text notification showing.
Do not defy me. You were warned what would happen.
I turned around quickly to look back at the syndicate members, checking to see if any of them had their phones out.
They hadn’t, and the thoughts from earlier returned: Why would any of them have wanted Potassium to lose? What advantage would it give them?
But if it was one of them, they would have surely ensured that they put their phone away as soon as they had pushed ‘Send.’
I put my own phone back in my pocket and walked quickly back to Nick.
‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I have to leave now. Something’s come up at home.’
I packed the trophy back into its carrying box, made my excuses to the rest of the syndicate members, and hurried out of Car Park 1.
I almost ran down the High Street to my Jaguar, placed the trophy box in the boot, along with my coat and top hat, and jumped in.
I could feel the panic rising in my throat, and I almost turned out onto the road right into the path of another car.
I slammed on the brakes just in time.
Calm down, I told myself. It won’t help to kill yourself in a car crash.
Although maybe it would.
I didn’t go home. Instead, I pulled up opposite the Raj Tandoori.
I went and banged on the front door of the flat above, but there was no answer. So I went back to the car and waited and waited and waited.
Georgina had called me on my phone’s hands-free system as I’d been passing Reading.
‘Dad and I watched the race together,’ she said. ‘It was so exciting. And we watched your interview afterwards. He is so pleased for you.’
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘How is he doing today?’
‘Much the same. Mum’s a bit better now she’s been able to have a couple of nights’ proper sleep after I moved her into the spare room. I’ve gone back into the bed I slept in before we were married. It feels very strange. And Mum keeps asking me what she will do if he dies, or rather when he dies.’
Not come to live with us, I hoped.
But Harrogate was a very long way away from south Oxfordshire, and after the early death of her sister, Georgina was their only child left.
A couple of years ago, we had investigated some sheltered-living bungalows in our village and had even put her parents’ name down for one, but there was a long waiting list — waiting for the current residents to die off.
Getting old was no fun, but it was probably better than the alternative.
‘Are you going to Ascot again tomorrow?’ Georgina asked.
‘Every day,’ I replied. ‘We have more runners, one on Thursday and another on Saturday, but I don’t really expect those two to win. I’m running them more because the syndicates are desperate for Royal Ascot tickets.’
‘I can’t think of anything worse.’
‘But you used to love to go.’
‘No, I didn’t. I only went because you wanted me to. It was always too damned hot — or raining — and I hated wearing all those bloody hats, and as for the shoes! They always hurt like hell by mid-morning.’