Cut Throat (11 page)

‘That's okay. I don't mind.'

Bill grunted. He wandered around the tackroom, looking at a bridle here, tidying a blanket box there, whistling tunelessly through his teeth all the while, until Ross could cheerfully have strangled him.

‘I'd rather you didn't encourage Danny in this stupid idea of becoming a jockey,' Bill said suddenly from behind him. ‘It's really none of your business.'

Ross caught his breath at the unfairness of this unexpected attack. He turned slowly to find Bill glaring belligerently at him.

‘I've done no such thing,' he said evenly. ‘But I'll not
discourage
him either, and if you've got any sense, you'll hold off too. It's his life, after all, and if he's got any spirit, opposition will only make him more determined. Believe me, I know.'

‘It's none of your bloody business!' Bill repeated with tight-lipped fury. ‘Just stay out of it. He thinks you're some kind of hero. Can't see you for what you really are. When he does, he'll despise you as he despises me.'

Ross shook his head emphatically. ‘No. You're wrong there. He doesn't despise you. If he did he wouldn't be aching to follow in your footsteps, would he? You should be proud of him. He'll do it, you know. Without your support if he has to, but he'd much rather do it with.'

‘What makes you think you've the right to tell me how to bring up my son?' Bill hissed furiously. ‘You're a fine bloody role model, aren't you? Don't think I don't know the
real
reason you lost your job in America! You might fool the Colonel and Mr Richmond but I know better, and it's only a matter of time before they find out for themselves. So why don't you get out while you can still go with dignity?'

With this, Bill turned abruptly on his heel and left the tackroom. Ross stared after him in bemused silence.

Obviously Bill had somehow come to hear of the rumours that had surrounded his ‘retirement' in the States, but quite what that had to do with Danny's ambition to be a jockey, Ross couldn't see. Somehow, too, it failed to account for the violence of the outburst.

Just before noon the following day, a red MG Roadster drew up in the yard and Lindsay climbed out, looking slim and tanned in cotton hipsters and a cropped top.

Ross had just finished hosing Bishop down after a hard but rewarding session in the school. He turned the tap off and went towards her, drying his hands on his unbuttoned denim shirt and smiling widely.

‘Hi! When did you get back? And why didn't you tell me?' He took advantage of the occasion to give her a welcoming kiss on the cheek.

‘Yesterday morning, early. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision. I've been longing to see how you're getting on and suddenly I couldn't wait any longer, so I rang the airport and they had a cancellation – so here I am! I was going to ring but then I thought I'd surprise you all.'

Bill and Sarah had appeared from the tackroom and joined in greeting Lindsay. Leo stood watching from a doorway until he was introduced and then turned on a hitherto undemonstrated charm.

‘You're just in time for coffee,' Ross told her. ‘Let me put Bishop away and we'll go and find Maggie.'

‘Do you know, that's one of the things I've missed most about England. Maggie's baking.' Lindsay laughed. ‘That and Gypsy. I'm longing to ride her again.'

Ross knew from their long conversations in the hospital that the Colonel's yard was barely three miles from the sizeable Georgian manor where Lindsay's family lived, and which was managed as a venue for conferences and up-market functions. She had told him that throughout her childhood, her ponies, and then horses, had been stabled at Oakley Manor to prevent her becoming, as her mother put it, ‘one of those abominable little horsey girls who always smell of stables'. As the only child of the Cresswells of Cresswell Hall, she was expected to make a suitable marriage and in due course take over the running of the Hall.

Seated at the table in the Scotts' cottage, Lindsay munched on one of Maggie's rock cakes and demanded to hear, in detail, about all Ross' successes to date.

‘And what happened to your hand?' she asked, after commiserating with him over the loss of the ride on King.

Ross hesitated. ‘I . . . uh . . . got kicked,' he said. ‘Bishop is a tad grouchy about having his legs handled, but it's nothing much.' He flexed the fingers of his bandaged hand to prove it was still operational.

‘“The patient is said to be comfortable”,' Lindsay quoted, grinning.

Ross smiled back. ‘Yeah, that sort of thing,' he agreed, noting that Leo was regarding him with a sullen stare, and wondering, not for the first time, if somebody really had pushed him under Bishop's feet. He shrugged the thought off. They had had their differences, but Leo had never given him any reason to think he wished him actual harm. For the most part they worked together well.

‘Whose is the dog?' Lindsay asked, seeing the German Shepherd lying half under Ross' chair.

‘Mine,' he said, reaching a hand down to stroke its head.

‘My, we have settled in, haven't we?'

‘Actually, it was more a case of the dog adopting me,' he told her.

Lindsay snapped her fingers, bending down to look at the animal. ‘Come on. Come and see me. What's his name?' she asked.

‘I don't know,' Ross said, realising that he'd never even thought about it. ‘I just call him “lad”, or “boy”.'

Lindsay looked heavenwards.

‘Honestly, men!' she said, heavily. ‘We'll have to think of one for you,' she told the dog, who flopped his tail but made no move towards her.

Maggie got up to clear away empty mugs and offer refills, and Ross remembered that he had another horse to ride before lunch.

‘Come on, back to work,' he said, standing up. ‘Sarah, will you saddle Clown for me in a minute? Leo, the poles in the jumping lane need picking up. Put them at two foot six, will you?'

Lindsay finished her coffee. ‘Thanks, Maggie, that was lovely. I must go and see Uncle John, but first I want to see my darling Gypsy. Is she here or out in the field?'

‘She's in the paddock behind the barn. I'll come with you,' Ross suggested.

As they walked, Lindsay glanced appraisingly at him. ‘So how're things, really?'

‘Good,' he stated. ‘I'm glad I came. Thanks.'

‘Oh, don't be silly! I must say you look a lot better than last time I saw you. You've lost that haunted look. England must suit you.'

‘Wow! Was I that bad?' Ross joked, uncomfortably.

Lindsay nodded. ‘Awful. You had me worried for a bit.' They had reached Gypsy's field and she called the mare over.

‘Yeah, well, I'm not especially proud of that little episode,' he admitted on a sigh.

‘You had good reason.' Lindsay reached out to pat her horse. ‘Anyway, it's all in the past. Now you can show them what you're really made of!'

‘Sure,' he agreed, pushing all thoughts of Ginger firmly to the back of his mind.

Shortly after that Lindsay departed with a cheery wave to visit ‘Uncle John', and Ross was left with mixed emotions. Seeing her again had lifted his spirits even more than he had expected, but his pleasure was tempered by the knowledge that somewhere in the wings lurked the man she was to marry.

‘James? Oh, he's still in Hong Kong at the moment,' she had said in answer to his casual query. ‘I spoke to him two days ago but he wasn't sure how soon he'd be back.'

Ross banished the absent James to the dim recesses of his mind, along with Ginger. He was getting quite good at it.

Lindsay's return acted like a breath of fresh air blowing through the yard at Oakley Manor. Leo exerted himself to be the classic romantic and affected deep hurt when she refused to take him seriously; Sarah came out of her shell and could be heard chatting quite animatedly to the older girl; even Bill was a shade more cheerful.

Lindsay spent at least part of most days at the yard, exercising Gypsy and sometimes one of the other horses. As far as Ross could tell, she seemed unaware of the growing strength of feeling he had for her and he took care to keep it that way. For her part, she gave no hint that she regarded Ross as anything more than a friend and he wasn't prepared to risk losing the companionship they shared by suggesting anything more.

A few days after her return he raided his savings and bought a battered jeep to run around in. Although he had been told he could borrow the yard's Land-Rover, Ross didn't like to use it on other than yard business in case there was an emergency. Besides, it was in his nature to be independent.

He also took Lindsay's less than subtle hint and went into Salisbury to get his hair cut, using the opportunity to fill out his sparse wardrobe and equip himself with a mobile phone and a new watch at the same time.

King was collected at the end of the week, and after consultation with the Colonel, Cragside was turned out to grass, Ross feeling that the solid grey had neither the ability nor the temperament to progress any further. Come autumn he would be sold as a hunter.

With Butterworth invalided indefinitely, the yard was down to seven horses in full work, not counting Gypsy, and with Lindsay around and Danny soon home for the holidays it seemed ridiculously overstaffed.

Ross' dog had settled in well, lying around in shady corners while Ross was in the yard or the school, padding softly out to follow the horses when he rode out to exercise and following him into his room at night. In the cottage or up at the main house he sat quietly behind Ross' chair as if he had been trained to do so and in general avoided everybody but Ross, whom he worshipped, and Sarah, whom he tolerated. He took to the jeep at once, jumping into the back as soon as Ross started the engine and travelling with his black muzzle resting on his master's shoulder.

The horses travelled to a couple more shows; Bishop and Flo building on their promising beginnings, and Franklin's old horse, Woodsmoke, pulling off a surprise win over a huge course at Lea Farm one evening.

Simone was proving hard to beat in speed classes, and although Ross still mistrusted Ginger, she didn't put a foot wrong at any of her shows and was even placed once.

Gradually the horses were beginning to accumulate the placings and amounts of prize-money that would move them up the grades and qualify for the bigger shows at Hickstead, Birmingham and Olympia. Regular attendance at county shows and smaller venues like Lea Farm was an inescapable part of the process.

Franklin Richmond's problem, never again spoken of by the man himself, began to fade into the back of Ross' mind.

Then the spell was broken.

It was a Tuesday. Lindsay's MG swept into the yard as usual, just after breakfast, but in place of the habitual jeans and jodhpur boots, she wore a smart skirt and blouse, with pearls gleaming at her throat.

‘Sorry, folks,' she said with a rueful smile. ‘James is coming home at the end of the week and I've got to go shopping for something to wear at our engagement do. I'm meeting a girlfriend in half an hour. London will be hell in this heat.'

Ross promised to exercise Gypsy for her and with a cheery wave she was gone, leaving him feeling more depressed than he cared to admit.

Bill and Sarah had gone out to do road work on Flo and Woody, and Leo was in the jump store repairing broken wings, when Ross brought Ginger into the school.

His mind was not entirely on the job in hand, he admitted to himself afterwards. He had been moodily wondering what kind of a man James Roberts was, that Lindsay should choose to spend the rest of her life with him: but that didn't in any way excuse or account for Ginger's subsequent behaviour.

It began in the way it had before, though Ross didn't notice the signs at first. Her ears began to flick to and fro nervously and she tossed her head a time or two. Her back hunched and stiffened, and her stride became choppy and uncomfortable.

Now fully alert, Ross guessed that the hammering noises emanating from the jump store were probably at the root of her unease and called out to Leo to stop working for the moment.

At first he thought Leo had not heard or was pretending he hadn't, but then the door opened and with a reverberating crash, he tossed several planks out on to the concrete apron.

Ginger exploded.

Quicker than thought, she whipped round and tore across the arena, heading blindly for the rails. Ross put all his weight on to one rein and pulled her head round until her muzzle was almost touching his knee and then, when a collision with the fence seemed inevitable, she lost her footing in the soft sand and fell heavily on to her side. Ross rolled off and tried to hang on to the reins as she scrambled furiously to her feet, but she ripped them through his fingers and whirled away.

The first thing she did was run into the rails on the other side of the school but they held and she rebounded and began to circle the arena at top speed. She careered past Ross five times before she started to slow up.

The first time, he moved towards her as she passed but could see by the look in her eyes that she would run him down if he got in her way, so he stood still and waited for her to calm down in her own time.

Eventually she stopped by the gate, head high and flanks heaving. Ross steeled himself to walk quietly up and take hold of her broken rein.

She didn't move; didn't even seem to notice him. Then she shuddered and her body drooped with released tension.

Ross patted her sweaty neck and then looked round.

Leo was leaning on the fence, watching with evident enjoyment. ‘Did I frighten her?' he asked innocently. ‘I'm so sorry.'