Spring (17 page)

‘I’m afraid I don’t, Jeremy.’

‘You must have something at Huntingdon today?’

‘None of em’s got much of a chance.’

‘No? Okay then. See you.’

Simon tilts his head for a moment in a sort of mock-­salute, then powers his window up and drives on. He parks the Range Rover in the yard. There is nothing picturesque about the place. Even the old house is a morose-­looking thing—­small-­windowed, white-­washed, with its inevitable satellite-­dish. Next to it is a warehouse-­like structure with mossy fibreglass walls where the haylage and Vixen nuts are stored and the tractor and various other pieces of sourly oily machinery live.

He finds Mrs Miller in the overheated kitchen looking through a surgical enhancement prospectus. ‘Where’ve you been?’ she says. He puts two packs of Marlboro Reds on the table and pats her terrycloth haunch. ‘Just fillin up the Range Rover.’

‘Oh?’ It hardly explains why he has been away for an hour and a half.

‘Yeah,’ he says, taking a seat with a tiny smirk on his face, ‘just fillin her up…’

‘Please don’t pat me like I’m a horse, Simon.’

‘Alright, alright…’ he mutters, and starts to read the UKIP Members’ Newsletter while she serves him his breakfast. He is quite involved politically.

He is still eating—­trying to pick up a slick of yolk with a mushy triangle of fried bread—­when his phone starts to sing ‘You’re Just Too Good To Be True.’

You’re just too good to be true

Can’t take my eyes off of you

You’d be like heaven to touch

I wanna hold you so much…

Shoving his plate away, he answers it. It is Francis Moss, a well-­known horseracing journalist, media personality, fellow UKIP member, and friend.

‘Alright, Mossy,’ Simon says. ‘How are you? Alright?’

Mossy says something.

‘Yeah alright,’ Simon says.

Then he says, ‘Oh, did you?’ He frowns and using only his free hand unwraps one of the packs of Marlboro Reds. Then he says, ‘Well as it happens, yes.’

Mossy speaks again.

‘No, Huntingdon.’

And then—­‘The two o’clock.’

And finally—­‘That’s just for you Mossy. Not for the service. I mean it.’ As one of his many sidelines Mossy operates a tipping service, his familiar face smiling out of ads in the
Racing Post.
‘Nice one,’ Simon says. ‘Yeah, I’m going to be there. Okay, see you there. Oh, did you get the newsletter? Just got it in the post this morning.’ For a few minutes they talk UKIP politics—­who’s in, who’s out (of the EU). Mossy is a fairly senior tin-­rattler for the party, on friendly terms with the national leadership.

Simon says, ‘Listen, I’ve got to go, mate. Yeah, I’ll see you at the track. Smashing. Yeah. Ta. See you there.’

Leaving his plate on the table, he lights a Marlboro, pulls on his Hunters and pushes his way through a fierce wet wind towards the stables, where Piers is supervising the loading of the horse transport.

*

In the first betting shop James enters, near Russell Square tube, the price is so short he thinks there’s been some mistake. There had not. And then, as he watches, it shortens still further. With the price unstoppably shortening, he spends the morning lowering his estimate of how much he will win if the touch is landed, until at about noon, from somewhere next to a motorway in Neasden, he phones Freddy. ‘Have you seen the fucking price?’ he shouts.

‘It’s fucking short,’ Freddy agrees.

‘Do you think Miller’s stiffing us? Do you think him and his mates got all the fancy prices?’

‘There was some twelve to one first thing,’ Freddy says. ‘Didn’t you have any of that?’

‘No, I didn’t…’

‘Last night on Betfair,’ Freddy says, ‘there were some silly prices. I hoovered up everything down to twenty to one. There was even a few quid of hundred to one.’

‘You didn’t use your own account?’

‘For some.’

‘You used your own account?’

‘For some of it. Why not? It’s normal. I part-­own the fucking horse…’

James says, ‘If we get in shit for this I’m going to fucking kill you.’

‘Stop worrying,’ Freddy says. ‘Everything’s going to be okay. What’s that noise? Where are you?’

‘Neasden.’

‘What the fuck are you doing there?’

‘Trying to be subtle about it,’ James says. ‘I shouldn’t have fucking bothered. I’ll talk to you later.’ There is little more than an hour to post time, and he still has nearly a thousand unwagered pounds in his pocket.

*

The scene of his triumph is a quiet William Hill’s in Hendon.

Standing in the threadbare Hill’s, his heart pumping, with two old men he watches his horse win easily on one of the screens. When she wins he experiences several seconds of pure satisfaction and pleasure. The pure stuff. Unmixed with anything else. Medical quality feelings. And then there is Miller on the screen, unmistakably flushed with triumph. From the way he is flushed, from the way he is windily speaking, it is obvious that he is euphoric. ‘Wasn’t expecting that!’ he says with a laugh.

‘Weren’t you?’ the interviewer asks him.

‘No, not at all!’

‘Well the market got it right.’

‘Yeah. Wasn’t my money though.’

‘You didn’t have a few quid on?’

‘Not a penny. Unfortunately!’

While Miller is still speaking, James takes the first of his winnings from the teller and walks out into the traffic noise, the London light—­sun smearing pigeon-­hued pavements and striking the modest parade of shops of which the Hill’s forms a part. In the end he won very much less than he hoped—­not much more than £10,000 is his first estimate, which will last him only a few months, five at the most—­and once the euphoria wears off a sort of di­sappointment sets in. He takes a taxi from Kilburn High Street in the late afternoon, and dusk is falling when he lets himself into the flat and hides his winnings, well wrapped in plastic, in the soil of a house-­plant, a hibiscus, that he acquired especially for the purpose. If the stewards are suspicious, they or the police might look for the money, for
some
money—­they were unlikely to find it there. Then he has a shower and dresses for an evening out.

*

When word got round that Simon had landed a nice little touch and was sharing the wealth in the usual way, the villagers packed the Plough like it were New Year’s Eve. As for the karaoke it were like this—­ Simon sang a song, then somebody else sang a song, then Simon sang two songs, then somebody else sang a song, then Simon sang three songs… He did all his favourites. ‘New York, New York’.
Start spreadinnn the noooze
… (Very flat on that last word.)
I’m leavinn terdaaay
… (Even flatter.) He did ‘Let Me Entertain You’. And obviously ‘You’re Just Too Good To Be True’—­ soft-­soaping the opening section with his eyes shut, and then absolutely yelling out
I LOVE YOU BAY-­BEE!!
He was looking straight at Kelly Nicholls when he sang those words. That was unwise. Especially since her father is in. Jeremy is sitting as far as possible from the temporary little stage in its puddle of coloured light, smoking a Hamlet—­ the law on smoking in public places was not always observed in the Plough—­ and drinking a double Scotch. When Simon passes him on his way to the Gents, his face varnished with sweat and his voice hoarse, Jeremy says, with a smile, ‘None of em’s got much of a chance, eh, Simon?’ It takes Simon a second to work out what he is talking about—­ their meeting in the lane. When he does, he just winks at him, without stopping, and proceeds to take his piss.

That double Scotch is not, of course, the only imbursement the Nicholls family has taken from the touch. Earlier in the evening—­the karaoke hadn’t started yet—­he met with Kelly on the empty expanse of tarmac at the side of the pub. There he took from her the same envelope she had pocketed in the morning, only now it was very much fatter. It would hardly shut. He sat in the Range Rover with the vanity light on leafing through the immense wad and quickly worked out there was the thick end of £10,000 there. Moistening his index finger at his small mouth, he extracted £200 from the envelope, and then—­experiencing a unexpected surge of feeling for his young mistress—­supplemented it with a further hundred. She was still waiting on the wet tarmac when he lowered himself from the Range Rover and slammed the door. ‘Here,’ he said. Then he tenderly lifted her fleece, popped the button of her jeans and pushed the folded money down the front of her pants.

He had started his speech when she sat down in the pub. (He told her to wait outside for a few minutes, then follow him in.) He had a mic in his hand. The music had been turned off. There was a tolerant silence. The first words she heard were—­‘… but it wouldn’t be nothing without you lot. I mean that. Every last one of you. Some might be more important than others, but every job matters. Even yours Piers.’ Laughter. And in the short turbulence of the merriment did he wink at her? The moment passed so quickly. And then he was saying, ‘I’m a sentimental old bugger…’ When he said that, she smiled secretly at the floor, thinking of the extra £100 she had found when she transferred the money from her pants to her pocket.

The speech went on for some time—­the thick end of half an hour. And it was hard to say when it happened, but at some point it seemed to metamorphose from a speech of thanks and welcome—­thanks for the support and welcome to the party—­into something else. The phrase ‘European superstate’ made the first of several appearances. He said something about ‘as long as we live in an independent nation.’ He said, ‘I’ve nothing against foreigners, as most of you know last summer we had a French lad in the stables…’ Towards the end there was some light-­hearted heckling.

When it was finally over and the music was on again, Frank Moss, who had had a lift from Huntingdon in the front of the horse transport, took him aside. ‘Top speech,’ he said.

‘Yeah, ta, Mossy…’

‘We have
got
to introduce you to Nigel. Listen, there’s a meeting in Eastbourne in a few weeks—­how about then? And what about being on the platform? You’ll have to say a few words. Alright?’

‘What do you mean a few words?’ Simon said, watching suspiciously as Dermot, one of the lads from the yard, went over to where Kelly was sitting and started to talk to her.

‘If we’re serious about this,’ Mossy said, ‘you need more profile. They love you here. That’s obvious. You’d be a shoo-­in here…’

‘Well most of em work for me…’

‘This is where you start from,’ Mossy whispered excitedly. ‘This is your heartland. Everyone in politics needs a heartland, Si. It’s step by step. You start small, then you take the next step. Eastbourne, Sunday second of April. Put it in the diary.’ Then he said quietly, ‘Everything okay with the stewards?’

‘Yeah I think so,’ Simon muttered. ‘I hope so.’

The Huntingdon stewards had had him in. They had had some questions for him about the mare. Standing there with young Tom, he had said that yes, she had shown striking improvement on previous form, he did not know why—­perhaps it was the onset of spring?—­and he wanted to be as helpful as possible with their inquiries. When the stewards said they wanted to speak to the owners, he said that since they weren’t expecting her to win, unfortunately they weren’t there. Then Francis Moss stepped in to testify that that very morning Mr Miller had told him he didn’t think the horse had any hope of winning. The stewards said they would look into the matter. ‘Okay,’ Simon said. ‘And if you have any questions just…’ With his thumb and little finger he mimed a phone.

There is a lock-­in, obviously. The Plough, with its horse-­brasses and low beams, is still quite full at two.

*

In the early evening, with unprecedented promptness, Freddy had paid James the £5,000 he owed him for his share in the mare in the form of a novel-­sized wad of £20 notes, which they proceeded to leave in a thick trail through the West End, finally picking up a flock of skimpily dressed Norwegian girls in a Mayfair nightclub. Two taxis whisked them all to Chelsea, where Freddy was their host.

The tall eighteenth century townhouse in which Freddy lives is not, of course, his own. Impressive from the outside—­spilling out of the taxis onto Cheyne Walk the Norwegian ladies were palpably excited by its size and splendour—­it is less promising once you step through the front door. Freddy’s landlord Anselm inherited it in the Eighties in a leaky, mouldering state, and has since done absolutely nothing to it. The whole place smells mustily of dust and wet plaster. Inside, Freddy starts showing off at the piano, and while the others surround him or slip off to explore the house—­naughty laughter in the unlit stairwells—­James finds himself on the smaller of the sofas with twenty-­two-­year-­old Maia, who had been taking a touchingly obvious interest in him from the start. (At one point she had placed his hands on her sparrowy diaphragm—­what had that been about?) He is very drunk. Things have started sliding around, not least his voice, and she is sitting on his knee and kissing him. Her strong little tongue is moving in his mouth as they slide down onto the seat of the sofa. There, out of sight of the others, she whispers, ‘I have a fiancé.
Hic!
In Norway. So we’ll just have a one night stand. Okay?’ In spite of the hiccups, she starts kissing him again, more forcefully, holding his head with her hands.

There is no shortage of empty rooms in the huge house. There are rooms overlooking the Thames. There are rooms overlooking the tops of mature trees. There are rooms full of antique furniture. There are rooms with four-­poster beds…

‘No,’ he says, prising her off him. ‘No, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.’ He touches her nose and smiles. ‘I’m sorry.’ She says nothing, and for a few minutes they just lie there on the sofa. Then she stands up and joins the others at the piano. She seems sad, and watching her he wonders whether he should have taken her upstairs and fucked her in one of the four-­poster beds. He wonders whether he
wants
to do that—­does he
want
to do that?

He is still watching her and wondering when the door opens and Anselm is there in a satin duvet of a dressing-­gown, his soft white hair askew, squinting in the light.