Chessie, who had just applied lipstick to match her red suit and who didn’t seem to go blue like everyone else, drifted towards Ricky as he rode back on to the field. For a second they stared at each other, then Chessie smiled.
‘Good luck, my darling, you can do it,’ she murmured, pretending to tread in a divot. Then breaking off a long pale-grey strand of wool from her fringed shawl, she handed it quickly up to him. ‘Wear it on your lance.’
‘I love you,’ Ricky called after her as he rode on. He was about to knot the wool round his stick, then realized he would be changing it and tied it to his whip. They would win now, he knew it.
Early in the fourth chukka, Red narrowed the gap with a penalty, but a second later Ricky widened it again. Galloping down the field with love in his heart, he skedaddled like a child in a bending race round Dommie, then Red, dummied passed Seb and with two magical offside forehands found the flags: 5-3. The stand went crazy. As if Chessie’s favour had put a spell on him, he went on to score three more goals.
‘Ricky France-Lynch has a secret weapon there,’ explained Terry Hanlon, the Cowdray commentator, ‘and it’s called practice. There he goes – eight goals of Rutshire dynamite – soon to be nine, if my spies are telling me right. Good to see you back on form, Ricky, oh, what a lovely shot, but it’s hit the posts. And Luke Alderton gives him back the sort of pass all players dream about, and Ricky slams it in. Apocalypse lead 9-3.’
In the fifth chukka, the Flyers tried repeatedly to score, but were foiled by the dogged bloody-minded courage of Apocalypse.
On its green baize table the Gold Cup, which had been reflecting the desperate struggle on the field, seemed to be waiting to be carried home in triumph to Robinsgrove. Surely even Red couldn’t score eight goals in one chukka.
But now Apocalypse changed on to stick-and-ball horses, which were all they had left. Luke, getting on to Geoffrey, the hangover horse, kept up the pressure.
‘Cool it, you guys. Don’t get over-confident. Red’s scored seven goals in a chukka before now and his blood’s up. Just keep rattling them, stop them scoring, above all stick to Red, Perdita, and we can do it,’ he exhorted, clamping a great hand on Dancer and then on Perdita’s back.
Without Fantasma he felt like a mercenary who’s run out of ammo in enemy territory, but he kept his fears to himself. Silently Ricky mounted Wayne. He was seven minutes away from his first leg and he didn’t dare to hope. As they rode out for the last chukka their shirts were no longer white but black with mud – Apocalypse again. Already they could hear the Midhurst town band warming up for the presentation; ‘Four horsemen, riding, riding, riding’.
‘Come on, Nigger,’ said Perdita clamping her legs round her fat black pony. ‘Why are you so fucking slow?’
‘You better rename him Snowflake if he wins Best Playing Pony,’ said Luke with a grin. ‘It’s being presented by some African prince. Oh, Jesus! No!’
The others followed his gaze.
‘Shit,’ whispered Ricky.
‘Oh, my God,’ gasped Perdita in horror, for the Tigers were riding towards them on four of the most beautiful, glossy, well-muscled thoroughbred ponies she had ever seen. ‘Who the hell are they?’
‘Inecita, Cecilia, Leila and Carmen – in a word,’ said Luke bleakly. ‘I don’t believe it, I simply do not believe it. Miguel must have flown them over.’
He cantered up to Red. ‘What the fuck are you doing on those ponies?’
Red grinned, white teeth flashing in a mud-caked face. ‘Dad was worried we were out of horses so he lent us four of his.’
‘Why isn’t he playing them in his own match?’
Red laughed. ‘He’s so unselfish he thought our need was greater. After all, he really doesn’t want Ricky to win the Gold Cup.’
‘And how does Victor feel riding his worst enemy’s horses?’
‘I guess he hasn’t noticed and he won’t care as long as he wins.’
The sixth chukka was crucifixion. On four matchless horses, who had each won Best Playing Pony in the Argentine Open, there was no defence. It was like putting three-legged bulldogs against greyhounds. And from the way Red and the twins were riding them, it was obvious they’d tried them out several times before. From the first throw-in Red scored goal after goal until the crowd, most of whom had no idea what had happened, were yelling on their feet. A wide-angled shot from Seb thirty seconds from the end of the match had the Tigers in front and now they had the wind behind them. Ricky was near suicide.
‘There’s still time,’ beseeched Luke. ‘For Christ’s sake, settle down, you guys.’
Then Victor, failing to control Inecita, barged across Dancer’s line. Whoever converted would tie up the score and take the match into extra time.
‘I’ll take it,’ said Ricky.
‘You sure?’ asked Luke.
Dancer opened his mouth to protest, then realizing Ricky needed the ultimate responsibility, shut it again.
Ricky turned, and for a moment stared at Chessie, who pointedly held up two crossed fingers; then he cantered Wayne round in a perfect arc before a totally silent crowd. Forward went his stick then back, then down it swooped like an eagle, meeting the ball perfectly so it flew straight and true between the posts. Then at the last moment a gust of wind tossed it against the right goal post and it bounced back. Apocalypse lunged forward, but the bell had gone.
Perdita burst into floods of tears. ‘We’ve been robbed! We’ve been bloody robbed!’
Luke cantered over and pulled her against his chest. Geoffrey and Nigger were so exhausted they just stood still, leaning against each other.
The twins, looking very sheepish, rode up to shake hands, followed by an openly laughing Red.
‘Fuck off, the lot of you,’ said Luke.
With his arm round Perdita’s shoulders he rode back to the pony lines where all the Apocalypse grooms were in tears and Ricky was sitting in the boot of his car, head in his hands, absolutely stunned.
Perdita threw her arms round him. ‘They stabbed us in the back,’ she sobbed frantically. ‘Oh, poor, poor Ricky.’
‘Why don’t you bugger off?’ snapped Luke to Cameron Cook and Venturer who were still avidly filming.
Putting a coat round Perdita’s shoulders and leaving her with Dancer and Daisy, who’d just arrived, Luke went off in search of his father whom he found putting on his knee pads for the second match.
‘You son-of-a-bitch,’ he roared. ‘We had it in the bag and we were robbed. I’ve always stuck up for you, but, by God, I’m well and truly in the enemy camp now.’
Bart looked up, as coldly angry as Luke was inflamed. ‘I know how to guard my own,’ he said softly. ‘It’s my marriage I’m fighting for. You’re the one who betrayed me, right? Publicly helping Ricky to win his bet.’
‘What bet?’ demanded Luke. ‘I don’t know anything about a bet.’
‘You’d better ask your friend Dancer.’
50
That night Luke had a blazing row with Dancer.
‘I’ve been working my ass off all summer trying to help Ricky win a bet everyone seems to have known about but me. Dad said I was being treacherous coming over here. I’d no idea how treacherous, and that son-of-a-bitch Ricky was in on it too.’
Dancer shook his head vehemently. ‘It weren’t Ricky’s fault. You know how pissed off he was when I hired you. He wanted to win the Gold Cup without any help from the Aldertons. An’ anyway your Dad started it by nicking Ricky’s wife in the first place.’
