Someone Like You Read online

  ‘No, all right.’

  These were the best dogs of all, the secret ones kept in the cars and taken out quick just to be entered up (under some invented name) and put back again quick and held there till the last minute, then straight down to the traps and back again into the cars after the race so no nosy bastard gets too close a look. The trainer at the big stadium said so. All right, he said. You can have him, but for Christsake don’t let anybody recognize him. There’s thousands of people know this dog, so you’ve got to be careful, see. And it’ll cost you fifty pound.

  Very fast dogs these, but it doesn’t much matter how fast they are they probably get the needle anyway, just to make sure. One and a half c.c.s of ether, subcutaneous, done in the car, injected very slow. That’ll put ten lengths on any dog. Or sometimes it’s caffein in oil, or camphor. That makes them go too. The men in the big cars know all about that. And some of them know about whisky. But that’s intravenous. Not so easy when it’s intravenous. Might miss the vein. All you got to do is miss the vein and it don’t work and where are you then? So it’s ether, or it’s caffein, or it’s camphor. Don’t give her too much of that stuff now, Jock. What does she weigh? Fifty-eight pounds. All right then, you know what the man told us. Wait a minute now. I got it written down on a piece of paper. Here it is. Point 1 of a c.c. per 10 pounds bodyweight equals 5 lengths over 300 yards. Wait a minute now while I work it out. Oh Christ, you better guess it. Just guess it, Jock. It’ll be all right you’ll find. Shouldn’t be any trouble anyway because I picked the others in the race myself. Cost me a tenner to old Feasey. A bloody tenner I gave him, and dear Mr Feasey, I says, that’s for your birthday and because I love you.

  Thank you ever so much, Mr Feasey says. Thank you, my good and trusted friend.

  And for stopping them, for the men in the big cars, it’s chlorbutal. That’s a beauty, chlorbutal, because you can give it the night before, especially to someone else’s dog. Or Pethidine. Pethidine and Hyoscine mixed, whatever that may be.

  ‘Lot of fine old English sporting gentry here.’ Claud said.

  ‘Certainly are.’

  ‘Watch your pockets, Gordon. You got that money hidden away?’

  We walked around the back of the line of cars – between the cars and the hedge – and I saw Jackie stiffen and begin to pull forward on the leash, advancing with a stiff crouching tread. About thirty yards away there were two men. One was holding a large fawn greyhound, the dog stiff and tense like Jackie. The other was holding a sack in his hands.

  ‘Watch,’ Claud whispered, ‘they’re giving him a kill.’

  Out of the sack on to the grass tumbled a small white rabbit, fluffy white, young, tame. It righted itself and sat still, crouching in the hunched up way rabbits crouch, its nose close to the ground. A frightened rabbit. Out of the sack so suddenly on to the grass with such a bump. Into the bright light. The dog was going mad with excitement now, jumping up against the leash, pawing the ground, throwing himself forward, whining. The rabbit saw the dog. It drew in its head and stayed still, paralysed with fear. The man transferred his hold to the dog’s collar, and the dog twisted and jumped and tried to get free. The other man pushed the rabbit with his foot but it was too terrified to move. He pushed it again, flicking it forward with his toe like a football, and the rabbit rolled over several times, righted itself and began to hop over the grass away from the dog. The other man released the dog which pounced with one huge pounce upon the rabbit, and then came the squeals, not very loud but shrill and anguished and lasting rather a long time.

  ‘There you are,’ Claud said. ‘That’s a kill.’

  ‘Not sure I liked it very much.’

  ‘I told you before, Gordon. Most of ’em does it. Keens the dog up before a race.’

  ‘I still don’t like it.’

  ‘Nor me. But they all do it. Even in the big stadiums the trainers do it. Proper barbary I call it.’

  We strolled away and below us on the slope of the hill the crowd was thickening and the bookies’ stands with the names written on them in red and gold and blue were all erected now in a long line back of the crowd, each bookie already stationed on an upturned box beside his stand, a pack of numbered cards in one hand, a piece of chalk in the other, his clerk behind him with book and pencil. Then we saw Mr Feasey walking over to a blackboard that was nailed to a post stuck in the ground.

  ‘He’s chalking up the first race,’ Claud said. ‘Come on, quick!’

  We walked rapidly down the hill and joined the crowd. Mr Feasey was writing the runners on the blackboard, copying names from his soft-covered notebook, and a little hush of suspense fell upon the crowd as they watched.

  Sally

  Three Quid

  Snailbox Lady

  Black Panther

  Whisky

  Rockit

  ‘He’s in it!’ Claud whispered. ‘First race! Trap four! Now, listen, Gordon! Give me a fiver quick to show the winder.’ Claud could hardly speak from excitement. That patch of whiteness had returned around his nose and eyes, and when I handed him a five pound note, his whole arm was shaking as he took it. The man who was going to wind the bicycle pedals was still standing on top of the wooden platform in his blue jersey, smoking. Claud went over and stood below him, looking up.

  ‘See this fiver,’ he said, talking softly, holding it folded small in the palm of his hand.

  The man glanced at it without moving his head.

  ‘Just so long as you wind her true this race, see. No stopping and no slowing down and run her fast. Right?’

  The man didn’t move but there was a slight, almost imperceptible lifting of the eyebrows. Claud turned away.

  ‘Now, look, Gordon. Get the money on gradual, all in little bits like I told you. Just keep going down the line putting on little bits so you don’t kill the price, see. And I’ll be walking Jackie down very slow, as slow as I dare, to give you plenty of time, Right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘And don’t forget to be standing ready to catch him at the end of the race. Get him clear away from all them others when they start fighting for the hare. Grab a hold of him tight and don’t let go till I come running up with the collar and lead. That Whisky’s a gipsy dog and he’ll tear the leg off anything as gets in his way.’

  ‘Right,’ I said. ‘Here we go.’

  I saw Claud lead Jackie over to the finishing post and collect a yellow jacket with 4 written on it large. Also a muzzle. The other five runners were there too, the owners fussing around them, putting on their numbered jackets, adjusting their muzzles. Mr Feasey was officiating, hopping about in his tight riding-breeches like an anxious perky bird, and once I saw him say something to Claud and laugh. Claud ignored him. Soon they would all start to lead the dogs down the track, the long walk down the hill and across to the far corner of the field to the starting-traps. It would take them ten minutes to walk it. I’ve got at least ten minutes, I told myself, and then I began to push my way through the crowd standing six or seven deep in front of the line of bookies.

  ‘Even money Whisky! Even money Whisky! Five to two Sally! Even money Whisky! Four to one Snailbox! Come on now! Hurry up, hurry up! Which is it?’

  On every board all down the line the Black Panther was chalked up at twenty-five to one. I edged forward to the nearest book.

  ‘Three pounds Black Panther,’ I said, holding out the money.

  The man on the box had an inflamed magenta face and traces of some white substance around the corners of his mouth. He snatched the money and dropped it in his satchel. ‘Seventy-five pounds to three Black Panther,’ he said. ‘Number forty-two.’ He handed me a ticket and his clerk recorded the bet.

  I stepped back and wrote rapidly on the back of the ticket 75 to 3, then slipped it into the inside pocket of my jacket with the money.

  So long as I continued to spread the cash out thin like this, it ought to be all right. And anyway, on Claud’s instructions, I’d made a point of betting a few pounds on the