Jump.

'Good luck, old chap, come back safe,' she said, scratching Cuthbert's neck with a claw-like liver-spotted hand. 'And good luck to you,' she called out to Awesome, as Tresa led them off to join the parade.

'That horse'll need a Zimmer to get round,' yelled Harvey-Holden.

Awesome for once was paying enough attention to turn round and give him a V-sign.

Winning trainers were being grabbed by BBC presenters and asked for their take on the race. Rogue, in the studio, had been asked for his most iconic National moment.

'Now, today,' he'd replied in a choked voice. 'Mrs Wilkinson is the smallest horse carrying the most weight, a brave and beautiful girl on her back,' and 600 million viewers cheered in agreement.

The crowds bubbling over with excitement, the clattering of police horses' hooves and the fanfare from red-uniformed trumpeters with radio mikes on the end of their instruments shredded the horses' nerves as they set out in the parade led by Mrs Wilkinson carrying the top weight.

The BBC had each horse's details ready in order, but everything was screwed up by Furious, who was used to having Rafiq on his back and going straight down to the start. Catching Michael Meagan off guard as he gazed at Tresa, Furious took off, taking half the runners with him.

'What would be going through your mind at this moment, Rogue?' asked Richard Pitman.

'Irritation at the hold-up, wanting to get going,' said Rogue.

It was eerie and very cold at the start. The huge crowd had gone so quiet you could hear the distant cries of the bookies as punters scurried to put on last bets. Treaders edged in final divots. Spotters checked their walkie-talkies.

Dora had gained the scoop of a lifetime, riding along in a car with the BBC camera crew filming the race. As they waited, she watched the jockeys taking their horses to look at the first fence.

Mrs Wilkinson couldn't see over it, Sir Cuthbert, who resented missing lunch, was trying to eat it and spitting out bits of spruce. Other horses were having their manes raked or their ears pulled, anything to calm them.

For a second Tommy clung to Mrs Wilkinson.

'Just come home safely, darling, and you too, Amber.'

'I want to say thank you for all you've done for me, Tom,' muttered Amber, about to cover her frantically chattering teeth with her gum s.h.i.+eld. 'If I don't come back, I want you to have all my jewellery.'

Tommy thought her heart would burst.

138.

As forty horses circled together, the sun came out to see them off. All the Irish jockeys were crossing themselves.

'Our father,' Awesome intoned.

'Defend oh Lord, this thy child and her horse,' murmured Amber. She thought about Rogue and then about Billy, then she thought of nothing but the race as they hustled in a cavalry charge over the Melling Road for three hundred yards to the first fence rising as huge as a green block of flats. A great cheer went up as Mrs Wilkinson stood back on her hocks and flew over.

'That bar used to be a railway siding, where people watched the race from the train,' said a BBC cameraman as they hurtled Dora along beside the track.

'Wilkie's jumping really well,' crowed Dora. 'Can we go a bit faster?'

'We mustn't go too fast or the horses start racing us, which infuriates the jockeys.'

As Rupert had told her to hunt round the first circuit, Amber was actually taking it very easily. Rupert had had a good effect on Wilkie, she was running much straighter. Furious, even further behind, was loathing having horses all round him, and exhausting himself battling against the brutal strength of Eddie, who'd been instructed to hold him up.

Shade's pacemaker Voltaire Scott was as usual going much too fast. Out of the forty runners, six horses, trying to keep up, fell at the first fence, eight at the second, seven at the third. Soon loose horses were galloping all round Amber.

At each fence the leaders ripped away a forest of fir tree and put up a cloud of dust it was difficult to see through. Amber was trying to get a clear run, but every time she landed, she had to avoid fallen horses and jockeys on the ground.

Now it was Becher's, vaster than Etta's conifer hedge and with its seven-foot drop. As Rupert had instructed, she steered Wilkie towards the middle and even though she felt they were falling off the edge of the world, they landed safely.

When would Harvey-Holden start employing his team tactics? Gradually on her left she was aware of a dark shadow growing closer, Johnnie Brutus and Ilkley Hall edging up on the rails, then Bafford Playboy sliding up on her right, and she realized in terror they were trying to box her in and once again block Wilkie's good eye.

Somehow they scrambled over Foinavon and were scorching towards the Ca.n.a.l Turn, where the course jinked ninety degrees and where, because of Animal Rights trouble in the past, no crowds were allowed.

Through a haze of fear, Amber tried to remember what Rupert had told her.

'Go wide round the bend, take it at an angle, then swing left in the air, straighten out and go h.e.l.l for leather for Valentine's.'

Shoved out by Johnnie Brutus on the inner, unable to go wide because of Killer threatening her on her right, Mrs Wilkinson forgot Rupert's lessons and jumped wildly to the left to reach the safety of the rails, cutting across Furious who was just behind her.

Losing concentration, distracted by the swearing and the shouts of the jockeys and by loose horses on all sides, Furious took off too early, hit the top of the fence and seeing a horse writhing just below him, lunged to the right. Next minute he had fallen heavily, taking Eddie with him.

Eddie sat with his head bowed, his right hand thras.h.i.+ng the cut-up ground with his whip, he'd done something awful to his left shoulder. He'd let Grandpa down, no three-thousandth win.

'f.u.c.king, f.u.c.king horse, f.u.c.king stupid animal,' he screamed, until the rest of the field had moved on and the sun had gone in in embarra.s.sment.

The crowd and Rafiq watching on the big screen had yelled in relief as, ever gallant, Furious scrambled to his feet and broke into a canter. The cameras moved on, but those nearby gasped in horror as they realized his hind leg

Ilkley Hall, who'd been the horse writhing on the ground and who'd been raced three times in three weeks, chasing the Order of Merit for Harvey-Holden, had not got up.

The screens went round both horses. Rupert's a.s.sistant Lysander, having grabbed an official car, was at the scene as quickly as possible, by which time a course vet had decreed that Furious must be put down and moved to the side of the course before the runners came round again. Furious, who'd been initially sedated by an injection, was for once standing docile.

Next moment a screaming, hysterical treader in a woolly hat and dark gla.s.ses had shoved aside the screens and, sobbing wildly, flung his arms around Furious.

'Don't shoot him. We can save him, Martin Pipe saved Our Vic, please don't kill him, please don't.'

'Rafiq,' gasped Lysander as he and a security man and two spotters managed to tug him away. Rafiq immediately struggled free, clutching Furious, smoothing back the blond mane, at which Furious whickered lovingly to see him.

'Look, he know me, he's OK. He's all right.' Rafiq looked beseechingly up at Lysander. 'We can mend him.' His sobs increased. 'I'm going to give you a wonderful home.' He dropped a kiss on Furious's white star.

'Please be quiet, you're upsetting the horse,' snapped the course vet. 'We've got to get it out of the way.'

This time it took two security men, two spotters and Lysander to drag Rafiq off and restrain him as a horse ambulance man held Furious while the course vet put a gun to his white star and pulled the trigger.

There was blood everywhere as, with maddened strength, Rafiq fell back on to Furious's body.

'You kill my horse, he shouldn't have died,' he howled at the course vet.

A shadow fell across them. It was Valent, who put a hand on Rafiq's shoulder.

'Nothing they could do?' he asked Lysander, who was also in tears as he shook his head.

Ilkley Hall, meanwhile, who was whimpering in the most pathetic way, had struggled to sit up like a dog. Putting his ear to the horse's back, the vet heard a crunch.

'Back's broken. We've got to get them to the side of the course.'

Eddie Alderton, spitting out mud and gra.s.s, had staggered to his feet. Johnnie Brutus lay still. Glaring wildly round, utterly deranged, Rafiq watched Harvey-Holden, with a strange, almost excited look in his reptilian eyes, approaching to see his horse dispatched. This time there was no whickering of recognition from Ilkley Hall. As the trigger was pulled he writhed, kicked violently and went still.

As the horse ambulance men winched the two horses to the side of the course, Rafiq turned like a viper on Harvey-Holden.

'At least you get the insurance like you did after that fire you started. I know everything about you, you evil b.a.s.t.a.r.d.'

As he whipped out a knife, everyone jumped back, except Valent, who stepped forward: 'Give that to me, lad.'

But Rafiq only wanted to cut off a lock of Furious's mane.

'They've killed my horse,' he yelled at Valent, then dropped a last kiss on Furious's shoulder, covering himself in blood.

'I'm awful sorry, Rafiq,' muttered Eddie, who, supported by an ambulance man, had joined the group.

For a moment, Rafiq fingered his knife.

'I'd have kept him out of trouble,' he hissed. 'He hate any horses round him, but it was Wilkie's fault, she hung left. She brought him down.'

'They're coming. Get off the course,' yelled a security man as the runners on the second circuit came thundering towards them. By the time they had gone and new fallers were waiting to be picked off the floor, Rafiq had vanished.

139.

News had flashed round the course that both Furious and Ilkley Hall had fallen and the screens had gone round but few knew the outcome or could hear the commentary because of the roar of the crowd.

Only fifteen horses were left. Ilkley Hall's stable mate was faring well. On the big screen, Playboy could be seen beginning to work his fatal magic on the race, eating up the miles, sweeping past the field as though they were standing still. Killer on his back was hunting him round a day out with the Beaufort.

Sir Cuthbert was up with the leaders, in with a chance. To the joy of the crowd, Mrs Wilkinson, tongue flapping, was in eighth place, leading the second group.

Amber was dying of pride, as she crouched over the neat grey plaits, watching the grey ears twitching, listening to every word of encouragement. Now Wilkie was grinding her teeth in her determination to catch the leaders.

'You can do it, Wilkie, you can do it.'

One furlong to go, two horses crashed at two out. Only Squiffey Liffey, Sir Cuthbert and Playboy were ahead. Then Julien Sorel, who'd uns.h.i.+pped Dare Catswood at the open ditch on the second circuit, lumbered past like a maddened buffalo determined to influence the race, and did so by spurring on Mrs Wilkinson.

'Come on, Wilkie,' roared the ecstatic crowd, as she overtook him.

Killer, bounding up to the last fence, a four-foot-six cliff of green, was so convinced he was going to win, he lost concentration and let Playboy take off too early so he banked the fence, scattering spruce, losing ground.

Reaching the elbow, he moved his whip into his right hand to guide Playboy to the left and into the home straight. Deafened by another roar, he glanced between his legs, arched like the John Smith horseshoe, and was flabbergasted to see his nemesis, a white face in a green browband, bearing down on him.

Never had a roof of blue sky been so raised at Aintree. Watching the huge bay and the little grey battling it out was like seeing a father racing his child. The difference was that Killer, mad with rage, was thras.h.i.+ng the life out of Bafford Playboy.

'Such a fight to the death,' yelled Jim McGrath from his commentary box. 'This is the battle of the s.e.xes. First time a mare's won for nearly sixty years, first time a woman's ever won it, making history in the battle of the s.e.xes.'

Mrs Wilkinson was so exhausted, humping her great burden of weight, she could scarcely put one foot in front of another. She'd given her all. Would the post never come?

In the BBC control room, they could see the Liverpool ladies screaming in ecstasy, the stewards leaving their polished table and running cheering to the window. Even the policemen in their yellow flak jackets turned round to smile and cheer as Wilkie pulled ahead.

'Mrs Wilkinson is about to join the great legends of the winter game,' shouted Jim McGrath. 'She's coming up on the inside rail, she's sc.r.a.ping the paint, this is un-be-liev-able.'

This is the longest time I've ever been on a horse. Keep asking, keep asking, Amber told herself.

Foam was flying from Wilkie's mouth, the veins on her grey coat stood out like pipelines, but she p.r.i.c.ked her ears and, still with a little left in the tank, she thrust her head forward.

But Killer, riding with b.a.l.l.s of steel, bringing his whip down again and again, was coming from the right again. He was ahead.

'Get your bat out,' Amber could imagine both Rupert and her father yelling. She could hear the crackle and slap of whips behind her. How many horses were going to overtake her? Glancing round she could see Squiffey Liffey and Sir Cuthbert bearing down.

Kicking and kicking with her heels, thrusting her body forward and forward, she caught sight of the post and Red Rum's grave on the left, 'Earning our love for ever more.'

'Rummy's calling you, Wilkie.'

As if by magic, Playboy's cavernous nostrils were receding, now level with Wilkie's ears, now with her sweat-darkened withers.

With a supreme effort as though her heart would 'burst the buckles of her armour', Mrs Wilkinson hurled herself past the post.

All heart, all heart, all heart.

Aintree erupted.

'This is focking unbelievable, focking unbelievable,' yelled Rogue to the delight and horror of the BBC's 600 million viewers. 'The smallest horse, a little mare with one eye carrying a young girl and 20 lb more than Bafford Playboy. We knew she had gots, like David, she's dispatched not one but forty Goliaths. What a marvellous ride, well done, Amber darling.'

'That's enough, Rogue,' said a not unamused director into Rogue's earpiece.

All over the course there was pandemonium hats, scarves, cuddly Wilkinsons and Chisolms being thrown into the air. Even people who hadn't backed Mrs Wilkinson were yelling their heads off.

A second later, to Amber's amazement, Killer was shaking her hand and kissing her cheek.

'Well done, baby, great ride.'

Next moment Awesome, ecstatic at coming third on Sir Cuthbert, had cantered up, hugging Wilkie and pulling her ears: 'Brave little girl.'

He was followed by the handful of jockeys who'd managed to finish, hugging, kissing Amber, banging on her helmet. She'd joined the band of brothers at last.

The yelling and cheering increased deafeningly as Tommy, crying her eyes out, and Valent, who'd just made it back, came running towards her, and turned to shouts of laughter as Chisolm, to avoid the scrum, leapt up and hitched a lift behind Amber.

'Bluddy marvellous, well done, both of you,' Valent had to yell to make himself heard over the crowd, and two fingers to Etta, perhaps she'd forgive him now. Tommy flung a Union Jack round Amber's shoulders and her arms round Wilkie. A fanfare of trumpeters and two police horses accompanied them back to the winners enclosure.

Raising her own two fingers to the Pony Club, Amber undid her cheek strap and hurled her hat into the crowd, then shyly touched her head to acknowledge the tumultuous applause. Her heart swelled to see an overjoyed Rupert, the handsomest man in England again, with a smile plastered across his face.

'Well done, angel. Christ, that was marvellous. How could I ever have doubted you? Well done, Wilkie,' and the little giant killer disappeared under a frenzy of patting from her supporters.

Burly Valent and Ryan then escorted Amber through the rugger scrum to the podium in the winners enclosure, so she could weigh in and be drenched in champagne by the other jockeys clapping her from the weighing-room steps, then back to Mrs Wilkinson for photographs and more patting.