‘The tag is in the Crown Plaza Hotel in Harrogate, probably hanging in the cloakroom while Valance is having lunch with a friend.’

‘Shame it doesn’t tell us who the friend is,’ Chico said.

‘No doubt it will be someone who can safely vouch for his exact whereabouts at precisely one o’clock.’

I remotely switched the tag off again.

‘We’ll try again later. Now let’s watch the race.’

Meeru was among the eight runners that jumped off from the two-mile start as the starter dropped his flag, bang on time.

Hexham is an undulating oval track of about a mile and a half round, so the start was near the end of the back straight.

With only a circuit and a bit to race and a mere eight flights of hurdles to negotiate, the initial pace was strong. Marcus settled Meeru in just behind the leading pair as the field made the stiff climb up towards the home straight and another flight, before passing the winning post for the first time at a good fast gallop.

After two more flights in the straight, they swung left-handed and downhill. Over the three hurdles in the back straight, Meeru began to show his class, stepping up the pace and taking the lead as the horses went into the dip before turning for home and the steep rise to the final flight and the finish.

There were good reasons why the racecourse bookmakers had made Meeru the short-priced favourite. Not only did he have the winning form from his last race at Wetherby, but the handicapper had been unusually generous in only asking him to carry 148 pounds. With Marcus’s five-pound allowance as a novice rider, that was brought down to 143, when the top-weighted horse was carrying twenty-one pounds more.

As a result, Meeru made easy weather of the hill, sweeping up into the straight with a lead of five lengths from the nearest of those struggling behind.

Just the final flight of hurdles to negotiate.

I held my breath.

Would Marcus make a hash of it and tumble off onto the bright-green spring grass? Or would he go on and win, setting himself up with a date in the Swinton Handicap at Haydock next month … that was provided, of course, that he hadn’t lost his jockey’s licence by then?

Meeru literally flew over the last, flattening his back in the manner of a true potential champion, and he galloped untroubled along the run-in to win, easing up, by ten lengths. Probably by too much for Noel Kline, I thought. The handicapper would not be so generous again.

‘Well,’ said Chico, clapping his hands and with a huge grin on his face, ‘That should have put the cat among the pigeons.’

CHAPTER

28

CHICO AND I continued to watch the afternoon’s racing from Hexham, interspersed by other races from further south, at Ludlow.