Of the approximately 450 licensed professional jockeys currently riding, almost 80 per cent now have an agent, including all of the top ones.

Usually invisible, a jockeys’ agent rarely, if ever, actually goes to the races. He spends his life on the telephone, constantly calling trainers and owners to find out which of their horses are going to run, and then booking his jockeys to ride them.

Entries are normally made by the trainer five or six days ahead of the race, although for some major fixtures this can be much longer—entries for the Epsom Derby, for example, are made some eighteen months beforehand, when the horses are still unraced yearlings, many of whom may not have even yet been named.

Horses can sometimes be entered for multiple races on the same day. The trainer will then look at the other entries for each of those races before deciding which one to declare the horse to run in, to give it the best chance of winning. Then the agents will call the trainer, offering one of their jockeys to ride it. At least that was how the system was meant to work.

‘So what is it about jockeys’ agents that upsets you?’ I asked.

‘They’re too damn big for their boots.’

‘In what way?’

‘Telling me how to do my job, and wanting paying for it too. But I won’t bloody pay them.’

Perhaps he should have done.

‘So one of these agents burned down your stables because you wouldn’t pay him?’ It sounded a bit extreme.

‘And also because I wouldn’t let him tell me where and when my horses are to race and whether they are to win or not.’

Now that was far more serious.

‘You don’t know the half of it,’ Gary said. ‘There’s a turf war going on over who controls British racing, and not just here in Middleham but all over the country. The bastards are trying to manipulate it for their own financial gain, and it’s worth millions, maybe tens of millions a year. It’s enough to make your hair curl, but no one else seems to realise what’s going on except me.’

CHAPTER

5

GARY SLIPPED AWAY from the Skoda in the same furtive manner that he had arrived.

‘Where’s your car?’ I asked him.

‘At home, but I’m not using that. Everyone knows my car in Middleham. It’s a small place.’

‘So how did you get here?’

‘How do you think? I came on Shanks’s pony—I walked. But not on the roads, mind. I used a roundabout route on the footpath through Cover Banks.’

‘Can I give you a lift back?’ I asked.

‘Not bloody likely. I wouldn’t be seen dead talking to Sid Halley.’

‘But you’re already dead.’

He laughed. ‘So I am.’

‘And what are you going to do about that? You can’t stay dead forever.’