Sidney Chambers and The Dangers of Temptation (18 page)

‘Which one was that?’

‘The one where she kicked me on the back of the leg in the middle of the Gay Gordons and you didn’t believe me.’

‘I don’t remember that.’

‘I had to have words with her after. You didn’t even notice.’

‘I didn’t need to if you took care of it, Sylvie.’

‘Sylvia. Don’t you Sylvie me, Ronnie Maguire. You’re supposed to be on your best behaviour.’

‘I seem to remember you didn’t mind when I wasn’t.’

‘Not in front of the vicar . . .’

‘He’s not a vicar any more. He’s an archdeacon; a very venerable man. That’s his title, you know. The
Venerable
Sidney Chambers, Archdeacon of Ely.’

‘It really doesn’t matter . . .’ Sidney interrupted.

‘All the more reason for you to mind your ps and qs, Ronnie Maguire.’

Despite the confusion over their respective memories, Sidney was reassured that the couple were sufficiently reunited to tease and argue, even if there was much to sort out.

‘You mentioned the flat-racing season, Mr Maguire,’ he said. ‘Do you know, in all my time as a priest in East Anglia, I’ve never been to the racecourse at Newmarket?’

‘Then you must go.’

‘I always seem too busy; and I’ve never quite known who to ask.’

‘Why don’t you ask me? I’m there all the time.’

‘What are you doing, Sidney?’ Mrs Maguire complained. ‘Are you planning on taking my husband away from me as soon as he’s got home?’

‘You could always come with us,’ said Ronnie.

‘I’ve never been a gambler.’

‘Never too late to start, Sylvia.’

‘I’ve taken a big enough gamble letting you back into my house, Ronnie Maguire. Don’t expect me to do any more.’

As soon as he had gathered up speed on his bicycle and was racing away from Grantchester, in top gear and glad to be returning home at last, Sidney was dismayed to be flagged down by Barbara Wilkinson as she approached her own house with a large bag of shopping. ‘I see you’ve no time to visit me these days,’ she said.

Sidney dismounted. ‘I am sorry, Mrs Wilkinson, but I am no longer of this parish.’

‘Out of sight, out of mind, eh? I see you only turn up when there’s trouble.’

‘That’s not true.’

‘Nothing so mundane as visiting a scarlet woman whose son is in prison.’

Danny Wilkinson was just beginning the second year of his life sentence; an appeal on the grounds of temporary insanity had been rejected. ‘You can imagine that my family would take a dim view of that.’

‘You don’t have to tell them.’

‘You are a very dangerous woman.’

‘As soon as the show’s over, you’re off quicker than Ronnie Maguire. I’m surprised you’re back so fast. He’s left it twenty-five years.’

‘The situation is altogether different. They are married to each other. We are acquaintances.’

‘I will tell you something for nothing. That is not the man I remember as Ronnie Maguire.’

‘People change over time.’

‘Not as much as that. He’s smaller, he’s redder and he’s much rounder.’

‘Perhaps he’s shrunk with age?’

‘If it is him, he’s done something very peculiar; although I wouldn’t put it past him. He’s as crooked as a bag of fish-hooks, that one.’

Sidney didn’t want to prolong the conversation or point out that this was quite a statement from the mother of a murderer with a wayward sense of the law, and it made him wonder whether those who were quick to judgement (Mrs Maguire
inter alia
) only did so in order to prevent an attack on themselves. They were like unfancied boxers aiming for a first-round knockout because they didn’t have any defence.

‘It can’t be the money,’ Barbara Wilkinson continued, ‘as Sylvia Maguire’s as poor as a church mouse. Maybe he’s after her house?’

‘Or perhaps,’ said Sidney, helplessly, ‘he wants to make good the mistakes of his past.’

On Monday 16th September Sidney’s father phoned to discuss an important sporting matter. The Warwickshire cricketer Tom Cartwright had failed a fitness test and pulled out of the England tour with a shoulder injury. The selectors had called up Basil D’Oliveira as a replacement.

‘At last they’ve seen sense. As you know, they should have picked him in the first place.’

‘But won’t the South Africans cancel their invitation?’

‘It’s possible. But they did say, I think, that they would welcome any team that has been selected purely on the grounds of cricketing ability . . .’

‘I like the “purely”.’

‘They didn’t put it exactly like that. But this should not become a political problem. It’s a cricketing matter. Although it’s a curious irony, isn’t it, that a coloured man should have to leave one nation and play for another in order to return to his birthplace?’

Sidney thought about the question of shifting identity, put down the receiver and was just about to return to the paperwork on his desk when he heard Anna call. She wanted tucking in and a bedtime story.

They read Beatrix Potter’s
The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck
in which a collie-dog and two puppies prevented the heroine from being eaten by a fox in disguise. When they had finished, Anna
looked serious and told her father what had happened during the day.

‘Mummy lost Byron.’

‘What?’

‘He ran away. I was scared, Daddy. We were calling and calling and he wouldn’t come back.’

‘Where did you go?’

‘By the river. It was all misty and dark. Then it got cold. I didn’t like it. Mummy was scared too but she pretended she wasn’t. We both did. I wish you had been there. Byron knows what to do when you’re there.’

Hildegard appeared in the doorway to explain what had happened. ‘You weren’t home, Sidney, so I had to walk him. I was distracted, I admit. I only had twenty minutes before my teaching. As you know,
mein Lieber
, Byron doesn’t respond to me as he does to you . . .’

‘Obedience has never been his strong point, I’m afraid.’

‘He wouldn’t come at all, Daddy.’

Hildegard turned to her daughter. ‘
Aber letztendlich ist er zu uns zurückgekommen, nicht wahr, meine Kleine?
’

She then explained to Sidney that an unworried Byron had ambled back as if nothing had happened some half an hour later. ‘It was not good, Sidney. I didn’t know what to say or how to discipline him. You said you would be home and I was late for the next lesson.’

Anna looked at her father. ‘You won’t run away like Byron did, will you, Daddy?’

‘Of course not, darling; now tuck yourself in.’

‘I didn’t like it when you were in Scotland.’

‘I know.’

‘You won’t go there again, will you?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘
Promise
me you won’t.’

‘I promise I won’t go without you. Now snuggle down.’

‘Honestly,’ said Hildegard when husband and wife were alone at last. ‘For Byron to go off like that without any warning. I could have killed him.’

‘I’m glad you didn’t.’

‘You are fortunate. If you’d been there I might have attacked you instead.’

‘Then I’m relieved to have been absent. Perhaps that’s what Ronnie Maguire was doing; avoiding his wife so often that it became a habit and then he never went back.’

‘Don’t start getting ideas.’

‘Don’t worry, Hildegard. I know I wouldn’t last five minutes without you.’

His wife thought briefly before her response. ‘Five minutes you would manage; five weeks is possible. Five years, never.’

The trip to Newmarket took place on Thursday 17th October. Sidney picked out an old three-piece suit that had been spared by the moths and a brown rabbit-felt trilby that he thought would be just the ticket for a day at the races. Ronnie was dressed up to the nines in a Donegal tweed sports jacket with a mustard-yellow jumper, a Tattersall shirt and dark-green tie that matched his corduroy trousers.

The two men visited the paddock before the first race to have a look at the horses for impressive muscle tone, shiny coats and bright eyes. The going was good. Ronnie told Sidney they had
to choose horses that were bred to stay, often keeping that extra reserve in the locker, ready to spark on the day.

Both men bet on Fortune’s Hope at 9–2 in the Chesterton Maiden Stakes, with Ronnie professing inside knowledge. ‘Humphrey Cottrill, who bred and still owns him, thinks the world of this colt.’

‘How do you decide who to back?’ Sidney enquired.

‘I look at the owners, the jockeys and then the horses themselves. Peter O’Sullevan and Jim Joel know their stuff and if Charlie Elliott or Lester Piggott’s riding then I’ll check the form. I do the basics on the two-year plates and gilts and try not to be greedy. You’ve got to cover yourself in case things don’t work out . . .’

‘And does that apply to life in general?’ Sidney asked before detecting a flash of frustration in Ronnie’s response and regretted that he had raised the subject so early in the day.

‘Let’s not go into that now. Sometimes a man is led astray. I don’t suppose you’d know about that.’

‘Officially not . . .’

‘But unofficially?’

‘No one has led an exemplary life, Ronnie. Not even a priest.’

‘I’m not too keen to explain myself, as you can probably imagine. When you sum it all up it doesn’t look too good. But wait, the bell’s gone and the horses are off to the start. Let’s watch.’

They stood at the edge of the stand near the bookmakers so they would be quick to collect their winnings and bet again but, despite being the favourite, Fortune’s Hope wasn’t even placed, outrun by West Partisan, Real Estate and Hickleton.

‘I see you don’t have God on your side,’ Ronnie observed.

‘Neither Fortune nor Hope, it seems.’

‘Let’s have a drink and another look at the horses. We’ve got a good twenty minutes until the next.’

Sidney was still trying to get the hang of the betting but was intrigued that, as in cricket, so much of it was taken up with the question of
form
. He thought of his father, and how much he would enjoy Newmarket. It would certainly have cheered him up a bit after all his anger and frustration with the cricketing authorities. England’s tour to South Africa had now been cancelled and the aftershock was still being felt as recriminations flew. A day at the races would have taken his mind off it all.

A bookmaker was offering tempting odds on an older horse with a good reputation, saying that he had too much class to be done, but Ronnie wasn’t having any of it, backing a younger, more promising alternative, telling Sidney, ‘Those that burn twice as bright burn half as long.’ Racing, like life, was about taking calculated risks, he said. ‘It’s like the old cliché, Sidney. If you only do what you’ve always done you can only get what you’ve always got.’

‘And is that what makes you a risk-taker?’ Sidney asked.

‘I always thought I could lead a better life,’ Ronnie replied. ‘But I suppose I was wrong.’

‘We can’t ever predict how things will turn out. The important thing is to try and behave decently.’

‘Well, I certainly failed at that.’

‘I know you may not want to talk about it.’

‘We all have to face the music some day. I’m just sorry I didn’t at the time.’

‘You got someone else to do it for you?’

‘Her sister. I asked her to tell Sylvia I wasn’t dead, but I wasn’t coming back either. I was a coward.’

‘Perhaps you were frightened of being caught in two minds.’

‘Let’s watch the race, Sidney. All in good time.’

Ronnie put a pound on Profit Sharing at 10–1 in the two thirty, while Sidney went for Harry Lauder at 100–8 in honour of his Scottish grandfather, but they had no more luck than they had had before and Sidney was worried about the extent of his losses. How much was he prepared to gamble in a single afternoon? If he lost more than a pound Hildegard would be furious.

The same thing happened in the three o’clock. Sidney put half a crown on Motet at 100–8 in a little musical tribute to his wife, despite Ronnie telling him that betting on a horse just because you liked its name could only lead to disaster. He was tempted to retort that experience didn’t seem to be doing much good either as his friend’s decision to go for Samivel at 100–6 had been equally unfortunate.

‘What’s happening?’ he asked. ‘All these horses were well fancied and yet we’ve lost every time.’

‘Don’t worry, Sidney, our luck will change. You’re enjoying yourself, aren’t you?’

‘Is it always like this? Whatever happened to beginner’s luck?’

‘Let’s go with the nap. Riboccare is 7–2 in the Jockey Club Cup. He’s a neat little colt and he’ll run two stone better with Lester Piggott on him. Put ten shillings on. I’ll pay you back if you lose.’

‘Don’t be silly.’

‘Trust me, Sidney. I’ll put it on for you.’

‘There’s no need for that.’

‘It’s all right. My treat. You’ll get almost two pounds back. Let me do it now in case they shorten the odds. I won’t be a jiffy.’

Ronnie was as good as his word, and the horse ran in by a comfortable half-length, digging in hard towards the finish, bursting past Fortissimo, the previous year’s winner, a furlong out.

‘It’s not just the winning that matters,’ Ronnie explained. ‘It’s that you suspend your life. When you’re at the races there’s only one thing to think about. The rest of the world disappears and you lose yourself in the sound of the hooves on the track, the flashes of colour, the speed and the movement. You put everything into the horse you’ve chosen.’

Sidney let him talk. He knew that the secret of having a proper conversation with a man was to have it while pretending to do something else. Like watching cricket with his father, flat-racing was a distraction that allowed serious discussion to feel almost incidental.

‘Alice keeps horses,’ Ronnie said out of nowhere. ‘I think that’s why we got on so well. There was so much we didn’t have to explain to each other. We were both brought up on farms.’

‘How did you meet her?’

‘I spent the first year of the war with the Cambridgeshire Regiment on defence duties on the Norfolk coast. We were at Stiffkey on the edge of the salt marshes. Everything that first winter froze solid. It was impossible to get warm. That’s when I met her. It was through her brother John. He was in the same battalion. She was only twenty. She had the
longest, curliest red hair you ever saw. Green eyes like she belonged to the land, a soft voice and a way of looking that wouldn’t let you go. She worked on a stud farm and exercised the horses every day. Sometimes I caught a glimpse as we were doing our own manoeuvres and I couldn’t concentrate on anything at all. To see her ride was something I can’t describe. John noticed and he teased me rotten. We were on defensive duties, trying to camouflage some double-decker buses.