I Own the Racecourse! (8 page)

Bert Hammond didn't answer for a moment or two. Then he said, ‘You don't get the money from the gate, do you?'

The money from the gate. That would be the money that people paid to come in and see the races.

‘I never got no money.'

‘There you are, then. Let the ones that take the money pay the bills.'

Andy smiled warmly. ‘That's fair,' he said.

After that Andy came quietly into the racecourse whenever he found the gate open. Sometimes he saw Bert Hammond, sometimes there was only a distant figure moving about the grounds or working in the stands, sometimes one or two of the trotters would be working on the track. Andy didn't mind. Bert Hammond had accepted him calmly and quietly, in a way that seemed quite natural. Andy took it for granted that other people who had business at Beecham Park would do the same. They were the people who used the course, or kept it in order, and they had a right to be here. Andy owned it, and he had a right to be here too. He wasn't going to bother them, and they wouldn't bother him.

Sometimes the driver of one of the horses would raise a whip in greeting as he whirled round the track with a beating of hoofs and a shirring of wheels. Andy would wave back very solemnly; and if Bert Hammond were there he would name the horse and driver.

‘Blushing Rose. Good little mare. That's Arthur Waley driving . . .' ‘Here's Bill Foster with Midnight Star. Looks better than he did last month.'

Andy would gaze at horse and driver in an absorbed way. He could always recognize them after the first time.

It was this that startled Andy's friends when they saw him again. Since his argument with Terry they had looked for him several times, but they had never thought of looking inside the racecourse. Then Andy found he had a day free from school because of some important meeting that most of his teachers seemed to be attending. At the busy time of morning when everyone was hurrying to school it occurred to him to keep an eye open for Matt and Joe, and perhaps to walk with them as far as their school. He had forgotten about Terry for the time being; so that when he caught up with all four of the boys at the corner of the street, he gave Terry a hunted look and began to slink away. Luckily, Mike and Joe had already seen him. Since they were uneasy and a little anxious, they gave him a louder and warmer welcome than usual.

‘Here's old Andy! Come on, mate, don't scoot off like that.'

‘There you are, then, Andy. Haven't seen you about. We thought you must have dropped us.'

‘Not sick, are you, boy? What's up with school?'

Andy was pleased but embarrassed. He shuffled his feet and smiled at the pavement. Terry, with the sharp words of Mike and Joe still stinging his ears, made a special effort. Looking straight at Andy and searching for a way to undo whatever harm he was supposed to have done, he said very seriously, ‘Everything all right at Beecham Park?'

Just as seriously, Andy's round blue eyes lifted to Terry's brown ones. He seemed to think for a moment. Then he nodded. A small movement of relief went round the group. Still talking rather more than usual, Andy's four friends started for school while he fell into his usual place a step or so behind.

They turned the corner and began to climb Wattle Road towards the traffic lights. Andy, enclosed in his private world but calm and content again, listened to their voices and watched the rush of morning traffic. Then he saw, stepping quietly and daintily amid the rushing traffic, a horse he knew. He shouted excitedly to his friends.

‘Hey, Mike! There's Midnight Star! See him, Joe? Looks better than he did last month. See him, Matt? That's Midnight Star—I know him! That's Bill Foster driving…Hey, Bill! Hullo, Bill!'

The four boys, hearing again the familiar call that had been missing for so long, all turned their heads at the first word. Humouring Andy again, they looked obediently where he pointed. Their eyes, falling on Midnight Star who was looking better than he did last month, narrowed a little. Learning that Bill Foster was driving, they looked on uncomfortably while Andy waved and shouted. Poor old Andy was making a show of himself. They cast hidden glances at the driver and prepared to walk on in a careless way. They saw the driver turn his head, catch sight of Andy, nod and lift his whip in greeting. Matt's eyes widened, Mike's grew still narrower.

‘See?' said Andy happily. ‘I know him. He comes to my racecourse, him and Midnight Star.'

The boys walked on in silence until they reached the school, where Andy waved and wandered off. They watched him go.

‘My sainted aunt,' muttered Matt.

‘I bet it was a different horse and driver,' said Terry.

‘Doesn't matter who it was,' Mike pointed out. ‘Whoever he was,
he
knew
Andy
.'

‘We'll have to keep more of an eye on him,' said Joe in an exasperated way. Mike merely shrugged.

After school Joe announced that he was going to find Andy Hoddel and see what he was up to. Mike shrugged again, and said nothing about coming too. Terry had already promised to give Matt some solid batting practice down in the park, but this was a plan that would take up several afternoons and could just as well begin tomorrow. They looked expectantly at their elders. Mike seemed to have drawn into himself; Joe was frowning. Matt raised his eyebrows in a puzzled way.

Terry curled his lip slightly and said, ‘Don't forget your bat.' It seemed to him that for the time being he and Matt had better stick to cricket in the park, and avoid taking sides. The fact that Andy Hoddel was on shouting terms with at least one of the racing drivers from Beecham Park seemed to have affected Mike and Joe in different ways. It was as though Joe wanted to hurry forward, anxious to come closer to Andy, while Mike had taken a step backwards to stand farther off.

Joe spent the afternoon alone, looking for Andy. He went to the open gate of Beecham Park, and then to the cliffs above it. He looked into all the shops, and the vacant ground where Andy often sat with the stray cats. He even went to Andy's front door and, standing on the pavement while Mrs Hoddel looked up from her work, asked if Andy were about. Mrs Hoddel's face at once set into anxious lines.

‘What—isn't he with you, Joe? Well—if he's not with you, I just don't know
where
he is. Keep an eye out for him like a good boy, will you? I don't like to think of him wandering on his own too much.' She pushed the hair back from her forehead with her free hand and sighed.

‘I might have missed him,' said Joe quickly. ‘I've been up to the corner shop. I'll look in at home—or O'Days' place, he's probably there.'

‘I hope you catch up with him, then.' She smoothed her face out and smiled. ‘I just take it for granted he's with you boys, you're all so good with him, and I just don't worry. I can't tell you what it's been to me, having you there—I just don't know how I'd have got on without you. It keeps me busy, you know; the work, and the house, and trying to keep Andy nice so people won't talk. You've been a real blessing, the four of you.'

‘That's all right, Mrs Hoddel, we like having him around. Everyone likes Andy.'

‘He
is
a nice boy, and that's a fact. Old Mrs Eaton was just telling me the other day what a good boy he's been. A help to me too, mind you. He
is
a good boy, but now he's getting bigger it's harder to keep track of him. You can't keep a big boy like that in the house all day. He's lucky to have you four, and I'm glad of the chance to tell you. I appreciate it.'

After that, of course neither Joe nor any of the others would have worried Mrs Hoddel again. They listened uncomfortably while Joe told them about it, looking pointedly at Mike while he did so. They could all see there was no way to explain to Mrs Hoddel that Andy had bought Beecham Park Trotting Course, that he was on easy terms with horse-trainers, and that he seemed to have little time for his old friends. They could only hope that no one else need ever tell her; and even Mike, though he no longer talked about the problem, continued to keep an eye open for Andy.

They went for long walks round the walls of the racecourse, and looked through the open gate, without seeing him. They hesitated to go inside—they, at least, had not bought the place. It was only by accident that they happened to be walking past the gate on an evening when the greyhounds were training and the sound of the hare came singing from the floodlit track. They glanced in as usual; there, sitting on the grass a little way inside, was Andy. The whole four stood still, and then went creeping to the gate. They were glad to find that there was no one else in sight.

‘Andy Hoddel!' hissed Matt, scandalized. ‘Come on out of that before you get kicked out!'

Andy looked up slowly, and they were all a little shaken to see his face. It was alive, absorbed. When Andy's mind looked out through its closed window, it looked directly. There were never twenty other ideas jostling the main one. There was never a curtain of restraint to hide his mind from other people. When there were other people around, distracting and confusing him, his mind could rarely concentrate in this simple and direct way, so that his friends were not used to seeing it at all. They stood, surprised and shaken, waiting for him to notice them.

Slowly the absorbed look faded, and a warm smile took its place. Andy jumped up and came to the gate, chuckling with pleasure to find that his friends had at last dropped in at Beecham Park.

‘Hey! Hear the dogs? Don't they make a noise? You hear them, Joe? They come past real close. They'll be just behind that fence—that's the rails, that is.
Whizz!
' He shook his head and laughed. It was impossible to describe the speed and purpose of the dogs. He said, ‘Come on, you can come in if you like.
I'm
here, aren't I?'

‘You better come out,' warned Terry. ‘They'll be after you.'

‘I don't bother them,' said Andy, ‘and they don't bother me…There he goes! See him jump! The dogs are coming.' Bunched in a mass of striving legs and springing bodies, silently pursuing the hare, the dogs leapt by. Andy exulted. ‘See 'em go!'

The faces of his friends were interested but reserved. He wanted to show them the fullness of Beecham Park, and he wanted them to know that it was his. He said, ‘You wait on. Don't go. I'll show you something.' He dodged past them through the gate and loped away.

‘Here, hold on, Andy—we can't…'

Andy turned at the corner and shouted, ‘Wait there!' Then he disappeared.

The others looked at each other doubtfully. ‘Are we going to hang about here like a lot of galahs till he gets back?' demanded Matt, vexed.

Mike settled back against the gatepost. ‘They can't stop us from standing here. We're not going in, are we?'

‘He
might
get back,' said Terry, ‘or he mightn't.'

Joe frowned at the track and said nothing. They stayed like that, staring at the course, the street or each other, for several minutes.

‘Here he comes,' said Matt suddenly. ‘
My sainted aunt!
'

Round the corner came Andy and a straggling pack of dogs, his friends of the streets and lanes. They were of odd shapes, colours, sizes and dispositions. A dachshund and a curly-tailed ginger pup frolicked at his heels. Something that looked like an airedale, but mostly white, trotted along a few feet to the right. On the left, silent and stealthy, sidled two elderly fox terriers. A large black dog with a patch of shiny bare skin on its back loped along behind and grinned cheerfully. In front strutted a very small pup with long creamy hair, a stumpy tail and a cocky expression. From time to time it looked back to make sure that the rest were still following. All the other dogs ignored it, glancing only at Andy and sidling away from each other. Andy chuckled at them, snapped his fingers occasionally, and waved to his four astonished friends.

‘
Now
you'll see. You'll bust laughing.'

He stood just outside the gate with his eyes fixed on the track, keeping the dogs by him with an absent-minded whistle and snap of the fingers. Farther down the street, Charlie Willis and another boy were dawdling.

‘Andy!' cried Joe, thoroughly alarmed. ‘What do you think you're doing? You can't bring a pack of strays in here! Do you want to end up in gaol?'

The whining of the hare came closer, and the thing itself cruised into sight on the inside of the track. It was travelling at half-speed; there were no greyhounds following. Andy spoke urgently to his dogs and they all milled forward through the gate.

‘There he goes, boys—get him! Sick him! On to him, boys!'

The dachshund and the curly-tailed pup at once hurled themselves at the track. The small creamy pup uttered a volley of yelps and scuttered after them. The terriers streaked off, low to the ground and deadly silent. The airedale and the black dog leapt forward in great, strong bounds. The whole many-coloured pack was strung out on the floodlit green of the track. The whine of the hare went suddenly shrill as it slid forward in a startled way. The creamy pup kept up a shrill yip-yip.

Andy was roaring with laughter. ‘Look at them go, look at them go! They nearly had him that time!' Terry was chuckling, Mike grinning, while Matt hung on to the gate and laughed nearly as much as Andy. Joe chuckled in a helpless and horrified way with his eyes fixed on the track. The crazy, strung-out field, with the dachshund in front and the silky pup yelping in the rear, swung away into the curve of the track. Meeting a group of angry, shouting men, they swerved under the rails, scattered and disappeared. The deep, dangerous baying of excited greyhounds drowned the sound of the hare. Andy sat down on the grass inside the gate and went on laughing.

‘I'm going,' said Mike. ‘Andy! Come out of that. There's some pretty big blokes over there, and they don't look too pleased. Come on, get a move on!'