Black Diamond by John F. Dobbyn Page B

second, but he nodded again and turned back to the cup. I understood him well enough to know he was saying it was all right. He accepted my decision.
    â€œTell me about Black Diamond. What was going on in that race?”
    He picked up his cup and turned to lean his back against the counter.
    â€œâ€™Bout two months ago. I got a call. Some Irish guy. He has a breeding farm somewhere in Ireland. He was sending this horse over. Wanted me to train him.”
    He walked a ways away from the counter to stand beside the track rail with no one in earshot.
    â€œI’m gonna tell you this ’cause it might help clear Danny.”
    â€œClear him of what, Rick?”
    â€œJust listen, Mike. Danny came by to give the Diamond a light gallop about this time the morning of the race. Danny seemed good.”
    â€œWas Erin with him?”
    â€œYeah. She liked to watch from the rail. All the riders spoke to her. Anyway, Danny left the track about nine thirty.”
    â€œAnd Erin was with him?”
    â€œSure. Anyway, that afternoon, I’m saddling the Diamond in the paddock for the fourth race. Danny walks up for the mount. He knows my instructions. Let the Diamond run his race. Only thing different, I told him we needed this win for the stable. Things have been a little tight.”
    â€œSo?”
    â€œHe didn’t say anything. That’s not like Danny. He just took the reins for a leg up, like he wanted to get it over with. Just before the pony led him off to the track, he turns around and looks at me like he’s gonna say something. Only he doesn’t.”
    I could feel the tumblers click. I figured by that time Erin had been taken. But Rick didn’t know about Erin, and I couldn’t tell him. Rick looked over at me for an explanation. I had no words.
    â€œDamn, Mike. I think the race was fixed and maybe Danny knew it. I think he knew someone was going to get him during the race. If he’d told me, I’d have scratched the horse on the spot.”
    â€œNot your fault. I guess Danny was right. How do you think they did it? Danny didn’t just fall off that horse.”
    Rick rubbed the random strands of his hair and shook his head. “I’ve watched that damn race on the film a hundred times. Two hundred in my mind. Whatever the hell they did, I can’t see it. One thing’s for damn sure. You’re right. Danny doesn’t just fall off a horse.”
    He finished the coffee and tossed the paper cup in the basket to get back to work. I had one more nagging question. “You saw Black Diamond’s workout times before the race. Pathetic. Where’d he get the speed he showed in that race?”
    Rick wiped his leathery face with a hand that was more callous than skin. He looked back at the track. “Horses are like people. Some days they want to run. Some days they don’t.”
    â€œYeah, Rick, and pigs are like dragonflies.”
    I didn’t actually say that. I didn’t say anything, which probably meant to Rick just what I was thinking.
Bull
. I had checked the
Daily Racing Form
fractions for that race. The first three furlongs had been run in blazing speed, and Black Diamond was close to the pace. It was as if the Diamond had been reborn that day as an athlete.
    About that time, the exercise riders began to ride their mounts out to the track. A fair number of the regular Suffolk Downs jockeys were there to exercise horses in the morning workouts. Some do it to make extra money, some to get the feel of a horse they’re going to ride in an afternoon race, and some just to be where they’d rather be than anywhere else on earth—hanging with the real horse people.
    I was there to find out who was pulling whose strings in that race that ended Danny’s life. I wore jeans and boots and a denim jacket, the better to blend in like a piece of wallpaper. Given my early Puerto Rican upbringing, there were two doors open to me. I could