They were together, day in and day out, going about their daily work at the many racecourses around the country, while I averaged only a dozen or so rides a year, almost always on my own horse. An ‘amateur rider’, as I was officially defined, was tolerated, just, as long as he knew his place, which was next to the door of the changing room where it was always coldest and where clothes and towels were regularly trampled when the jockeys were called to the paddock by an official.

A few of the older changing rooms still had wood-burning stoves in a corner to provide comfort when it was wet and freezing outside. Woe betide some eager young amateur rider who took a seat near the heat, however early he might have arrived at the racecourse. Such comforts had to be earned and were the privilege of the senior jocks.

‘Any juicy cases, Perry?’ asked a voice from up the far end.

I looked up. Steve Mitchell was one of the elite, constantly vying over the past few seasons with two others for the steeplechase champion jockey’s crown. He was currently the reigning champion, having won more races in the previous year than any other, and he was lying third in the present campaign.

‘Just the usual,’ I said. ‘Kidnap, rape and murder.’

‘Don’t know how you do it,’ he said, pulling a white roll-neck sweater over his head.

‘It’s a job,’ I said. ‘And it’s safer than yours.’

‘Yeah, suppose so. But some guy’s life depends on you.’ He pulled on his breeches.

‘They don’t hang murderers any more, you know,’ I said. More’s the pity, I thought, for some of them.

‘No,’ said Steve. ‘But if you mess up, someone might go to jail for years.’

‘They may go to jail because they deserve to, no matter what I do,’ I said.

‘Does that make you a failure?’ he said, buttoning up his blue and white hooped jacket.