This book is dedicated to my late wife Mary

and to the memory of

Dr Jara Moserova

my Czech language translator and friend for forty years who died the day this book was finished.

My thanks to

Andrew Hewson, literary agent Alan Stephenson, Roehampton Rehabilitation Centre Professor Alex Markham, London Research Institute Dr Rosemarie Hutchinson, DNA specialist Jonathan Powell, racing journalist Edward Gillespie, Cheltenham Racecourse Rodney Pettinga, Raceform Interactive Catrina McDonald, RGN, nurse

And especially to my son

Felix

for everything

Sadly, death at the races is not uncommon.

However, three in a single afternoon was sufficiently unusual to raise more than an eyebrow. That only one of the deaths was of a horse was more than enough to bring the local constabulary hotfoot to the track.

Cheltenham Gold Cup day had dawned bright and sunny with a fine dusting of a March frost showing white between the grass. The forecast for the day was dreadful, with heavy rain due to drive in from the west, but as I stood in my ex-father-in-law’s kitchen looking through the window at the westerly sky, there was no sign yet of the warm front that was promised.

‘There you are, Sid,’ said Charles, coming into the kitchen in his dressing gown over striped pyjamas, with soft blue velvet slippers on his feet. Rear Admiral Charles Rowland, Royal Navy (retired), my ex-father-in-law, my confidant, my mentor and, without doubt, my best friend.

I still introduced him to strangers as my father-in-law although it was now some ten years since his daughter, Jenny, my wife, had seen the need to give me an ultimatum: give up my job or she would give me up. Like any man at the top of his profession, I had assumed she didn’t really mean it and continued to work day in and day out. And so Jenny left with acrimony and spite.