Low life
Ice cold in Lambourn
Jeffrey Bernard
Ireturned to Lambourn valley last weekend with some trepidation. The place holds some bad memories for me. Four car crashes and one wife crash. As it turned out it was a delightful weekend and half of it was strangely triggered off by a tragedy. On Monday there was a memorial service for the jockey Paul Coucher who was killed in a car crash. It meant that everybody turned out for that and so there was one hell of a thrash in the Swan and the Ibex. All the old faces, some of them with a few more broken veins, but all very jolly.
But the goings-on in Lambourn haven't changed much since I lived there as far as I could see. I had missed a spectacle by a few days. An old friend had, I was told, been given a tremendous whack by someone he had been rude to and was sent flying across a table and some chairs. He lay on the floor with blood pouring from his nose and Wally Swinburn — Shergar's ex-jockey — who doesn't like the sight of blood minis- tered to him by trying to push ice cubes up his nostrils to stem the flow. I suppose you could put an ice cube up a cow's or horse's nostril if you felt so inclined but up a man's nostril is stretching things a little. I also met a young racing blade who I was told has just asked one of the local bank managers for a loan of £6,000 on top of his outstanding overdraft. The manager said, 'Six thousand! But your overdraft is already more than my annual income.' The man said, 'Well, why don't you get another job?' He got his £6,000. On Monday afternoon six of us played boules in the sunshine and drinks were served. Everything in the valley has got better. Dear old Flo who used to work in the Red Lion has just had an operation to remove a cataract and her heart stopped in the middle of the business. Like everyone else who has died for a short while she said she saw a tunnel and there was a man at the end of it. I asked her hopefully, 'Did he have a drink in his hand?' She said that she hadn't noticed so it is still all a mystery.
The guvnor of the George died quite recently and his wife has taken up ballroom dancing, her hair quite 'gold with grief'. The Ibex has improved too since Colin Browne has taken over. He used to ride the great Desert Orchid. And now that Noel Bennet has got the Swan it is prob- ably the best country pub I can think of. Fresh turbot on a Sunday and you can actually get served which is proving to be damn nigh impossible here in Soho. Yes, being in Lambourn I missed the celebra- tions Monday when the new drinking law came into being. I'm told they let off fireworks outside the Coach and I would like to know who paid for them. Perhaps some decent citizen was trying to blow the place up and Norman mistook the action for a party.
But I had something of a small and private party myself before I set out for Lambourn. The great man came over unexpectedly from Antibes on business and he invited me to the Ritz for a drink. He brought me a load of the very good vitamins he takes and which he says will give me the courage to go on. It isn't very often that you meet someone you admire tremendously who turns out to be as nice as you would have hoped for them to be. Mr Greene is aces. But what a strange hotel the Ritz is. They took half an hour to bring up some soda water. Are they employing Norman's rejects?
So the past few days have been a little hectic and the body is screaming for a rest but the trouble with an old banger is that if you switch the engine off you might not be able to start it again. But GG's vitamins are mustard. They have caffeine in them and they rev me up in the morning. Just as well because I have another date in Lam- bourn in a few days' time. The trainers and jockeys are giving a do. I shall take some extra ice cubes for the nostrils. I just don't know how they do it. I suppose if you ride out every day at dawn you get to be fit enough for any sort of battle. Taxis don't do it for me.
Previous page
