The Horse With My Name Read Free Page B

that you could tell the difference from the stills on the wall. It was just an interesting fact . There was no TV and no juke box, but there was a cigarette machine. The condom machine in the toilets gave out empty crisp packets and elastic bands. Or should have.
    We were hiding in plain sight. Better to talk seriously in a crowded pub than whisper in an empty lounge. Corkery had moved on to the Guinness. ‘Geordie McClean has three injunctions out against me. I’m on the run, but he won’t get me.’
    I’ve never been able to stomach Guinness. I switched to cider, mostly because I’d no wife any more to tell me to grow up. I said, ‘Why is he after you?’
    ‘Because I’m the Horse Whisperer.’
    ‘Uhuh.’
    ‘You must have heard of the Horse Whisperer.’
    ‘Uhuh. Nicholas Evans. Book. Robert Redford. Film.’
    ‘No! Not that cak. The internet site.’
    I looked at him. I was surprised he’d even heard of the internet. I’d always thought of him as a man who’d find a ballpoint pen new and fangled. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘you’ve lost me again.’
    ‘Jesus Christ!’ He fumed into his pint for several moments. ‘Okay. All right,’ he began again, ‘sorry’n all. Sometimes you get immersed in a world and you start to presume everyone knows what you’re talking about, you can’t see the wood for the trees. And I forgot your knowledge of racing amounts to brown horses and Trigger. Okay. All right. It still might work. Okay. All right. Dan, I’m the Horse Whisperer. That’s the name of my internet site. It’s the inside track on the racing game. News, gossip, rumours, all sorts of shit. Everyone who’s anyone reads it, everyone feeds me info; just like it was here with the fighting. The powers that be would like to present a nice PR job on the racing, y’know, all nice happy families and pretty horses, when the truth is it’s the most vicious fucking thing I’ve ever been involved in, and that’s including the ‘Ra. Cut-throat, Dan, fucking cut-throat. Bribery. Corruption. Doping. Nobbling. Stable lads feed me, jockeys, trainers, the man who sells the feed, the man who collects the shit, the man who pilots the helicopter, it all comes through the Horse Whisperer, and not a one of them knows who the fuck I am. That’s the magic of it. It’s completely anonymous. I mean, to look at me you’d think I was the type who’d consider a fountain pen new and fangled, not running a fucking internet site.’
    ‘Nah, Mark, I always knew you had your finger on the pulse.’
    ‘Anyway, they haven’t a clue it’s me.’
    ‘Who’s they ?’
    ‘The money men, Dan, who else? Up to now they’ve been taking it in the arse but haven’t had the wherewithal to do anything about it. But now Geordie McClean’s muscling in, bringing his Sandy Row wide-boy mentality with him. A few innocuous stories about him and he’s slapped out a cartload of injunctions on the site; it’s been thrown off half a dozen servers already, but if you know the internet you know there’s more servers out there than you can fucking count, so he’s not going to close me down that way. The only way he’s going to do it is find out who I am and then sue me for libel. And that’s what he’s trying to do now.’
    ‘So that’s why you’re on the run.’
    ‘Exactly.’
    ‘And where do I come in?’
    ‘I need to fight fire with fire. Because his is a new set-up, because he’s brought in a lot of American expertise, because he runs the tightest fucking ship in the harbour, I’ve not been able to get a man on the inside. Nobody is feeding me info. I know he’s up to something because you don’t get to where he is in such a short space of time without tramping on toes. You know him, Dan, he’s not Mister Nice Guy. I’ve got to find out what he’s up to, but I can’t do anything while he’s chasing me from pillar to winning post. He has stables north of Dublin. I need you to go down there, ingratiate yourself and find