A Three Day Event Read Online Free PDF Page A

judge, steward and trainer to this day. In this self–contained and self–referring clique, the obsession with ethical behaviour characterizing the nineties everywhere else on the planet has gone completely unnoticed. Could somebody please stop the world and let these people get on?”
    Barbara Lumb loudly demanded, tremulously indignant, “I do not understand why you have brought these vicious slanders to this table, Stuart! Why is this–this journalist person–this–” she peered closely at the byline–“this Sue Parker person persecuting our people like this? I call this very disloyal of you–”
    “I couldn’t agree more!” Marion rose from her seat, a hectic glow suffusing her puffy face and neck, “I did not realize that we would be subjected to a re–hashing of this– garbage –at a time when we must be thinking only the most positive of thoughts. I mean, after all, why is all this happening all of a sudden? Why are these people suddenly attacking our sport? I’ll tell you why!”
    She leaned forward on the table and lowered her head in furious prophecy, “ It’s because there are people in the sport now who were never there before. Not our sort of people at all –”
    “ Marion!” Stuart hissed, trying desperately to remind her of who was at the table, but she was beyond his counsel–
    “These people have no history in horses. They have no respect for our traditions. They have no loyalty to our institutions. These people–”
    Hy’s inner alarm system was ringing at full volume. In a split second a surge of adrenaline had his heart beating frighteningly fast in a spasm of fight–or–flight paralysis.
    He struggled with his options. If he interrupted her to accuse her of anti–Semitism–for there was no question but that her reference was to a lawsuit recently won by Syd and Shira Greenberg against their son’s trainer in Hudson–she would indignantly deny any such suggestion and everyone at the table would be uncomfortable. If he said nothing, he would be seething inwardly for the rest of the meeting, and feel a fool to boot.
    What did he need this aggravation for? This was supposed to be a kind of honeymoon cum sabbatical year for him. With his marriage and his new home in Saint Armand as priorities, he had turned the daily management of the Tissus Clar–Mor sprawl of stores and warehouses over to his children, and repudiated the can’t–say–no syndrome that had characterized his last twenty years of fund–raising, task forces and community leadership work in Montreal.
    His determination to put his own happiness first had been reinforced by the minor, but chilling little caution his heart had received last fall. He heard his ex–wife’s brother, his doctor, urging lightly, I’m not minimizing it, Hy. But sometimes a tiny warning can be your best friend. Change your lifestyle. Eat right. Get rid of the stress. Enjoy yourself, it’s better than any medicine I can give you.
    In the half–second of his hesitation, Stuart Jessop had seized the initiative and cut Marion off. “I don’t believe Mr. Jacobsen has been properly introduced to everyone. Why don’t we go round the table for a moment, and afterward I will explain why our sponsor”–he hovered worshipfully around the magic word–“for the games, the Royal Dominion Bank, asked me to include the subject at this meeting.” He patted Marion’s hand and leaned in to whisper something to her. She pressed her lips together and stared fixedly away from Hy.
    This was a bad beginning. Hy was weighing up the consequences of walking out. Let them put on the goddam show without his cooperation. It must have showed in his face. A stagey cough erupted to his left. Hy looked down the table to find Roch Laurin catching his eye with a wink and a tiny shake of the head: don’t do anything yet. Roch began to write furiously on the back of his agenda. He folded up his note and passed it down to Hy just as Thea Ankstrom was