Darian Wallace needed money. He was out at two years, half the sentence served. It was a condition of parole that he wore an electronic tag on his ankle. One step outside the ten square metres of his hostel room after curfew and an alarm would go off in a security firm’s office somewhere. Made it impossible for him to move around at night with the tag on. Tamper-proof, they’d said. Anything you can think of to remove it, we’ve already tried and it won’t work. He smiled to himself. That was if it had been attached properly in the first place.
Wallace scanned the stadium’s exterior. Floodlights were fired up, the air already charged. He’d missed the greyhounds in prison. The Wimbledon track was his favourite, the most predictable. He pushed through turnstiles; no one searched him on the way in. Hundreds of people milled about inside, holding plastic pint glasses, the smell of chips heavy on the air. Sound rose as he emerged onto the grandstand, cigarette smoke thick. Wallace felt a rush go through him, but needed to check his excitement: it wasn’t useful. He had a talent for gambling here. Why? Because he understood the dogs, the track, form and trainers. And he knew maths. Couldn’t really explain it, he just got numbers. Even when he was a little kid. Saw the patterns. Could’ve gone to college or even university, but he had better things to do. Like get paid, by whatever means.
Three hundred quid in one coat pocket, something to protect him in the other. Never know when someone might call you out. Recognise you and try to settle a score. Wallace stood opposite the clutch of trackside bookmakers shouting names and odds, scrutinising the row of electronic boards. He waited. He needed to watch the first couple of races to see how the track was running tonight. People who said the bookies always won didn’t know how to bet.
There were four ways to win at greyhound racing: simulations, arbitrage, luck, knowledge. With no computer, simulations from big data were out of the question. Arbitrage meant exploiting differences in bookies’ odds so you were guaranteed a win. Effective, but the margins were small. More a long-term strategy, and he didn’t have time. For serious money there was always blind luck. That kind of unpredictability wasn’t really his style, which left knowledge. An informed guess was reliable if you knew what you were doing, and he did. Wallace was twenty-five; he’d been watching dogs at Wimbledon since he was fifteen. Followed every race during his two years inside. He’d even owned a pair of racing dogs – Blaze and Bambam – but he’d had to put them both down before he went to prison. They’d served their purpose.
Target tonight was three grand. Should be enough, for now. Until he could get back what was his, and sort out the other business. Then he’d be gone.
Greyhound racing wasn’t the sport of kings, but there was something real about it for him, compelling. Lacked the glamour of horses, but it was raw: survival of the fittest. He watched the dogs being placed in their traps for the next race. Lean beasts trained to hunt, seek and destroy. Chasing on sight, they needed to be muzzled to stop them attacking each other. None had a choice in life; the system was run by someone else. They just had to fight and make money, or they’d end up in a canvas sack being shot and dumped in a canal. Yup, that resonated.
Wallace studied the programme. The 7.45 was up. Eyes flicked between numbers on the bookies’ screens. Supersonic at 7/2; 11/3 at the next guy. Wiggins Flyer 3/1, the favourite Mephistopheles 7/4. Long odds on the outside runners. Betting was closed. He moved closer to see the sand track. The bell rang. A whining motor meant the hare was coming. As it whipped past the box, the traps flung open and six dogs bolted. Crowd roaring around him, Wallace kept quiet, watching the bend. Dogs One and Two by the rails skidded out slightly. And they were inside runners. Seemed outside was better tonight, firmer. Charging down the back straight, Dog Five took the lead from Six ahead of first and second favourites. They held round the final two bends as baying men surged forward in the stands, Five pounding past the line to win. Couple of guys were celebrating. Most were staring at their betting slips or into their pints. Wallace checked the stats: 30.15 seconds for 480 metres. He did the maths. Just over fifty-seven kilometres per hour. Bit slower than usual. He noted it, factored everything in.
Letting the next two races go, Wallace bided his time. Refined the algorithm in his head. In the 8.30, Vince Parry had a bitch called Bullet Tooth drawn in Trap Five. The dog next to it in Six was two kilos lighter and Parry trained outside runners. Most importantly, he knew Parry gave his younger dogs steroids. Wallace made his calculations, then bet a hundred pounds on Bullet Tooth.
Five minutes later he had a four hundred quid profit. Now it was time to get creative. Nothing he liked in the next race; let it go. But 9.00 and 9.15 both looked good. Wallace took the programme and began computing an accumulator bet across the two races. His choice for the first was Double Top, with Mad Bomber in the second. Each-way bets: if both finished top two in their races, a five-hundred-pound stake would let him walk away just over three grand up. If it came off, that’d probably be enough for one night. If not, well, there was always robbery.
Wallace climbed the grandstand to get a better view as the 9.00 set up. Felt a slight stab of adrenalin. He’d never been one to react much, even as a youth. Didn’t really get nervous. That wasn’t him trying to be hard, it was just fact. Psychologist’s report when he was sixteen said that was common in conduct disorder. It was supposed to be a bad thing. Unless you were gambling.
* * *
Relief. Double Top had scraped in second. About a snout’s length from losing five hundred quid. Wallace watched preparations begin for the 9.15. So far, so good. Part one of the accumulator had come off, just. Now he needed Mad Bomber to finish top two and the cash was his.
Dogs were set in the traps. He took out the programme again, checked his competition.
The shunt was followed by cold liquid spreading down his left arm.
‘Watch out, son,’ came a voice behind him.
Wallace turned slowly, registered a big skinhead with an empty pint glass, England football shirt stretched over his gut. Glanced down at his own sleeve, the shirt material darkened, sticking to his arm as beer soaked in. The guy was about six three, seventeen stone, and had two mates. Wallace was three inches shorter, six stone lighter, alone. But he already knew size didn’t matter. And once you took out the loudest one, the others backed down.
‘You spilled my pint,’ the guy smirked at Wallace. Jerked his head towards the bar. ‘Go get me a new one. Boy.’
That rage grew inside him, ballooning in his torso. Eyes narrowed and jaw set. Wallace’s mum, Leonie, was a pacifist. Said she’d seen enough violence in her life – on the streets of Jungle in West Kingston, Jamaica, where she was raised, then in the ’81 Brixton riots just after she arrived here as a teenager. Strange then that she’d shacked up a decade later with his dad, Craig, the angry soldier. They must’ve bonded at first over feeling like outsiders in London, though he was only from Drumchapel in Glasgow. Craig was a worthless piece of shit, but before he left Darian and his mum for the last time, he’d taught his son one thing. Strike first, surprise them, finish it quick. His mum hated fighting, but if you had to, her advice was the same.
‘Up next tonight, our 9.15 race. In lane one, Bricklayer’s Lad; Morden Electric in two,’ came the announcer’s voice, tinny through the speakers.
Wallace held eye contact, still facing away from the track. Slowed his breathing. Felt in his right pocket.