At preciely three thirty two on the afternoon of the ninth of April in the year of Our Lord 2000, Mystic collapsed and died fifty yards short of the finish line. She had been leading the race at the time by a massive twelve lengths when all at once both she, and Dolphin's bet, came to a sad end. She had run so hard that her heart had blown up. Dolphin blew up as well. Incidentally, he always flitted between the two biggest sets, convinced that he would miss something vital on the other one if he concentrated on just one, even thought they both showed the same picture.
Superstition can be so silly sometimes.
An anger mounted in Dolphin which only the naive can experience. Dolphin's answer was to charge out the door screaming silently at himself for being so foolish in the first place. Of course Chesterfield were also optimistic just then, being as they were, unbeaten in all competitions and with that nap of a home game to come against struggling Carlisle. A pity then, for both Dolphin and Chesterfield, that a certain flu virus by the name of Chinese was currently making its deadly way into the bloodstream of all the Chesterfield players, just late enough to allow them to play on Saturday, but just early enough so that, come kick off time, the Division Three leaders would be feeling shivery and weak. Being a tough bunch though, they would play through their discomfort to record their first defeat in fourteen months, just as Dolphin was turning a deep shade of red as he force-fed himself yet another betting slip.