Dick Francis's Refusal (5 page)

“What job?” Marina asked, pushing away my hand as I tried to take the phone from her.

“I need him to investigate Sir Richard Stewart's allegations of race fixing.”

I sat on the edge of the bed with my mouth hanging open in surprise.

I reached over and took the phone from Marina.

“What did you say?” I asked.

“You will investigate Stewart's claims and find them groundless.”

“And are they groundless?”

“You will find them so.”

That hadn't been what I'd asked, but it was answer enough.

“Sorry,” I said. “My investigating days are over.”

I hung up.

“Are you mad!” Marina shouted at me. “You must do as he says.”

“I must not,” I said decisively. “He's asking me to investigate, but he also tells me what I will find out. If Sid Halley says there's nothing going on, then people will believe that nothing is going on. But there clearly is or he wouldn't be so keen to get me to say otherwise. He wants a whitewash. So where would that leave my credibility, and where would it leave racing?”

“What's more important? Bloody racing or your own daughter?”

I was certain that Saskia would ultimately be in more danger, not less, if I did what the man demanded, but Marina could only see the short-term consequences.

“First, you don't want me to investigate anything, and now you think I'm mad not to.”

“I don't know what I want.” Marina sat down on the side of the bed and buried her head in her hands. “I'm just frightened.”

I went and sat next to her and put my right arm around her shoulders.

“Trust me,” I said again. “I know what is best. I will protect you and Sassy. I promise.”

And, I thought, I would start investigating.

I would find out who was doing this to us, and stop him.

•   •   •

B
OTH
M
ARINA
and I took Saskia to school on Friday morning, Marina having spent the night in the other bed in Saskia's bedroom and with the landing light switched on, but there had been no further interruptions, telephonic or otherwise.

Marina didn't want Saskia to go to school at all. In fact, she was all for locking ourselves in the house and getting the police to mount guards at the doors.

“We can't live like that,” I'd said. “We have to go on as normal.”

“Normal!” Marina had shouted at me. “Sid, it's not normal to have your child kidnapped.”

It had been the police who had been the deciding factor. D.C.I. Watkinson had called at seven-thirty to say he would meet us at the school. He would have a team of officers there to interview other parents and to reassure them that their children were safe.

I, personally, thought that the police presence would have the opposite effect, and so it proved, with many mums taking their children straight back home again.

“Did you trace the call?” I asked the chief inspector. Marina had insisted that I give the police permission to listen in and trace our calls.

“Ah, not exactly,” he admitted. “It appears that our friend used several reroutings through a number of different SIM cards, some of which were overseas.”

“D'you think I came up the Lagan in a bubble?” I said quietly to myself.

“What did you say?” asked the chief inspector.

“D'you think I came up the Lagan in a bubble?” I repeated louder. “It's what the man said when I told him the police were tracing the call.”

“And what does it mean?”

“It basically means
Do you think I was born yesterday?
The Lagan is the river that runs through Belfast. Our friend, as you call him, is smarter than we take him for.”

“He's not that smart,” said the chief inspector, “not if what I hear is true.”

“And what do you hear?”

“I hear that the more someone tries to tell Sid Halley what to do, the more he does the opposite.” He smiled. “The more you warn him off, the harder he comes after you.”

“And where did you hear that?” I asked.

“On the police grapevine.”

“What else does the police grapevine say about me?”

“That you're not opposed to taking the law into your own hands.”

“Hand,” I said, smiling. “I've only got one.”

He smiled back at me. “Yeah. I've also heard you sometimes use that false one as a club.”

“Don't believe everything you hear,” I said, laughing, although I knew it to be true. “But I might club our friend if I find him.” I made a clubbing motion with my left forearm.

“Yeah, like I said, it wasn't very smart of him to involve Sid Halley when he didn't need to. Bit like poking a hornets' nest with a stick. Bloody stupid.”

“Have you spoken to the police investigating Sir Richard Stewart's death?” I asked, changing the subject.

“Only briefly, earlier this morning,” said the chief inspector. “They seem pretty convinced it was suicide.”

“Well, for what it's worth, my father-in-law thinks it was murder, and I tend to agree with him.”

“On what evidence?”

“Not much. My father-in-law was a naval admiral, but he was also a friend of Richard Stewart, and he doesn't believe he was the type to kill himself.”

“Is there a type?”

“Maybe not,” I said. “But don't you think it's rather suspicious that Sir Richard comes to see me on Wednesday morning about race fixing, then he's found dead on Thursday, the very day some Irish nutter kidnaps my daughter, demanding that I investigate the self-same race fixing?”

“Mmm, I see what you mean. It does look slightly odd.”

“Slightly odd!” I said ironically. “I think it looks extremely odd. So what are you going to do about it?”

“Maybe I'll have another word with the Hampshire force,” he said, clearly not believing that the opinions of an elderly retired sailor and an ex-jockey were that important. “Meanwhile, will you do what our friend demands?”

“Yes and no,” I said. “Yes, I'll investigate the race-fixing allegations but, no, I won't file a whitewashed report. Instead, I'll find out who is doing what to whom and stop them.”

“If you find the people who abducted your daughter, let
me
deal with them,” he said, suddenly more serious. “The law doesn't take kindly to interference from members of the public.”

At least he hadn't called me an amateur as Peter Medicos had done.

“I thought you said that warning me off was counterproductive.”

“I mean it,” he said, pointing a finger at my chest.

So did I. If I found the man responsible for abducting Saskia, I'd like to club him good and proper.

W
here did I start to find the man with a Northern Irish accent?

He'd said he was an Ulsterman and proud of it.

I looked up the population of Ulster—just over two million. Assuming half of those were female and a quarter were children, I reckoned I had about seven hundred and fifty thousand men to choose from.

I thought back to the voice on the phone. I was pretty sure it hadn't been a very young man or someone in his dotage. That would cut the numbers down a bit, but I could still be looking at a potential pool of half a million.

Perhaps I needed to start at the other end.

I retrieved the folder of Sir Richard's papers from the drawer in which I had placed them. If I could discover there had indeed been race fixing and, if so, who had been responsible, then I might be able to trace it back to an Irish connection.

I looked again at each of the suspect races and made a detailed list of the jockeys and trainers involved. Two jockeys had ridden in all of the nine races, with one other having had a ride in seven.

That, I decided, was where I would start.

I used my computer to look up the racing fixtures for the coming weekend.

Jump racing in England is mostly a winter sport, with the major steeplechase and hurdle races taking place each year between November and April. The Cheltenham Festival, the highlight of the jumping calendar, had been held the previous week, and the Grand National was another four weeks away, after which the steeplechase season would wind down for another year.

Not that jump racing finished altogether. Many of the smaller tracks continued to stage jump meetings throughout the summer months, while most of the bigger ones, Cheltenham excepted, concentrated on the flat code until the late autumn.

During June and July, many steeplechase horses, including the real stars of the sport, were rested and put out in paddocks to eat the fresh grass and stretch their legs.

The jockeys, however, don't enjoy such luxuries, spending the same time driving all over the country to ride the juvenile, beginner and novice horses that made up many of the fields, the horses that might just possibly become the stars of tomorrow. Rides gained on novices in the summer could occasionally turn into championship rides in future winters.

But that was all several weeks away yet.

The
Racing Post
website showed me that there were due to be three steeplechases and four hurdle races on a card at Newbury the following day, and the two jockeys who had ridden in all the nine suspect races would both be in action, together with another who had ridden in four of them.

“I'm going to the races tomorrow,” I said, walking into the kitchen to make myself a cup of instant coffee.

Marina looked horrified. “But what about Sassy and me?”

“You can come if you want.”

“Sid,” she said, putting her hands on her hips, “what about our safety? Have you forgotten there's a maniac out there who abducts children?”

“Of course I haven't,” I said. “But sitting in here behind closed doors isn't going to find out who it is. You'll be safe enough at the races with all the people round or you can stay here and lock yourself in.”

She stared at me across the kitchen, and I couldn't read what she was thinking. “Are you mad?” she said. “Of course we're coming with you. I'm not staying here on my own, with or without locked doors.”

“Great,” I said. “We'll leave at eleven.”

•   •   •

T
HE THREE OF US
went to Newbury in the Range Rover, with Sassy sitting in the center of the backseat on her booster.

There had been no further communication from “our friend” since the two late-night calls on Thursday, and the lack of contact was beginning to worry me slightly. What was he planning? I didn't think for a second that he'd given up on his quest.

Consequently, I was extra vigilant as I turned through the gates and into the racetrack parking lot. I was pretty sure we would be safe inside the enclosures simply because it would be difficult to make a rapid getaway from there with a kidnapped child, but in the parking lot was another matter.

I followed the directions of the attendants and parked in a growing line of cars on the grass. We waited for the group of four young men in the adjacent car to climb out and get themselves ready, and then the three of us joined them, seeking safety in numbers, as we walked together towards the racetrack entrance.

“Aren't you Sid Halley?” one of the men said to me. “The jockey?”

“I used to be him,” I said, smiling, “but now he's too old.”

“Happens to us all, mate,” the man said. “I used to run marathons, but look at me now.” He grabbed his substantial stomach and guffawed loudly.

But I didn't feel like laughing.

Latterly, and for the first time I had begun to feel my age. I no longer bounded out of bed each morning, and I could no longer shrug off late nights and hangovers.

My more sedentary and deskbound lifestyle of recent years had also taken their toll on my fitness, and I was now regularly beaten in a sprint by my six-year-old and her friends. Indeed, going for a run around the village had become a chore rather than a joy.

I was nearing my forty-seventh birthday, and the flecks of gray hair, which had first appeared at my temples about ten years previously, had started to spread right across my head. Soon I would have to admit that it was the dark bits that were the real flecks in an otherwise solid gray landscape. But at least I still had my hair. Some of my former jockey colleagues were long past the comb-over stage and looked even older than I did.

On top of everything else, the years of racing falls were beginning to catch up with me, and my ankles were regularly sore and aching from arthritis. It didn't bode particularly well for the future.

I wondered if Dr. Harold Bryant at Roehampton also did complete foot and ankle transplants.

“So, Sid, what's going to win the big race?” asked my marathon friend with the bulging stomach. “You must know, being an insider.”

Being solicited for tips was the bane of any jockey's life. Jockeys notoriously make bad tipsters. In my case, when I was riding, I was invariably overoptimistic about my own chances and would tell everyone to back me.

Early on in my career, I had expected to win every race I'd ridden in. I soon began to realize that I was more disappointed when I lost than I was pleased when I won. Experience soon changed that attitude, and a good job too. Otherwise, it might have been the quick road to depression and suicide. “To tell you the truth, mate,” I said, turning towards him, “I don't even know what's running.”

“You're just saying that to protect the price.” He placed his finger knowingly down the side of his nose and winked at me.

I didn't bother to deny it. He wouldn't have believed me anyway.

The seven of us made it to the racetrack entrance in easygoing companionship, safe from molestation or abduction, and the four guys peeled off to the nearest bar while Marina, Saskia and I made a direct line towards the Weighing Room. There was still well over an hour to go before the first race, and there were things I had to do.

“You two can go for a wander round,” I said to Marina. “There are some people I need to talk to.”

Marina had Saskia firmly by the hand. “We'll stick with you,” she said, the stress of the past two days etched deeply on her face.

“It's all right,” I said to her calmly. “You will be safe in the racetrack enclosures.”

The look she gave me implied that she didn't agree. “I'd still rather stick with you. But I'll give you the space you need to talk to people.” She didn't like it. She didn't want me to investigate at all, but she knew we had no choice in the matter.

“Mommy, can I go and see the horses?” Sassy said, pulling hard at her mother's arm.

“No,” Marina said firmly. “Stay here with Daddy.”

“Please!” Sassy squealed, pulling harder so that her body was almost at forty-five degrees to the vertical.

Marina smiled at me wryly. “What do you think?”

“Stick with other people. You'll be fine.”

Marina allowed herself to be dragged slowly away towards the horses in the pre-parade ring, but she didn't look very happy.

“Be back here well before the first,” I shouted after her.

•   •   •

I
HAD COME
to Newbury to speak to Jimmy Guernsey and Angus Drummond specifically, the two jockeys that had ridden in all nine of Sir Richard Stewart's suspect races, and also to Tony Molson, who had ridden in four of them, but there was much more to the day than that.

I hadn't been to the races for nearly two years, not since the Grand National before last when the brewery that sponsored the race had held a reunion for all living National-winning jockeys. And I couldn't remember how long it had been before that. Without my investigating work, I had found it meaningless to do so.

I still longed to be one of those daring young men in their bright-colored silks, hurtling over fences at thirty miles an hour and risking life and limb on a daily basis. But I had risked a limb once too often, and, since then, I found no great pleasure in watching others still do what I hungered for.

So I had stopped going racing altogether. It had been less painful.

“Hello, Sid,” said one trainer that I used to ride for, placing his hand on my shoulder. “Long time no see.”

“Hello, Paul,” I replied, smiling at him.

“Sid,” called another trainer, hurrying past, “have you got yer saddle? I need a jock in the fourth. Mine's ill.”

“Don't tempt me,” I said, laughing.

I looked up in the race program to see which jockey it was. Dammit, I thought. It was Tony Molson, one of those I'd come specifically to speak to.

I spent the next five to ten minutes or so greeting old friends and slipping back into racing life like a hand into a well-worn glove. It all fit snugly around me, and the pain of not being directly involved seemed to have eased a little. I resolved not to be away from my love for so long again.

All the while I kept a lookout for either Jimmy Guernsey or Angus Drummond and, presently, I saw them both walking in together from the direction of the parking lot, chatting amicably. I wanted to speak to them separately rather than together, so I allowed them to walk past me into the Weighing Room and the jockeys' changing room beyond. According to the race program, Jimmy had a ride in the second race while Angus's first engagement was in the third.

“Sid, me old mucker. How's the world treating you?” I was slapped on the back and turned to find Paddy O'Fitch, a fellow ex-jockey and a walking racing encyclopedia and, before last Thursday, the only man I'd known who spoke with a broad Belfast accent. “I thought you must be dead.”

“Not yet, Paddy, not quite,” I said, smiling. “And how are you keeping?”

“Well, I think,” he said. “My bloody doctor keeps going on about me drinking too much Guinness. But as I tells him, if I drinks less of the black stuff, then I eats more, and that puts me cholesterol right up like a rocket. Can't bloody win, can I?”

I had been secretly hoping that Paddy might be at Newbury. Not that Paddy was his real name. He had been born plain Harold Fitch in Liverpool, but he was more Irish than the Irish, and he loved everything green—except, that was, his beer, which he liked black with a white head.

“Can I buy you a drink?” I asked him.

He looked around in a guilty manner, perhaps checking for his “bloody doctor.”

“I shouldn't,” he said. “If I get started before the horses have even gone out for the first, then I'll be paralytic before the end of the day. How about later?”

“After the fourth?” I said. “In the Champagne Bar.”

“Do they serve Guinness?”

“I'm sure they will for you,” I said. “Otherwise, we'll go elsewhere.”

“Right y'are,” he said. “After the fourth.” He looked at his watch. He didn't look too happy. “Can you make it after the third? I'm not sure I can wait until after the fourth.”

He could always have gone earlier and bought himself a pint, but then I wouldn't have had the pleasure of his sober, sharp mind.

“OK,” I said. “After the third. But don't drink anything before then.”

“Me? Drink? Whatever gave you dat idea?”

“See you after the third, then,” I said. “In the Champagne Bar.”

“Right y'are, Sid. But what is it that you'll be wanting?”

“Why should I be wanting anything?” I asked.

“Don't be daft, of course you'll be wanting something. No one buys me drink just for the fun of it.”

I laughed. “See you after the third.”

He walked away from me, steadily, upright and in a straight line. I wondered how long it would last. After his riding years, Paddy O'Fitch had made his living by writing brief histories of racing and selling them in the racetrack parking lots. The business had flourished and developed into a multimillion-pound enterprise, which Paddy had then sold to an international media consortium for a fortune. Without the business to run, Paddy had become bored and was now seemingly intent on drinking away all the proceeds from the sale. But he seemed happy enough, and I could think of worse ways of spending one's retirement. He was also the most knowledgeable man on a racetrack of anything and everything that was happening. At least he was when he was sober.

With the help of the official standing guard over the jockeys' changing room door, I managed to collar Angus Drummond on his own outside the Weighing Room between the first and second races.

“Angus,” I said, “do you remember riding Leaping Gold at Sandown in February? On the day of the Mercia Gold Cup?”

“Yeah,” he said, “sure do. Novice chase, weren't it?”