"Whip Hand" - читать интересную книгу автора (Francis Dick)

CHAPTER SIX

'That's that, then,' Chico said over a pint and pie in the White Hart Hotel. 'End of case. Mrs Caspar's off her tiny rocker, and no one's been getting at George Caspar's youngsters except George Caspar himself.'

'She won't be pleased to hear it,' I said.

'Will you tell her?'

'Straight away. If she's convinced, she might calm down.'

So I telephoned to George Caspar's house, and asked for Rosemary, saying I was a Mr Barnes. She came on the line and said hallo in the questioning voice one uses to unknown callers.

'Mr… Barnes?'

'It's Sid Halley.'

The alarm came instantly.

'I can't talk to you.'

'Can you meet me, then?'

'Of course not. I've no reason for going to London.'

'I'm just down the road, in the town,' I said. 'I've things to tell you. And I don't honestly think there's any need for disguises and so on.'

'Im not being seen with you in Newmarket.'

She agreed, however, to drive out in her car, pick Chico up, and go where he directed: and Chico and I worked out a place on the map which looked a tranquillising spot for paranoiacs. The churchyard at Barton Mills, eight miles towards Norwich.

We parked the cars side by side at the gate and Rosemary walked with me among the graves. She was wearing again the fawn raincoat and a scarf, but not this time the false curls. The wind blew wisps of her own chestnut hair across her eyes, and she pulled them away impatiently: not with quite as much tension as when she had come to my flat, but still with more force than was needed.

I told her I had been to see Tom Garvey and Henry Thrace at their stud farms. I told her I had talked to Brothersmith; and I told her what they'd all said. She listened, and shook her head.

'The horses were nobbled,' she said obstinately. 'I'm sure they were.'

'How?'

'I don't know how.' Her voice rose sharply, the agitation showing in spasms of the muscles round her mouth. 'But I told you. I told you, they'll get at Tri-Nitro. A week today, it's the Guineas. You've got to keep him safe for a week.'

We walked along the path beside the quiet mounds and the grey weatherbeaten headstones. The grass was mown, but there were no flowers, and no mourners. The dead there were long gone, long forgotten. Raw grief and tears now in the municipal plot outside the town; brown heaps of earth and brilliant wreaths and desolation in tidy rows.

'George has doubled the security on Tri-Nitro,' I said.

'I know that. Don't be stupid.'

I said reluctantly, 'In the normal course of events he'll be giving Tri-Nitro some strong work before the Guineas. Probably on Saturday morning.'

'I suppose so. What do you mean? Why do you ask?'

'Well…' I paused, wondering if indeed it would be sensible to suggest a way-out theory without testing it, and thinking that there was no way of testing it anyway.

'Go on,' she said sharply. 'What do you mean?'

'You could… er… make sure he takes all sorts of precautions when he gives Tri-Nitro that last gallop.' I paused. 'Inspect the saddle… that sort of thing.'

Rosemary said fiercely, 'What are you saying? Spell it out, for God's sake. Don't pussyfoot round it.'

'Lots of races have been lost because of too-hard training gallops too soon beforehand.' 'Of course,' she said impatiently. 'Everyone knows that. But George would never do it.'

'What if the saddle was packed with lead? What if a three-year-old was given a strong gallop carrying fifty pounds dead weight? And then ran under severe pressure a few days later in the Guineas? And strained his heart?'

'My God,' she said. 'My God.'

'I'm not saying that it did happen to Zingaloo and Gleaner, or anything like it. Only that it's a distant possibility. And if it's something like that… it must involve someone inside the stable.'

She had begun trembling again.

'You must go on,' she said. 'Please go on trying. I brought some money for you.' She plunged a hand into her raincoat pocket and brought out a smallish brown envelope. 'It's cash. I can't give you a cheque.'

'I haven't earned it,' I said.

'Yes, yes. Take it.' She was insistent, and finally I put it in my pocket, unopened.

'Let me consult George,' I said.

'No. He'd be furious. I'll do it… I mean, I'll warn him about the gallops. He thinks I'm crazy, but if I go on about it long enough he'll take notice.' She looked at her watch and her agitation increased. 'I'll have to go back now. I said I was going for a walk on the Heath. I never do that. I'll have to get back, or they'll be wondering.'

'Who'll be wondering?'

'George, of course.'

'Does he know where you are every minute of the day?'

We were retracing our steps with some speed towards the churchyard gates. Rosemary looked as if she would soon be running.

'We always talk. He asks where I've been. He's not suspicious… it's just a habit. We're always together. Well, you know what it's like in a racing household. Owners come at odd times. George likes me to be there.'

We reached the cars. She said goodbye uncertainly, and drove off homewards in a great hurry. Chico, waiting in the Scimitar, said, 'Quiet here, isn't it. Even the ghosts must find it boring.'

I got into the car and tossed Rosemary's envelope onto his lap. 'Count that,' I said, starting the engine. 'See how we're doing.'

He tore it open, pulled out a neat wad of expensive-coloured banknotes, and licked his fingers.

'Phew,' he said, coming to the end. 'She's bonkers.'

'She wants us to go on.'

'Then you know what this is, Sid,' he said, flicking the stack.

'Guilt money. To spur you on when you want to stop.'

'Well, it works.'

We spent some of Rosemary's incentive in staying overnight in Newmarket and going round the bars, Chico where the lads hung out and I with the trainers. It was Tuesday evening and very quiet everywhere. I heard nothing of any interest and drank more than enough whisky, and Chico came back with hiccups and not much else.

'Ever heard of Inky Poole?' he said. 'Is that a song?'

'No, it's a work jockey. What's a work jockey? Chico my son, a work jockey is a lad who rides work on the gallops.'

'You're drunk,' I said.

'Certainly not. What's a work jockey?'

'What you just said. Not much good in races but can gallop the best at home.'

'Inky Poole,' he said, 'is George Caspar's work jockey. Inky Poole rides Tri-Nitro his strong work at home on the gallops. Did you ask me to find out who rides Tri-Nitro's gallops?'

'Yes, I did,' I said. 'And you're drunk.'

'Inky Poole, Inky Poole', he said.

'Did you talk to him?'

'Never met him. Bunch of the lads, they told me. George Caspar's work jockey. Inky Poole.'

Armed with raceglasses on a strap round my neck I walked along to Warren Hill at seven-thirty in the morning to watch the strings out at morning exercise. A long time, it seemed, since I'd been one of the tucked-up figures in sweaters and skull cap, with three horses to muck out and care for, and a bed in a hostel with rain-soaked breeches for ever drying on an airer in the kitchen. Frozen fingers and not enough baths, ears full of four-letter words and no chance of being alone.

I had enjoyed it all well enough, when I was sixteen, on account of the horses. Beautiful, marvellous creatures whose responses and instincts worked on a plane as different from humans' as water and oil, not mingling even where they touched. Insight into their senses and consciousness had been like an opening door, a foreign language glimpsed and half learned, full comprehension maddeningly baulked by not having the right sort of hearing or sense of smell, nor sufficient skill in telepathy.

The feeling of one-ness with horses I'd sometimes had in the heat of a race had been their gift to an inferior being; and maybe my passion for winning had been my gift to them. The urge to get to the front was born in them; all they needed was to be shown where and when to go. It could fairly be said that like most jump jockeys I had aided and abetted horses beyond the bounds of common sense.

The smell and sight of them on the Heath was like a sea breeze to a sailor. I filled my lungs and eyes, and felt content.

Each exercise string was accompanied and shepherded by its watchful trainer, some of them arriving in cars, some on horseback, some on foot. I collected a lot of 'Good morning, Sid's. Several smiling faces seemed genuinely pleased to see me; and some that weren't in a hurry stopped to talk.

'Sid!' exclaimed one I'd ridden on the Flat for in the years before my weight caught up with my height, 'Sid, we don't see you up here much these days.'

'My loss,' I said, smiling.

'Why don't you come and ride out for me? Next time, you're here, give me a ring, and we'll fix it.'

'Do you mean it?'

'Of course I mean it. If you'd like to, that is.'

'I'd love it.'

'Right. That's great. Don't forget, now.' He wheeled away, waving, to shout to a lad earning his disfavour by slopping in the saddle like a disorganised jellyfish. 'How the bloody hell d'you expect your horse to pay attention if you don't?' The boy sat decently for all of twenty seconds. He'd go far, I thought, starting from Newmarket station.

Wednesday being a morning for full training gallops, there was the usual scattering of interested watchers: owners, pressmen, and assorted bookmakers' touts. Binoculars sprouted like an extra growth of eyes, and notes went down in private shorthand. Though the morning was cold the new season was warming up. There was a feeling overall of purpose, and the bustle of things happening. An industry flexing its muscles. Money, profit, and tax revenue making their proper circle under the wide Suffolk sky. I was still a part of it, even if not in the old way. And Jenny was right. I'd die in an office.

'Morning, Sid.' I looked round.

George Caspar, on a horse, his eyes on a distant string walking down the side of the Heath from his stable in Bury Road.

'Morning, George.'

'You staying up here?'

'Just for a night or two.'

'You should've let us know. We've always a bed. Give Rosemary a ring.' His eyes were on his string: the invitation a politeness, not meant to be accepted. Rosemary, I thought, would have fainted if she'd heard.

'Is Tri-Nitro in that lot?' I said.

'Yes, he is. Sixth from the front.' He looked round at the interested spectators. 'Have you seen Trevor Deansgate anywhere? He said he was coming up here this morning from London. Setting off early.'

'Haven't seen him.' I shook my head.

'He's got two in the string. He was coming to see them work.' He shrugged. 'He'll miss them if he isn't here soon.'

I smiled to myself. Some trainers might delay working the horses until the owner did arrive, but not George. Owners queued up for his favours and treasured his comments, and Trevor Deansgate for all his power was just one of a crowd. I lifted my raceglasses and watched while the string, forty strong, approached and began circling, waiting for their turn on the uphill gallop. The stable before George's had nearly finished, and George would be next.

The lad on Tri-Nitro wore a red scarf in the neck of his olive-green husky jacket. I lowered the glasses and kept my eye on him as he circled, and looked at his mount with the same curiosity as everyone else. A good-looking bay colt, well grown, with strong shoulders and a lot of heart room; but nothing about him to shout from the housetops that here was the wildly backed winter favourite for the Guineas and the Derby. If you hadn't known, you wouldn't have known, as they say.

'Do you mind photographs, George?' I said.

'Help yourself, Sid.'

'Thanks.' I seldom went anywhere these days without a camera in my pocket. Sixteen millimetre, automatic light meter, all the expense in its lens. I brought it out and showed it to him, and he nodded. 'Take what you like.'

He shook up his patient hack and went away, across to his string, to begin the morning's business. The lad who rode a horse down from the stables wasn't necessarily the same one who rode it in fast work, and as usual there was a good deal of swapping around, to put the best lads up where it mattered. The boy with the red scarf dismounted from Tri-Nitro and held him, and presently a much older lad swung up onto his back.

I walked across to be close to the string, and took three or four photographs of the wonder horse and a couple of closer shots of his rider.

'Inky Poole?' I said to him at one point, as he rode by six feet away.

'That's right,' he said. 'Mind your back. You're in the way.'

A right touch of surliness. If he hadn't seen me talking to George first, he would have objected to my being there at all. I wondered if his grudging against-the-world manner was the cause or the result of his not getting on as a jockey, and felt sympathy for him, on the whole.

George began detailing his lads into the small bunches that would go up the gallops together, and I walked back to the fringes of things, to watch.

A car arrived very fast and pulled up with a jerk, alarming some horses alongside and sending them skittering, with the lads' voices rising high in alarm and protest.

Trevor Deansgate climbed out of his Jaguar and for good measure slammed the door. He was dressed in a city suit, in contrast to everyone else there, and looked ready for the boardroom. Black hair rigorously brushed, chin smoothly shaven, shoes polished like glass. Not the sort of man I would have sought as a friend, because I didn't on the whole like to sit at the feet of power, picking up crumbs of patronage with nervous laughter, but a force to be reckoned with on the racing scene.

Big scale bookmakers could be and often were a positive influence for good, a stance I thought sardonically that they had been pushed into, to survive the lobby that knew that a Tote monopoly (and a less greedy tax climate) would put back into racing what bookmakers took out. Trevor Deansgate personified the new breed; urbane, a man of the world, seeking top company, becoming a name in the City, the sycophant of earls.

'Hallo,' he said, seeing me. 'I met you at Kempton… Do you know where George's horses are?'

'Right there,' I said, pointing. 'You're just in time.'

'Bloody traffic.'

He strode across the grass towards George, raceglasses swinging from his hand, and George said hallo briefly and apparently told him to watch the gallops with me, because he came straight back, heavy and confident, and stopped at my side.

'George says my two both go in the first bunch. He said you'd tell me how they're doing, insolent bugger. Got eyes, haven't I? He's going on up the hill.'

I nodded. Trainers often went up halfway and watched from there, the better to see their horses' action as they galloped past.

Four horses were wheeling into position at the starting point. Trevor Deansgate applied his binoculars, twisting them to focus. Navy suiting with faint red pinstripes. The well-kept hands, gold cuff links, onyx ring, as before.

'Which are yours?' I said.

'The two chestnuts. That one with the white socks is Pinafore. The other's nothing much.'

The nothing much had short cannon bones and a rounded rump. Might make a 'chaser one day, I thought. I liked the look of him better than the whippet-shaped Pinafore. They set off together up the gallop at George's signal, and the sprinting blood showed all the way to the top. Pinafore romped it and the nothing much lived up to his owner's assessment. Trevor Deansgate lowered his binoculars with a sigh.

'That's that, then. Are you coming to George's for breakfast?'

'No. Not today.' He raised the glasses again and focussed them on the much nearer target of the circling string, and, from the angle, he was looking at the riders, not the horses. The search came to an end on Inky Poole: he lowered the glasses and followed Tri-Nitro with the naked eye.

'A week today,' I said.

'Looks a picture.' I supposed that he, like all bookmakers, would be happy to see the hot favourite lose the Guineas, but there was nothing in his voice except admiration for a great horse. Tri-Nitro lined up in his turn and at a signal from George set off with two companions at a deceptively fast pace. Inky Poole, I was interested to see, sat as quiet as patience and rode with a skill worth ten times what he would be paid. Good work jockeys were undervalued. Bad ones could ruin a horse's mouth and temperament and whole career. It figured that for the stableful he'd got, George Caspar would employ only the best.

It was not the flat-out searching gallop they would hold on the following Saturday morning over a long smooth surface like the Limekilns. Up the incline of Warren Hill a fast canter was testing enough. Tri-Nitro took the whole thing without a hint of effort, and breasted the top as if he could go up there six times more without noticing.

Impressive, I thought. The Press, clearly agreeing, were scribbling in their notebooks. Trevor Deansgate looked thoughtful, as well he might, and George Caspar, coming down the hill and reining in near us, looked almost smugly satisfied. The Guineas, one felt, were in the bag.

After they had done their work the horses walked down the hill to join the still circling string where the work riders changed onto fresh mounts and set off again up to the top. Tri-Nitro got back his lad with the olive-green husky and the red scarf, and eventually the whole lot of them set off home.

'That's that, then,' George said. 'All set, Trevor? Breakfast?'

They nodded farewells to me and set off, one in the car, one on the horse. I had eyes mostly, however, for Inky Poole, who had been four times up the hill and was walking off a shade morosely to a parked car.

'Inky,' I said, coming up behind him, 'the gallop on Tri-Nitro… that was great.'

He looked at me sourly. 'I've got nothing to say.'

'I'm not from the press.'

'I know who you are. Saw you racing. Who hasn't?' Unfriendly: almost a sneer. 'What do you want?'

'How does Tri-Nitro compare with Gleaner, this time last year?'

He fished the car keys out of a zipper pocket in his anorak, and fitted one into the lock. What I could see of his face looked obstinately unhelpful.

'Did Gleaner, a week before the Guineas, give you the same sort of feel?' I said.

'I'm not talking to you.'

'How about Zingaloo?' I said. 'Or Bethesda?' He opened his car door and slid down into the driving seat, taking out time to give me a hostile glare.

'Piss off,' he said. Slammed the door. Stabbed the ignition key into the dashboard and forcefully drove away.

Chico had arisen to breakfast but was sitting in the pub's dining room holding his head.

'Don't look so healthy,' he said when I joined him.

'Bacon and eggs,' I said. 'That's what I'll have. Or kippers, perhaps. And strawberry jam.'

He groaned.

'I'm going back to London,' I said. 'But would you mind staying here?' I brought the camera out of my pocket. 'Take the film out of that and get it developed. Overnight if possible. There's some pictures of Tri-Nitro and Inky Poole on there. We might find them helpful, you never know.'

'O. K., then,' he said. 'But you'll have to ring up the Comprehensive and tell them that my black belt's at the cleaners.'

I laughed. 'There were some girls riding in George Caspar's string this morning,' I said. 'See what you can do.'

'That's beyond the call of duty.' But his eye seemed suddenly brighter. 'What am I asking?'

'Things like who saddles Tri-Nitro for exercise gallops, and what's the routine from now until next Wednesday, and whether anything nasty is stirring in the jungle.'

'What about you, then?' 'I'll be back Friday night,' I said. 'In time for the gallops on Saturday. They're bound to gallop Tri-Nitro on Saturday. A strong work-out, to bring him to a peak.'

'Do you really think anything dodgy's going on?' Chico said.

'A toss-up. I just don't know. I'd better ring Rosemary.'

I went through the Mr Barnes routine again and Rosemary came on the line sounding as agitated as ever. 'I can't talk. We've people here for breakfast.' 'Just listen, then,' I said. 'Try to persuade George to vary his routine, when he gallops Tri-Nitro on Saturday. Put up a different jockey, for instance? Not Inky Poole.'

'You don't think…' her voice was high, and broke off.

'I don't know at all,' I said. 'But if George changed everything about, there'd be less chance of skulduggery. Routine is the robber's best friend.'

'What? Oh yes. All right. I'll try. What about you?'

'I'll be out watching the gallop. After that, I'll stick around, until after the Guineas is safely over. But I wish you'd let me talk to George.'

'No. He'd be livid. I'll have to go now.' The receiver went down with a rattle which spoke of still unsteady hands, and I feared that George might be right about his wife being neurotic.

Charles and I met as usual at the Cavendish the following day, and sat in the upstairs bar's armchairs.

'You look happier,' he said, 'than I've seen you since…'he gestured to my arm, with his glass. 'Released in spirit. Not your usual stoical self.'

'I've been in Newmarket,' I said. 'Watched the gallops, yesterday morning.'

'I would have thought…' he stopped. 'That I'd be eaten by jealousy?' I said. 'So would I. But I enjoyed it.'

'Good.' 'I'm going up again tomorrow night and staying until after the Guineas next Wednesday.'

'And lunch, next Thursday?'

I smiled and bought him a large pink gin. 'I'll be back for that.'

In due course we ate scallops one-handedly in a wine and cheese sauce, and he gave me the news of Jenny.

'Oliver Quayle sent the address you asked for, for the polish.' He took a paper from his breast pocket and handed it over. 'Oliver is worried. He says the police are actively pursuing their enquiries, and Jenny is almost certain to be charged.'

'When?'

'I don't know. Oliver doesn't know. Sometimes these things take weeks, but not always. And when they charge her, Oliver says, she will have to appear in a magistrates' court, and they are certain to refer the case to the Crown Court, as so much money is involved. They'll give her bail, of course.'

'Bail!'

'Oliver says she is unfortunately very likely to be convicted, but that if it is stressed that she acted as she did under the influence of Nicholas Ashe, she'll probably get some sympathy from the judge and a conditional discharge.'

'Even if he isn't found?' 'Yes. But of course if he is found, and charged, and found guilty, Jenny would with luck escape a conviction altogether.'

I took a deep breath that was half a sigh. 'Have to find him then, won't we?' I said.

'How?'

'Well… I spent a lot of Monday, and all of this morning, looking through a box of letters. They came from the people who sent money, and ordered wax. Eighteen hundred of them, or thereabouts.'

'How do they help?'

'I've started sorting them into alphabetical order, and making a list.' He frowned sceptically, but I went on. 'The interesting thing is that all the surnames start with the letters L, M, N and O. None from A to K, and none from P to Z.'

'I don't see…'

'They might be part of a mailing list,' I said. 'Like for a catalogue. Or even for a charity. There must be thousands of mailing lists, but this one certainly did produce the required results, so it wasn't a mailing list for dog licence reminders, for example.'

'That seems reasonable,' he said dryly.

'I thought I'd get all the names into order and then see if anyone, like Christie's or Sotheby's, say – because of the polish angle – has a mailing list which matches. A long shot, I know, but there's just a chance.'

'I could help you,' he said.

'It's a boring job.'

'She's my daughter.'

'All right then. I'd like it.'. I finished the scallops and sat back in my chair, and drank Charles's good cold white wine.

He said he would stay overnight in his club and come to my flat in the morning to help with the sorting, and I gave him a spare key to get in with, in case I should be out for a newspaper or cigarettes when he came. He lit a cigar and watched me through the smoke. 'What did Jenny say to you upstairs after lunch on Sunday?'

I looked at him briefly. 'Nothing much.'

'She was moody all day, afterwards. She even snapped at Toby.' He smiled. 'Toby protested, and Jenny said "At least Sid didn't whine.' He paused. 'I gathered that she'd been giving you a particularly rough mauling, and was feeling guilty.'

'It wouldn't be guilt. With luck, it was misgivings about Ashe.'

'And not before time.'

From the Cavendish I went to the Portman Square headquarters of the Jockey Club, to keep an appointment made that morning on the telephone by Lucas Wainwright. Unofficial my task for him might be, but official enough for him to ask me to his office. Ex-Superintendent Eddy Keith, it transpired, had gone to Yorkshire to look into a positive doping test, and no one else was going to wonder much at my visit.

'I've got all the files for you,' Lucas said. 'Eddy's reports on the syndicates, and some notes on the rogues he O.K.'d.'

'I'll make a start then,' I said. 'Can I take them away, or do you want me to look at them here?'

'Here, if you would,' he said. 'I don't want to draw my secretary's attention to them by letting them out or getting them xeroxed, as she works for Eddy too, and I know she admires him. She would tell him. You'd better copy down what you need.'

'Right,' I said.

He gave me a table to one side of his room, and a comfortable chair, and a bright light, and for an hour or so I read and made notes. At his own desk he did some desultory pen-pushing and rustled a few papers, but in the end it was clear that it was only a pretence of being busy. He wasn't so much waiting for me to finish as generally uneasy.

I looked up from my writing. 'What's the matter?' I said.

'The… matter?'

'Something's troubling you.' He hesitated. 'Have you done all you want?' he said, nodding at my work.

'Only about half,' I said. 'Can you give me another hour?'

'Yes, but… Look, I'll have to be fair with you. There's something you'll have to know.'

'What sort of thing?'

Lucas, who was normally urbane even when in a hurry, and whose naval habits of thought I understood from long practice with my Admiral father-in-law, was showing signs of embarrassment. The things that acutely embarrassed naval officers were collisions between warships and quaysides, ladies visiting the crew's mess deck with the crew present and at ease, and dishonourable conduct among gentlemen. It couldn't be the first two; so where were we with the third?

'I have not perhaps given you all the facts,' he said.

'Go on, then.'

'I did send someone else to check on two of the syndicates, some time ago. Six months ago.' He fiddled with some paperclips, no longer looking in my direction. 'Before Eddy checked them.'

'With what result?'

'Ah. Yes.' He cleared his throat. 'The man I sent- his name's Mason – we never received his report because he was attacked in the street before he could write it.'

Attacked in the street… 'What sort of attack?' I said. 'And who attacked him?'

He shook his head. 'Nobody knows who attacked him. He was found on the pavement by some passer-by, who called the police.'

'Well… have you asked him – Mason?' But I guessed at something of the answer, if not all of it.

'He's, er, never really recovered,' Lucas said regretfully. 'His head, it seemed, had been repeatedly kicked, as well as his body. There was a good deal of brain damage. He's still in an institution. He always will be. He's a vegetable… and he's blind.'

I bit the end of the pencil with which I'd been making notes. 'Was he robbed?' I said.

'His wallet was missing. But not his watch.' His face was worried.

'So it might have been a straightforward mugging?'

'Yes… except that the police treated it as intended homicide, because of the number and target of the boot marks.'

He sat back in his chair as if he'd got rid of an unwelcome burden. Honour among gentlemen… honour satisfied.

'All right,' I said. 'Which two syndicates was he checking?'

'The first two that you have there.'

'And do you think any of the people on them – the undesirables – are the sort to kick their way out of trouble?'

He said unhappily, 'They might be.'

'And am I,' I said carefully, 'investigating the possible corruption of Eddy Keith, or Mason's semi-murder?'

After a pause, he said, 'Perhaps both.'

There was a long silence. Finally I said, 'You do realise that by sending me notes at the races and meeting me in the tearoom and bringing me here, you haven't left much doubt that I'm working for you?'

'But it could be at anything.' I said gloomily, 'Not when I turn up on the syndicates' doorsteps.'

'I'd quite understand,' he said, 'if, in view of what I've said, you wanted to… er…'

So would I, I thought. I would understand that I didn't want my head kicked in. But then what I'd told Jenny was true: one never thought it would happen. And you're always wrong, she'd said.

I sighed. 'You'd better tell me about Mason. Where he went, and who he saw. Anything you can think of.'

'It's practically nothing. He went off in the ordinary way and the next we heard was he'd been attacked. The police couldn't trace where he'd been, and all the syndicate people swore they'd never seen him. The case isn't closed, of course, but after six months it's got no sort of priority.'

We talked it over for a while, and I spent another hour after that writing notes. I left the Jockey Club premises at a quarter to six, to go back to the flat; and I didn't get there.