Dick Francis - The Edge

Filmer said strongly, 'I object to this.'

'At any future trial or Jockey Club enquiry,' Bill Baudelaire said, 'you may of course be accompanied by a legal representative We will furnish you with a copy of the tape of this morning's preliminary proceedings which you may care to give to your lawyer '

'You can't do this,' Filmer said 'I'm not staying.'

When he went to the door he had entered by, he found it locked.

'Let me out,' Filmer said furiously 'You can't do this '

In the serving pantry Mercer Lorrimore took a deep breath, opened the door to the conference room, went through and closed it behind him.

'Good-morning, Julius,' he said.

'What are you doing here? ' Filmer's voice was surprised but not overwhelmingly dismayed. 'Tell them to give me my paper and he done with it '

'Sit down, Julius,' Mercer said He was speaking into the conference table microphone, his voice sounding much louder than Filmer's 'Sit down by the desk.'

'The preliminary enquiry, Mr Filmer,' the Brigadier's voice said, 'is principally into your actions before and during, and in conjunction with, the journey of the race train.' There was a pause, presumably a wait for Filmer to settle. Then the Brigadier's voice again, 'Mr Lorrimore… may I ask you? '

Mercer cleared his throat. 'My son Sheridan,' he said evenly, 'who died two days ago, suffered intermittently from a mental instability which led him sometimes to do bizarre… and unpleasant things '

There was a pause. No words from Filmer.

Mercer said, 'To his great regret, there was an incident of that sort, back in May Sheridan killed… some animals. The bodies were taken from where they were found by a veterinary pathologist who then performed private autopsies on them ' He paused again. The strain was clear in his voice, but he didn't falter. 'You, Julius, indicated to my family on the train that you knew about this incident, and three of us… my wife Bambi, my son Sheridan and myself… all understood during that evening that you would use Sheridan's regrettable act as leverage to get hold of my horse, Voting Right.'

Filmer said furiously, 'That damned play!'

'Yes,' Mercer said. 'It put things very clearly. After Sheridan died, I gave permission to the Master of my son's college, to the British Jockey Club Security Service, and to the veterinary pathologist himself, to find out how that piece of information came into your possession.'

'We did find out,' the Brigadier said, and repeated what a triumphant John Millington had relayed to us less than an hour ago. 'It happened by chance… by accident. You, Mr Filmer, owned a horse, trained in England at Newmarket, which died. You suspected poison of some sort and insisted on a post-mortem, making your trainer arrange to have some organs sent to the path lab. The lab wrote a letter to your trainer saying there was no foreign substance in the organs, and at your request they later sent a copy of the letter to you. One of their less bright computer operators had meanwhile loaded your letter on to a very private disc which she shouldn't have used, and in some way chain-loaded it, so that you received not only a copy of your letter but copies of three other letters besides, letters which were private and confidential.' The Brigadier paused. 'We know this is so,' he said, 'because when one of our operators asked the lab to print out a copy for us, your own letter and the others came out attached to it, chain-loaded into the same secret document name.'

The pathologist, Millington had said, was in total disarray and thinking of scrapping the lab's computer for a new one. 'But it wasn't the computer,' he said. 'It was a nitwit girl, who apparently thought the poison enquiry on the horse was top secret also, and put it on the top-secret disc. They can't sack her, she left weeks ago.'

'Could the pathologist be prosecuted for the cover-up?' the Brigadier had asked.

'Doubtful,' Millington had said, 'now that Sheridan's dead.'

Filmer's voice, slightly hoarse, came out of the loudspeaker into the pantry. 'This is rubbish.'

'You kept the letter,' the Brigadier said. 'It was dynamite, if you could find who it referred to. No doubt you kept all three of the letters, though the other two didn't concern criminal acts. Then you saw one day in your local paper that Mercer Lorrimore was putting up money for a new college library. And you would have had to ask only one question to find out that Mercer Lorrimore's son had left that college in a hurry during May. After that, you would have found that no one would say why. You became sure that the letter refered to Sheridan Lorrimore. You did nothing with your information until you heard that Mercer Lorrimore would be on the Transcontinental Race Train, and then you saw an opportunity of exploring the possibility of blackmailing Mr Lorrimore into letting you have his horse, Voting Right.'

'You can't prove any of this,' Filmer said defiantly.

'We all believe,' said Bill Baudelaire's voice, 'that with you, Mr Filmer, it is the urge to crush people and make them suffer that sets you going. We know you could afford to buy good horses. We know that for you simply owning horses isn't enough.'

'Save me the sermon,' Filmer said. 'And if you can't put up, shut up.'

'Very well,' the Brigadier said. 'We'll ask our next visitor to come in, please.'

Daffodil Quentin, who was standing beside George in the pantry and had been listening with parted mouth and growing anger, opened the dividing door dramatically and slammed it shut behind her.

'You unspeakable toad,' her voice said vehemently over the loudspeaker.

Attagirl, I thought.

She was wearing a scarlet dress and a wide shiny black belt and carrying a large shiny black handbag. Under the high curls and in a flaming rage, she attacked as an avenging angel in full spate.

'I will never give you or sell you my half of Laurentide Ice,' she said forcefully, 'and you can threaten and blackmail until you're blue in the face. You can frighten my stable lad until you think you're God Almighty, but you can't from now on frighten me- and I think you're contemptible and should be put in a zoo.'

Bill Baudelaire, who had persuaded her to come with him to Vancouver, cleared his throat and sounded as if he were trying not to laugh.

'Mrs Quentin,' he said to the world at large, 'is prepared to testify.'

'You bet I am,' Daffodil interrupted.

'… that you threatened to have her prosecuted for killing one of her own horses if she didn't give… give… you her remaining share of Laurentide Ice.'

'You used me,' Daffodil said furiously. 'You bought your way on to the train and you were all charm and smarm and all you were aiming to do was ingratiate yourself with Mercer Lorrimore so you could sneer at him and cause him pain and take away his horse. You make me puke.'

'I don't have to listen to this,' Filmer said.

'Yes, you damned well do. It's time someone told you to your face what a slimy putrid blob of spit you are and gave you back some of the hatred you sow.'

'Er,' Bill Baudelaire said. 'We have here a letter from Mrs Quentin's insurance company, written yesterday, saying that they made exhaustive tests on her horse that died of colic and they are satisfied that they paid her claim correctly. We also have here an affidavit from the stable lad, Lenny Higgs, to the effect that you learned about the colic and the specially numbered feeds for Laurentide Ice from him during one of your early visits to the horse car. He goes on to swear that he was later frightened into saying that Mrs Quentin gave him some food to give to her horse who died of colic.' He cleared his throat. 'As you have heard, the insurance company are satisfied that whatever she gave her horse didn't cause its death. Lenny Higgs further testifies that the man who frightened him, by telling him he would be sent to prison where he would catch AIDS and die, that man is an ex-baggage handler once employed by VIA Rail, name of Alex Mitchell McLachlan.'