Dick Francis - Enquiry

‘All right. I’ll be down in the library. Don’t go without... telling me.’

I shook my head, and she went collectedly out of the room, shutting the door behind her.

I walked to the window and looked at the view. Small fields trickling down into the valley. Trees all bent one way by the wind off the Downs. A row of pylons, a cluster of council house roofs. Not a horse in sight. The dressing-room was on the opposite side of the house to the stables.

‘Have you a gun?’ I asked.

No answer from the bed. I went over and sat down beside him. ‘Where is it?’

His eyes slid a fraction in my direction and then back. He had been looking past me. I got up and went to the table beside his bed, but there was nothing lethal on it, and nothing in the drawer.

I found it behind the high mahogany bedhead. A finely wrought Purdey more suitable for pheasants. Both barrels were loaded. I unloaded them.

‘Very messy,’ I remarked. ‘Very inconsiderate. And anyway, you didn’t mean to do it.’

I wasn’t at all sure about that, but there was no harm in trying to convince him.

‘What are you doing here?’ he said indifferently.

‘Telling you to snap out of it. There’s work to be done.’

‘Don’t speak to me like that.’

‘How, then?’

His head came up a little, just like Roberta’s. If I made him angry, he’d be half way back to his normal self. And I could go home.

‘It’s useless sitting up here sulking. It won’t achieve anything at all.’

‘ Sulking? ’ He was annoyed, but not enough.

‘Someone took our toys away. Very unfair. But nothing to be gained by grizzling in corners.’

‘ Toys ... You’re talking nonsense.’

‘Toys, licences, what’s the difference. The things we prized most. Someone’s snatched them away. Tricked us out of them. And nobody except us can get them back. Nobody else will bother.’

‘We can apply,’ he said without conviction.

‘Oh, we can apply. In six months time, I suppose. But there’s no guarantee we’d get them. The only sensible thing to do is to start fighting back right now and find out who fixed us. Who, and why. And after that I’ll wring his bloody neck.’

He was still staring at the floor, still hunched. He couldn’t even look me in the face yet, let alone the world. If he hadn’t been such a climbing snob, I thought uncharitably, his present troubles wouldn’t have produced such a complete cave-in. He was on the verge of literally not being able to bear the public disgrace of being warned off.

Well, I wasn’t so sure I much cared for it myself. It was all very well knowing that one was not guilty, and even having one’s closest friends believe it, but one could hardly walk around everywhere wearing a notice proclaiming ‘I am innocent. I never done it. It were all a stinking frame-up.’

‘It’s not so bad for you,’ he said.

‘That’s perfectly true.’ I paused. ‘I came in through the yard.’

He made a low sound of protest.

‘Archie seems to be seeing to everything himself. And he’s worried about his house.’

Cranfield made a waving movement of his hand as much as to ask how did I think he could be bothered with Archie’s problems on top of his own.

‘It wouldn’t hurt you to pay Archie’s mortgage for a bit.’

‘ What? ’ That finally reached him. His head came up at least six inches.

‘It’s only a few pounds a week. Peanuts to you. Life or death to him. And if you lose him, you’ll never get so many winners again.’

‘You... you...’ He spluttered. But he still didn’t look up.

‘A trainer is as good as his lads.’

‘That’s stupid.’

‘You’ve got good lads just now. You’ve chucked out the duds, the rough and lazy ones. It takes time to weed out and build up a good team, but you can’t get a high ratio of winners without one. You might get your licence back but you won’t get these lads back and it’ll take years for the stable to recover. If it ever does. And I hear you have already given them all the sack.’

‘What else was there to do?’

‘You could try keeping them on for a month.’

His head came up a little more. ‘You haven’t the slightest idea what that would cost me. The wages come to more than four hundred pounds a week.’

‘There must still be quite a lot to come in in training fees. Owners seldom pay in advance. You won’t have to dig very deep into your own pocket. Not for a month, anyway, and it might not take as long as that.’

‘What might not?’

‘Getting our licences back.’

‘Don’t be so bloody ridiculous.’

‘I mean it. What is it worth to you? Four weeks’ wages for your lads? Would you pay that much if there was a chance you’d be back in racing in a month? The owners would send their horses back, if it was as quick as that. Particularly if you tell them you confidently expect to be back in business almost immediately.’

‘They wouldn’t believe it.’

‘They’d be uncertain. That should be enough.’

‘There isn’t a chance of getting back.’

‘Oh yes there damn well is,’ I said forcefully. ‘But only if you’re willing to take it. Tell the lads you’re keeping them on for a bit. Especially Archie. Go down to the yard and tell them now.’

‘ Now .’

‘Of course,’ I said impatiently. ‘Probably half of them have already read the Situations Vacant columns and written to other trainers.’

‘There isn’t any point.’ He seemed sunk in fresh gloom. ‘It’s all hopeless. And it couldn’t have happened, it simply could not have happened at a worse time. Edwin Byler was going to send me his horses. It was all fixed up. Now of course he’s telephoned to say it’s all off, his horses are staying where they are, at Jack Roxford’s.’

To train Edwin Byler’s horses was to be presented with a pot of gold. He was a north country business man who had made a million or two out of mail order, and had used a little of it to fulfil a long held ambition to own the best string of steeplechasers in Britain. Four of his present horses had in turn cost more than anyone had paid before. When he wanted, he bid. He only wanted the best, and he had bought enough of them to put him for the two previous seasons at the top of the Winning Owners’ list. To have been going to train Edwin Byler’s horses, and now not to be going to, was a refined cruelty to pile on top of everything else.

To have been going to ride Edwin Byler’s horses... as I would no doubt have done... that too was a thrust where it hurt.

‘There’s all the more point, then,’ I said. ‘What more do you want in the way of incentive? You’re throwing away without a struggle not only what you’ve got but what you might have... Why in the Hell don’t you get off your bed and behave like a gentleman and show some spirit?’

‘Hughes!’ He was outraged. But he still sat. He still wouldn’t look at me.

I paused, considering him. Then, slowly, I said, ‘All right, then. I’ll tell you why you won’t. You won’t because... to some degree... you are in fact guilty. You made sure Squelch wouldn’t win. And you backed Cherry Pie.’

That got him. Not just his head up, but up, trembling, on to his feet.

‘How dare you?’

‘Frankly, just now I’d dare practically anything.’

‘You said we were framed.’

‘So we were.’

Some of his alarm subsided. I stoked it up again.

‘You banded us away on a plate.’

He swallowed, his eyes flicking from side to side, looking everywhere except at me.

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘Don’t be so weak,’ I said impatiently. ‘I rode Squelch, remember? Was he his usual self? He was not.’