Dick Francis - In the Frame

‘Donald Stuart’s cousin? Is it true about little Regina being killed?’

‘I’m afraid so.’

‘It’s a real tragedy. A real nice lass, that Regina.’

‘Yes.’

‘Lookee here, then, what can I do for you? Is it tickets for the races?’

‘Er, no,’ I said. It was just that since the receipt and provenance letter of the Munnings had been stolen along with the picture, Donald would like to get in touch with the people who had sold it to him, for insurance purposes, but he had forgotten their name. And as I was coming to Melbourne for the Cup...

‘That’s easy enough,’ Hudson Taylor said pleasantly. ‘I remember the place well. I went with Donald to see the picture there, and the guy in charge brought it along to the Hilton afterwards, when we arranged the finance. Now let’s see...’ There was a pause for thought. ‘I can’t remember the name of the place just now. Or the manager. It was some months ago, do you see? But I’ve got him on record here in the Melbourne office, and I’m calling in there anyway in the morning, so I’ll look them up. You’ll be at the races tomorrow?’

‘Yes,’ I said.

‘How about meeting for a drink, then? You can tell me about poor Donald and Regina, and I’ll have the information he wants.’

I said that would be fine, and he gave me detailed instructions as to where I would find him, and when. ‘There will be a huge crowd,’ he said, ‘But if you stand on that exact spot I shouldn’t miss you.’

The spot he had described sounded public and exposed. I hoped that it would only be he who found me on it.

I’ll be there,’ I said.

Jik called through on the telephone at eight next morning.

‘Come down to the coffee shop and have breakfast.’

‘O.K.’

I went down in the lift and along the foyer to the hotel’s informal restaurant. He was sitting at a table alone, wearing dark glasses and making inroads into a mountain of scrambled egg.

‘They bring you coffee,’ he said, ‘But you have to fetch everything else from that buffet.’ He nodded towards a large well-laden table in the centre of the breezy blue and sharp green decor. ‘How’s things?’

‘Not what they used to be.’

He made a face. ‘Bastard.’

‘How are the eyes?’

He whipped off the glasses with a theatrical flourish and leaned forward to give me a good look. Pink, they were, and still inflamed, but on the definite mend.

‘Has Sarah relented?’ I asked.

‘She’s feeling sick.’

‘Oh?’

‘God knows,’ he said. ‘I hope not. I don’t want a kid yet. She isn’t overdue or anything.’

‘She’s a nice girl,’ I said.

He slid me a glance. ‘She says she’s got nothing against you personally.’

‘But,’ I said.

He nodded. ‘The mother hen syndrome.’

‘Wouldn’t have cast you as a chick.’

He put down his knife and fork. ‘Nor would I, by God. I told her to cheer up and get this little enterprise over as soon as possible and face the fact she hadn’t married a marshmallow.’

‘And she said?’

He gave a twisted grin. ‘From my performance in bed last night, that she had.’

I wondered idly about the success or otherwise of their sex life. From the testimony of one or two past girls who had let their hair down to me while waiting hours in the flat for Jik’s unpredictable return, he was a moody lover, quick to arousal and easily put off. ‘It only takes a dog barking, and he’s gone.’ Not much, I dared say, had changed.

‘Anyway,’ he said. ‘There’s this car we’ve got. Damned silly if you didn’t come with us to the races.’

‘Would Sarah...’ I asked carefully, ‘... scowl?’

‘She says not.’

I accepted this offer and inwardly sighed. It looked as if he wouldn’t take the smallest step henceforth without the nod from Sarah. When the wildest ones got married, was it always like that? Wedded bliss putting nets over the eagles.

‘Where did you get to, last night?’ he said.

‘Aladdin’s cave,’ I said. ‘Treasures galore and damned lucky to escape the boiling oil.’

I told him about the gallery, the Munnings, and my brief moment of captivity. I told him what I thought of the burglaries. It pleased him. His eyes gleamed with humour and the familiar excitement rose.

‘How are we going to prove it?’ he said.

He heard the ‘we’ as soon as he said it. He laughed ruefully, the fizz dying away. ‘Well, how?’

‘Don’t know yet.’

‘I’d like to help,’ he said apologetically.

I thought of a dozen sarcastic replies and stifled the lot. It was I who was the one out of step, not them. The voice of the past had no right to break up the future.

‘You’ll do what pleases Sarah,’ I said with finality, and as an order, not a prodding satire.

‘Don’t sound so bloody bossy.’

We finished breakfast amicably trying to build a suitable new relationship on the ruins of the old, and both knowing well what we were about.

When I met them later in the hall at setting-off time it was clear that Sarah too had made a reassessment and put her mind to work on her emotions. She greeted me with an attempted smile and an outstretched hand. I shook the hand lightly and also gave her a token kiss on the cheek. She took it as it was meant.

Truce made, terms agreed, pact signed. Jik the mediator stood around looking smug.

‘Take a look at him,’ he said, flapping a hand in my direction. ‘The complete stockbroker. Suit, tie, leather shoes. If he isn’t careful they’ll have him in the Royal Academy.’

Sarah looked bewildered. ‘I thought that was an honour.’

‘It depends,’ said Jik, sneering happily. ‘Passable artists with polished social graces get elected in their thirties. Masters with average social graces, in their forties; masters with no social graces, in their fifties. Geniuses who don’t give a damn about being elected are ignored as long as possible.’

‘Putting Todd in the first category and yourself in the last?’ Sarah said.

‘Of course.’

‘Stands to reason,’ I said. ‘You never hear about Young Masters. Masters are always Old.’

‘For God’s sake,’ Sarah said. ‘Let’s go to the races.’

We went slowly, on account of a continuous stream of traffic going the same way. The car park at Flemington racecourse, when we arrived, looked like a giant picnic ground, with hundreds of full-scale lunch parties going on between the cars. Tables, chairs, cloths, china, silver, glass. Sun umbrellas optimistically raised in defiance of the rain-clouds threatening above. A lot of gaiety and booze and a giant overall statement that ‘This Was The Life’.

To my mild astonishment Jik and Sarah had come prepared. They whipped out table, chairs, drinks and food from the rented car’s boot and said it was easy when you knew how, you just ordered the whole works.

‘I have an uncle,’ Sarah said, ‘who holds the title of Fastest Bar in the West. It takes him roughly ten seconds from putting the brakes on to pouring the first drink.’

She was really trying, I thought. Not just putting up with an arrangement for Jik’s sake, but actually trying to make it work. If it was an effort, it didn’t show. She was wearing an interesting olive green linen coat, with a broad brimmed hat of the same colour, which she held on from time to time against little gusts of wind. Overall, a new Sarah, prettier, more relaxed, less afraid.

‘Champagne?’ Jik offered, popping the cork. ‘Steak and oyster pie?’

‘How will I go back to cocoa and chips?’

‘Fatter.’

We demolished the goodies, repacked the boot, and with a sense of taking part in some vast semi-religious ritual, squeezed along with the crowd through the gate to the Holy of Holies.