Dick Francis - In the Frame

‘I wonder how long the party lasted,’ I said.

‘Until the bubbles ran out.’

‘They must all have thought you mad,’ Sarah said.

‘Anything goes on Cup day,’ I said, ‘and the staff of the Hilton would be used to eccentric guests.’

‘What if Greene had had a gun?’ Sarah said.

I smiled at her twistedly. ‘He would have had to wave it around in front of a hell of a lot of witnesses.’

‘But he might have done.’

‘He might... but he was a long way from the front door.’ I bit my thumbnail. ‘Er... how did he know I was in the Hilton?’

There was a tangible silence.

‘I told him,’ Sarah said finally, in a small mixed outburst of shame and defiance. ‘Jik didn’t tell you it all, just now. At first they said... Greene said... they’d burn my face if Jik didn’t tell them where you were. He didn’t want to... but he had to... so I told them, so that it wouldn’t be him... I suppose that sounds stupid.’

I thought it sounded extraordinarily moving. Love of an exceptional order, and a depth of understanding.

I smiled at her. ‘So they didn’t know I was there, to begin with?’

Jik shook his head. ‘I don’t think they knew you were even in Melbourne. They seemed surprised when Sarah said you were upstairs. I think all they knew was that you weren’t still in hospital in Alice Springs.’

‘Did they know about our robbery?’

‘I’m sure they didn’t.’

I grinned. ‘They’ll be schizophrenic when they find out.’

Jik and I both carefully shied away from what would have happened if I’d gone straight down to their room, though I saw from his eyes that he knew. With Sarah held as a hostage I would have had to leave the Hilton with Greene and taken my chance. The uncomfortably slim chance that they would have let me off again with my life.

‘I’m hungry,’ I said.

Sarah smiled. ‘Whenever are you not?’

We ate in a small Bring Your Own restaurant nearby, with people at tables all around us talking about what they’d backed in the Cup.

‘Good heavens,’ Sarah exclaimed. ‘I’d forgotten about that.’

‘About what?’

‘Your winnings,’ she said. ‘On Ringwood.’

‘But...’ I began.

‘It was number eleven!’

‘I don’t believe it.’

She opened her handbag and produced a fat wad of notes. Somehow, in all the mêlée in the Hilton, she had managed to emerge from fiery danger with the cream leather pouch swinging from her arm. The strength of the instinct which kept women attached to their handbags had often astounded me, but never more than that day.

‘It was forty to one,’ she said. ‘I put twenty dollars on for you, so you’ve got eight hundred dollars, and I think it’s disgusting.’

‘Share it,’ I said, laughing.

She shook her head. ‘Not a cent... To be honest, I thought it had no chance at all, and I thought I’d teach you not to bet that way by losing you twenty dollars, otherwise I’d only have staked you ten.’

‘I owe most of it to Jik, anyway,’ I said.

‘Keep it,’ he said. ‘We’ll add and subtract later. Do you want me to cut your steak?’

‘Please.’

He sliced away neatly at my plate, and pushed it back with the fork placed ready.

‘What else happened at the races?’ I said, spearing the first succulent piece. ‘Who did you see?’ The steak tasted as good as it looked, and I realised that in spite of all the sore patches I had at last lost the overall feeling of unsettled shaky sickness. Things were on the mend, it seemed.

‘We didn’t see Greene,’ Jik said. ‘Or the boy, or Beetle-brows.’

‘I’d guess they saw you.’

‘Do you think so?’ Sarah said worriedly.

‘I’d guess,’ I said, ‘That they saw you at the races and simply followed you back to the Hilton.’

‘Jesus,’ Jik groaned. ‘We never spotted them. There was a whole mass of traffic.’

I nodded. ‘And all moving very slowly. If Greene was perhaps three cars behind you, you’d never have seen him, but he could have kept you in sight easily.’

‘I’m bloody sorry, Todd.’

‘Don’t be silly. And no harm done.’

‘Except for the fact,’ Sarah said, ‘That I’ve still got no clothes.’

‘You look fine,’ I said absently.

‘We saw a girl I know in Sydney,’ Sarah said. ‘We watched the first two races together and talked to her aunt. And Jik and I were talking to a photographer we both knew just after he got back... so it would be pretty easy to prove Jik was at the races all afternoon, like you wanted.’

‘No sign of Wexford?’

‘Not if he looked like your drawing,’ Sarah said. ‘Though of course he might have been there. It’s awfully difficult to recognise a complete stranger just from a drawing, in a huge crowd like that.’

‘We talked to a lot of people,’ Jik said. ‘To everyone Sarah knew even slightly. She used the excuse of introducing me as her newly-bagged husband.’

‘We even talked to that man you met on Saturday,’ Sarah agreed, nodding. ‘Or rather, he came over and talked to us.’

‘Hudson Taylor?’ I asked.

‘The one you saw talking to Wexford,’ Jik said.

‘He asked if you were at the Cup,’ Sarah said. ‘He said he’d been going to ask you along for another drink. We said we’d tell you he’d asked.’

‘His horse ran quite well, didn’t it?’ I said.

‘We saw him earlier than that. We wished him luck and he said he’d need it.’

‘He bets a bit,’ I said, remembering.

‘Who doesn’t?’

‘Another commission down the drain,’ I said. ‘He would have had Vinery painted if he’d won.’

‘You hire yourself out like a prostitute,’ Jik said. ‘It’s obscene.’

‘And anyway,’ added Sarah cheerfully, ‘You won more on Ringwood than you’d’ve got for the painting.’

I looked pained, and Jik laughed.

We drank coffee, went back to the motel, and divided to our separate rooms. Five minutes later Jik knocked on my door.

‘Come in,’ I said, opening it.

He grinned. ‘You were expecting me.’

‘Thought you might come.’

He sat in the armchair and swivelled. His gaze fell on my suitcase, which lay flat on one of the divans.

‘What did you do with all the stuff we took from the gallery?’

I told him.

He stopped swivelling and sat still.

‘You don’t mess about, do you?’ he said eventually.

‘A few days from now,’ I said, ‘I’m going home.’

‘And until then?’

‘Um... until then, I aim to stay one jump ahead of Wexford, Greene, Beetle-brows, the Arts Centre boy, and the tough who met me on the balcony at Alice.’

‘Not to mention our copy artist, Harley Renbo.’

I considered it. ‘Him too,’ I said.

‘Do you think we can?’

‘Not we. Not from here on. This is where you take Sarah home.’

He slowly shook his head. ‘I don’t reckon it would be any safer than staying with you. We’re too easy to find. For one thing, we’re in the Sydney ‘phone book. What’s to stop Wexford from marching on to the boat with a bigger threat than a cigarette lighter?’

‘You could tell him what I’ve just told you.’

‘And waste all your efforts.’

‘Retreat is sometimes necessary.’

He shook his head. ‘If we stay with you, retreat may never be necessary. It’s the better of two risks. And anyway...’ the old fire gleamed in his eye... ‘It will be a great game. Cat and mouse. With cats who don’t know they are mice chasing a mouse who knows he’s a cat.’

More like a bull fight, I thought, with myself waving the cape to invite the charge. Or a conjuror, attracting attention to one hand while he did the trick with the other. On the whole I preferred the notion of the conjuror. There seemed less likelihood of being gored.