Felix Francis - Dick Francis's Gamble

I could remember most of the details of the investment portfolios of most of my clients, and Billy Searle was no exception. His was rather smaller than one might imagine after so many years at the top of his profession, but Billy had always been a spender rather than a saver, driving expensive cars and staying in lavish hotels. However, as far as I could recall, he had a nest egg of around a hundred and fifty thousand growing nicely for his retirement, certainly more than he would prudently need just for a new car or a foreign holiday.

“OK, Billy,” I said. “I’ll get on with liquidating everything tomorrow. But it’ll take a few days for you to get the cash.”

“Can’t I have it tomorrow?” He looked desperate. “I need it tomorrow.”

“Billy, that simply isn’t possible. I need to sell the shares and bonds, have the funds transferred into the company’s client account, and then transfer it to your own. Banks always say to allow three days for each transfer so overall it might take a week but it will probably be a little quicker than that. Today’s Tuesday. You might have it by Friday if you’re lucky, but more likely it will be Monday.”

Billy went pale.

“Billy,” I said, “are you sure you’re not in any trouble?”

“I owe a guy some money, that’s all,” he said. “He says I have to pay him by tomorrow.”

“You will just have to tell him that’s impossible,” I said. “Explain to him the reasons. I’m sure he’ll understand.”

Billy gave me a look that said everything. Clearly the guy in question wouldn’t take excuses.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “But I can’t do it any quicker.”

“Can’t your firm lend me the money until everything’s sold?” he asked.

“Billy,” I said, “it’s a hundred and fifty thousand pounds. We don’t have that sort of cash lying round.”

“I only need a hundred,” he said.

“No,” I said firmly. “Not even a hundred.”

“You don’t understand,” he said in desperation. “I need that money by tomorrow night.” He was almost crying.

“Why?” I asked him. “Why do you owe so much?”

“I can’t tell you.” He almost screamed the words at me and the heads of a few other late-leaving racegoers turned our way. “But I need it tomorrow.”

I looked at him. “And I cannot help you,” I said quietly. “I think I’d better go now. Do you still want me to sell your portfolio and liquidate the money?”

“Yes,” he said in a resigned tone.

“Right,” I said. “I’ll get the office to send you a written authority. Just sign it and send it straight back. I’ll try and get the cash into your account by Friday.”

He was almost in a trance. “I hope I’m still alive by Friday.”

Isat in my car in the members’ parking lot and thought through my recent conversation with Billy Searle. I wondered what I should do about it, if anything.

As he had said, it was his money and he could do what he liked with it. Except that he clearly didn’t like what he was doing with it.

He’d also told me that he owed some guy about a hundred thousand and had implied that his life would be in danger if he didn’t repay it by the following evening. I would have normally dismissed such a threat as melodramatic nonsense but now, after the events at Aintree the previous Saturday, I wasn’t so sure.

Should I tell someone about our conversation? But who? The police would probably want some evidence, and I had none. I also didn’t want to get Billy into trouble. Jockeys who owe money would always be suspected of involvement with bookmakers. Perhaps Billy’s need for urgent cash was completely legitimate. Maybe he was buying a house. I knew that estate agents could be pretty determined in their selling methods, but surely they didn’t threaten murder to close a deal.

I decided to do nothing until I’d had a chance to discuss it with Patrick. Besides, I would need to inform him before I could start the process of liquidating Billy’s assets.

I looked at my watch. It was already past six o’clock, and the office would be closed. I’d have to speak to Patrick about it in the morning. Nothing could be done now anyway, the markets in London were also long closed for the day.

Instead, I went to stay with my mother.

Hello, darling,” she said, opening her front door. “You’re far too thin.”

It was her usual greeting, and one that was due to her long-standing pathological fear that I was anorexic. It had all started when I’d been a fifteen-year-old who had been desperate to be a jockey. I’d never been very short so I had begun starving myself to keep my weight down. But it hadn’t been due to anorexia, just willpower. I had always loved my food, but it seemed that my body, and my mind, had now finally trained themselves to stay thin.

As a rule, I never really thought about food and, if left to my own devices, there was little doubt that I would have become undernourished through neglect. But my mother saw to it that I didn’t. She would literally send food parcels to Claudia with strict instructions to feed me more protein, or more carbohydrate, or just more.

“Hello, Mum,” I said, ignoring her comment and giving her a kiss. “How are things?”

“So-so,” she replied, as always.

She still lived near Cheltenham but not in the big house in which I had grown up. Sadly, that had had to be sold during my parents’ acrimonious divorce proceedings in order to divide the capital between them. My mother’s current home was a small whitewashed cottage, hidden down a rutted lane on the edge of a small village just north of the racetrack with two double bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs, and a single open-plan kitchen/ dining room/living room downstairs, the levels connected by a narrow, twisting, boxed-in staircase in the corner, with a leverlatched door at the bottom.

The cottage was an ideal size for her enforced solitary lifestyle, but I knew she longed still to be the charming hostess in the grand house, a role in which she had excelled throughout my childhood.

“How’s your father?” she asked.

Her inquiry was a social nicety rather than a true request for information. She probably thought that I’d appreciate her asking.

“He’s fine,” I replied, completing the duty. At least I assumed he was fine. I hadn’t spoken to him for more than a fortnight. We really didn’t have much to say to each other.

“Good,” she said, but I doubt that she really meant it. I thought she would almost certainly have also replied “Good” if I’d told her he was on his deathbed. But at least she had asked, which was more than he ever did about her.

“I’ve bought you some fillet steak for dinner,” she said, turning the conversation back to my feeding habits. “And I’ve made some profiteroles for pudding.”

“Lovely,” I said. And I meant it. As usual, when coming to stay with my mother, I hadn’t eaten anything all day in preparation for a high-calorie encounter with her cooking and, by now, I was really hungry.

I went up to the guest bedroom and changed out of my suit and into jeans and sweatshirt. I tossed my mobile onto the bed. As always, the closeness to Cleeve Hill, and the phone-signal shadow it produced, rendered the thing useless. But at least I’d have a rest from its constant ringing.

When I came down, my mother was standing by the stove starting supper with saucepans already steaming on the hob.

“Help yourself to a glass of wine,” she said over her shoulder. “I’ve already got one.”

I went over to the antique sideboard that had once sat in the dining room of the big house and helped myself to a glass of Merlot from the open bottle.