Felix Francis - Dick Francis's Gamble

While Claudia and my mother went from aisle to aisle, loading two large trolleys with mountains of food, I was banished by them to the clothing section.

I browsed through the rails of shirts and trousers, jackets and suits, but, sadly, this particular supermarket didn’t stock bulletproof vests.

Sunday was, indeed, a day of rest.

The trip to the supermarket had almost been too much for Claudia, who was still far from well after her surgery.

“Don’t try and do too much too soon,” Dr. Tomic, the surgeon, had said. “Plenty of rest is needed to allow the abdominal wall to mend.”

He hadn’t mentioned anything about running up stairs, shouting at gunmen or food shopping, but he probably wouldn’t have approved of any of them.

“You stay in bed today,” I said to Claudia. “I’ll fetch you some breakfast.”

She smiled and closed her eyes again as I went out.

Jan was already downstairs making toast.

“My God,” she said, going into the larder, “we’ve even got marmalade!” She turned around and grinned at me. “I can’t remember when I last had so much food in here. I’m completely useless at cooking. All I can do is heat things up in the microwave. But you really shouldn’t have bought so much.”

“Consider it our rent,” I said.

“You don’t have to pay rent, lover boy,” she said, coming back out of the larder and opening the marmalade. “You can pay me in kind.” She laughed. “Except I now know I have no chance of that.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“Don’t be,” she said. “I think Claudia is really lovely. You’re a lucky man.” She paused and breathed deeply. “And I suppose I’d better stop calling you lover boy.”

There were tears in her eyes. I went over to her and gave her a hug. There was nothing to say, so I didn’t speak, I just held her tightly until the moment had passed.

“Life can be so random,” she said, stepping back from me. “When I was married to Stuart, all I wanted was to divorce him and keep half his fortune. Well, I’ve done that, but-and I know this sounds crazy-I miss him. I even miss the god-awful rows we used to have. Now, with Maria away at college in London, I’m just a rich, lonely old spinster.”

“But you must have masses of friends,” I said.

She looked at me as she spread the marmalade on her toast. “I have plenty of acquaintances but no real friends. Racing is so competitive that I find it difficult to make any true friends with racing people. Of course, I know lots of them round here, other trainers and such, and I see them at the races, but I’m not a member of the village dinner-party set. All my friends were Stuart’s friends, and when he went, they went too.”

“Well, it’s high time you met some more,” I said, trying to lighten the mood.

She laughed again but only briefly. “That’s not as simple as it sounds, and finding someone to satisfy one’s needs is far from straightforward, I can tell you. You chaps have it made.”

“In what way?” I asked.

“If a man wants sex, he can just go and buy it from some girl on a street corner or in some lap-dancing club,” she said. “It’s not so easy for a middle-aged woman.”

I stood there slightly dumbstruck. I had always treated her advances as a bit of a joke. I hadn’t realized the degree of her desperation.

“Oh, Jan!” I said. “I’m so sorry.”

“I don’t want your pity,” she said, quickly turning away from me and taking the marmalade back into the larder.

No, I thought, she wanted my body.

Itook a cup of coffee and some muesli up to Claudia.

“You took your time,” she said, sitting up in bed.

“Sorry. I was talking to Jan.”

“Isn’t she lovely?” Claudia said. “We had a long chat yesterday morning while you were out.”

“What did you talk about?” I asked.

“Life in general,” she said obliquely. “Stuff like that.”

“Did you tell her about… you know?”

Why was the word cancer so difficult to use?

“I started to, but then your mother came in, and I’m still not sure it’s time to tell her yet.”

“But when will it be time?” I said. “Now seems as good a time as any.”

“I suppose you’re right,” she said. “I just feel…” She stopped.

“What?” I said.

“I suppose I feel a failure. And I don’t want her to be disappointed in me.”

“Don’t be daft,” I said. “She loves you.”

“Only because she thinks I’m her pathway to grandchildren.”

“That’s not true,” I said, but I did wonder if she was right.

“And she won’t love me if I marry you and then we find I can’t have any babies. She will then see me not as a pathway but as an obstacle.”

She was almost in tears.

“Darling,” I said, “please don’t upset yourself. OK, if you don’t want to, we won’t tell her. Not yet.”

But we would have to tell her if, and when, Claudia’s hair started falling out.

The rest of Sunday seemed to drag on interminably, with me forever wondering how Ben Roberts was faring with his father. But, as I was still reluctant to leave my mobile phone switched on, I would have no way of knowing anyway.

My mother, with Jan helping, cooked roast beef for lunch with all the trimmings, the wonderful smells even enticing Claudia downstairs in her dressing gown.

“I can’t tell you how long it’s been since I had a proper Sunday lunch in this house,” Jan said as we all sat down at the kitchen table. “Not since Stuart left, that’s for sure. He used to do the cooking.” She laughed. “Can’t you stay forever?”

The lunch was accompanied by a couple of bottles of the supermarket’s finest claret, of which I had just one small glass. Someone had to keep their wits about them. I left the ladies to sleep it off on the deep sofas in the living room while I again went to make some calls from Jan’s office.

First I used her landline to remotely access my voice mail. There were four new messages. All were from Chief Inspector Flight and each one threatening me with arrest if I didn’t come forward immediately to speak to him. He read out a number where he could always be reached, and I wrote it down on the notepad beside the telephone.

But there was no message from Ben Roberts. Perhaps he hadn’t yet found the right moment to speak to his father.

Next, I called DCI Tomlinson’s mobile number, taking care to dial 141 first to withhold Jan’s number from caller ID.

He answered at the fourth ring, but he sounded as if I’d woken him from a Sunday-afternoon slumber.

“Sorry,” I said. “I thought you’d have your phone off if you weren’t working.”

“I am working,” he said. “I’m in my office. Just having forty winks on my desk. I was up half the night.”

“Partying?” I asked.

“Something like that,” he said. “Or what goes for partying round these parts. An abused girlfriend finally had too much and stabbed her boyfriend to death.”

“Nice.”

“No,” he said, “not really. She stabbed him about thirty times with a screwdriver. He bled to death. It was not a pretty sight, and especially not at four in the morning when I should have been tucked up in my bed.”

“Sorry,” I said.

“Thanks,” he replied. “But it’s sadly too common round here, especially after they’ve been drinking. I rarely get a full night’s sleep on a Saturday.”

I decided against adding homicide detective to my list of possible future careers.

“Do you have any news for me?” I asked.

“What sort of news?” he asked back.

“Anything,” I said. “How about the dead man? Was he Bulgarian?”