Felix Francis: Dick Francis's Gamble

© 2011

Iwas standing right next to Herb Kovak when he was murdered. Executed would have been a better word. Shot three times from close range, twice in the heart and once in the face, he was almost certainly dead before he hit the ground, and definitely before the gunman had turned away and disappeared into the Grand National race-day crowd.

The shooting had happened so fast that neither Herb nor I, nor anyone else for that matter, would have had a chance to prevent it. In fact, I hadn’t realized what was actually going on until it was over, and Herb was already dead at my feet. I wondered if Herb himself had had the time to comprehend that his life was in danger before the bullets tore into his body to end it.

Probably not, and I found that strangely comforting.

I had liked Herb.

But someone else clearly hadn’t.

The murder of Herb Kovak changed everyone’s day, not just his.

The police took over the situation with their usual insensitive efficiency, canceling one of the world’s major sporting events with just half an hour’s notice and requiring the more than sixty thousand frustrated spectators to wait patiently in line for several hours to give their names and addresses.

“But you must have seen his face!”

I was sitting at a table opposite an exasperated police detective inspector in one of the restaurants that had been cleared of its usual clientele and set up as an emergency-incident room.

“I’ve already told you,” I said. “I wasn’t looking at the man’s face.”

I thought back once again to those few fatal seconds and all I could remember clearly was the gun.

“So it was a man?” the inspector asked.

“I think so,” I said.

“Was he black or white?”

“The gun was black,” I said. “With a silencer.”

It didn’t sound very helpful. Even I could tell that.

“Mr… er.” The detective consulted the notebook on the table. “Foxton. Is there nothing else you can tell us about the murderer?”

“I’m sorry,” I said, shaking my head. “It all happened so quickly.”

He changed his line of questioning. “So how well did you know Mr. Kovak?”

“Well enough,” I said. “We work together. Have done for the past five years or so. I’d say we are work friends.” I paused. “At least we were.”

It was difficult to believe that he was dead.

“What line of work?”

“Financial services,” I said. “We’re independent financial advisers.”

I could almost see the detective’s eyes glaze over with boredom.

“It may not be as exciting as riding in the Grand National,” I said, “but it’s not that bad.”

He looked up at my face. “And have you ridden in the Grand National?” His voice was full of sarcasm, and he was smiling.

“As a matter of fact, I have,” I said. “Twice.”

The smile faded. “Oh,” he said.

Oh, indeed, I thought. “And I won it the second time.”

It was unlike me to talk much about what I now felt was a previous life, and bragging about it was even more uncharacteristic. I silently rebuked myself for my indulgence, but I was getting a little irritated by the policeman’s attitude not only towards me but also towards my dead colleague.

He looked down again at his notes.

“Foxton,” he said reading. He looked up. “Not Foxy Foxton?”

“Yes,” I said, although I had long been trying to give up the Foxy nickname, preferring my real name of Nicholas, which I felt was more suited to a serious life in the City.

“Well, well,” said the policeman. “I won a few quid on you.”

I smiled. He’d probably lost a few quid too, but I wasn’t going to say so.

“Not riding today, then?”

“No,” I said. “Not for a long time.”

Had it really been eight years, I thought, since I had last ridden in a race? In some ways it felt like only yesterday, but in others it was a lifetime away.

The policeman wrote another line in his notebook.

“So now you’re a financial adviser?”

“Yes.”

“Bit of a comedown, wouldn’t you say?”

I thought about replying that I believed it was better than being a policeman but decided, in the end, that silence was probably the best policy. Anyway, I tended to agree with him. My whole life had been a bit of a comedown since those heady days of hurling myself over Aintree fences with half a ton of horseflesh between my legs.

“Who do you advise?” he asked.

“Anyone who will pay me,” I said, rather flippantly.

“And Mr. Kovak?”

“Him too,” I said. “We both work for a firm of independent financial advisers in the City.”

“Here in Liverpool?” he asked.

“No,” I said. “The City of London.”

“Which firm?”

“Lyall and Black,” I said. “Our offices are in Lombard Street.”

He wrote it down.

“Can you think of any reason why anyone would want Mr. Kovak dead?”

It was the question I had been asking myself over and over again for the past two hours.

“No,” I said. “Absolutely not. Everyone liked Herb. He was always smiling and happy. He was the life and soul of any party.”

“How long did you say you have known him?” asked the detective.

“Five years. We joined the firm at the same time.”

“I understand he was an American citizen.”

“Yes,” I said. “He came from Louisville, in Kentucky. He used to go back to the States a couple of times a year.”

Everything was written down in the inspector’s notebook.

“Was he married?”

“No.”

“Girlfriend?”

“None that I knew of,” I said.

“Were you and he in a gay relationship?” the policeman asked in a deadpan tone of voice, his eyes still on his notes.

“No,” I said, equally deadpan.

“I’ll find out, you know,” he said, looking up.

“There’s nothing to find out,” I said. “I may have worked with Mr. Kovak, but I live with my girlfriend.”

“Where?”

“Finchley,” I said. “North London.”

I gave him my full address, and he wrote it down.

“Was Mr. Kovak involved in a gay relationship with anyone else?”

“What makes you think he was gay?” I asked.

“No wife. No girlfriend. What else should I think?”

“I have no reason to believe Herb was gay. In fact, I know he wasn’t.”

“How do you know?” The policeman leaned towards me purposefully.

I thought back to those rare occasions when Herb and I had spent any time together, sometimes in hotels where we would be staying overnight at financial conferences. He had never made any sort of pass at me, and he had occasionally chatted up the local girls and then boasted about his conquests over breakfast. It was true that I’d never actually seen him in a sexual situation with a woman, but I hadn’t seen him with a man either.

“I just know,” I said weakly.

“Hmm,” said the inspector, clearly not believing me and making another note in his book.

But did I really know? And did it matter?

“What difference would it make anyway?” I asked.