Дик Фрэнсис - Break In

There were the usual small scattering of racing journalists at the meeting, but no one from the Flag . The racing column in the Flag was most often the work of a sharp young man who wrote disparagingly about what was to come and critically of what was past, and who was avoided whenever possible by all jockeys. On that day, however, I would have been satisfied enough to see him, but had to make do with his equivalent on the Towncrier .

You want to know about the Flag ? Whatever for? Disgusting rag.’ Large and benevolent, Bunty Ireland, the Towncrier’s man, spoke with the complacency of a more respectful rag behind him. ‘But if you want to know if the parts about your brother-in-law are the work of our sharp-nosed colleague, then no, I’m pretty sure they’re not. He was at Doncaster on Friday and he didn’t know at first what was in the gossip column. Slightly put out, he was, when he found out. He said the gossip people hadn’t consulted him and they should have done. He was his usual endearing sunny self.’ Bunty Ireland beamed. ‘Anything else?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Who runs Intimate Details?’

‘Can’t help you there, old son. I’ll ask around, if you like. But it won’t do Bobby much good, you can’t just go and bop us fellows on the nose, however great the provocation.’

Never be too sure, I thought.

I cadged a lift home to Lambourn, ate some lobster and an orange, and thought about telephoning Holly.

Someone, it was certain, would be listening in on the line. Someone had probably been listening in on that line for quite a long period. Long enough to make a list of people Bobby dealt with in Newmarket, long enough to know where he banked, long enough to know how things stood between him and his father. The owner who had telephoned to say he couldn’t afford to pay fifty thousand for his yearling must have been listened to, and so must Bobby’s unsuccessful attempts to sell it to anyone else.

Someone must indeed have listened also to Bobby’s racing plans and to his many conversations with owners and jockeys. There was no trainer alive who wouldn’t in the fullness of time have passed unflattering or downright slanderous opinions about jockeys to owners and vice versa, but nothing of that nature had been used in the paper. No ‘inside’ revelations of betting coups. No innuendoes about regulations broken or crimes committed, such as giving a horse an easy race, a common practice for which one could be fined or even have one’s licence suspended if found out. The target hadn’t in fact been Bobby’s training secrets, but his financial status alone.

Why?

Too many whys.

I pressed the necessary buttons and the bell rang only once at the other end.

‘Kit?’ Holly said immediately.

‘Yes.’

‘Did you try earlier?’

‘No,’ I said.

‘That’s all right, then. We’ve left the receiver off for most of the day, the calls were so awful. But it just occurred to me that you might be trying to ring, so I put it back less than a minute ago...’ Her voice faded away as she realised what she was saying. ‘We’ve done it again,’ she said.

‘Yes.’

She must have heard the smile in my voice, because it was in hers also when she replied.

‘Look,’ she said. ‘I’ve been thinking... I’ve got to go out, now. I’ll ring you later, OK?’

‘Sure,’ I said.

‘Bye.’

‘Bye,’ I said, and disconnected. I also waited, wondering where she would go. Where she’d planned. She called back within fifteen minutes and it was unexpectedly from the feed-merchant’s office. The feed-merchant, it appeared, had let her in, switched on the heater, and left her in private.

‘He’s been terribly good,’ Holly explained. ‘I think he’d been feeling a bit guilty, though he’s no need to really. Anyway I told him we thought our telephone might be bugged and he said he thought it highly possible, and I could come in here and use the phone whenever I liked. I said I’d like to ring you this evening... and anyway, here I am.’

‘Great,’ I said. ‘How are things going?’

‘We spent the whole day doing those letters and we’re frankly bushed. Bobby’s asleep on his feet. Everyone took your cheque without question and gave us paid-in-full letters, and we photocopied those and also the rebuttal letter we all wrote before you went to Plumpton, and by the time we’d finished putting everything in the envelopes the last post was just going, and in fact the postman actually waited at the post office while I stuck on the last ten stamps, and I saw him take the special delivery one to the editor of the Flag , so with luck, with luck, it will be all over.’

‘Mm,’ I said. ‘Let’s hope so.’

‘Oh, and Bobby went to see the solicitor, who said he would write a strong letter of protest to the editor and demand a retraction in the paper, like Lord Vaughnley told you, but Bobby says he isn’t sure that that letter will have gone today, he says the solicitor didn’t seem to think it was frantically urgent.’

‘Tell Bobby to get a different solicitor.’

Holly almost laughed. ‘Yes. OK.’

We made plans and times for me to talk to her again the next evening after I got home from Devon, but it was at eight in the morning when my telephone rang and her voice came sharp and distressed into my ear.

‘It’s Holly,’ she said. ‘Get a copy of the Flag . I’ll be along where I was last night. OK?’

‘Yes,’ I said.

She disconnected without another word, and I drove to the village for the paper.

The column would have been printed during the past night. The special delivery envelope wouldn’t reach the editor until later in the present morning. I thought in hindsight it would have been better for Bobby to have driven the letter to London and specially delivered it himself, which might just possibly have halted the campaign.

The third broadside read:

Don’t pity Robertson (Bobby) Allardeck (32), strapped for cash but still trying to train racehorses in Newmarket. It’s the small trader who suffers when fat cats run up unpaid bills .

In his luxury home yesterday Bobby refused to comment on reports he came to blows with the owner of one of the horses in the stable, preventing the owner taking his horse away by force. ‘I deny everything,’ Bobby fumed .

Meanwhile Daddy Maynard (’Moneybags’) Allardeck (50) goes on record as prize skinflint of the month. ‘My son won’t get a penny in aid from me,’ he intones piously. ‘He doesn’t deserve it.’

Instead Moneybags lavishes ostentatious hand-outs on good deserving charities dear to the Government’s heart. Can knighthoods be bought nowadays? Of course not!

Bobby wails that while Daddy lashes out the loot on the main chance, he (Bobby) gets threatening letters from Daddy’s lawyers demanding repayment of a fourteen-year-old loan. Seems Moneybags advanced a small sum for 18-year-old Bobby to buy a banger on leaving school. With the wheels a long-ago memory on the scrapheap, Daddy wants his money back. Bobby’s opinion of Daddy? ‘Ruthless swine.’

Can stingy Maynard be extorting interest on top?

Watch this space .

Thoughtfully I got the feed-merchant’s number from directory enquiries and pressed the buttons: Holly was waiting at the other end.

‘What are we going to do?’ she said miserably. ‘They’re such pigs. All those quotes... they just made them up.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘If you could bear to put together another batch of those letters you sent yesterday, it might do some good to send them to the editors of the other national newspapers, and to the Sporting Life . None of them likes the Flag . A spot of ridicule from its rivals might make the Flag shut up.’