Дик Фрэнсис - Break In

‘Listen,’ I said after a while. ‘Do something for me, will you?’

‘Yes. What?’

‘Look up in the form books for Maynard’s horse Metavane. Do you remember, it won the 2000 Guineas about eight years ago?’

‘Vaguely.’

‘I want to know who owned it before Maynard.’

Is it important?’ She sounded uninterested and dispirited.

‘Yes. See if you can find out, and ring me back.’

‘All right.’

‘And don’t worry.’

‘I can’t help it.’

No one could help it, I thought, disconnecting. Her unhappiness settled heavily on me as if generated in my own mind.

I telephoned Rose Quince at the home number she had given me on my way out, and she answered breathlessly at the eighth ring saying she had just that minute come through the door.

‘So they didn’t throw you to the presses?’ she said.

‘No. But I fear I got bounced off the flak jacket.’

‘Not surprising.’

‘All the same, read Intimate Details on Friday. And by the way, do you know a man called Tunny? He edits Intimate Details.’

‘Tunny,’ she said. ‘Tug Tunny. A memory like a floppy disc, instant recall at the flick of a switch. He’s been in the gossip business all his life. He probably pulled the wings off butterflies as a child and he’s fulfilled if he can goad any poor slob to a messy divorce.’

‘He didn’t look like that,’ I said dubiously.

‘Don’t be put off by the parsonage exterior. Read his column. That’s him .’

‘Yes. Thanks. And what about Owen Watts and Jay Erskine?’

‘The people who left their belongings in your sister’s garden?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Owen Watts I’ve never heard of before today,’ Rose said. ‘Jay Erskine... if it’s the same Jay Erskine, he used to work on the Towncrier as a crime reporter.’

There were reservations in her voice, and I said persuasively, ‘Tell me about him.’

‘Hm.’ She paused, then seemed to make up her mind. ‘He went to jail some time ago,’ she said. ‘He was among criminals so much because of his job, he grew to like them, like policemen sometimes do. He got tried for conspiracy to obstruct the course of justice. Anyway, if it’s the same Jay Erskine, he was as hard as nails but a terrific writer. If he wrote those pieces about your brother-in-law, he’s sold out for the money.’

‘To eat,’ I said.

‘Don’t get compassionate,’ Rose said critically. ‘Jay Erskine wouldn’t.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘Thanks. Have you been inside the Flag building?’

‘Not since they did it up. I hear it’s gruesome. When Pollgate took over he let loose some decorator who’d been weaned on orange kitchen plastic. What’s it like?’

‘Gruesome,’ I said, ‘is an understatement. What’s Pollgate like himself?’

‘Nestor Pollgate, owner of the Flag as of a year ago,’ she said, ‘is reported to be a fairly young upwardly mobile shit of the first water. I’ve never met him myself. They say a charging rhinoceros is safer.’

‘Does he have editorial control?’ I asked. ‘Does Sam Leggatt print to Pollgate’s orders?’

‘In the good old days proprietors never interfered,’ she said nostalgically. ‘Now, some do, some still don’t. Bill Vaughnley gives general advice. The old Lord edited the Towncrier himself in the early years, which was different. Pollgate bought the Flag over several smarting dead bodies and you’ll see old-guard Flag journalists weeping into their beer in Fleet Street bars over the whipped-up rancour they have to dip their pens in. The editor before Sam Leggatt threw in the sponge and retired. Pollgate has certainly dragged the Flag to new heights of depravity, but whether he stands over Leggatt with a whip, I don’t know.’

‘He wasn’t around tonight, I don’t think,’ I said.

‘He spends his time putting his weight about in the City, so I’m told. Incidentally, compared with Pollgate, your man Maynard is a babe in arms with his small takeovers and his saintly front. They say Pollgate doesn’t give a damn what people think of him, and his financial bullying starts where Maynard’s leaves off.’

‘A right darling.’

‘Sam Leggatt I understand,’ she said. ‘Pollgate I don’t. If I were you I wouldn’t twist the Flag’s tail any further.’

‘Perhaps not.’

‘Look what they did to your brother-in-law,’ she said, ‘and be warned.’

‘Yes,’ I said soberly. ‘Thank you.’

‘Any time.’

She said goodbye cheerfully and I sat drinking a glass of wine and thinking of Sam Leggatt and the fearsome manipulator behind him: wondering if the campaign against Maynard had originated from the very top, or from Leggatt or from Tunny, or from Watts and Erskine, or from outside the Flag altogether, or from one of Maynard’s comet-trail of victims.

The telephone rang and I picked up the receiver, hearing Holly’s voice saying without preamble, ‘Maynard got Metavane when he was an unraced two-year-old, and I couldn’t find the former owners in the form book. But Bobby has come back now, and he says he thinks they were called Perryside. He’s sure his grandfather used to train for them, but they seem to have dropped right out of racing.’

‘Um,’ I said. ‘Have you got any of those old Racing Who’s Whos ? They had pages of owners in them, with addresses. I’ve got them, but they’re in the cottage, which isn’t much good tonight.’

‘I don’t think we’ve got any from ten years ago,’ she said doubtfully, and I heard her asking Bobby. ‘No, he says not.’

‘Then I’ll ring up Grandfather and ask him. I know he’s kept them all, back to the beginning.’

‘Bobby wants to know what’s so important about Metavane after all these years.’

‘Ask him if Maynard still owns any part of Metavane.’

The murmuring went on and the answer came back. ‘He thinks Maynard still owns one share. He syndicated the rest for millions.’

I said, ‘I don’t know if Metavane’s important. I’ll know tomorrow. Keep the chin up, won’t you?’

‘Bobby says to tell you the dragon has started up the drive.’

I put the receiver down smiling. If Bobby could make jokes he had come back whole from the Heath.

Grandfather grumbled that he was ready for bed but consented to go downstairs in his pyjamas. ‘Perryside,’ he said, reading, ‘Major Clement Perryside, The Firs, St Albans, Hertfordshire, telephone number attached.’ Disgust filled the old voice. ‘Did you know the fella had his horses with Allardeck?’

‘Sorry, yes.’

‘To hell with him, then. Anything else? No? Then goodnight.’

I telephoned to the Perryside number he’d given me and a voice at the other end said, Yes, it was The Firs, but the Perrysides hadn’t lived there for about seven years. The voice had bought the house from Major and Mrs Perryside, and if I would wait they might find their new address and telephone number.

I waited. They found them. I thanked them; said goodnight.

At the new number another voice said, No, Major and Mrs Perryside don’t live here any more. The voice had bought the bungalow from them several months back. They thought the Perrysides had gone into sheltered housing in Hitchin. Which sheltered housing? They couldn’t say, but it was definitely in Hitchin. Or just outside. They thought.

Thank you, I said, sighing, and disconnected.

Major and Mrs Perryside, growing older and perhaps poorer, knowing Maynard had made millions from their horse: could they still hold a grievance obsessional enough to set them tilting at him at this late stage? But even if they hadn’t, I thought it would be profitable to talk to them.