Dick Francis - 10 lb Penalty

Usher Rudd’s rage slowly ran down and he began first to whine and then deny that he had ever said what Samson and I had both just heard.

Samson phoned the police. Joe Duke was not on duty, but Samson knew all the force individually and put down the receiver, reporting a promise of immediate action.

Usher Rudd shouted, “I want a lawyer.”

He got his lawyer, passed a night in the cells and on Monday morning collected a slap on the wrist from a busy magistrate (for causing a disturbance indoors at the Hoopwestern Gazette) who had no real conception of the speed and noise and danger involved.

No actual damage had been done. The newspaper had appeared as usual. Usher Rudd, meek and respectful, walked out free.

I talked to Joe Duke.

I said, “It was Usher Rudd who stuffed wax in the sump drain of the Range Rover, and Leonard Kitchens who started the fire. Both of them were put up to it by Alderney Wyvern.”

Joe Duke slowly nodded. “But they didn’t stop your father, did they? And as for you” — he gave a half smile — “I’ll never forget you that night of the fire, sitting there half-naked on the cobbles with that red blanket over your shoulders and no sign of pain, though you’d burns on your hands and feet and you’d smashed down into the square. Don’t you ever feel pain?”

“Of course, but there was so much happening...”

“And you’re used to falling off horses?”

“Horses fall... Anyway, I suppose so. I’ve hit the ground quite a lot.”

The smile broadened. “Then why do it?”

“Speed,” I told him. “Nothing like it.” I paused. “If you want something badly enough, you can risk your life for it and consider it normal behavior.”

He pondered. “If you want Orinda Nagle enough to be an MP, you’ll risk...”

“Almost anything. I think it was Wyvern who shot at my father.”

“I’m not saying you’re wrong. He could have carried a rifle in his golf bag, with one of those covers on it that they use for clubs.”

“Yes.”

“And he’d had to have had murder in his mind to do that.”

“Uh huh. And when he heard and saw my father’s success at that meeting, he judged he needed to get rid of him at once.”

“He was crazy.”

“He still is.”

Joe Duke knew my father was engaged in a serious power struggle but was dismayed when I explained about Hudson Hurst.

“You don’t think,” Joe said, horrified, “that Wyvern would try again to kill your father?”

“Wyvern’s stakes are higher now, and my father still stands in his way. If my father is chosen to lead his party, I’m sure he’ll be in appalling danger. It frightens me badly, to be honest.”

Joe said thoughtfully, “You know what?”

“What?”

“Just in case we’re doing Wyvern a great injustice, thinking it was he that shot at you... I mean, so far we’ve only got theory to go on, really. Why don’t you and I do an unofficial walk through... a reconstruction? I’ll use a walking stick for a gun. I’ll transport it in a golf bag. And I’ll carry it up into the little lounge, and aim it at you while you’re crossing the square, like you did that night, and I’ll see how difficult it will be to put the walking stick up in the gutter. What do you think?”

“Can’t do any harm.”

“We might come across something we haven’t thought of. It often works that way with reconstructions.”

“OK.”

“We’ll have to do it at night,” Joe said.

“It was after midnight.”

“After midnight, then. I’ll be off duty. It will be just the two of us.”

I agreed that we would meet that evening in The Sleeping Dragon, and that Joe would tell the manager what we were doing.

I went to see Orinda, who had finally returned from her weekend and answered the telephone.

Five years had been kind to her. She looked as striking as ever, the green eyes black-lashed, the greasepaint makeup smooth and blended. She was less brittle, less stressed, more fulfilled.

She called me darling with only two or three a ’s. “Daaarling.”

“Orinda.” I hugged her.

“How you’ve grown,” she exclaimed. “I mean, not just upwards, but older.”

She had made us a salad lunch with Diet Coke and coffee after.

She knew about the power struggle going on in the party and mentioned that every time there was this sort of ballot, the politicians changed the rules.

“They invent whatever procedure they think will give a result that everyone thinks is fair, even if not everyone is happy with the eventual winner. I don’t think they’ve ever before done a vote like today’s. It’s now all up to the party’s MPs, the members of Parliament.”

I had forgotten how much Orinda knew about governments.

“I suppose Dennis told you how it all works.”

“No, it was Alderney Wyvern.” She frowned. “I never want to see that man again.”

I said neutrally, “Did you know that Wyvern now controls Hudson Hurst, like he used to control you and Dennis? Do you realize that if Hurst wins the ballot and becomes prime minister, it will be Alderney Wyvern who effectively governs this country?”

Orinda looked horrified but shook her head. “Your father’s more popular in the country.”

“Don’t forget schadenfreude.”

Orinda laughed. “You mean the malicious enjoyment of someone else’s misfortune?”

I nodded. “Half the Cabinet would like to see my father come a cropper after his spectacular way of fighting the fish war.”

“It will be marvelous for this constituency if he wins.” She smiled widely. “I never thought I would say that, but it’s true.”

I told Orinda about the reconstruction that Joe Duke and I had planned.

I asked, “Do you remember much about that evening?”

“Of course, I do. I was furious at not being chosen as candidate.”

“How much were you with Alderney Wyvern after the political meeting?”

“I wasn’t. I was angry and miserable and drove straight home.”

“Do you know if Alderney Wyvern had his golf clubs with him at the meeting in the hall?”

“What an extraordinary question! He always used to have them in the back of the car.”

Orinda might have hated my father that night, but not enough to do him harm. She had no wickedness in her nature.

I spent a comfortable hour or two longer with her and then drove to Polly’s house to wait for my father to telephone from London with the result of the ballot.

He gave me news from his car. “It was all indecisive,” he reported. “It was basically a three-way split. All that’s certain is that we have to vote again tomorrow.”

“Do explain,” I begged him.

He described a day that had been full of doubt and maneuvering, but it seemed that what had finally happened was that neither my father nor Hudson Hurst had received enough votes to secure victory outright. Jill Vinicheck, the third candidate, had received the fewest votes and had been eliminated. The next ballot would be a straight fight between Hurst and Juliard, and no one was predicting who would win.

My father sounded tired. He said he and Polly were on their way to join me at the house for a quiet night. He had done all he could behind the scenes to sway the vote his way: now it was up to his colleagues to choose whom they wanted.

I explained about Joe Duke and the reconstruction and, after a brief discussion with Polly by his side, he said they would meet me in The Sleeping Dragon and we would eat together.

Any thought that we might have had about a peaceful evening disappeared between the soup and the apple pie.

While neither Joe Duke nor I had made any particular secret about our plan for the reconstruction, we had not expected the manager of the hotel to broadcast the scenario. He appeared to have told the whole town. The hotel was buzzing, as it had on the night of the dinner, and people came up to my father in droves to shake his hand and wish him well.