Dick Francis's Front Runner

24

On Saturday I went again to Ascot for the second day of the pre-Christmas meeting.

I had briefly thought of asking Henri if she would like to come with me, but I’d quickly dismissed the notion.

I was always working when on a racecourse. Even the day at Sandown when I’d first met Henri, my work had been the higher priority — I had gone off to hospital with Bill McKenzie rather than accepting Gay Smith’s invitation to go back to the box for tea.

That day, it had been a difficult decision, and the right one, as it was again now.

‘I couldn’t come with you, anyway,’ Henri had said when I’d called to explain why I wasn’t asking her. ‘I’m going to a wedding in Kent.’

‘As long as it’s not your wedding,’ I’d said with a laugh.

‘There’s no chance of that.’

I hadn’t been quite sure what to make of that answer, but it was not the right time to delve deeper into the matter, and definitely not when on the telephone.

I wandered down to the Ascot weighing room still thinking about her and looking forward to spending some decent time with her in the warmth of the Caribbean. I wondered if we were going to Martin Reynard’s place in the Cayman Islands. Henri had said that she would be away with her uncle and aunt, so it would be quite likely that her cousin would be there too.

Bill McKenzie was standing on the terrace in front of the weighing room and he was clearly not happy to see me.

‘How’s the shoulder?’ I said.

‘Mending slowly.’

‘I thought you’d be resting it at home.’

‘I don’t want any of the trainers to think I’m going to be out for long,’ he said. ‘Out of sight, out of mind.’ He wasn’t even wearing a sling. ‘I need to be back in good time for the King George.’

That would be just three short weeks after the fall at Sandown. His surgeon had been right — he was crazy.

‘Do you fancy a quiet talk over a drink or a sandwich?’ I asked.

‘What, with you?’ He sounded incredulous.

‘Yes. With me.’

‘Now, why would I want to do that?’

‘Because, Bill, I may be the only friend you have.’ He didn’t look like he believed it. ‘There’s a disciplinary hearing next month and, as far as I can tell from the evidence, you’re going to lose your jockey’s licence for a very long time, maybe for ever. Then it won’t matter whether the trainers see you or not. You won’t be riding. You won’t even be allowed on a racecourse.’

He looked miserable.

‘Is that what you want?’ I asked.

‘Of course it bloody isn’t.’

‘So speak to me,’ I said. ‘Tell me what’s going on.’

‘I can’t.’ He was again almost in tears.

‘Come on,’ I said in my most persuasive tone. ‘Let’s go and find a quiet place to have that drink and a chat.’

I steered him not to a bar but to the lifts, which took us up to the private hospitality area of the Ascot Authority, the organization that operates the racecourse on behalf of the Queen, who owns the place.

As I had suspected, even though there were some guests, the hospitality area at a jumps meeting was far from full and I was able to secure a table in a quiet corner, well away from where the others were enjoying a champagne reception near the viewing balcony.

I went over to the waitresses’ station and one of them poured me a couple of glasses of white wine.

‘I can’t have anything to drink,’ Bill said. ‘I’m having enough trouble with my weight as it is. Lack of riding is making me flabby.’

‘Drink it,’ I said, handing him one of the glasses. ‘You need it.’

And, I thought, it might loosen his tongue.

He drank it down in just a few large gulps, and I waved at the waitress to bring him another.

‘Tell me what’s going on.’

‘I can’t,’ he said pitifully.

‘Are you sure you’re not being blackmailed?’ I asked.

He took a gulp of wine from his new glass.

‘No.’ He sighed. ‘Not for money, anyway.’

‘Is someone making you ride to lose?’

He didn’t say anything, he just nodded slightly, as if not voicing the admission somehow made it less damaging.

‘How?’

‘I love my wife,’ he said gloomily. ‘She’s five months pregnant and I absolutely adore her. And Oscar, my son. He’s now nearly two.’

‘I’m sure you do,’ I said, not immediately realizing the significance.

‘I don’t want to lose them,’ he said, looking down at the table with tears running down his cheeks.

‘Why would you?’ I asked.

‘There are some photos,’ he said. ‘This man calls me and says he’ll send them to my Julie unless I lose the races.’

So he was being blackmailed after all.

‘What are the photos of?’

He looked up at me. ‘What do you think?’ he said. ‘Me and a girl.’

‘Have you seen them?’

‘No. I don’t want to. But the man swears he has them.’

‘Where and when were they taken?’ I asked.

‘In May,’ he said. ‘I went to Paris to ride in the Grand Steeple-Chase. I was in a hotel near the track and I got picked up by some bird in the bar. The next thing I know it’s the morning and I’m waking up in bed next to her, and both of us are stark-bollock naked. I must have had more red wine than I’d realized because I don’t really remember much, but this geezer on the phone says he’s got some graphic pictures of me and the girl having sex.’

‘Didn’t you ask to see them?’ I asked. ‘He may be bluffing.’

‘Does it matter?’ he said. ‘Even if he just tells my missus that I’ve been sleeping with some French floozy, with or without pictures, she’d hit the roof and I’d be out on my ear.’

‘Was it a set-up?’

‘Yeah, ’course it was. I remember being flattered by her attention. It seemed harmless enough. And I was a long way from home. At first we were just laughing and chatting. And drinking. Then she was all over me, kissing me and such. I never intended screwing her or anything, but...’ He tailed off.

‘Whose bed?’ I asked. ‘Hers or yours?’

‘Mine. Upstairs in the hotel. I don’t even remember going up to the room, let alone doing anything with her when I got there.’ He put his head in his hands. ‘I’m bloody finished, aren’t I? My job’s going down the Swanee over this Wisden Wonder business. And my marriage will be in ruins too. I might as well go and top myself.’

He downed the rest of his wine.

‘Come on, Bill,’ I said. ‘There’s no need to talk like that.’

‘Isn’t there? My life’s over either way.’

I felt sorry for him because it did rather sound like he’d been specifically targeted.

‘I’ll see what I can do for you,’ I said. ‘In the meantime, tell me about riding Pool Table at Cheltenham. Was that another race you were told to lose?’

He hung his head, as if in shame. ‘That was the first time.’

‘How were you contacted?’ I asked.

‘By phone,’ he said. ‘I got a call at home one night when I’m watching telly. My missus was there in the room with me. It was bloody awful. I couldn’t believe what the man was saying. My mouth went completely dry and I remember going hot and cold all over. I started sweating and such. I was convinced Julie must be able to tell just by looking at me. I’ve never felt so wretched in my whole life.’

‘Was it by phone every time?’ I asked.

‘It’s only been twice,’ he said. ‘Stopping one, that is. Not twice with other girls. That was just the once, and I’d give anything for that not to have happened at all.’

‘Do you know who it was who called?’

‘He didn’t give his name,’ Bill said.

There was something about his tone of voice that made me think he did know.

‘Was it a man called Leslie Morris?’ I asked.

He looked up at me sharply.

‘When I asked you about him before, you said you’d never heard of him, but you blushed, so I knew you were lying. So was it Morris who called you?’

He looked down again at the empty wineglass in his hand.

Then he nodded. ‘He didn’t actually say so, but I think it was him.’

‘Why did you lie to me about knowing him?’ I said.

‘Because I was worried about what he might say to you.’

‘Have you known him long?’ I asked.

‘Only since May. It was his bloody horse I went to Paris to ride. Morris called me out of the blue after Aintree. He was dead keen for me to go — paid my fare and everything, although, at the time, I couldn’t think why he bothered. Useless nag finished tailed-off last.’

So Morris had been lying about that too. Bill McKenzie had indeed ridden his horse, but in France. I silently berated myself for not having checked the French records as well as those for the UK and Ireland.

‘So Morris was over there with you?’

‘Yeah, together with his son. Nasty piece of work he is, I can tell you.’

‘Does Morris know about the girl?’ I asked.

‘I reckon he might.’

I believed there was no might about it. I’d wager my life savings that, not only did Morris know about it, he’d set it up. He’d probably arranged for the girl to get McKenzie drunk or, more likely, to slip him a mickey. Rohypnol maybe.

Easy.

Help him up to his room, remove all his clothes, lie him on the bed with the naked girl in a few compromising positions on top, snap a few photos just to be sure, and, hey presto, he had cause for blackmail and control. Rohypnol even caused temporary amnesia as a side effect so he wouldn’t have remembered much, but just enough not to question that it had happened.

Bill probably never even had sex with the girl. He’d have been incapable. But how would he be able to convince his wife of that?

‘Who else knows?’ I asked.

‘No one,’ he said. ‘I’ve not mentioned it to a soul before you. Please don’t tell anyone.’ He was begging me. ‘I don’t want Julie finding out.’

‘There may be nothing for her to find out about,’ I said. ‘If you don’t remember anything happening, then it’s quite likely that nothing actually did happen. Especially if you were unconscious.’

‘I chatted up the girl in the first place,’ he said gloomily.

‘If every wife divorced her husband simply because he’d chatted up some other girl, there’d hardly be a single marriage left intact.’

‘You don’t know my Julie. She can be very jealous.’

More fool her, I thought. But, then, I wouldn’t have wanted Henri chatting up some other man at the wedding in Kent.

I wondered what she was doing right now.

‘I was determined not to go through with it,’ Bill said, bringing me back from my daydreaming.

‘With what?’ I asked.

‘Stopping Wisden Wonder from winning. I’d done it once with Pool Table and I told the man that that was enough. But he says that I should think very carefully before I subjected my wife to such distressing news.’ Bill laughed forlornly. ‘I told him it wasn’t bloody me who would be subjecting her to the distressing news. He just replied that I should have thought about that before I fucked another woman.’

I could appreciate his dilemma.

‘I did consider trying to win the race anyway and to hell with him. If I’d won, perhaps it would screw the man good and proper. And, if I didn’t, then it wouldn’t matter because at least I hadn’t stopped the horse on purpose.’

‘So why didn’t you try and win?’ I asked.

‘I didn’t want to risk it. The man would have sent the pictures to Julie.’ He put his head in his hands again. ‘I even tried to get you lot to stop him.’

‘What?’ I said, surprised.

He looked up. ‘I tried to get the BHA to stop him by phoning that anonymous tip-off line. I was hoping you might arrest Morris or something. Then I’d be off the hook, so to speak. But I saw him standing by the paddock exit at Sandown as I was going out on Wisden Wonder, all bold as brass in his bloody hat. He didn’t say anything, he just glared at me. It gave me the bloody willies, I can tell you. So I made damn sure I couldn’t win. I fell off.’

‘Why did you tell the tip-off line that he was placing bets for an excluded person?’

‘I was hardly going to say that he was betting on a fixed race, was I, not when I was the bloody fixer? Don’t be daft. I tried to think of something that the BHA would have to act on. Something that would prevent him from being allowed into the racecourse. Something that wouldn’t implicate me.’

But it had implicated him.

It had been Bill’s telephone call that had alerted me to what was actually going on.

The irony wasn’t lost on him.

‘I suppose that was a bloody stupid idea.’