'He tipped me over the rails-' He was ready to start all over again.
I interrupted. 'It wasn't Sandy, surely, who was paying you not to win?'
'No, I don't think so. I don't know,' he snivelled.
'Do you mean you don't know who was paying you? Ever?'
'A man rang up and told me when he wanted me to stop one, and afterwards I got a packet full of money through the post.'
'How many times have you done it?' I asked.
'Ten,' said Joe, 'all in the last six months.' I stared at him.
'Often it was easy,' said Joe defensively. 'The -'s wouldn't have won anyway, even if I'd helped them.'
'How much did you get for it?'
'A hundred. Twice it was two-fifty.' Joe's tongue was still running away with him, and I believed him. It was big money, and anyone prepared to pay on that scale would surely want considerable revenge when Joe won against orders. But Sandy? I couldn't believe it.
'What did Sandy say to you after you won?' I asked.
Joe was still crying. 'He said he'd backed the horse I beat and that he'd get even with me,' said Joe. And it seemed that Sandy had done that.
'You didn't get your parcel of money, I suppose?'
'No,' said Joe, sniffing.
'Haven't you any idea where they come from?' I asked.
'Some had London postmarks,' said Joe. 'I didn't take much notice.' Too eager to count the contents to look closely at the wrappings, no doubt.
'Well, I said, 'surely now that Sandy has had his little revenge, you are in the clear? Can't you possibly stop crying about it? It's all over. What are you in such a state about?'
For answer Joe took a paper from his jacket pocket and gave it to me.
'You might as well know it all. I don't know what to do. Help me, Alan. I'm frightened.'
In the light of the dashboard I could see that this was true. And Joe was beginning to sober up.
I unfolded the paper and switched on the lights inside the car. It was a single sheet of thin, ordinary typing paper. In simple capital letters, written with a ball-point pen, were five words: BOLINGBROKE, YOU WILL BE PUNISHED.
'Bolingbroke is the horse you were supposed to stop and didn't?'
'Yes.' The tears no longer welled in his eyes.
'When did you get this?' I asked.
'I found it in my pocket, today, when I put my jacket on after I'd changed. Just before the fifth race. It wasn't there when I took it off.'
'And you spent the rest of the afternoon in the bar, in a blue funk, I suppose,' I said.
'Yes- and I went back there while you took Mr Tudor to Brighton. I didn't think anything was going to happen to me because of Bolingbroke, and I've been frightened ever since he won. And just as I was thinking it was all right Sandy pushed me over the rails and then I found this letter in my pocket. It isn't fair.' The self-pity still whined in his voice.
I gave him back the paper.
'What am I to do?' said Joe.
I couldn't tell him, because I didn't know. He had got himself into a thorough mess, and he had good reason to be afraid. People who manipulated horses and jockeys to that extent were certain to play rough. The time lag of ten days between Bolingbroke's win and the arrival of the note could mean, I thought, that there was a cat-and-mouse, rather than a straight forward, mentality at work. Which was little comfort to offer Joe.
Apart from some convulsive hiccups and sniffs, Joe seemed to have recovered from his tears, and the worst of the drunkenness was over. I switched off the inside lights, started the car up, and pulled back on the road. As I had hoped, Joe soon went to sleep. He snored loudly.
Approaching Dorking, I woke him up. I had some questions to ask.
'Joe, who is that Mr Tudor I took to Brighton? He knows you.'
'He owns Bolingbroke,' said Joe. 'I often ride for him.'
I was surprised. 'Was he pleased when Bolingbroke won?' I asked.
'I suppose so. He wasn't there. He sent me ten per cent afterwards, though, and a letter thanking me. The usual thing.'
'He hasn't been in racing long, has he?' I asked.
Topped up about the same time you did,' said Joe, with a distinct return to his old brash manner. 'Both of you arrived with dark sun-tans in the middle of winter.'
I had come by air from the burning African summer to the icy reception of October in England: but after eighteen months my skin was as pale as an Englishman's. Tudor's, on the other hand, remained dark.
Joe was sniggering. 'You know why Mr Clifford bloody Tudor lives at Brighton? It gives him an excuse to be sunburnt all the year round. Touch of the old tar, really.'
After that I had no compunction in turning Joe out at the bus stop for Epsom. Unloading his troubles on me seemed, for the present at least, to have restored his ego.
I drove back to the Cotswolds. At first I thought about Sandy Mason and wondered how he had got wind of Joe's intention to stop Bolingbroke.
But for the last hour of the journey I thought about Kate.
CHAPTER SIX
Scilla was lying asleep on the sofa with a rug over her legs and a half-full glass on a low table beside her. I picked up the glass and sniffed. Brandy. She usually drank gin and Campari. Brandy was for bad days only.
She opened her eyes. 'Alan! I'm so glad you're back. What time is it?'
'Half past nine,' I said.
'You must be starving,' she said, pushing off the rug. 'Why ever didn't you wake me? Dinner was ready hours ago.'
'I've only just got here, and Joan is cooking now, so relax,' I said.
We went in to eat. I sat in my usual place. Bill's chair, opposite Scilla, was empty. I made a mental note to move it back against the wall.
Half way through the steaks, Scilla said, breaking a long silence, 'Two policemen came to see me today.'
'Did they? About the inquest tomorrow?'
'No, it was about Bill.' She pushed her plate away.
'They asked me if he was in any trouble, like you did. They asked me the same questions in different ways for over half an hour. One of them suggested that if I was as fond of my husband as I said I was and on excellent terms with him, I ought to know if something was wrong in his life. They were rather nasty, really.'
She was not looking at me. She kept her eyes down, regarding her half-eaten, congealing steak, and there was a slight embarrassment in her manner, which was unusual.
'I can imagine,' I said, realizing what was the matter. 'They asked you, I suppose, to explain your relationship with me, and why I was still living in your house?'
She glanced up in surprise and evident relief. 'Yes, they did. I didn't know how to tell you. It seems so ordinary to me that you should be here, yet I couldn't seem to make them understand that.'
'I'll go tomorrow, Scilla,' I said. 'I'm not letting you in for any more gossip. If the police can think that you were cheating Bill with me, so can the village and the county. I've been exceedingly thoughtless, and I'm very very sorry.' For I, too, had found it quite natural to stay on in Bill's house after his death.
'You will certainly not leave tomorrow on my account, Alan,' said Scilla with more resolution that I would have given her credit for. 'I need you here. I shall do nothing but cry all the time if I don't have you to talk to, especially in the evenings. I can get through the days, with the children and the house to think about. But the nights-' And in her suddenly ravaged face I could read all the tearing, savage pain of a loss four days old.
'I don't care what anyone says,' she said through starting tears, 'I need you here. Please, please, don't go away.'
'I'll stay,' I said. 'Don't worry. I'll stay as long as you want me to. But you must promise to tell me when you are ready for me to go.'
She dried her eyes and raised a smile. 'When I begin to worry about my reputation, you mean? I promise.'
I had driven the better part of three hundred miles besides riding in two races, and I was tired. We went to our beds early, Scilla promising to take her sleeping pills.
But at two o'clock in the morning she opened my bedroom door. I woke at once. She came over and switched on my bedside light, and sat down on my bed.