'Ex-Regimental Sergeant-Major Tnomkins made such serious inroads into the illicit profits of Marconicars,' I continued, 'that as a racket it was more or less defunct. The legitimate side hasn't been doing too well during the winter either, according to the typists who work in the office. There are too many taxis in Brighton for the number of fares at this time of year, I should think. Anyway, it seems to me that the Marconicar boss – the Chairman, your mysterious Claud Thiveridge – set about mending his fortunes by branching out into another form of crime. He bought, I think, the shaky bookmaking business on the floor above the Marconicars, in the same building.'
I could almost smell the cabbage in the Olde Oake caf‚ as I remembered it. 'An earnest lady told me the bookmakers had been taken over by a new firm about six months ago, but that its name was still the same. L. C. Perth, written in neon. She was very wrought up about them sticking such a garish sign on an architectural gem, and she and her old buildings society, whose name I forget, had tried to reason with the new owners to take down what they had just put up. Only they couldn't find out who the new owner was. It's too much of a coincidence to have two businesses, both shady, one above the other, both with invisible and untraceable owners. They must be owned by the same person.'
'It doesn't follow, and I don't see the point,' said my father.
'You will in a minute,' I said. 'Bill died because he wouldn't stop his horse winning a race. I know his death wasn't necessarily intended, but force was used against him. He was told not to win by a husky-voiced man on the telephone. Henry, Bill's elder son, he's eight-' I explained to Lodge, 'has a habit of listening on the extension upstairs, and he heard every word. Two days before Bill died, Henry says, the voice offered him five hundred pounds to stop his horse winning, and when Bill laughed at this, the voice told him he wouldn't win because his horse would fall.'
I paused, but neither Lodge nor my father said anything. Swallowing the last of the brandy, I went on. 'There is a jockey called Joe Nantwich who during the last six months, ever since L. C. Perth changed hands, has regularly accepted a hundred pounds, sometimes more, to stop a horse winning. Joe gets his instructions by telephone from a husky-voiced man he has never met.'
Lodge stirred on his hard, self-chosen chair.
I went on. 'I, as you know, was set upon by the Marconicar drivers, and a few days later the man with the husky voice rang me up and told me to take heed of the warning I had been given in the horse-box. One doesn't have to be Sherlock Holmes to see that the crooked racing and the Marconicar protection racket were being run by the same man.' I stopped.
'Finish it off, then,' said my father impatiently.
'The only person who would offer a jockey a large sum to lose a race is a crooked bookmaker. If he knows a well-fancied horse is not going to win, he can accept any amount of money on that horse without risk.'
'Enlarge,' said Lodge.
'Normally bookmakers try to balance their books so that whichever horse wins they come out on the winning side,' I said. 'If too many people want to back one horse, they accept the bets, but they back the horse themselves with another bookmaker; then if that horse wins, they collect their winnings from the second bookmaker, and pay it out to their customers. It's a universal system known as laying off. Now suppose you were a crooked bookmaker and Joe Nantwich is to ride a fancied horse. You tip Joe the wink to lose. Then however much is betted with you on that horse, you do no laying off, because you know you won't have to pay out.'
'I would have thought that a hundred pounds would have been more than it was worth,' said Lodge, 'since bookmakers normally make a profit anyway.'
'Your friend wasn't satisfied with the legitimate gains from the taxis,' my father pointed out.
I sighed, and shifted my stiff shoulders against the frame of the window.
'There's a bit more to it, of course,' I said. 'If a bookmaker knows he hasn't got to pay out on a certain horse, he can offer better odds on it. Not enough to be suspicious, but just enough to attract a lot of extra custom. A point better than anyone else would go to – say eleven to four, when the next best offer was five to two. The money would roll in, don't you think?'
I stood up and went towards the door, saying, 'I'll show you something.'
The stairs seemed steeper than usual. I went up to my room and fetched the racing form book and the little bunch of bookmakers' tickets, and shuffled back to the drawing-room. I laid the tickets out on the table in front of Lodge, and my father came over to have a look.
'These,' I explained, 'are some tickets Bill kept for his children to play with. Three of them, as you see, were issued by L. C. Perth, and all the others are from different firms, no two alike. Bill was a methodical man. On the backs of all the tickets he wrote the date, the details of his bet, and the name of the horse he'd put his money on. He used to search around in Tattersall's for the best odds and bet in cash, instead of betting on credit with Tote Investors or one of the bookmakers on the rails – those,' I added for Lodge's benefit, as I could see the question forming on his lips, 'are bookmakers who stand along the railing between Tattersall's and the Club enclosures, writing down bets made by Club members and other people known to them. They send out weekly accounts, win or lose. Bill didn't bet in large amounts, and he thought credit betting wasn't exciting enough.'
Lodge turned over the three Perth tickets.
Bill's loopy writing was clear and unmistakable. I picked up the first ticket, and read aloud,' Peripatetic. 7 November. Ten pounds staked at eleven to ten. So he stood to win eleven pounds for his money.' I opened the detailed form book and turned to 7 November.
'Peripatetic,' I said, 'lost the two mile hurdle at Sandown that day by four lengths. He was ridden by Joe Nantwich. The starting price was eleven to ten on – that is, you have to stake eleven pounds to win ten – and had earlier been as low as eleven to eight on. L. C. Perth must have done a roaring trade at eleven to ten against.'
I picked up the second card and read, 'Sackbut. 10 October. Five pounds staked at six to one.' I opened the form book for that day. 'Sackbut was unplaced at Newbury and Joe Nantwich rode it. The best price generally offered was five to one, and the starting price was seven to two.'
I put the Sackbut ticket back on the table, and read the third card where it lay. 'Malabar. 2 December. Eight pounds staked at fifteen to eight.' I laid the form book beside it, opened at 2 December. 'Malabar finished fourth at Birmingham. Joe Nantwich rode him. The starting price was six to four.'
Lodge and my father silently checked the book with the ticket.
'I looked up all the other cards as well,' I said. 'Of course, as Bill still had the tickets, all the horses lost; but on only one of them did he get better odds than you'd expect. Joe didn't ride it, and I don't think it's significant, because it was an outsider at a hundred to six.'
'I wish the racing fraternity would use only whole numbers and halves,' said Lodge plaintively.
'Haven't you heard,' I asked, 'about the keen gambler who taught his baby son to count? One, six-to-four, two-'
Lodge laughed, his dark eyes crinkling at the corners. 'I'll have to write down these figures on the Perth tickets alongside the form book information, and get it straightened out in my mind,' he said, unscrewing his pen and settling to the task.