‘Mr Know-all, aren’t you? Yes, I did.’
‘Er, why?’
‘Lewis told me one day you could carry anything under the horseboxes if you wanted to.’
‘Why did he say that?’ I asked.
‘Why does anyone say anything? He liked saying things to get you going. He said he’d carried soap in a container under one of your boxes, but he’d given it up, it didn’t work.’
‘Soap,’ Michael said, hopelessly lost, ‘why ever soap?’
‘I don’t know. How should I know? Lewis just says weird things. Just his way.’
‘So... er...’ I said, ‘did you find any soap under my horsebox?’
‘No, of course I didn’t. I was looking for a thermos. There was nothing at all under there. It was all filthy dirty.’
‘When you tried to get Nigel to take you to Newmarket with the fillies,’ I said, ‘were you still hoping to find the virus container and infect the horses on the journey?’
‘What if I was?’
‘It was a different horsebox,’ I said.
‘It wasn’t... well, they all look alike.’
‘Many do.’
She looked shattered.
‘Did you pay Dave?’ I asked mildly.
‘No, I didn’t. I mean, I never got the stuff, did I?’
‘And you didn’t pay Ogden, because he was dead. Did you pay Lewis?’
After a pause she said sullenly, ‘He wanted it in advance. So, yes.’
Michael said, ‘Tessa,’ again, almost wailing.
‘Well I did it for you, Dad,’ she said. ‘I hate Jericho Rich. Taking his horses away because I slapped his face! I did it for you.’
Michael was overcome, full of too-easy indulgence. I didn’t believe her, but perhaps Michael needed to.
Chapter 13
Isobel was still in the office when I returned to the farmyard although it was by then nearly five. Rose had gone home.
Lewis had phoned, Isobel said. I had just missed him. He and Nina were back through the Mont Blanc tunnel and had stopped for a sandwich and refuelling. Nina had been driving. The colt had had its head out of the window all the way but had not gone berserk. Lewis would be driving north through the night, though he would stop somewhere to fill the jerrycans with French water for the colt.
‘Right,’ I said.
French water, pure and sweet from springs, was good for horses. Such a stop would be unremarkable.
‘Aziz asked for tomorrow off,’ Isobel said. ‘He doesn’t want to drive tomorrow. Something to do with his religion.’
‘His religion?’
‘That’s what he said.’
‘He’s a rogue. Where is he now?’
‘On his way back from taking horses to Doncaster sales.’
I sighed. Religions were difficult to argue with, but Aziz was still a rogue, if not something worse.
‘Anything else?’
‘Mr Usher asked if we’d collected the colt. I told him he’d be in Pixhill by six tomorrow evening, if there were no ferry delays.’
‘Thanks.’
‘Fingers crossed,’ Isobel said.
‘Mm.’
‘You look awfully worried,’ she said.
‘It’s this Jogger business.’
She nodded in understanding. The police, she said, had been irritated to find so many drivers away out on the road.
‘They don’t seem to realise we’ve a business to run,’ she said. ‘They think we should all down tools. I told them we couldn’t.’
‘Thanks again.’
‘Get some sleep,’ she said impulsively, young but no fool.
‘Mm.’
I tried to take her advice. Concussion no longer did the trick. I lay awake thinking of Lewis stopping somewhere to fill the cans with French water. I hoped to hell Nina would keep her head down and her eyes — partially — shut.
On Wednesday morning I saw off the lorries going out again to Doncaster, where the Flat racing season would open the next day. The March meeting of Doncaster sales and races were the start of Croft Raceways’ busiest time: we were entering six months of work, work, improvisation and scramble, an atmosphere I usually loved. Juggling the number of boxes, the number of drivers, against the prospects of profitability: normally it excited me, but this week so far I could barely concentrate.
‘The whole fleet,’ Isobel said, cheeringly, ‘will be rolling tomorrow.’
I cared only that Lewis would roll home today.
At nine, when the telephone rang for the nth time, Isobel answered it, frowning.
‘Aziz?’ she said. ‘Just a moment.’ She put her hand over the receiver. ‘What’s “hold on” in French?’
‘Ne quittez pas,’ I said.
Isobel repeated ‘Ne quittez pas’ into the instrument and rose to her feet. ‘It’s a Frenchman, for Aziz.’
‘He isn’t here today,’ I said.
She replied over her shoulder as she went through the door, ‘He’s in the canteen.’
Aziz came in hurriedly and picked up the receiver from Isobel’s desk.
‘Oui... Aziz. Oui.’ He listened and spoke rapidly in French, stretching out a hand for a piece of memo paper and a pencil. ‘Oui. Oui. Merci, Monsieur. Merci.’ Aziz wrote carefully, thanked his informant profusely and put the phone back in its cradle.
‘A message from France,’ he said unnecessarily. He pushed the memo sheet towards me. ‘It seems Nina asked the man to phone here. She gave him money for the phone call and an address. This is it.’
I took the paper and read the scant words. ‘Ecurie Bonne Chance, près de Belley.’
‘Good Luck Stables,’ Aziz translated. ‘Near Belley.’
He gave me the usual brilliant smile and smartly left the office.
‘I thought Aziz had the day off,’ I said to Isobel.
She shrugged. ‘He said he didn’t want to drive. He was here already in the canteen when I arrived for work. Reading and drinking tea. He said, “Good morning, darlin’”.’
Isobel faintly blushed.
I looked at the French address and phoned the Jockey Club. Peter Venables must have been sitting there, waiting.
‘Nina sent an address via a Frenchman,’ I told him. ‘Ecurie Bonne Chance, near Belley. Can you ask your equivalents in France for any information about it?’
‘Spell it.’
I spelled it. ‘Aziz took the message in French,’ I said.
‘Good.’ He sounded decisive. ‘I’ll ask my French colleagues and phone you back.’
I sat for a few seconds looking at the telephone after he’d disconnected, and then went and found Aziz in the canteen and invited him into the open air.
‘What’s your religion?’ I asked, out in the farmyard.
‘Er...’ He gave me a sideways look with his bright eyes, the smile untroubled.
‘Do you work for the Jockey Club?’ I asked flatly.
The smile simply broadened.
I turned away from him. Patrick Venables, I thought bitterly, and Nina also, had trusted me so little that they’d sent another undercover man, one I wouldn’t know of, to make sure I wasn’t myself the villain I purported to be looking for. Aziz had turned up the day after Jogger died. I suppose I shouldn’t have minded, but I did.
‘Freddie,’ Aziz took a step and grasped my sleeve, ‘listen.’ The smile had faded. ‘Patrick wanted Nina to have back-up. I suppose we should have told you, but...’
‘Stick around,’ I said briefly, and returned to my office.
An hour later, Patrick Venables came on the line.
‘First of all, I think I owe you an apology,’ he said. ‘But I’m curious. How did you suss out Aziz? He phoned to say you’d rumbled him.’
‘Little things,’ I explained. ‘He’s too bright for the job. I’ll bet he never drove for a racing stable. The phone caller from France asked for him specifically, which meant Nina had arranged for Aziz to be available. And you, yourself, didn’t ask who Aziz was when I mentioned him.’