He said, ‘There’s been some redevelopment round there and that land is suddenly worth about a quarter of a million. And our lease runs out in three years... We have been negotiating a new one, but the old one was for ninety-nine years and no one is keen to renew for that long... The ground rent is in any case going to be raised considerably, but if Gowery changes his mind and wants to sell that land for development, there’s nothing we can do about it. We only own the buildings... We’d lose the entire factory if he didn’t renew the lease... And we can only make cups and saucers so cheaply because our overheads are small... If we have to build or rent a new factory our prices will be less competitive and our world trade figures will slump. Gowery himself has the final say as to whether our lease will be renewed or not, and on what terms... so you see, Kelly, it’s not that I’m afraid of him... there’s so much more at stake... and he’s always a man to hold it against you if you argue with him.’
He stopped and looked at me gloomily. I looked gloomily back. The facts of life stared us stonily in the face.
‘So that’s that,’ I agreed. ‘You are quite right. You can’t help me. You couldn’t, right from the start. I’m glad you explained...’ I smiled at him twistedly, facing another dead end, the last of a profitless day.
‘I’m sorry, Kelly...’
‘Sure,’ I said.
Tony finished his fortified breakfast and said, ‘So there wasn’t anything sinister in Andy Tring’s lily-livered bit on Monday.’
‘It depends what you call sinister. But no, I suppose not.’
‘What’s left, then?’
‘Damn all,’ I said in depression.
‘You can’t give up,’ he protested.
‘Oh no. But I’ve learned one thing in learning nothing, and that is that I’m getting nowhere because I’m me. First thing Monday morning I’m going to hire me my own David Oakley.’
‘Attaboy,’ he said. He stood up. ‘Time for second lot, I hear.’ Down in the yard the lads were bringing out the horses, their hooves scrunching hollowly on the packed gravel.
‘How are they doing?’ I asked.
‘Oh... so so. I sure hate having to put up other jocks. Given me a bellyful of the whole game, this business has.’
When he’d gone down to ride I cleaned up my already clean flat and made some more coffee. The day stretched emptily ahead. So did the next day and the one after that, and every day for an indefinite age.
Ten minutes of this prospect was enough. I searched around and found another straw to cling to: telephoned to a man I knew slightly at the B.B.C. A cool secretary said he was out, and to try again at eleven.
I tried again at eleven. Still out. I tried at twelve. He was in then, but sounded as if he wished he weren’t.
‘Not Kelly Hughes, the...’ His voice trailed off while he failed to find a tactful way of putting it.
‘That’s right.’
‘Well... er... I don’t think...’
‘I don’t want anything much,’ I assured him resignedly. ‘I just want to know the name of the outfit who make the films of races. The camera patrol people.’
‘Oh.’ He sounded relieved. That’s the Racecourse Technical Services. Run by the Levy Board. They’ve a virtual monopoly, though there’s one other small firm operating sometimes under licence. Then there are the television companies, of course. Did you want any particular race? Oh... the Lemonfizz Crystal Cup, I suppose.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘The meeting at Reading two weeks earlier.’
‘Reading... Reading... Let’s see, then. Which lot would that be?’ He hummed a few out of tune bars while he thought it over. ‘I should think... yes, definitely the small firm, the Cannot Lie people. Cannot Lie, Ltd. Offices at Woking, Surrey. Do you want their number?’
‘Yes please.’
He read it to me.
‘Thank you very much,’ I said.
‘Any time... er... well... I mean...’
‘I know what you mean,’ I agreed. ‘But thanks anyway.’
I put down the receiver with a grimace. It was still no fun being everyone’s idea of a villain.
The B.B.C. man’s reaction made me decide that the telephone might get me nil results from the Cannot Lie brigade. Maybe they couldn’t lie, but they would certainly evade. And anyway, I had the whole day to waste.
The Cannot Lie office was a rung or two up the luxury ladder from David Oakley’s, which wasn’t saying a great deal. A large rather bare room on the second floor of an Edwardian house in a side street. A rickety lift large enough for one slim man or two starving children. A well worn desk with a well worn blonde painting her toe nails on top of it.
‘Yes?’ she said, when I walked in.
She had lilac panties on, with lace. She made no move to prevent me seeing a lot of them.
‘No one in?’ I asked.
‘Only us chickens,’ she agreed. She had a South London accent and the smart back-chatting intelligence that often goes with it. ‘Which do you want, the old man or our Alfie?’
‘You’ll do nicely,’ I said.
‘Ta.’ She took it as her due, with a practised come-on-so-far-but-no-further smile. One foot was finished. She stretched out her leg and wiggled it up and down to help with the drying.
‘Going to a dance tonight,’ she explained. ‘In me peep-toes.’
I didn’t think anyone would concentrate on the toes. Apart from the legs she had a sharp pointed little bosom under a white cotton sweater and a bright pink patent leather belt clasping a bikini sized waist. Her body looked about twenty years old. Her face looked as if she’d spent the last six of them bed hopping.
‘Paint the other one,’ I suggested.
‘You’re not in a hurry?’
‘I’m enjoying the scenery.’
She gave a knowing giggle and started on the other foot. The view was even more hair-raising than before. She watched me watching, and enjoyed it.
‘What’s your name?’ I asked.
‘Carol. What’s yours?’
‘Kelly.’
‘From the Isle of Man?’
‘No. The land of our fathers.’
She gave me a bright glance. ‘You catch on quick, don’t you?’
I wished I did. I said regretfully, ‘How long do you keep ordinary routine race films?’
Huh? For ever, I suppose.’ She changed mental gear effortlessly, carrying straight on with her uninhibited painting. ‘We haven’t destroyed any so far, that’s to say. ’Course, we’ve only been in the racing business eighteen months. No telling what they’ll do when the big storeroom’s full. We’re up to the eyebrows in all the others with films of motor races, golf matches, three day events, any old things like that.’
‘Where’s the big storeroom?’
‘Through there.’ She waved the small pink enamelling brush in the general direction of a scratched once cream door. ‘Want to see?’
‘If you don’t mind.’
‘Go right ahead.’
She had finished the second foot. The show was over. With a sigh I removed my gaze and walked over to the door in question. There was only a round hole where most doors have a handle. I pushed against the wood and the door swung inwards into another large high room, furnished this time with rows of free standing bookshelves, like a public library. The shelves, however, were of bare functional wood, and there was no covering on the planked floor.
Well over half the shelves were empty. On the others were rows of short wide box files, their backs labelled with neat typed strips explaining what was to be found within. Each box proved to contain all the films from one day’s racing, and they were all efficiently arranged in chronological order. I pulled out the box for the day I rode Squelch and Wanderlust at Reading, and looked inside. There were six round cans of sixteen millimetre film, numbered one to six, and space enough for another one, number seven.