He turned in his seat until his back was against the car"s door and spent a long time studying the half he could see of my face. His silence itself was an answer, but when we had travelled fully three miles he sighed deeply and said, finally, "Yes."
As an act of trust, that was remarkable.
"Tell me about the horses," I said, and he did, at some length. The names of some of them were a great surprise, and the careers of all of them as straightforward as Nicholas Ashe.
"Tell me how you got your licence suspended," I said.
He had been riding for one of the amenable trainers, he said, only the trainer hadn"t had an amenable wife. "She had a bit of a spite on, so she shopped him with the Jockey Club. Wrote to Thomas Ullaston personally, I ask you. Of course, the whole bleeding lot of Stewards believed her, and suspended the lot of us, me, him, and the other jock who rides for him, poor sod, who never got a penny from Rammileese and wouldn"t know a backhander if it smacked him in the face."
"How come," I said casually, "that no one in the Jockey Club has found out about all these syndicates and done something positive about Rammileese?"
"Good question."
I glanced at him, hearing the doubt in his voice and seeing the frown. "Go on," I said.
"Yeah.... This is strictly a whisper, see, not even a rumour hardly, just something I heard...."He paused, then he said, "I don"t reckon it"s true."
"Try me."
"One of the bookies... I was waiting about outside the gates at Kempton, see, and these two bookies came out, and one was saying that the bloke in the Security Service would smooth it over if the price was right." He stopped again, and went on, "One of the lads said I"d never have got suspended if that b.i.t.c.h of a trainer"s wife had sent her letter to the Security Service and not to the big white chief himself."
"Which of the lads said thats?"
"Yeah. Well, I can"t remember. And don"t look like that, Sid, I really can"t. It was months ago. I mean, I didn"t even think about it until I heard the bookies at Kempton. I don"t reckon there could be anyone that bent in the Security Service, do you? I mean, not in the Jockey Club."
His faith was touching, I thought, considering his present troubles, but in days gone by I would have thought he was right. Once plant the doubt, though, and one could see there were a lot of dirty misdeeds that Eddy Keith might have ignored in return for a tax-free gain. He had pa.s.sed the four Friarly syndicates: and he might have done all of the twenty or more. He might even have put Rammileese"s two pals on the respectable owners" list, knowing they weren"t. Somehow or other, I would have to find out.
"Sid," Jacksy said. "Don"t you get me in bad with the bra.s.s. I"m not repeating what I just told you, not to no stewards."
"I won"t say you told me," I a.s.sured him. "Do you know those two bookies at Kempton?"
"Not a chance. I mean, I don"t even know they were bookies. They just looked like them. I mean, I thought "bookies" when I saw them."
So strong an impression was probably right, but not of much help; and Jacksy, altogether, had run dry. I dropped him where he wanted, at the outskirts of Watford, and the last thing he said was that if I was going after Rammileese to keep him, Jacksy, strictly out of it, like I"d promised.
I stayed in a hotel in London instead of the flat, and felt overcautious. Chico, however, when I telephoned, said it made sense. Breakfast, I suggested, and he said he"d be there.
He came, but without much hooray. He had trudged around all day visiting the people on the mailing list, but no one had received a begging letter from Ashe within the last month.
Tell you what, though," he said. "People beginning with A and B and right down to K have had wax in the past, so it"ll be the Ps and Rs that get done next time, which narrows the leg-work."
"Great," I said, meaning it.
"I left sticky labels everywhere with your address on, and some of them said they"d let us know, if it came. But whether they"ll bother..."
"It would only take one," I said.
"That"s true."
"Feel like a spot of breaking and entering?"
"Don"t see why not." He started on a huge order of scrambled eggs and sausages. "Where and what for?"
"Er... ," I said. "This morning you do a recce. This evening, after office hours but before it gets dark, we drift along to Portman Square."
Chico stopped chewing in mid-mouthful, and then carefully swallowed before saying, "By Portman Square, do you mean the Jockey Club?"
"That"s right."
"Haven"t you noticed they let you in the front door?"
"I want a quiet look-see that they don"t know about."
He shrugged. "All right then. Meet you back here after the recce?"
I nodded. "The Admiral"s coming here for lunch. He went down to the wax factory yesterday."
"That should put a shine in his eyes."
"Oh very funny."
While he finished the eggs and attacked the toast I told him most of what Jacksy had said about the syndicates, and also about rumours of kickbacks in high places.
"And that"s what we"re looking for? Turning out Eddy Keith"s office to see what he didn"t do when he should"ve?"
"You got it. Sir Thomas Ullaston - Senior Steward - says Eddy was along complaining to him about me seeing the files, and Lucas Wainwright can"t let me see them without Eddy"s secretary knowing, and she"s loyal to Eddy. So if I want to look, it has to be quiet." And would breaking in to the Jockey Club, I wondered, be considered "absolutely diabolical" if I were found out?
"O.K.," he said. "I got the judo today, don"t forget."
"The little bleeders," I said, "are welcome."
Charles came at twelve, sniffing the air of the unfamiliar surroundings like an unsettled dog.
"I got your message from Mrs Cross," he said. "But why here? Why not the Cavendish, as usual?"
"There"s someone I don"t want to meet," I said. "He won"t look for me here. Pink gin?"
"A double."
I ordered the drinks. He said, "Is that what it was, for those six days? Evasive action?"
I didn"t reply. He looked at me quizzically. "I see it still hurts you, whatever it was."
"Leave it, Charles."
He sighed and lit a cigar, sucking in smoke and eyeing me through the flame of the match. "So who don"t you want to meet?"
"A man called Peter Rammileese. If anyone asks, you don"t know where I am."