The Silver Falcon (34 page)

‘You needn't be,' Isabel said. She leaned her head against his cheek, holding him. ‘I've been thinking so much about it all and everything is making sense at last. I love you, Richard. I think we're going to be very happy.'

‘I know we are,' he said.

Andrew Graham put down the telephone; he looked at it for a moment as if it were alive, his forehead puckered, his mouth drawn into a grimace. His right hand was sweating all over the palm; there was a dewy mark on the black surface of the receiver set. He had just finished speaking to Tim Ryan at Lambourn.

He had been waiting two days to hear from Isabel. He hadn't telephoned her; it seemed wiser to let the initiative come from her. Then he could suggest a meeting, make a plan. And a plan which wouldn't go wrong like the other one. The trouble was, the housekeeper had been about the same height and the hall at Coolbridge was dark.… He went backwards from the telephone and suddenly the hotel room was unbearably stuffy and confined. He had a sensation near to claustrophobia. He grabbed his room keys from the bedside table and hurried out. He went quickly through the reception hall; people had got used to him coming and going, and several had spoken to him. He had heard one elderly woman remark to her husband what a charming man the American doctor was. So full of Southern courtesy. He didn't want to speak to anyone. He wanted to get outside, somewhere where there was space. He went to Kensington Gardens, just as he had the first day he arrived. He walked quickly, brushing against people. He found a seat at the edge of the Round Pond, which was said to be famous, though he couldn't see why. He sat down, and crossed one leg over the other. His foot trembled. Isabel was going to marry Richard Schriber. That was what Tim Ryan had told him. He had hardly listened to the Irishman's exclamations of alarm. She sounded confident and happy. He remembered a single phrase.
One day Tim would know the whole story
. That was her promise and it could only mean one thing. She knew. Richard had told her the truth and she had believed him. The façade he had so cleverly built around Richard had collapsed. He closed his eyes for a moment; it was a very sunny day and the light reflected from the water was strong. Two little girls were at the edge, throwing bread to some excited ducks. She was going to marry him. And that meant he would never inherit the money. He could recall his wife complaining about the will and his own defence of Charles. You don't equate friendship in terms of money. He had tried hard to convince her that he meant it. But he had expected gratitude for letting Frances Schriber die. He had expected money to be left to him. A strange man, Charles. A great man, of course, with a powerful personality that dominated. But even so his wife had slipped away with someone else and borne that lover a child. And had rejected Andrew. He opened his eyes again; he had a tendency to drift lately, to confuse things like time and place. It was the strain of the past few days. It had been a tremendous strain, even for someone as tough and resilient as himself. He had been quite handsome when he was young; he rode well to hounds and he had a good figure. A lot of women had found him attractive. And he had sensed very quickly that Charles's young wife was unhappy. He hadn't rushed anything either. He came to Beaumont with Joan, and they made up parties for bridge and talked horses with Charles, while he watched Frances Schriber and longed and hoped. It was a summer evening when he made his move; it was carefully planned to coincide with Charles taking a trip to the Sales at Keenland. Frances had been alone in the house when he called. Remembering that night caused him so much humiliation that even now, sitting by the lake in an English park, he winced. He had tried to make love to her, and she had refused him. With such scorn and anger; it made him realize that he had totally misjudged her friendliness. Her accusation of disloyalty to Charles, his great friend, frightened him, because Charles was so powerful and such a dangerous enemy. To save himself, Andrew had been humble, almost servile in his apology. She had kept her promise not to mention it to her husband, but her contempt for him was in her eyes every time they met. If he had been in love with her before, he grew to hate her from that moment. And when Charles came to him for a minor examination and he discovered his sterility, he hadn't been able to resist the chance to expose Frances and her child. It had been a long punishment for her acceptance of another man instead of him; Charles had made her suffer. And he was glad. Glad when her health began to break, when her spirit wilted. And he hated her son as much as Charles did; he was a symbol of failure to them both. And at the end, because it was the ultimate revenge, he had let her die. She wasn't going to leave Charles and go to someone else. When Charles poured out the whole story of his marriage, his loathing for her and for her bastard son, he had known what Charles wanted, what his appeal for help and friendship really meant. And he had said the words that Charles wanted to hear.

‘She's beyond helping anyway. I guess we let her pass away in peace.' And he had put his arm round Charles's shoulders and seen the relief, and the gratitude in his eyes. They hadn't reckoned on Richard returning. It hadn't been too difficult; both of them acted quickly, and the boy, crazy with grief and suspicion, had made it so very easy for them.…

Andrew stared at the ducks on the water. The children had gone, and the birds circled, looking for food. Charles had never mentioned money.

But he had talked of his gratitude. What they had done was never put into words. He spoke of the way Andrew had cared for his wife, and his sick son, and Andrew played the game with him, shrugging it off as the least he could do for the family. It was almost as if the truth receded and its place was taken by the lies they told each other and the world. He made Andrew feel indispensable, his closest friend. And he was grateful. He made sure Andrew understood that. And then he married again.

An Englishwoman, twenty-seven years younger. An outsider. It had been easy to dislike and suspect her. More difficult to justify it as the marriage proved successful. He hated her. He was jealous. As jealous as a woman, whose lover has found someone else. His friend had shifted his allegiance. And she was a threat, a threat to the expectations which he had taken for granted. Charles was older than he was, godfather to one of their children. He owed Andrew a great deal. Even if he had remarried, carried away into folly by an old man's lust, he would remember that debt. But he hadn't. He had left the kind of will one might expect from a man with a clear conscience. Twenty millions to a woman who had given him three years. She didn't even lose a dollar of it if she married someone else. Only if she died in a specified time, unmarried. Then Andrew got what was rightfully his. And Charles himself had told him the terms of that will. A month before his death, sitting propped up in the bed where Frances had been left to die, he told Andrew that he had left everything to Isabel. Nothing to Andrew. Nothing to his godson. Not a red cent to anyone. It was that day, driving home to his own house, that Andrew had made up his mind to kill her. And again, he hadn't reckoned on Richard.

Richard coming back, raising his mother's ghost. And incredibly, pursuing his stepmother. If he married her, that would be the ultimate injustice. That Richard should be the instrument chosen by Fate to deprive him of the money.… They were going to be married, so Ryan had said. After the Derby. It had come so close to working out. Then he had made the first mistake and killed the housekeeper that night. Even that was not irretrievable. It had cast suspicion upon Richard; it had almost brought Isabel into his reach. MacNeil had been the greatest danger. It was pure chance that he discovered what MacNeil was doing. Driving down to Lambourn on his way to warn Isabel against Richard, he had noticed a black Ford Cortina following him along the road to Hungerford. He had decided to bury the gloves somewhere on the downs. It was too dangerous to try and dispose of them in the hotel, and they had stayed in the boot of the car. That worried him. If there was an accident, if anyone broke open the boot when it was parked in the street outside the hotel. He had decided to get rid of them early that morning. And he had found just the place. A secluded belt of trees, where nobody would notice him digging a shallow hole. There was no car behind him then. Nothing aroused his suspicion until he saw the same black Ford come out of a turning when he left Foster's yard. It hadn't appeared to follow him. He lost it quite soon, but the sight of it reappearing made him uneasy. And that night, putting his own car into the hotel car park, he had seen it there. It was the hall porter who told him it belonged to MacNeil. Then he knew MacNeil had seen him go into the little copse. That the detective, far from shadowing Richard, was following him.

So he had reversed the roles, and followed MacNeil. God knew how he had found out or how much he knew. Or what his motive was. Probably blackmail. But Andrew had killed him, so for the moment he was safe.

He found himself unable to think too far ahead. Too much had happened and was going to happen. The Derby, with Charles's horse bidding for the greatest racing prize in the world. Isabel, moving nearer to marriage – events were crowding him. The goal had seemed so near only an hour or so ago, until he spoke to Ryan. It would have been easy to kill her; he had planned it all so carefully. A meeting to discuss what could be done about Richard, a drink in her suite. Enough barbiturate in it to make her sleep – a tragic suicide, brought on by shock after the murder.…

But not now. She wouldn't let him get within a mile of her now. And there were only four days till the Derby. He felt in his pocket. The little plastic bag was there. Imagine dropping it in front of her – his mouth widened in a mirthless smile. If she had known what was inside it.… He clasped his hands together and then released them, flexing the fingers. They had all made a fool of him, in their different ways. Counting him for nothing. Charles, Frances, Isabel, even MacNeil.

But he wasn't going to be cheated. He was going to have what was rightly his. Charles had made use of him; he admitted that, bitterly. And let him down in the end. He wasn't going to get away with it.

None of them were. He had four days left. He got up slowly. Two women walking past him turned to stare. He didn't know it but he had been talking to himself. He began to walk away from the Round Pond towards the muffled frenzy of the London traffic.

Seven a.m. on Saturday I June and the horsebox carrying three horses from Nigel Foster's yard wound its way up to the Lambourn gallops.

It was a glorious morning, crisp and fresh, the green sweep of the downs sparkled with the early dew and the sun was raising a very light mist over the ground. Nigel, with Isabel, Tim and Richard, followed the box in a Range Rover.

‘Here we are,' he said. ‘I'll pull in here and see them unboxed, then we'll drive on ahead and get ourselves positioned before they come up.' He turned up a rough track, and the big horsebox was already stopped, its side ramp lowered, lads busy getting the saddles out, watched by the travelling head lad. Minutes later a bright green TR7 shot up the road like an iridescent beetle, swung in behind the Range Rover, and a very small, wiry figure in jodhpurs and sweater climbed out, a tweed cap pulled at an angle on his head. ‘Morning –' he greeted Nigel, nodded to Tim, and shook hands with Isabel. ‘Morning, Mrs Schriber.' Jimmy Carlton was a head shorter than she was; he had been Champion Jockey twice. He had always ridden Charles's horses in England, as the great Jean-Martin rode them in France. He had a wide, gap-toothed grin and bright brown eyes; he was known for speaking his mind to owners and trainers if he was given a bad horse. He was a superb horseman and famous for his stylish riding of a finish. He had agreed to come down and give the Silver Falcon his work over a mile and a quarter, before riding him in the Derby.

Two of the horses were out of the box, stamping and fretting while they were saddled up. Then the Falcon came down the ramp.

He didn't hurry; he stepped down and stood on the ground, glancing from right to left, the lad holding him at his head. A big bay colt who was to work with him moved sideways, and the Falcon's ears went back. His iron-grey coat was shining like gunmetal, and as he moved the muscles in his body showed taut under the skin.

‘He looks well,' the jockey remarked.

‘He's cherry ripe,' Nigel Foster said. ‘All right, Harry, let's get him saddled up –'

It took two lads to hold him while the saddle was put on and the girth tightened. Isabel watched him, her arm linked through Richard's. The horse had a quality that generated excitement, fear and pride; the ownership of so much beauty, ferocity and power carried a sense of awe. She made no move towards him; there was no personal relationship possible between that horse and any human being except constant warfare on his part and vigilance on the other. He was man's enemy, and his servant. The other two horses were saddled up and mounted; they fretted and jigged, waiting to walk off down the road towards the gallops. The jockey was swung into the saddle by Nigel and gathered up the reins. The lad holding the Falcon backed away and the grey colt swung round, dancing with impatience, testing the skill of the man on his back. Carlton had beautiful hands, firm and yet gentle; they settled the colt into a swinging walk in the wake of the others, their hooves clattering along the empty road.

‘By God that's some horse,' Tim Ryan said, almost to himself. He turned and went back to the Range Rover, holding the door open for Isabel. He didn't look at Richard as he climbed in beside her.

Ever since she had announced that she and Richard were getting married, his spirits had been at their lowest ebb. She was too happy, too confident in her decision to listen to anything except congratulations. And sensing that he was unenthusiastic, she had put her hand on his arm and repeated her promise that one day soon, she would tell him everything. Miserably anxious for her, and heartsick for himself, he had telephoned Andrew. Graham had said very little. To Tim's questions about the police, he had been negative, even defeatist. They weren't considering Richard seriously. There was nothing to be done. The great grey colt had raised his spirits for the first time in days. As a professional he couldn't hide his satisfaction, and as a true racing man he longed for the contest between the horse he had nursed and directed since it was a yearling, with this one race in view. With a quarter of a million dollars added if he won.…