The Danger

by Dick Francis

  “Colonel Tansing thought it best to contact your chairman first,” she said. “Colonel Tansing, you see, is . . .” She paused as if seeking for acceptable words. “Colonel Tansing is the deputy licensing officer, whose job is mainly the registration of racehorse owners. No one of any seniority is here this afternoon, though they were this morning. No one here now really has the power to make top-level decisions. We’re trying to find the stewards . . . they’re all out.” She stopped rather blankly. “No one expects this sort of thing, you know.”

  “No,” I agreed. “Well, the first thing to do is to tell the police here and get them to put a tap on all the Jockey Club’s telephones, and after that to get on with living, and wait.”

  “Wait?”

  I nodded. “While the ransom negotiations go on. I don’t want to alarm you, but it may be some time before Mr. Freemantle comes home . . . and what about his family? His wife? Has she been told?”

  She said glumly, “He’s a widower.”

  “Children?”

  “He has a daughter,” she said dubiously, “but I don’t think they get on well. I believe she lives abroad . . . Mr. Freemantle never mentions her.”

  “And, excuse me,” I said. “Is Mr. Freemantle himself . . . er . . . rich?”

  She looked as if the question were in ultra-poor taste but finally answered, “I have no idea. But anyone who becomes senior steward must be considered to have personal funds of some sort.”

  “Ten million?” I asked.

  “Certainly not,” she said positively. “By many standards he is moderate in his expenditure.” Her voice approved of this. “He dislikes waste.”

  Moderate spending habits and a dislike of waste turned up often enough in the most multi of millionaires, but I let it go. I thanked her instead and went in search of Colonel Tansing, who proved to be a male version of Mrs. Berkeley, courteous, charming, and shocked to near immobility.

  In his office I telephoned to the police and got things moving there and then asked him who was the top authority at the Jockey Club in Mr. Freemantle’s absence.

  “Sir Owen Higgs,” he said. “He was here this morning. We’ve been trying to reach him . . .” He looked slightly apprehensive. “I’m sure he will agree we had to call you in.”

  “Yes,” I said reassuringly. “Can you arrange to record all calls on all your telephones? Separately from and in addition to the police?”

  “Shall be done,” he said.

  “We have a twenty-four-hour service at Liberty Market, if you want us.”

  He clasped my hand. “The Jockey Club is one of the most effective organizations in Britain,” he said apologetically. “This business has just caught us on the hop. Tomorrow everything will swing into action.”

  I nodded and departed, and went back to the Liberty Market offices reflecting that neither the colonel nor Mrs. Berkeley had speculated about the victim’s present personal sufferings.

  Stunned disbelief, yes. Tearful sympathetic devotion, no.

  SIR OWEN HIGGS having formally engaged Liberty Market services I set off to Washington the following morning, and by early afternoon, their time, was driving a rented car towards Laurel racecourse to talk to Eric Rickenbacker, its president.

  The racecourse lay an hour’s drive away from the capital city along roads ablaze with brilliant trees, golden, red, orange, tan, nature’s last great flourish of trumpets before winter. The first few days of November: warm, sunny, and windless under a high blue sky. The sort of day to lift the spirits and sing to. I felt liberated, as always in America, a feeling which I thought had something to do with the country’s own vastness, as if the wide-apartness of everything flooded into the mind and put spaces between everyday problems.

  Mr. Rickenbacker had left instructions about me at the raceclub entrance: I was to be conveyed immediately to his presence. Not so immediately, it transpired, as to exempt me from being stamped on the back of the hand with an ultraviolet dye, normally invisible to the eye but transformed to a glowing purple circular pattern under special lamps. My pass into the club, it was explained: without it I would be stopped at certain doorways. A ticket one couldn’t lose or surreptitiously pass to a friend, I thought. It would wash off, they said.

  Mr. Rickenbacker was in the president’s domain, a retreat at the top of the grandstand, reached by elevator, hand-checks, a trudge through the members’ lounges, more checks, an inconspicuous doorway and a narrow stair. At the top of the stair, a guardian sitting at a table. I gave my name. The guardian checked it against a list, found it, ticked it, and let me through. I went round one more corner and finished the journey. The president’s private dining room, built on three levels, looked out across the course through acres of glass, with tables for about a hundred people; but it was almost empty.

  The only people in the place were sitting round one of the furthest tables on the lowest level. I walked over and down, and they looked up inquiringly at my approach. Six men, four women, dressed for tidy racing.

  “Mr. Rickenbacker?” I said generally.

  “Yes?”

  He was a big man with thick white hair, quite clearly tall even though sitting down. His eyes had the reflecting brilliance of contact lenses and his skin was pale and smooth, immensely well-shaven.

  “I’m Andrew Douglas,” I said briefly.

  “Ah.” He stood up and clasped my hand, lopping me by a good six inches. “These are friends of mine.” He indicated them with a small gesture but made none of the usual detailed introductions, and to them he said, “Excuse me, everyone, I have some business with Mr. Douglas.” He waved to me to follow him and led the way up deep-carpeted steps to a yet more private aerie, a small room beyond, above, behind his more public dining room.

  “This is a goddam mess,” he said forcefully, pointing me to an armchair. “One minute Morgan was telling me about John Nerrity’s troubles, and the next . . .” He moved his arms frustratedly. “We’ve heard nothing ourselves from any kidnappers. We’ve told the police both here and in Washington of the ransom demand received in London, and they’ve been looking into Morgan’s disappearance. How much do you know about that?”

  “Nothing,” I said. “Please tell me.”

  “Do you want a drink?” he said. “Scotch? Champagne?”

  “No, thank you.”

  “We have a public relations firm that handles a lot of things here for us. This is a social week, you follow me? We have a lot of overseas visitors. There are receptions, press conferences, sponsors’ parties. We have guests of honor—Morgan was one of those—for whom we arrange transport from the hotel to the racecourse, and to the various receptions, you follow?”

  I nodded.

  “The public relations firm hires the cars from a limousine service. The cars come with drivers, of course. The public relations firm tells the limousine service who to pick up from where, and where to take them, and the limousine service instructs its drivers, you follow me?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Morgan was staying at the Ritz Carlton, you follow? We put him in there, it’s a nice place. The racecourse is picking up his tab. Morgan was supposed to join us at a reception in Baltimore the evening before last. The reception was for the press . . . many overseas sportswriters come over for our big race, and I guess we do everything we can to make them feel welcome.”

  “Mm,” I said, understanding. “World coverage of a sports event is good for the gate.”

  He paused a fraction before nodding. Maybe I shouldn’t have put it so badly; but the public-relations-promotions bandwagon generated business and business generated jobs, and the artificial roundabout bought real groceries down the line.

  “Morgan didn’t arrive at the reception,” Rickenbacker said. “He was expected . . . He had assured me he would be there. I know he intended to say he was glad to be representing British racing, and to tell the press of some of the plans the English Jockey Club is making for the coming year.”

  “He was going to
speak?” I said. “I mean, make a speech?”

  “Yes, didn’t I make that clear? We always have three or four speakers at the press party, but very short and informal, you follow, just a few words of appreciation, that sort of thing. We were surprised when Morgan didn’t show, but not disturbed. I was myself surprised he hadn’t sent a message, but I don’t know him well. We met just three days ago. I wouldn’t know if he would be careful about courtesies, you follow?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I follow.”

  He smoothed a muscular hand over the white hair. “Our public relations firm told the limousine service to pick Morgan up from the Ritz Carlton and take him to the Harbor Room in Baltimore.” He paused. “Baltimore is nearer to this racetrack than Washington is, you follow me, so a majority of the press stay in Baltimore.” He paused again, giving me time for understanding. “The Ritz Carlton report a chauffeur coming to the front desk, saying he had been assigned to collect Morgan. The front desk called Morgan, who came down, left his key, and went out with the chauffeur. And that’s all. That’s all anyone knows.”

  “Could the front desk describe the chauffeur?” I asked.

  “All they could positively remember was that he wore a chauffeur’s uniform and a cap. He didn’t say much. They think he may have spoken with some sort of non-American accent, but this is a polyglot city and no one took much notice.”

  “Mm,” I said. “What happened to the real chauffeur?”

  “The real . . . ? Oh, no, nothing. The Ritz Carlton report a second chauffeur appeared. They told him Morgan had already been collected. The chauffeur was surprised, but not too much. With an operation of this size going on there are always mixups. He reported back to his service, who directed him to another assignment. The limousine service thought Morgan must have taken a ride with a friend and not told them. They were philosophical. They would charge the racetrack for their trouble. They wouldn’t lose.”

  “So no one was alarmed,” I said.

  “Of course not. The public relations firm called the Ritz Carlton in the morning—that was yesterday—and the front desk said Morgan’s key was there, he must already have gone out. No one was alarmed until we had the call from your Colonel Tansing asking about a hoax.” He paused. “I was at home eating breakfast.”

  “Rather a shock,” I said. “Have all these pressmen woken up yet to the story under their noses?”

  With the first faint glimmer of humor he said that things were at the unconfirmed rumor stage, the whole hive buzzing.

  “It’ll put your race on the world map like nothing else will,” I said.

  “I’m afraid so.” He looked undecided about the worth of that sort of publicity, or more probably about the impropriety of dancing up and down with commercial glee.

  “You told the police,” I said.

  “Sure. Both here in Laurel and in Washington. The people in Washington are handling it.”

  I nodded and asked which police, specifically: there were about five separate forces in the capital.

  “The Metropolitan Police,” he said. “Sure, the F.B.I. and the Missing Persons Bureau have taken an interest, but they’ve sorted it out that it’s the Metropolitan Police’s baby. The man in charge is a Captain Kent Wagner. I told him you were coming. He said I could send you along, if you wanted.”

  “Yes, please.”

  He took a wallet from an inner pocket and removed a small white card. “Here you are,” he said, handing it over. “And also”—he sorted out another card—“this is my home number. If I’ve left the racetrack, you can call me there.”

  “Right.”

  “Tomorrow morning we have the press breakfast,” he said. “That’s when all the overseas owners and trainers and jockeys meet downstairs here in the club.” He paused. “We have a press breakfast before most big races in America . . . have you been to one before?”

  “No,” I said.

  “Come tomorrow. You’ll be interested. I’ll arrange passes for you.”

  I thanked him, not sure whether I could manage it. He nodded genially. A small thing like the abduction of Britain’s top racing executive was not, it seemed, going to dent the onward steamrollering of the week’s serious pleasures.

  I asked him if I could make a call to Liberty Market before I went to the police in Washington, and he waved me generously to the telephone.

  “Sure. Go right ahead. It’s a private line. I’ll do everything possible to help, you know that, don’t you? I didn’t know Morgan himself real well, and I guess it couldn’t be thought this racetrack’s fault he was kidnapped, but anything we can do . . . we’ll give it our best shot.”

  I thanked him and got through to London, and Gerry Clayton answered.

  “Don’t you ever go home?” I said.

  “Someone has to mind the store,” he said plaintively; but we all knew he lived alone and was lonely away from the office.

  “Any news from the Jockey Club?” I asked.

  “Yeah, and how. Want me to play you the tape they got by Express Mail?”

  “Fire away.”

  “Hang on.” There was a pause and a few clicks, and then an American voice, punchy and hard.

  “If you Brits in the Jockey Club want Freemantle back, listen good. It’s going to cost you ten million English pounds sterling. Don’t collect the money in notes. You’re going to pay in certified banker’s checks. You won’t get Freemantle back until the checks are cleared. You’ve got one week to collect the bread. In one week you’ll get more instructions. If you fool around, Freemantle will lose his fingers. You’ll get one every day, Express Mail, starting two weeks from now.

  “No tricks. You in the Jockey Club, you’ve got money. Either you buy Freemantle back, or we kill him. That’s a promise. We’ll take him out. And if you don’t come up with the bread, you won’t even get his corpse. If we kill him, we’ll kill him real slow. Make him curse. Make him scream. You hear us? He gets no tidy single shot. He dies hard. If we kill him, you’ll get his screams on tape. If you don’t want that, you’re going to have to pay.

  “Freemantle wants to talk to you. You listen.”

  There was a pause on the line, then Freemantle’s own voice, sounding strong and tough and incredibly cultured after the other.

  “If you do not pay the ransom, I will be killed. I am told this is so, and I believe it.”

  Click.

  “Did you get all that?” Gerry Clayton’s voice said immediately.

  “Yeah.”

  “What do you think?”

  “I think it’s our man again,” I said. “For sure.”

  “Right. Same feel.”

  “How long will you be on the switchboard?” I asked.

  “Until midnight. Seven P.M., your time.”

  “I’ll probably ring again.”

  “O.K. Happy hunting.”

  I thanked Rickenbacker and drove off to Washington, and after a few false trails found Captain of Detectives Kent Wagner in his precinct.

  The captain was a walking crime deterrent, big of body, hard of eye, a man who spoke softly and reminded one of cobras. He was perhaps fifty with flat-brushed dark hair, his chin tucked back like a fighting man; and I had a powerful impression of facing a wary, decisive intelligence. He shook my hand perfunctorily, looking me over from heat to foot, summing up my soul.

  “Kidnappers never get away with it in the United States,” he said. “This time will be no exception.”

  I agreed with him in principle. The American record against kidnappers was second to none.

  “What can you tell me?” he asked flatly, from his look not hoping much.

  “Quite a lot, I think,” I said mildly.

  He eyed me for a moment, then opened the door of his glasswalled office and called across an expanse of desks, “Ask Lieutenant Stavoski to step in here, if you please.”

  One of the many blue-uniformed men rose to his feet and went on the errand, and through the windows I watched the busy, orderly scene, many pe
ople moving, telephones ringing, voices talking, typewriters clacking, computer screens flicking, cups of coffee on the march. Lieutenant Stavoski, when he came, was a pudgy man in the late thirties with a large drooping moustache and no visible doubts about himself. He gave me a disillusioned stare; probably out of habit.

  The captain explained who I was. Stavoski looked unimpressed. The captain invited me to give. I obligingly opened my briefcase and brought out a few assorted articles, which I laid on his desk.

  “We think this is definitely the third, and probably the fourth, of a series of kidnappings instigated by one particular person,” I said. “The Jockey Club in England has today received a tape from the kidnappers of Morgan Freemantle, which I’ve arranged for you to hear now on the telephone, if you like. I’ve also brought with me the ransom-demand tapes from two of the other kidnaps.” I pointed to them as they lay on the desk. “You might be interested to hear the similarities.” I paused slightly. “One of the tapes is in Italian.”

  “Italian?”

  “The kidnapper himself is Italian.”

  Neither of them particularly liked it.

  “He speaks English,” I said, “but in England he recruited an English national to utter his threats, and on today’s tape the voice is American.”

  Wagner pursed his lips. “Let’s hear today’s tape then.” He gave me the receiver from his telephone and pressed a few preliminary buttons. “This call will be recorded,” he said. “Also all our conversations from now on.”

  I nodded and got through to Gerry Clayton, who gave the kidnapper a repeat performance. The aggressive voice rasped out loudly through the amplifier in Captain Wagner’s office, both the policemen listening with concentrated disgust.

  I thanked Gerry and disconnected, and without a word Wagner held out a hand to me, his eyes on the tapes I’d brought. I gave him the Nerrity one, which he fitted into a player and set going. The sour threats to Dominic, the cutting off of fingers, the screams, the nonreturn of the body, all thundered into the office like an echo. The faces of Wagner and Stavoski both grew still and then judicious and finally convinced.