by Dick Francis
“The higher the volume, the greater the gain?” I said.
“Just so,” he said. “But transistors need a power supply. They must either have a battery or be connected to the mains for them to work, so this little sucker can’t have transistors.” He held up the tiny electrical circuit from the broken grain.
“Passive electronics,” I said.
“You’ve got it,” he said, smiling.
“What are you two on about?” asked Betsy suddenly from the backseat.
“This,” said Luca, carefully handing her one of the unbroken grains.
“Oh, I know what that is,” she said rather condescendingly.
“What?” Luca and I said together.
“It’s a chip for dogs,” she said. “We had one put in our Irish setter last year.”
“What do they do?” I asked over my shoulder.
“They’re for identification,” she said. “They’re injected under the skin using a syringe. We had one put in our dog so Mum and Dad could take her to France without having to do that quarantine thing when she came back. She simply got scanned by customs to check she was the right dog with the right vaccinations.”
“Like horses,” I said.
“Eh?” said Luca.
“Horses have them too,” I said. “To check they are indeed who their owner says they are. All of them have to have chips inserted or they can’t run. I read about it in the Racing Post ages ago. I just didn’t know what the chips looked like. I don’t know why, but I somehow expected them to be bigger, rectangular and flat.”
Luca looked again at the tiny electrical circuit.
“It must be a passive arfid circuit,” he said. “This little coil must be the antenna.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” I said. “What’s an arfid when it’s at home?”
“A radio frequency identification circuit, R-F-I-D, pronounced ARE-fid,” he said slowly as if for a child. “You put a scanner close by that emits a radio wave. The wave is picked up by the little antenna, and that provides just enough power for the circuit to transmit back an identification number.”
“Sounds complicated,” I said.
“Not really,” Luca replied. “They exist all over the place. Those alarm things in shops that go off if you try and take things out without paying, they use RFIDs. They simply have the tags on the items, and the scanners are the vertical things by the doors you have to walk between. Also, the tube and buses in London use them in the Oyster cards. You put the card on the scanner, and it reads the information to make sure you have enough credit to travel. They’re very clever.”
“So I see,” I said.
“Not everyone is keen on them, though,” he went on. “Some call them ‘spychips’ because they allow people to be tracked without their knowledge. But I think they’ll soon be on everything. You know, instead of bar codes. The supermarkets are already experimenting with them for checkout. You only have to walk past the scanner and everything is automatically checked out without you even having to take it out of the cart. One day, your credit card will be scanned in the same way, and the total deducted from your bank account without you having to do anything except push the whole lot out to your car, load up and drive away.”
“Amazing,” I said.
“Yeah. But the trouble is that, theoretically, the same RFIDs could also be used to tell the cops if you broke the speed limit on the way home from the store.”
“Surely not,” I said.
“Oh yes they could,” he said. “They already use RFIDs in cars to pay road and bridge tolls in lots of places—E-ZPass in New York, for one. It’s not much more of a step for them to calculate your average speed between two points and issue a ticket if you were going too fast. Big Brother is definitely watching you, and, even if he isn’t now, he will be soon.”
“How do you know so much about these RFID things?” I asked.
“Studied them at college, and I also read electronics magazines,” he said. “But I’ve never seen one this small before.” He held up one of the tiny glass grains.
So why, I thought, had my father had ten of them in his luggage? Perhaps they were something to do with the photocopied horse passports.
“Is the black remote thing a scanner?” I asked.
Luca pointed it at the chip and pushed the ENTER button. The red light came on briefly and then went off again, just as before.
“It doesn’t have any sort of readout, so I doubt it,” said Luca. “I’ll ask at my electronics club, if you like.”
“Electronics club?” I said.
“Yeah. Mostly teenagers,” he said. “Making robots or radio-controlled cars and such. Every Friday night in the local youth center in Wycombe. I help them out most weeks.”
I thought about whether I should give the device to him, or to the police, along with the money.
“OK,” I said. “Ask at your club if anyone knows what it’s for. Take the glass grains as well, in case they’re somehow connected.”
“Right,” he replied, smiling. “We love a challenge. Can we take it apart?”
“I suppose so,” I said. “But make sure it goes back together again.”
“Right,” he said again. “I’ll take it with me tonight. I’ll let you know in the morning if we get anywhere.”
I dropped Luca and Betsy in High Wycombe, and then I went to see my grandmother.
Her room at the nursing home in Warwick was a microcosm of my childhood memories. On the wall over her bed was a nineteenth-century original watercolor of a child feeding chickens that had once hung over the mantelpiece in the family sitting room. Photographs in silver frames stood alongside little porcelain pots and other knickknacks on her antique chest of drawers as they had always done in my grandparents’ bedroom. A framed tapestry of the Queen in her coronation coach shared wall space with a hand-painted plate that I had given them in celebration of their ruby wedding anniversary.
Each item was so familiar to me. It was only my grandmother herself who was unfamiliar. As unfamiliar to me as I sometimes was to her.
“Hello, Nanna,” I said to her, leaning down and kissing her on the forehead.
She briefly looked up at me with confused recognition and said nothing. The nurses told me that she could still chat away quite well on some days but not at all on others, and I personally hadn’t heard her speak now for quite a few weeks.
“How are you feeling?” I asked her. “Have you been watching the racing on the television? And the Queen?”
There was no reply, not a flicker of apparent understanding. Today was clearly not one of her good days.
The decision to place her in a nursing home had been both a difficult and an easy one. I had realized for some time that she had been losing her memory but had simply put it down to old age. Only when I was contacted by the police, who had found her wandering the streets in her pink nightie and slippers, had I taken her to the doctor’s. There had been a period of testing and several visits to neurologists before a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s had been confirmed. Sophie had abdicated all responsibility in the caring department, which was fair enough as she had her own problems to worry about, so I arranged for a live-in nurse to look after my grandmother in her own house. I was determined that she shouldn’t have to live in a care home full of old people who sat in a circle all day staring at the floor.
Then one day, when I went to spend an evening with her, she became very agitated and confused. She didn’t seem to know who I was and continually accused me of stealing her wedding ring. It was more distressing for me than it was for her, but it was her live-in nurse who was the most upset.
The poor girl was totally exhausted from the ever-increasing workload and was at the end of her tether. Between bouts of tears, she had told me what life for my grandmother was really like. Above all, she was lonely. Keeping her in her own home had been no real kindness to anyone, and certainly not to her. So the following day I had made arrangements for my grandmother to go into permane
nt residential care and had promptly sold her house to pay for it.
That had been two and a half years ago, and the money was starting to run out. I hated to think what would happen if she lived much longer.
As usual in the evenings, she was sitting in her room with all the lights full on. She didn’t like the dark and insisted that the lights be left on both day and night. As it was, on this midsummer day, the sun was still shining brightly through her west-facing window, but that made no difference to her need for maximum electric light as well.
I sat down on a chair facing her and took her hand in mine. She looked at my face with hollow, staring eyes. I stroked her hand and smiled at her. I was beginning to think this had been a waste of my time.
“Nanna,” I said to her slowly, “I’ve come to ask you about Peter. Do you remember your son, Peter?”
She went on looking at me without giving any sign that she had heard.
“Your son Peter,” I repeated. “He got married to a girl called Tricia. Do you remember? They had a little boy called Ned. Do you remember Ned? You looked after him.”
I thought she hadn’t registered anything, but then she smiled and spoke, softly but clearly. “Ned,” she said. “My little Ned.”
Her voice was unchanged, and I felt myself welling up with emotion.
“Yes,” I said. “Your little Ned. Nanna, I’m right here.”
Her eyes focused on my face.
“Ned,” she repeated. I wasn’t sure if she was remembering the past or whether she was able to recognize me.
“Nanna,” I said, “do you remember Peter? Your son Peter?”
“Dead,” she said.
“Do you remember his wife, Tricia?” I asked her gently.
“Dead,” she repeated.
“Yes,” I said. “But do you know how she died?”
My grandmother just looked at me with a quizzical expression on her face.
Finally she said, “Secret,” and put one of her long, thin fingers to her lips.
“And Peter,” I said. “Where did Peter go?”
“Dead,” she repeated.
“No,” I said. “Peter wasn’t dead. Tricia was dead. Where is Peter?”
She didn’t say anything, and her eyes had returned to their distant stare.
“Secret,” she had said. So she must have known.
I pulled the photocopy of my father’s photograph from my pocket and put it on her lap. She looked down at it. I placed the tiny photo of my mother and father at Blackpool there too.
She looked down for some time, and I thought at one point that she had drifted off to sleep, so I took the pictures and put them back in my pocket.
I stood up to leave, but, as I leaned forward to kiss her on her head, she sat up straight.
“Murderer,” she said quietly but quite distinctly.
“Who was a murderer?” I asked, kneeling down so that my face was close to hers.
“Murderer,” she repeated.
“Yes,” I said. “But who was a murderer?”
“Murderer,” she said once more.
“Who was murdered?” I asked, changing tack. I already knew the answer.
“He murdered Tricia,” she said. She began to cry, and I gave her a tissue from the box beside her bed. She wiped her nose, and then she turned and looked at me, her eyes momentarily full of recognition and understanding.
“And he murdered her baby.”
7
It emits a radio signal,” said Luca in the car on the way to Ascot on Saturday morning. He was holding the black remote-type thing with the buttons. “You were bloody lucky this wasn’t stolen,” he added.
“Why would it be stolen?” I asked him.
“Because the teenagers at the electronics club are a bunch of hooligans,” he said.“Most of them are only there because the courts make them go. To keep them off the streets on Friday nights. Supposed to be part of their rehabilitation. I ask you . . . Most of them wouldn’t be rehabilitated by a stretch in the army.”
“But what about this?” I said, pointing at the device.
“One of the little horrors had it in his bag,” he said. “God knows what he thought he would do with it. Just liked the look of it so he lifted it. They are like bloody magpies. If it shines, they’ll steal it.”
“You said it emits a radio signal,” I said. “What sort of signal?”
“Fairly low frequency,” he said. “But quite powerful. One of the staff at the club was able to set up an oscilloscope to see it.”
“What’s an oscilloscope?” I asked.
“Like one of those things in a hospital that shows the heart rate of patients,” he said. “It displays a trace on a screen.”
“But what’s the thing for?” I asked.
“I’m not sure, but I think it might be for writing information onto the RFIDs.”
“The glass grains?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said. “The end slides off.” He showed me. “And you can fit one of the grains into this hollow.” He pointed at it as I drove. “When you push the ENTER button, it sends out a signal. I think that must program the RFID with the numbers you punch into it before pushing the ENTER button.”
“Is that really possible?” I said. “There aren’t any connectors.”
“It’s easy,” he said. “Writing to RFIDs occurs all the time. When someone puts their Oyster card near one of those round yellow pads on the tube gates, the card is first scanned to determine the available credit, then the system automatically deducts the fare and rewrites the card with a new balance. Same thing on all the buses. It’s done by radio waves. It doesn’t need connectors.”
I was slightly disappointed. I had somehow hoped that the device was going to be more exciting than something that was fitted to every bus in London. But why, then, I wondered, did my father think it was necessary to hide it in his rucksack?
I yawned. Sleep had not come easily to me after my visit to my grandmother. I had lain awake for hours thinking about what she had said to me, and also how that secret must have burned ferociously in her for so long. What did you do when you found out that your son was a murderer? More to the point for me, what did you do when you found out that your father was one?
I thought back to when I had sat by my father’s body in the hospital after he had died. Was it really just four days previously? It felt like half a lifetime.
I had mourned for what might have been, for the lost years of opportunity. Somehow, even in spite of the knowledge I had gained since, I felt some form of affinity with the man who now lay silently in some mortuary’s cold storage. But what had he done? Had he really deprived me not only of himself but also of my mother, and a brother or sister as well?
I had tried to telephone Detective Sergeant Murray at Windsor Police Station, but I was told he was either elsewhere or off duty. I had left a message for him to call me, but, so far, there had been nothing.
“It’s the Wokingham today,” said Luca, rubbing his hands and bringing me back from my daydreaming.
“Sure is,” I said.
The Wokingham Stakes was the fourth race of the day on Royal Ascot Saturday, and it was one of the most lucrative races of the whole meeting for us bookmakers. It was also a popular race with the trainers, with the number of runners limited only by how many starting stalls could be accommodated across the width of the racetrack.
But it was not only a cash cow for the bookies, it was fun as well. While it was true that most bets tended to be smaller than for some of the group races, there were plenty of them, and it seemed like a happy race, with no one placing white-knuckle wagers that they couldn’t afford to lose.
Betsy went to sleep in the back and Luca looked through the Racing Post as I drove.
“Thirty runners again today,” he said. “They reckon here that Burton Bank will start favorite at about six- or seven-to-one.”
“Who trains him?” I asked.
“George Wiley,” Luca replied.
“W
iley trains in Cumbria, doesn’t he?” I said. “That’s quite a way to come. He must think he’s a good prospect. How about the others?”
Luca studied the paper. “About ten with a realistic chance, I’d say, but the Wokingham is always a bit of a lottery.” He smiled.
“How about the Golden Jubilee?” I asked. The Golden Jubilee Stakes was the big race of the day. Like the Wokingham, it was also run over a straight six furlongs and was for three-year-olds and upwards.
“Eighteen runners this year,” he said. “Pulpit Reader will probably be favorite, but, again, it’s anyone’s race. Always the same in the sprints.”
We discussed the afternoon’s races and runners for a while longer. I thought we would need the unpredictability of the Wokingham and the Golden Jubilee Stakes after the first two races of the day. The Chesham Stakes and the Hardwicke Stakes were both renowned for producing short-priced winners favoring the punter.
The previous day’s rain had swept away eastwards into the North Sea and the sun had returned, bringing out the Saturday crowd, which was streaming into the racetrack by the time we had negotiated the traffic jams and parked the car. It looked like being another busy day at the office.
Detective Chief Inspector Llewellyn and Detective Sergeant Murray were waiting for me in the betting ring.
“That was quick,” I said to the sergeant before either of them could say a word.
“What was quick?” he asked.
“Didn’t you get my message?” I asked him.
“No,” he replied blankly.
“Oh,” I said. “I left one for you this morning at Windsor Police Station.”
“What did it say?” he asked.
“Just to call me,” I said.
“And what exactly did you want to speak to my sergeant about?” the chief inspector asked in his accusing tone.