by Crossfire
Quite a few were of the back of the person’s head, and a few more had missed the mark altogether, but there were three perfect shots, in full-zoom close-up. Two of them showed the collector in profile as the package was being removed from the box, and one was full face as the person left through the shop door.
In truth, I hadn’t really known who to expect, but the person who looked out at me from the camera screen hadn’t even been on my list of possible candidates.
The face in the photograph, the face of my mother’s blackmailer, was that of Julie Yorke, the caged tigress.
14
On Saturday morning at nine o’clock, I was sitting in Ian’s car parked in a gateway halfway up the Baydon Road. I had chosen the position so I could easily see the traffic that came up the hill towards me out of Lambourn village. I was waiting for one particular vehicle, and I’d been here for half an hour already.
I had woken early again after another troubled night’s sleep.
The same questions had been revolving around and around in my head since the early hours. How could Julie Yorke be the blackmailer? How had she obtained my mother’s tax papers or, at least, the information in them?
And in particular, who was she working with?
There had to be someone else involved. My mother had always referred to the blackmailer as “him,” and I had heard the whisperer myself on the telephone, and was pretty certain that it had been a man.
A motorized horse van came up the hill towards me. I sank down in the seat so that the driver wouldn’t see me. I was not waiting for a horse van.
I yawned. I was tired due to lack of sleep, but I knew that I could exist indefinitely on just a few hours a night. Sometimes I’d survived for weeks on far less than that. And my overriding memory of my time at Sandhurst was that I was always completely exhausted, sometimes to the point of collapse, but I somehow kept going, as had all my fellow officer cadets.
I had again left Kauri House in Ian’s car well before dawn, and before the lights had gone on in my mother’s bedroom. I’d driven out of the village along the Wantage Road and had chanced driving in through the open gates of Greystone Stables, and up the tarmac driveway. I’d crept forwards slowly, scanning the surface in front of me in the glow of the headlights. My two sticks remained exactly where I’d left them, leaning on the small stones. Still no cars had been driven up here since the gates had been unlocked.
It had been a calculated risk to drive up to the sticks, but no more so than leaving the car down by the gate and walking. As it was, I’d been there no more than a minute in total.
I had then driven on into Wantage and parked in the market square under the imposing statue of King Alfred the Great with his battle-ax in one hand and roll of parchment in the other, designed to depict the Saxon warrior who became the lawgiver.
I’d bought the Racing Post from a newsagent in the town, not having wanted to buy one at the shop in Lambourn village in case I was spotted by someone who thought I was dead, or dying.
According to the paper, Ewen Yorke had seven horses running that afternoon at two different racetracks: three at Haydock Park and four at Ascot, including two in their big race of the day, the Group 1 Make-a-Wager Gold Cup.
Haydock was about midway between Manchester and Liverpool, and a good three hours’ drive away. Ascot, meanwhile, was much closer, in the same county as Lambourn, and just a fifty-minute trip down the M4 motorway, with maybe a bit extra to allow for race-day traffic.
Ewen had a runner in the first race at both courses, and if he was going to be at Haydock Park in time for the first, he would be expected to drive his distinctive top-of-the-range white BMW up the hill on the Baydon Road sometime around ten o’clock, and by ten-thirty at the very latest.
So I sat and waited some more.
I turned on the car radio, but like the handbrake, it didn’t work too well. In fact, it made an annoying buzzing noise even when the engine wasn’t running. It was worse than having no radio at all, so I turned it off again.
I looked at the new watch I’d bought in Newbury the previous afternoon. It told me it was nine-thirty.
At nine forty-five I recognized a car coming up the hill towards me. It wasn’t a white BMW but an aging and battered blue Ford—my mother’s car.
I sank down as far as I could in the seat as she drove by, hoping that she wouldn’t identify the vehicle in the gateway as that of her head lad. Even if she’d done so, I knew she wouldn’t have stopped to enquire after “staff,” and I gratefully watched as her car disappeared around the next corner. As I had expected, my mother was off to the Haydock Park races, where she had Oregon running in the novice hurdle, his last outing before the Triumph Hurdle at the Cheltenham Festival. Ian had told me that he was looking forwards to watching the race on Channel 4.
I went back to watching and waiting, but there was no sign of a white BMW.
At ten to eleven I decided it was time to move. I hadn’t seen Ewen’s car go past, but that didn’t mean he hadn’t gone to Haydock, it just meant he hadn’t gone there via the Baydon Road. It was the most likely route from the Yorkes’ house but certainly not the only one.
I moved Ian’s car from the gateway on Baydon Road to another similarly positioned on Hungerford Hill, another of the roads out of Lambourn. If Ewen Yorke was going to Ascot this afternoon he would almost certainly pass this way, and would do so by twelve-thirty at the absolute latest if he was going to be in time to saddle his runner in the first race.
The distinctive white top-of-the-range BMW swept up the hill at five minutes to twelve, and I pulled out of the gateway behind it.
I had planned to follow him at a safe distance to avoid detection, and to make sure that he actually did drive to the motorway and join it going east towards Ascot. As it was, I had no need to worry about keeping far enough back so that the driver couldn’t see that it was me behind him. Ian Norland’s little Corsa struggled up Hungerford Hill as fast as it could, but Ewen Yorke’s powerful BMW was already long gone, and was well out of sight by the time I reached the top road by The Hare pub.
I didn’t like doing it, but I’d have to assume that he had, in fact, gone to Ascot and that he wouldn’t be back in Lambourn for at least the next five hours. Once upon a time I would have been able to check by watching the racing from Ascot on BBC television. That was sadly no longer the case, as, except for the Grand National, the BBC had cut back its jump-race coverage to almost nothing. Someone in that organization seemed to believe that if a sport didn’t involve wheels, balls or skis, it was hardly worth reporting.
Instead, I pulled into the parking lot of The Hare and waited, watching the road to see if the white BMW came back. Maybe he had forgotten something and would return to get it.
He didn’t.
I waited a full thirty minutes before I was sure enough that Ewen and his BMW were away for the afternoon. He wouldn’t now have had enough time to return home and then make it to Ascot for the first race.
I drove the Corsa out of the pub’s parking lot, down the hill to Lambourn village, and pulled up on the gravel driveway next to the Yorkes’ front door.
Julie seemed surprised to see me, but maybe not so surprised as if she had believed me dead.
“What are you doing here?” she asked from behind the door through a six-inch gap.
“I thought you said at Newbury races to come and see you sometime,” I said. “So here I am.”
She blushed slightly across her neck.
“What’s in the bag?” she asked, looking at the plastic bag I was holding.
“Champagne,” I said.
She blushed again, and this time, it reached her cheeks.
“You had better come in, then,” she said, opening the door wide for me to pass. She looked out beyond me, as if concerned that someone had seen my arrival. It was not just her who hoped they hadn’t.
“How lovely,” I said, admiring the white curved staircase in the hallway. “Which way’s the bedroom?”<
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“My,” she said with a giggle. “You are an eager boy.”
“No time like the present,” I said. “Is your husband in?”
“No,” she said, giggling again. “He’s gone to the races.”
“I know,” I said. “I watched him go.”
“You are such a naughty boy,” she said, wagging a finger at me.
“So what are you going to do about it, then?” I asked her.
She breathed deeply with excitement, her breasts rising and falling under her flimsy sweater.
“Get some glasses,” I said, starting to climb the stairs. “Go on,” I said, seeing her still standing in the hallway.
She skipped away while I continued up.
“In the guest room,” she shouted. “On the left.”
I went into the guest room on the left, and pulled back the duvet on the king-size bed.
A couple of life’s little questions crossed my mind.
Was I really going to have sex with this woman?
I suppose it depended if she wanted it, and so far, the signs had been pretty positive. But did I want it too?
And there was one other pressing question.
Did I leave my leg on, or did I take it off?
On this occasion I decided that leaving it on was definitely better, especially as a quick getaway would be a likely necessity.
I went into the en suite bathroom. I thought briefly about having a shower, but it would mean taking off my leg and then putting it on again. The foot may have been waterproof, but the join between the real me and the false was not.
I stripped off, left my clothes on the bathroom floor and climbed into the bed, pulling the duvet up to my waist.
I had never paid for sex, although I’d bought quite a few expensive dinners in my time, which was tantamount to the same thing. On this occasion, however, my mother had been paying two thousand pounds a week for the past seven months. I hoped it was going to be worth it.
Julie appeared in the doorway carrying two champagne flutes in her left hand and wearing a flimsy housecoat that she allowed to fall open, revealing her nakedness beneath.
“Now, just how naughty have you been?” she asked, swinging a leather riding whip into view.
“Very,” I said, opening the champagne with a loud pop.
“Oh, goodie,” she replied.
It wasn’t quite what I had in mind, but I went along with her little game for a while as she became more and more excited.
“Just a minute,” I said, getting off the bed.
“What?” she gasped. “Get back here now!”
“Just a minute,” I repeated. “I need the bathroom.”
She was lying on her back, half sitting up, resting on her elbows with the whip in her right hand, her knees drawn up, and her legs spread wide apart. She threw her head back. “I just don’t believe it,” she cried. “You get back here right now or you’ll really be in trouble.”
I ignored her, went into the bathroom and put on my boxer shorts. I then took my new camera from the cupboard under the sink where I had placed it when I arrived, and checked that it was switched on. The champagne hadn’t been the only thing in the plastic bag.
“Hurry up, you naughty boy,” she shouted.
“Coming,” I shouted back.
I came out of the bathroom taking shot after shot of her naked body as she lay on the bed, still in the same compromising position. She’d had her eyes closed, and it was a few seconds before she realized what I was doing.
“What the fuck’s going on?” she screamed, throwing the whip at me and grabbing the duvet to cover herself.
“Just taking some photos,” I said calmly.
“What the fuck for?” she shouted angrily.
“Blackmail,” I replied.
“Blackmail!” she shrieked.
“Yes,” I said. “Do you want to see?”
I held the camera towards her so she could see the screen on the back of it. But the photograph I showed her wasn’t one of those I’d just taken; it was the one with her face in profile from yesterday, the one with her hand reaching into mailbox number 116 to collect the package of money.
She cried a lot.
We were still in her guest bedroom. I had thrown her the housecoat when I’d gone into the bathroom to put on my shirt and trousers, and when I’d reemerged, she had been sitting up in bed, wearing the coat, with the duvet pulled right up. Somehow she didn’t look like someone up to their neck in a criminal conspiracy. She had even straightened her hair.
“It was only a game,” she said.
“Murder is never a game,” I said, standing at the end of the bed.
“Murder?” She went very pale. “What murder?”
My murder, I thought. Hanging on a wall in Greystone Stables.
“Who was murdered?” she demanded.
“Someone called Roderick Ward,” I said, even though I had no evidence that it was true.
“No,” she wailed. “Roderick wasn’t murdered; he died in a car crash.”
So she knew of Roderick Ward.
“That’s what it was meant to look like,” I said. “Who killed him?”
“I didn’t kill anybody,” she shouted.
“Someone did,” I said. “Was it Ewen?”
“Ewen?” She almost laughed. “The only thing Ewen is interested in is bloody horses. That and whisky. Horses all day and whisky all night.”
Perhaps that explained her sexually flirtatious nature—she couldn’t get any satisfaction in the marital bed, so she had looked elsewhere.
“So who killed Roderick Ward?” I asked her again.
“No one,” she said. “I told you. He died in a car crash.”
“Who says so?” I asked. She didn’t respond. I looked down at her. “Do you know what the sentence is for being an accessory to murder?” There was still no response. “Life in prison,” I said. “That’s a very long time for someone as young as you.”
“I told you, I didn’t murder anyone.” She was now crying again.
“But do you think a jury will believe you once they’ve convicted you for blackmail?” She went on crying, the tears smudging her mascara and dripping black marks onto the white bed linens. “So tell me, who did kill Roderick Ward?” I asked.
She didn’t say anything; she just buried her face in a pillow and sobbed.
“You will tell me,” I said. “Eventually. Are you aware that the maximum sentence for blackmail is fourteen years?”
That brought her head back up. “No.” It was almost a plea.
“Oh yes,” I said. “And the same for conspiracy to blackmail.”
I knew. I’d looked it up on the Internet.
“Where’s the money?” I asked, changing direction.
“What money?” she said.
“The money you collected yesterday from Newbury.”
“In my handbag,” she whimpered.
“And how about the rest of it?”
“The rest?” she said.
“Yes, all the packages you’ve been collecting each week for the past seven months. Where’s all that money?”
“I don’t have it,” she said.
“So who has?”
She still didn’t want to tell me.
“Julie,” I said. “You are leaving me no alternative but to give the picture of you in Newbury yesterday to the police.”
“No,” she wailed again.
“But I can only help you if you will help me,” I said softly. “Otherwise, I will also have to send the other photos to Ewen.” Both of us knew what the other photos showed. Set a thief to catch a thief, or, as in this case, set a blackmailer to catch a blackmailer.
“No, please.” She was begging.
“Then tell me who has the money.”
“Can’t I pay you back in a different way?” she asked, pulling down the duvet and opening her housecoat to reveal her left breast.
“No,” I said emphatically. “You cannot.”
She covered herself up again.
“Julie,” I said in my voice-of-command, “this is your last chance. Either you tell me now who’s got the money or I will call the police.” She wasn’t to know that I had absolutely no intention of doing that.
“I can’t tell you,” she said forlornly.
“What are you frightened of?” I asked.
“Nothing.”
“But you claimed it was only a game,” I said.“Was it him who told you that?” I paused. She gave no answer. “Did he just ask you to collect something for him from a mailbox each week?” I paused again. Again there was no answer, but she began to cry once more. “Did he tell you that you wouldn’t get caught?” She nodded slightly.“Only now you have been.” She nodded again, tears flowing freely down her cheeks. “And you’re not going to tell me who it was. That’s not very clever, you know. You’ll end up taking all the blame.”
“I don’t want to go to prison,” she sobbed, echoing my mother.
“You don’t have to,” I said. “If you tell me who you give the money to, I am sure the courts won’t send you to prison.” Not for long anyway, I thought. Certainly not for the maximum fourteen years.
I could see that she still didn’t want to say. Was it fear, I wondered, or some misguided sense of loyalty.
“Do you love him?” I asked her.
She looked up at me, still sobbing. But she nodded.
“Then why are you doing this?” I waved my arm at her, at the bed, and at the riding whip that still lay on the floor where she had thrown it. She had hardly acted as if she was deeply in love with someone.
“Habit, I suppose,” she said quietly.
Some habit, I thought.
“Does he love you?” I asked.
“He says so,” she said, but I detected some hesitancy in her voice.
“But you’re not so sure?” I asked.
“No.”
“Then why on earth are you protecting him?” She gave me no answer. “OK,” I said at length. “Don’t say that I haven’t warned you.” I took my cell phone from my pocket. “And I’m sure Ewen is going to find the photographs of you most interesting. Does he know about your secret blackmailing lover? Because he will soon.”