by Joe McNally
‘I doubt it.’
‘Some day you’ll be grateful.’
The pain killer got me home without me having to stop. I parked, and the wind across the flat land ripped the car door open as I sprung the catch, then cut icily through my sweater as I made for the door.
The identity of Doctor Donnelly’s informer had bugged me throughout the drive, and it still gnawed as I clumsily built a fire, piling it high in case I couldn’t move too well later.
It had to be the doctor at Hereford Hospital, he’d been angry enough with me. I washed up, made coffee and rang him. He remembered me, said he was glad I’d been stood down but denied contacting the racecourse doctor: ‘I’ve better things to do with my time than continuing to care for patients who have foolishly discharged themselves.’
The other man who’d crossed my mind was Barber. Although I’d asked him to keep it quiet, maybe he’d let it slip. If not, that left McCarthy and the two cops; they were the only others who knew, but I couldn’t see a motive for them other than Miller’s obvious dislike of me.
I rang McCarthy’s office. He told me he hadn’t spoken to the doctor or anyone else.
I raised Kavanagh next. He’d mentioned my injuries to nobody, nor had Miller to the best of his knowledge though he’d check.
I said, ‘Barber’s the only other person I’ve told. If he didn’t report me there’s only one more guy who knew the state my back was in.’
I rang the racecourse and managed to speak to Barber just before he left.
‘How’d your horses do?’ I asked, not sure if I wanted to hear the answer.
‘Stuffed, both of them.’
‘Sorry to hear it for your sake, Mister Barber, though I can’t say I am for mine.’
‘At least you’re honest.’
‘Mister Barber, did you speak to anybody today about, about my injuries?’
‘Not a soul, Eddie. You asked me not to.’
‘Of course, I know but, well, I had a run in with the course doctor, he stood me down for fourteen days.’
Silence for a while, then, ‘I’m sorry to hear that, Eddie.’
‘Me too, but there could be a clue in there somewhere that might be useful to the police. I just wanted to be sure you hadn’t let anything slip, even by accident.’
‘Definitely not. Absolutely not.’
‘Mister Barber, I had to check, no offence intended.’
‘None taken.’
‘Good, thanks again, I’ll keep you in touch.’
‘Do that.’
I rang Kavanagh and told him.
‘Did you ask this doctor who tipped him the wink?’ he said.
‘Several times. He’s not saying.’
‘Well he’ll be saying when I ask him. Do you know where he’ll be tomorrow?’
‘Southwell maybe, possibly Worcester. If you ring the track in the morning they’ll tell you.’
‘Where will you be?’
‘I’ll be here by the phone. Probably lying flat on my belly trying not to move, but I’ll be waiting for your call.’
32
As the night wore on and the wind howled around the Lodge, the pain returned, slowly, like small biting animals hatching all over my back. I rejected the paracetamol in favour of a half bottle of whiskey, which dulled the soreness in my body in exchange for a spreading melancholy.
Fractured thoughts floated, ruined career, screwed-up comeback, broken relationships, nobody to turn to... I wallowed a while, then something that had been nagging at me all day finally surfaced. I hadn’t spoken to Lisa. She’d probably be thinking I was trying to avoid her.
I found her number. It rang eight or nine times before she answered. ‘Eddie. How are you?’
‘Okay.’
‘Listen, can I ring you back?’
‘Tonight?’
‘Five minutes, give me five minutes.’
‘Sure.’
I hung up, feeling better already. She sounded fine, not mad or anything. I thought about pouring another drink, considered what fourteen days of inactivity would do to my weight, then said what the hell and half-filled the glass.
The phone rang. I reached for it. ‘God, that was quick! Thought you said five minutes?’
Silence.
‘Lisa?’
Nothing.
‘Hello...?’
‘Eddie...?’
That sweet soft Irish voice, sounding hurt, unsure.
‘Jackie! Where are you?’
‘Who’s Lisa?’
‘She’s just a friend. Tell me where you are.’
‘No. I just wanted to make sure you were okay, but obviously Lisa is seeing to that.’
‘Jackie, come on!’
‘Barely two bloody weeks, you bastard!’
‘Jackie, listen for God’s sake!’
She hung up.
Shit! What a day this was turning out to be. I laughed with frustration and relief. At least Jackie was all right. It had been a good clear line, maybe she hadn’t gone to Ireland after all.
The phone rang again. Jackie or Lisa. I answered carefully, ‘Hello?’
‘Eddie.’
McCarthy, sounding tense.
‘What is it Mac?’
‘David Cooper’s disappeared.’
‘When?’
‘Yesterday. He didn’t show up to ride at Fontwell today.’
‘He’s done that before.’
‘He was due at his mother’s house in London last night for her birthday party. Didn’t turn up.’
‘Maybe he doesn’t like parties.’
‘Don’t be facetious, Eddie, I’ve spoken to the police, they’re treating it seriously.’
‘The kid’s probably just got sick of his old man’s bullying and buggered off somewhere.’
‘You know the boy’s father?’
‘Unfortunately, yes.’
Mac said, ‘He’s just been ranting at me for the last ten minutes. He wants to put up a fifty grand reward. Both the police and I have advised against it in case he gets into a ransom situation with this guy.’
‘And?’
‘He’s going to do it anyway.’
‘Good for him. Gives me something to occupy myself with for the next two weeks. And, there’s nobody I’d rather take fifty grand off than Jack Cooper.’
Mac seemed baffled. I reminded him I’d been stood down by the doctor. Mac said, ‘If you’re unfit to ride, what makes you think you can charge around the country looking for David Cooper? What if the killer has got him?’
‘Mac, my career is sliding swiftly down the pan. The prospect of no job and no money makes fifty grand worth taking a lot of risks for.’
‘So now you think the killer’s got young Cooper?’
‘I hope not, for his sake.’
‘Yours too. The reward is for the boy’s safe return only. No payout on corpses.’
We talked a while longer, and Mac wasn’t pleased when I said I thought there was a leak on his side. Somebody had reported me to the doctor at Nottingham. Somebody knew about the notes and the ether. As if the prospect of being on the killer’s list wasn’t bad enough, somebody else was out to end my career.
Mac said, ‘That’s wild speculation, Eddie. You’ll have to name suspects.’
‘Okay. I’ll give you two.’
I told Mac it had to be either Con Layton or Claude Beckman. Both had major grudges against me; Layton for obvious reasons, Beckman’s motive I’d yet to discover. Mac disagreed. Accepting my theory meant admitting there was a problem in his department. We didn’t say goodnight on the best of terms.
Next morning, I sat down to plan the practicalities of searching for David Cooper.
Money: I’d paid the most pressing bills and was still owed my five per cent of second prize money in the Gold Cup, fifteen hundred quid.
Transport: wouldn’t win any Formula Ones but was fast enough to get me out of most trouble spots.
Health: not good. Wounds still sore, driving long dista
nces looked out. Have to do what I could on the phone for the first couple of days and hope for improvement.
Thoughts of the telephone made me realize Lisa hadn’t called back last night. Maybe she’d tried a few times. I called her number. No answer.
Straight-backed and suffering, I shuffled to the kitchen for coffee and toast then sat down to list people who could tell me things about David Cooper.
Might as well start at the top. I found his father’s office number in The Directory of the Turf and phoned him. His secretary told me he wouldn’t take my call, and did so in such a casual way that I realised she’d never had to offer the standard ‘he’s in a meeting’ euphemism.
‘Tell him it’s about David,’ I said.
‘His son?’
‘That’s right.’
Seconds later his familiar bark came through, ‘Malloy! What do you know about David?’
‘That he’s missing. That I think I can find him, and that I need the reward money.’
‘Well, you should have thought of that before you decided to be so fucking insolent last time you saw me.’
‘You only thought it was insolence because you’re not used to people standing up to you. You think your money makes you free to behave as you like, when all it does is trap you into thinking everyone agrees with you all the time.’
‘Well, you’ve come running back like all the rest.’
‘I’m not running back. I’ve suddenly found I’ve got time on my hands. And I like David. As it happens, I’d go looking for him for nothing, but there’s nobody I’d rather take fifty grand from than you.’
He laughed. I got the job, but it didn’t make him amenable during my follow up questions, which he answered more with irritation than enthusiasm. I made notes while he talked about his son’s background - education, friends, places they’d lived. I asked about girlfriends. Cooper couldn’t name any (‘He’s not fucking queer, if that’s what you mean!’). The Coopers had divorced when David was twelve. Was he still close to his mother? Cooper said the kid never talked about her.
I’d expected at least a couple of nostalgic reminiscences about the boy’s childhood, but Cooper kept it practical. It seemed to me he hardly knew his son. Memories of my own father loomed; our relationship had been no better. Makes you wonder why people have kids.
Cooper quickly grew impatient, and told me to get cracking and to assume the boy had been abducted by the killer.
David had last been seen by his father’s trainer, Bobby Watt, visiting his yard on Monday to school a couple of horses. Watt’s place was near Uttoxeter in Staffordshire.
The trainer wasn’t that helpful when I phoned. ‘The kid looked okay, quiet as usual. He arrived about eight, schooled three for me, had breakfast and buggered off.’
‘Did he say where he was going?’
‘Nope. He wasn’t racing that day was all he told me.’
‘And he seemed all right?’
‘I told you, the boy’s so quiet you wouldn’t notice any difference. He could be suicidal and you prob’ly couldn’t tell.’
‘He finish his breakfast?’
‘As far as I know. I don’t wet-nurse him.’
‘He was supposed to be going to his mother’s birthday party that night, did he mention it?’
‘Not to me he didn’t.’
‘Is he close to anyone in the yard, any of the lads?’
‘I think Pauline’s got the hots for him but I doubt it’s mutual.’
‘Can I talk to her?’
‘She’s out with the second lot just now.’
‘Ask her to ring me, will you?’ I gave him my number and asked him who would ride Cooper’s horses while the kid was missing.
‘Nobody. Jack told me to withdraw two today and two tomorrow and not to make any more entries until the kid’s found.’
‘So you will be suspending his training bills out of sympathy?’
‘Fat fucking chance.’
Pauline called within an hour. She was hard work. All I learnt was that David wasn’t happy living with his father, and had talked vaguely about moving to France with his mother sometime soon. He had mentioned his mother’s birthday party and intended going on the evening he’d disappeared. He hadn’t said what he’d planned for the rest of that day and no, Pauline didn’t walk him to his car, so couldn’t say if he had a suitcase with him.
I thought the next best lead would be David’s mother. If he was close enough to her to talk about moving to France, then he wouldn’t have run away without telling her. If he’d absconded to escape his father, there was every chance she’d be in on it.
I rang her, introduced myself and asked if she’d mind answering some questions.
‘I don’t know you from Adam,’ she said, ‘you could be anybody.’
‘If you’d like to call your husband, he can -’
‘Listen Mister Malloy, Jack Cooper hasn’t been my husband for a long time. I haven’t spoken to him for even longer. If you want me to answer questions, come and see me, and bring some ID.’
She gave me her address in London. I said I’d be there by eight that evening.
Lisa had left a message on the answer-phone.
I called her. ‘Not working today?’ I asked.
‘On leave for two weeks.’
‘That’s right, I forgot. How’s Susan?’
‘Not at all well, I’m afraid. They took her into hospital last night.’
‘Jeez. That bad?’
‘On the edge of a complete breakdown.’
She sounded strained. I said, ‘Are you okay?’
‘Fine. I just feel so sorry for her.’
I sympathised and we talked for a while. I told her what had happened over the past few days. She reacted with anger and incredulity. When I reached the part where the doctor stood me down, she told me she’d been at Nottingham and overheard a discussion between the racecourse doctor and Claude Beckman.
‘Beckman was saying something like, when he does come back I’ll have him in front of the stewards. I hadn’t a clue who they were talking about.’
‘Can you remember what time it was?’
‘It was after racing. I was on my way home. Why?’
‘I was just wondering if Beckman could have been the guy who tipped the Doc off, but there’s no way he could have known.’
‘That man does not care for you at all,’ Lisa said.
‘It’s getting to be mutual. What do you know about him?’
‘Not much. Was a bit of a mummy’s boy. He travelled abroad for a few years from what I hear. Moved in with his mother when he returned and looked after her until she died. Lives on his own somewhere in the Welsh Borders now, I think. Never married.’
‘Gay?’
‘Does it matter?’
‘Not to me, but the more I know about him, the better chance of me finding out why he hates me.’
‘Well if he was gay, he’d probably fancy you.’
That shut me up for a moment. ‘I don’t think I’d be his type.’
‘Whose type would you be, Eddie?’
The conversation was taking a turn which felt more like a skid. I was losing control of it, unsure whether Lisa was coming on to me or not. ‘I don’t think I’m the one to ask about that. Can we concentrate on Beckman?’
‘Sure.’
‘Does he bet?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know.’
‘Maybe he lost a lot of money on one of my horses, and that’s why he can’t stand me. In fact, I’m wondering now if he’s in with Layton on the bent races. He was raging at Wolverhampton after that race that was supposed to be fixed.’
‘I don’t think he does bet. He’s not supposed to, as you know, but I’d have heard it on the grapevine if he was a gambler.’
‘He’s beginning to bug me.’
She said, ‘Let me nose around and see what else I can find out about him.’
‘Be careful. You’ve got a job to protect.’
‘Least
of my worries.’
I told her I was heading for London to see David’s mother, and that I’d keep her in touch.
She said, ‘What about your back? Can you drive?’
‘A bit like Quasimodo in a milk-cart but I’ll get there.’
‘Why don’t I drive you?’
‘To London?’
‘Wherever. I’m doing nothing for the next ten days. Pick me up.’
‘You might need to pack an overnight bag.’ Unsure if I was reading too much into the ensuing pause, I added, ‘Just as a precaution. It’s not a come-on.’
‘Of course not.’
Again, I couldn’t read her tone and wished I could see her face. She said, ‘See you when you get here.’
33
Lisa must have been watching from the window. As I parked, she came striding toward me in that easy athletic gait. I tried not to grimace or groan as I eased myself out of the car and straightened slowly.
We both smiled. Her hair shone, the whites of her brown eyes were luminously clear beneath a dark fringe. I couldn’t see a trace of make-up. She smiled; her teeth gleamed. Standing close to me on this bright cold afternoon, I thought she was the healthiest, most vibrant human being I’d ever seen.
‘You look... very well,’ I said awkwardly.
She smiled wide and said, ‘Thanks, I wish I could say the same for you. You look like shit. Your back must be killing you.’
‘Is it that obvious?’
‘You’re an awful colour.’
I smiled. ‘I can see this is going to be a really uplifting trip.’
She touched my arm. ‘Sorry, I should keep my mouth shut.’
‘Forget it.’
I moved my makeshift backpad to the passenger seat, Lisa adjusted the driving position and mirrors and we set off south.
We talked about Beckman and the killings, young Cooper and his father, Susan and the children (staying now with their grandparents in Devon) and about things in general. Nothing too personal, but by the time we reached the outskirts of London we seemed reasonably familiar and comfortable with each other.
We stopped for coffee. I rang Kavanagh to find out if he’d spoken to Doctor Donnelly.
‘Funnily enough, I just got back from interviewing him.’
‘Did he say who reported me?’