The Eddie Malloy Series

by Joe McNally

  We got talking about Dunn. ‘You’re looking for him?’ Breslin asked.

  ‘I’d quite like to speak to him.’

  ‘Been a bad boy, has he?’

  ‘Not that I know of. I just think he might be able to help me out.’

  ‘Got a veterinary problem?’

  ‘More of a personal one, really. Well, on behalf of a friend.’ I mentioned Brian Kincaid and gave him the same spiel I’d given McCarthy.

  ‘I can give you his address,’ Breslin said.

  ‘The bungalow out at Six Mile Bottom?’

  ‘You know it?’

  I nodded. ‘But it’s no good.’ I told him about the moonlight flit.

  He laughed. ‘Well, bugger me; I wonder if he’ll welch this time?’

  ‘Does he owe much?’

  He shrugged his big shoulders. ‘About seven grand. It’s not the end of the world.’

  He wasn’t showing off. He didn’t seem that concerned about it though he said sure, he’d like to know where Dunn turned up if I managed to find him. In exchange, he told me a few details about Dunn’s gambling habits. One tidbit was to prove very useful.

  Thankfully, Breslin brushed aside my offer to pay the bill and we parted on good terms. Always a better audience than a performer, I’d enjoyed his company. He gave me his card and we made mutual promises to stay in touch.

  My first stop next morning was a newsagent’s shop where I picked up a little tourist booklet about Newmarket, Headquarters of British Racing. Inside was a map listing the names of all the training yards, along with the trainers currently inhabiting them. Breslin had told me that a significant number of Alex Dunn’s bets in the last eighteen months to two years had been on horses trained by William Capshaw, a highly successful Newmarket trainer.

  I found Capshaw’s yard location on the map, and just to double check, I walked down the Bury Road past the yard. It was the same one Dunn had gone to after Martin had confronted him. I thought it unwise to pass the yard gates again and took a different route to the High Street.

  So Dunn was getting information from Capshaw’s yard. In exchange for what? Veterinary services? I couldn’t recall seeing Capshaw’s name among Dunn’s copy invoices, though that might be the deal, no cash.

  In a small cafe, I ordered coffee and got out Dunn’s client list: no sign of Capshaw’s name.

  Perhaps Dunn was holed up at Capshaw’s place. If so, would he be careless and park his car close by? It was worth risking another walk past, more slowly this time. My mobile rang, shattering the peace in the sunny little cafe and bringing sour looks from three elderly ladies. It was Martin. I went outside. He’d phoned thirty-nine studs. Eight had given him reasons for suspicion.

  I didn’t want him with me and managed to persuade him to look more closely at the studs involved. I asked him to plot their locations on a map, find out their histories: who was running them, their background, if they’d had the same employee through their hands, etc. - enough work to keep him in Wiltshire for a few days and out of my hair.

  On the off chance I’d been spotted around Capshaw’s yard, it would be best to delay another stroll in that direction until this afternoon. If I watched the yard from a safe distance around lunchtime, maybe I’d see some of Capshaw’s lads heading for the pub. It would be easy to strike up a conversation over a drink and try to find out if the vet was a temporary lodger, but some of the lads might recognize me and start spreading the wrong kind of stories.

  I decided to stick to lone observation, at least until late afternoon, and found a car park close enough to Capshaw’s place to let me watch the main exit road from the yard. I had no view of the yard itself, and if Dunn came out of it and turned right, I’d miss him completely, but better to cover half the options in relative safety than all of them in an exposed position.

  In the car, with the windows rolled down, I settled back with a copy of The Sporting Life which would offer extra camouflage if necessary.

  I wondered how Dunn was running his business. Would he be having his calls automatically transferred to wherever he now was? I called his number. Answerphone. That meant he would have to play it back, although he could do that remotely.

  As the 11.30 radio news began, my phone rang. ‘Alex Dunn is at his house at Six Mile Bottom.’ The caller immediately hung up. I started the car and headed for Dunn’s place, wondering who my informant was. Perhaps Breslin had put the word out. Quick work if he had.

  I pulled up, blocking Dunn’s driveway in case he made a run for it, but his car wasn’t there. Either I’d been hoaxed or I’d just missed him. I went through the green iron gates to the rear of the bungalow. As I turned at the end of the wall, I stopped short. Two men were sitting on an old garden bench. They wore expensive summer suits and lounged lazily, faces, in very dark glasses, tilted to the sun.

  The man closest to me stood up and came forward, smiling, welcoming. ‘Mister Malloy, how kind of you to drop in.’ Bewildered, I shook his hand, waiting for him to introduce himself. He didn’t. His friend was standing now, smoothing out imaginary wrinkles on the front of his trousers. They were mid-twenties, fit and hard looking, tall as University oarsmen.

  I said to the one who’d greeted me, ‘You called me?’

  ‘That’s right. I understand you’re seeking advice.’

  ‘Information. I’ve got all the advice I need at the moment.’

  He was still smiling. It annoyed me that his eyes were hidden, the high sun glinting off his gold framed dark glasses. He said, ‘The wrong kind of advice, Mister Malloy. It’s good reliable advice you want, and luckily that is our specialist business. Come and sit down.’ He put a hand lightly on my elbow. I eased it away. ‘No, thanks.’

  ‘Fine. I give the same high-calibre advice standing up.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Drop what you’re involved in and go home. Stick to riding horses.’

  ‘Who do you work for?’

  ‘We’re a charitable organization dedicated to keeping people out of hospitals.’

  ‘You’re threatening me?’

  The smile faded. Stern-mouthed he said, ‘I’m offering you genuine professional advice. You won’t realize how valuable it is unless you don’t take it, then you’ll reflect on this conversation with a bit more circumspection.’

  An educated hit man. He took off his sunglasses, exposing blue eyes, which looked very sincere. He said, ‘It is very important to me that you leave Newmarket within the hour and that you stay away from the town and the people who live here. It is vitally important to me that you stop asking questions.’

  He was serious. I didn’t know what to say or how to take it. ‘Do you understand how important it is to me?’ he pressed.

  ‘If you tell me why, it might just drive the message home.’

  A flicker of anger in his cold eyes and what seemed a conscious effort to regain the calm expression, and that was when I knew how potentially dangerous he could be. I thought it best to call it quits for the time being.

  They came out onto the road and watched me till my car was out of sight. Curiouser and curiouser. No heavy stuff but they’d looked the part all right, and I was in no doubt the gloves would be off next time. Where had Dunn got these two from? The guy spent all his money gambling, how was he paying them?

  And why had things accelerated so quickly?

  By the time I reached Newmarket, I’d decided to pack up and leave immediately. Dunn would have his spies out and would think I’d fled. Maybe he’d return home then, and it would be a nice surprise for him when I turned up there in a couple of days. At my digs, I made a show of throwing my things in my bag, leaving it unzipped as I hurried to the car and scooted along the High Street and out of town at a pace that would have drawn attention. Hamming it up, but if it helped tempt Dunn to the surface I could forgive myself.

  I returned to my flat for a change of clothes. It was late afternoon. The yard was still as quiet as it had been since the end of May. It would be anothe
r month before the horses were back. A racing yard without thoroughbreds is a melancholy place.

  I thought about Charles Tunney, the trainer. The man who’d buggered off to Alaska for a month after watching some TV series about a town there. Impulsive man, Charles. I smiled, thinking about him.

  Charles and the stable lads were my only regular contacts, a big bantering family without emotional obligations. I missed them all.

  I’d planned to avoid Newmarket for a few days in the hope Dunn would think I’d given up, but I couldn’t face another day in the flat. I packed enough clothes for a week and headed east again, stopping only to fill up and buy groceries.

  I pulled up in front of Dunn’s bungalow, blocking the drive again. I went down the path, heels clicking loudly on the flagstones, and round the back.

  Nobody on the garden bench. Nobody in the house. The second glass pane I’d broken hadn’t been repaired nor the mess cleaned up. On the trip across, I’d decided on a plan of attack. Anxious to get started, I returned to the car and drove to the clearing in the woods I’d used last week. I took my kitbag and walked to Dunn’s, where I unpacked the bag then cleared away the broken glass.

  I listened to the messages on Dunn’s answerphone; all were from customers and had been left that morning so he was emptying his machine regularly. Next time he did, I’d try Martin’s trick of dialing the recall code to see where Dunn had called from. I used the phone to call McCarthy on his mobile. He didn’t sound delighted when he heard my voice. ‘Did you find Alex Dunn?’ he asked.

  ‘Nope, that’s why I’m calling. I need to see you, Mac.’

  ‘That means you want a favour.’

  ‘Have any of the “favours” you’ve done me in the past worked against you? You’ve always come up smelling of roses.’

  ‘Mostly because you dropped me in deep shit to begin with.’

  ‘Ha! Where have you been sharpening your wit?’

  ‘On the horns of all the dilemmas you’ve left me in.’

  ‘Touché, Mac. First two rounds to you.’

  I could almost feel his smug smile down the phone. I said, ‘Where are you going today?’

  ‘Got a meeting in London. A long one.’

  ‘Want to come here afterwards for dinner?’

  ‘Where’s “here”?’

  ‘Newmarket.’

  ‘No, thanks. I promised Jean I’d take her out.’

  ‘Where are you tomorrow?’

  ‘Sandown.’

  ‘Can you spare me half an hour there?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘I’ll get there before racing. Want to meet by the parade ring?’

  ‘No. Meet me in the car park an hour before the first. I get nervous talking to you on course.’

  ‘Okay. I’ll see you in the car park.’

  ‘Eddie, I’ll stay in my car. Come and find me.’

  ‘Sure.’

  I didn’t want to leave Dunn’s bungalow in case he came back, but I thought it was time to start building up a few alternatives. I’d have to tell Mac more than I’d originally planned to, but not enough to compromise his position in Jockey Club Security.

  I rang Martin, who was barely halfway through the task of analyzing all the information on the suspect studs. The staff histories were proving the toughest, as I’d known they would. I left him to it.

  I found three tea bags lying on an otherwise bare shelf in Dunn’s kitchen and made a mug of strong black tea, which I sipped as I dialed Compton Breslin’s office. A girl told me he was betting at Yarmouth. I called his mobile. His cheery voice brought an immediate picture of him in his loud suit. I asked him for a list of all Dunn’s bets this season. He promised it would be ready for me to collect in twenty-four hours.

  I sat by the silent phone for a while then paced the living room. Looking out of the front window I saw the glint of the sun reflected from deep in the woods and realized I hadn’t driven the car far enough into the trees. I was reluctant to leave in case Dunn called to empty the answerphone then someone else called immediately after him, wiping out his recall number.

  I’d need to be desperately unlucky for that to happen. Deciding to chance it, I hurried out into the woods and ran toward the car. I couldn’t have been gone more than ten minutes, but when I returned the flashing light on the answerphone had stopped.

  It had been emptied. I grabbed the handset from the cradle before another call could come through and dialed 1471. I jotted down the number given by the recorded voice, even said thank you to the lady. Dunn must still be in Newmarket; that was the STD code.

  My impulse was to dial it immediately but that might prove counter-productive. If Dunn realized I’d tracked him down, he’d probably take off again, sending me rapidly back to square one. It would be much better if I could find out the address the number belonged to. Mac should be able to get that. I rang his mobile again: switched off. I tried him every fifteen minutes until six then gave up. Tomorrow would have to do.

  29

  I wandered through Sandown’s car park looking for Mac, and then I saw his silver Rover come in off the road. He bypassed the turn into the officials’ entrance and backed into a space against the fence. I walked over and opened the passenger door to see Mac’s belly touching the steering wheel.

  He was red, flustered, and trying not to look it. ‘Sorry I’m a bit late, Eddie. The traffic’s deplorable.’

  ‘No hurry. Not on my side anyway.’

  ‘Well, I don’t exactly have all day. What was it you wanted to talk about?’

  ‘Alex Dunn.’

  ‘Again?’

  I told him about Dunn’s disappearance, about the two hard men I’d run into at his house, about how anxious Dunn was to discourage me from finding him. I was still playing it around Brian Kincaid’s death, not mentioning anything about the stallions.

  Mac said, ‘So you think Dunn’s involved in Kincaid’s death?’

  ‘I don’t know. But I do know that a simple question from me sent him into a panic that was bad enough for him to up stakes and leave his home and business.’

  ‘What makes you so sure you were the catalyst?’

  This was where things got tricky. I didn’t want to bring Martin’s name into it at all, let alone tell Mac it was the confrontation with him that had been the real cue for Dunn’s vanishing act. I busked along, trying to convince Mac that the pure shock on Dunn’s face when I’d first approached him at the races told me that he had to be deeply worried.

  I chose my words carefully, but Mac assumed I was trying to implicate Dunn in Brian’s death. He shifted heavily in his seat so he was looking straight at me. ‘You’d best be very careful, Eddie. You can’t make accusations on hunches.’

  ‘Come on, Mac, it’s more than a hunch, you’ve known me long enough to realize that.’

  ‘The same as your first suspect in Kincaid’s death was more than a hunch? Tranter, he of the cast-iron alibi?’

  ‘Okay, fair enough. That was a mistake.’

  He sighed. ‘So what do you want me to do?’

  I looked at him. ‘Mac, don’t make it sound like it’s all for me. You guys should be investigating Dunn’s disappearance.’

  ‘What disappearance? He’s told the racecourses that normally use him he’s unavailable until further notice. If we “investigated” every vet, doctor or starter who decided to take a few weeks off work, we’d never get anything done.’

  ‘It’s more than that, Mac. He’s up to something. I’m tipping you off, trying to make sure you’re not left with large helpings of egg on your face.’

  ‘Very philanthropic of you.’

  A frown I knew well gathered on Mac’s face. This was the poker hand where he had to decide whether to fold and leave me to it or draw some cards. He’d be worried about coming in too late if this blew up. Not much point in the Jockey Club Security Department having their finger on the pulse of a dead case. He said, ‘Okay. Let me see what I can find out.’

  ‘Maybe you
could start with this?’ I said, giving him the recall number used by Dunn to clear his answerphone. Mac promised to ring me when he had something then asked me to leave the car ‘as unobtrusively as possible’.

  I did and he drove away to take up his customary spot in the car park. I’d considered going into the racecourse for an hour to see if I could pick anything up, but decided against it. Until I’d nailed Dunn, it was important to make him believe I’d been scared off.

  I’d just settled and turned the ignition key when I noticed a familiar figure step out of a black Mercedes parked about six rows in front of me. It was old Iron Fist in a Velvet Glove himself, the guy who’d warned me off at Dunn’s bungalow. He set off toward the stands.

  I let him get up the steps and through the main doors before I started to get out to follow him. As I did so, the driver’s door of the black Merc opened and out stepped another man I knew, another man I’d seen recently: Sheik Ahmad Saad’s racing manager, Mr. F. Loss. Candy.

  I stayed in my car, waiting to see if anyone else would come out of the Merc, but Candy locked it and headed for the stands, striding out boldly in his perfectly cut pinstripe suit.

  I relaxed in the seat, drumming on the steering wheel, trying like hell not to jump to conclusions. What was Candy’s connection with the hit man? Were they associated ‘professionally’ or had Candy simply, and perfectly innocently, offered him a lift to the races? If so, why had they sat so long in the Merc? Why had they entered the racecourse separately?

  What should I do next?

  Before I could make any connection, I had to find out who this guy was. Maybe Mac would know him by sight. It was simply a matter of getting Mac within safe viewing distance of Iron Fist, which might not be too difficult. Today’s crowd wouldn’t be that big and it was still half an hour before the first race.

  I locked the car and headed for the entrance.

  30

  Wending my way through the parked cars, I came upon an old friend, Charlie Harris, a racecourse photographer. Charlie was unloading his gear. I had an idea and asked him to lend me one of his cameras with a zoom lens, promising to return it by first race time. He told me it was a spare and that I could keep it all day if I needed to.