by Joe McNally
My father had died the year before and I had hoped his death would free her, that the ragged ruined strands of the supposed bond between mother and child could somehow be re-tied. But his memory and her guilt had done too much damage. The dry words in her will offered the only recompense she could find: “To our surviving son, Edward, we bequeath our share in Keelkerry Stud.”
Surviving son. A final barb.
The other shareholder in the stud, my sister Marie, was living there. She offered to buy out my share and I told her she could have it for nothing.
‘Why?’ Marie asked, ‘You’re entitled to half the value.’
‘Because it’s blood money.’
‘Don’t be stupid, Eddie, for God’s sake! It was her way of trying to make everything right.’
‘I’ve found the place I want to live. I don’t want to build it with their money, not a brick of it.’
Marie and I had seen little of each other over the years, and we’d had a bitter fallout over her son, Kim. Last year she had spurned him for a second time, and Kim had come to live with me and Laura, the woman I’d believed was finally the woman. But faced yet again with the intimacies of life as a ‘partner’, with meeting the expectations of a loved one, the cracks in the foundations of my personality could not withstand the strain.
We broke up.
Marie, motherless and alone in that big house, suddenly decided she did want her son back in her life. So Kim, a noble boy, did the selfless thing and went to live with her. He’d never admit that he’d seen it as a duty. But we’d known, he and I. Only Marie seemed oblivious of the fact.
I saw Kim from time to time, but it was painful for us. We’d formed a strong bond, and it was he who’d consoled me with promises that one day we would all be together again. And he had cut through my cynicism. I believed him. He was thirteen, and more mature than his mother and his uncle put together.
But all of that had made me more ruthless in my desire for a fresh start, dependent on no one, determined to reject an inheritance that would have tied me forever to my father. And Marie, at least, had known me well enough to realize it wasn’t worth arguing. We agreed that she’d lend me enough to finish the bungalow.
That’s how far forward I had planned; a bungalow. No stairs. Nothing to hinder battered arthritic joints if I reached retirement age. I’d learn to relax, I told myself, do some gardening, sit in the sun house reading on summer evenings.
I’d known, of course, that the aptitude for relaxation had always eluded me. But this, this renewal, this home I had built would change things, wouldn’t it?
I smiled as I sat swilling whiskey round my glass, trying to make it reach the rim without looping out. I’d spent no more than an hour in this sun house since I’d bought it, and here I was in the freezing darkness, the snow pale on the lawn except for the yellow rectangle lit from the picture window.
Oh, yes, that window was to be another relaxation outlet; my view of nature, of wildlife. I drank and washed the whiskey round my mouth, thinking back to the spring, to my mother’s funeral. I stood at the grave, soil and turf barely settled over my father when they’d carved it open once more for his wife.
With both parents below me, I was conscious of taking a step forward in the mortality line, one rank closer to death.
3
I lay awake in the dead silence. Since finding him hanging, I’d been unable to wipe the image, to blink it from my mind’s eye. Anytime my thoughts were unoccupied, he came back. I even had a name for him now: Swinging Jimmy.
Swinging Jimmy. It wasn’t meant to belittle him or his memory, it was just that he was with me so often, my mind had found a way of welcoming him. Not as a ghoulish suicide, but as a relaxed, peaceful, gently swinging Jimmy.
His body had been warm. I’d lifted him, half over my shoulder. Rust flakes from the chain fell into my hair.
I’d kept saying his name. He had wet himself and it seeped into my shirt. Supporting him with my right arm, I’d managed to pull my phone out with my left hand, intent on holding him up until an ambulance arrived. But there was no mobile signal in the cellar.
I had made myself count out a minute in silence, holding my breath to try and hear Jimmy’s. I clutched his wrist, seeking a pulse. Nothing.
I let him go and ran upstairs to make the call and when I returned he was swinging in a small circle. I sat in his dangling shadow cast from the cobwebbed light-bulb, and when the police arrived I turned away, not wanting to see strangers work Jimmy through the cold practicalities of release.
A uniformed policeman, Sergeant Middleton, took my statement. I told him Jimmy had asked to see me, although I didn’t know why.
‘Were you close friends?’
‘Not really. We’d known each other a long time, and I saw him two or three days a week on the racecourse, but we didn’t socialize.’
‘So you’ve no idea what he wanted to talk to you about?’
‘He told me he was packing his job in. I’d helped get him it and I think he might have wanted to explain his reasons.’
‘In what way did you help him get the job?’
I told him how Jimmy had saved my life fourteen years ago. ‘I owed him.’
He nodded, finishing his notes. He got me to check and sign them. ‘Is this a formal statement then?’
‘For now.’ I might need to ask more questions in the next few days.’
After New Year’s day breakfast, I looked at the satellite picture of the UK on my PC.
White.
Sixty racecourses buried under snow and frost. I should have been on the road to Cheltenham for two rides, but my workplace was snowbound. The weathermen promised no relief in the coming days.
I put on my running gear and headed into the woods, imagining myself alone on the planet, breaking new ground through the whiteness. A mercenary thought crept in. I’d probably get the rides back for Bayley Watt’s yard now that Jimmy was gone.
Bayley had offered me that position as stable jockey along with a small cash retainer. I could have used the job and the money. But balancing things on my imaginary scales, I found my wallet outweighed by my conscience.
Jimmy was clinging by his fingertips at the time. He’d split with his wife and was just trying to handle each day as it came. He’d needed the job more than I did, although he hadn’t known it was on offer.
I persuaded Bayley to take him instead of me and they’d done okay together.
I crunched on rhythmically through the snow, trying to recall what Jimmy had said about warning me to be careful if Bayley Watt made an offer. I’d wait a day or two, then ring Bayley. Or maybe a week. For decency’s sake.
4
On the afternoon of January 3rd, my phone lit up with an unknown number. It was Jimmy Sherrick’s father. He sounded surprisingly strong, given how frail he’d looked at the funeral. ‘Eddie, I got your number from Jimmy’s diary. I’m at his house trying to sort out his stuff. He left a letter for you.’
‘Oh.’ I searched for something to say.
He said, ‘Do you want me to drop it in? You’re not far away, are you?’
‘I’m not, no. Ten minutes. But I can come to you. You’ll have enough to do.’
‘I’d… I’d rather be on my own here until this is done, if you know what I mean. No offence. It’s a bit…hard.’
‘Sure. Fine. I understand. Do you want to ring when you’re leaving and I’ll give you directions?’
Mister Sherrick arrived as dusk fell. His hand was cold, the skin loose and thin. ‘Come in. The kettle is on, or I can offer you something stronger.’
He wiped snow from his shiny black boots. ‘Tea would be fine. Heat me up. You’re well tucked away down here, eh?’
We settled at the kitchen table, the room warmed by the stove and the bright lights. Mister Sherrick kept his jacket on. He wore a brown suit, black tie tight to his shirt collar. I knew from my childhood that the schedule of mourning was important to his generation. He took a pale blue e
nvelope from his pocket and handed it to me.
“E. Malloy”. Business-like. I could imagine Jimmy sitting alone, putting his affairs in order. We should all have done it by now, but jockeys, who have less chance than many of living out their full years, are no more disciplined than the rest.
Mister Sherrick watched me. I didn’t know the protocol for this. Maybe there wasn’t one. ‘Should I open it now?’
He shrugged, open-armed and said. ‘I read mine at the house.’
How many letters had Jimmy written? I opened it. One sheet of paper, neat, symmetrical writing in blue pen.
Dear Eddie,
I’d been meaning to talk to you for a while. If you’re reading this, then I probably never got round to it. Don’t think too badly of me. I was just trying to come with a late run. I doubt I’d ever have got up, and the stewards would have taken it away from me anyway.
Life is short. Health is precious. Spend no time trying to make your mark, because we will all be forgotten.
Best
Jimmy
Folding it I said, ‘Sad. I wish I’d known he’d been struggling so badly.’ I told Mister Sherrick about the job offer from Bayley Watt and how I felt Jimmy would have been better suited to it. He nodded. ‘Did he mention suicide in the letter?
‘No. He didn’t.’ I felt obliged to hold the page out to him. He palmed it away with a raised hand. ‘No. No. Thank you. I don’t doubt your word. There was nothing in mine either. If only he’d given me some clue.’ He bowed his head.
‘You’re not responsible for what Jimmy did, Mister Sherrick.’
He said, ‘I’d thought at first it was a cry for help gone wrong. He knew you were coming to see him and I believe his body was still warm when you found him and, well I just kind of thought he’d tried to time things so you’d get there to save him. But the police told me he took cyanide too.’
‘Cyanide?’
He nodded sadly. ‘He was quite thorough, Jimmy. Attended to detail. He was the same when he was a boy.’
‘Jeez, where would he get cyanide?’
He shrugged again and looked toward the stove. I watched his watery, bloodshot eyes. He turned to me and said, ‘They asked if I wanted to listen to the message he left. The suicide message.’
‘The note?’
‘A note, I suppose, but he didn’t write it. He recorded it. The police found it on his computer and on a, what did they call it, some kind of stick, a computer thing.’
‘A memory stick?’
‘That was it. I told them I didn’t want to know what was on it. They offered me the memory stick anyway, said I didn’t have to play it but that it was part of Jimmy’s belongings. I told them to keep it.’
I nodded, ‘Probably best, Mister Sherrick.’ I could understand him not wanting to hear it but I wanted to, because the voice on it would not belong to Jimmy Sherrick. A murder message, maybe, but not suicide.
5
On January 4th, the racing world was still hibernating. I waited alone in what the female PC who led me there had called the ‘green room’ in Newbury police station.
The door opened and Sergeant Middleton came in dressed in a short-sleeved white shirt and navy trousers. When I’d first met him in Jimmy Sherrick’s cellar, he’d been burlier and more serious, though I realized now that he wore no uniform jacket or high vis waterproof. No need in here for a stab vest.
He held out his hand and I stood to shake it. ‘Thanks for seeing me at short notice.’
‘That’s okay. All quiet on the western front. Sit down, please.’ We sat facing each other. ‘You mentioned Jimmy Sherrick?’
‘I saw his father yesterday. He told me Jimmy had left a suicide message on his PC.’
He looked at me; no doubt weighing up the wisdom of confirming then realizing he could hardly imply Mister Sherrick had been lying. ‘That’s right,’ he said.
‘And he saved a copy on a memory stick?’
He nodded slowly, his look keener now.
‘Jimmy couldn’t even send a text. He was a technophobe, a digital dyslexic.’
He hesitated then said, ‘How do you know that?’
‘It was a standing joke in the weighing room.’ He seemed puzzled. I said, ‘The weighing room’s where we all head for. It’s where we get weighed before riding in a race then weighed again when we come back in to make sure we haven’t dumped a stone of lead in the water jump. The jockey’s changing room is inside the weighing room.’
He nodded. ‘Go on. About the texting.’
‘Let me give you an example. About two weeks ago we were all laughing when Bill Kittinger came in and told us he’d sent Jimmy a text that morning and, for the first time ever, Jimmy had responded. He put “OK”. Bill sent him another one saying “Who taught you to text?”. A minute later Bill’s phone rang. It was Jimmy. He said “Bill, I can only do OK so I had to call you.”‘
The sergeant thought about it then said, ‘Some people claim to be technophobes just to make themselves stand out these days.’
‘Jimmy wasn’t like that. There was only one side to him. What you saw was what you got. A few of us had tried to teach him how to text but he just couldn’t grasp it. Somebody brought in a laptop a few months back to show him how to use email and look at the Racing Post website.’
‘Maybe he developed from there?’
I shook my head. The sergeant said, ‘Well he developed enough to order cyanide online.’
I looked at him and waited. He said, ‘We checked his PC and found the confirmation email and receipt for payment.’
‘How did he pay?’
‘Debit card.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Certain. Why?’
‘Because all he used his card for was to withdraw money. Jimmy paid cash. He used to warn anybody who said they’d ordered stuff online that they’d end up in a fraud case.’
‘Give me a minute,’ he said, and went out. He returned with a black memory stick and thirty seconds later I was listening to Jimmy’s voice.
“Every day I hurt from old injuries and from old memories. Something happens to a man when he turns forty. I’ve seen too many sad people. I don’t want to be one of them. I want to make extra sure. That’s why I did it this way. Hanging? It’s no certainty. Goodbye.”
Sergeant Middleton watched me. ‘Would you agree that is Mister Sherrick’s voice?’
‘It sounds like him.’
‘It is him. We compared it with two interviews he did on TV.’ He checked his notes. ‘The forensic speech analyst we use classified it a five, the highest score, which expresses as, “Exceptionally distinctive - the possibility of this combination of features being shared by other speakers is considered to be remote”‘.
‘How remote?’
‘Enough to convince ninety nine percent of judges and juries, I’d say.’
‘Sergeant, interview some of the guys who worked with him. To make that recording Jimmy would need to have downloaded software, installed it, and learned how to use it… just to record a suicide note, which he’d then go to the trouble of saving on a memory stick so it was easily found?’
‘That’s what we’re left with, evidence. Add it to the fact he hanged himself and took a cyanide pill and ask yourself what the man in the street would say about the police if we came to any other conclusion.’
I nodded. ‘Fair point. But I still think it’s the wrong conclusion.’
‘Why?’
‘Look, I’m not going to say Jimmy wasn’t the type to commit suicide, he might well have been. We weren’t bosom buddies, but I knew him pretty well. I told you in my statement how he was unhappy riding for Bayley Watt.’
‘You should speak to his father about this. He says Jimmy never really got over the break-up of his relationships. He was in pain much of the time. There’s more I could tell you but it wouldn’t be right to. I’ve seen his medical notes. Why do you believe he didn’t commit suicide?’
‘I don’t necessarily belie
ve he didn’t. I came here ready to bet that wasn’t Jimmy’s voice on the tape but it sounds exactly like him. I just don’t know how he did it, made the recording I mean. And I still don’t think he did.’
‘Sometimes people just aren’t what they seem. The longer you’ve known them, the bigger the shock can be.’
I took out the letter Jimmy had left for me and passed it over. ‘Jimmy’s father found this yesterday.’
He read it. ‘Sad.’
‘It is. But what do you think of it, as a policeman, I mean?’
‘In what way?’
‘Forget the content, look at it. Check the date. Draw a conclusion about what kind of person would have written it.’
He looked at it, turned it over, placed it flat on the desk. ‘Neat handwriting, even, unhurried. I’d say somebody fairly meticulous, a person who liked to plan things, keep control, somebody who didn’t like surprises.’
‘Jimmy wrote that for me more than four months ago. He wrote one for his father and a few other people, though you’d need to ask Mister Sherrick about that.’
‘Go on.’
‘Why didn’t Jimmy leave recordings for us? Or a nicely typed note? Why would he take the trouble to record a suicide message when he could have written it in less than a minute?’
‘Good question. I don’t know the answer.’ He picked up the letter. ‘What is this about the stewards taking it away from him? Any idea?’
‘It’s just an expression. The stewards are judge and jury in racing. If they decide you’ve broken the rules in a race, they can disqualify you; take the race away from you.’
‘Could Mister Sherrick have been hinting at something there?’
‘I don’t know. He’d had a few personal problems and they might have been coming to a head around the time he wrote that. He’s obviously low, and trying to make plans, but there’s no direct mention of suicide, and even if that was his intent, there can’t be many who’d wait four months after writing it. Not if they were serious.’