Dead Heat

  I beat Caroline back to the hotel room but only by about ten minutes. As before, she was high on the applause-induced adrenalin rush, while I was high on a mix of nitrous oxide and painkillers. And I was sporting a fibreglass cast on my wrist that stretched from the palm of my hand, round my thumb, and up to my elbow.

  An X-ray had clearly shown that I had a broken wrist, my ulna having been well and truly cracked right through, about an inch above the joint. Fortunately it wasn’t much displaced and the fracture had been reduced by a doctor simply pulling on my hand until the ends of the bone had returned to their rightful positions. I hadn’t enjoyed the experience in spite of the partial anaesthetic effects of the nitrous oxide. Laughing gas it may be, but the procedure had not been a laughing matter.

  The cast was designed to immobilize the joint and the doctor had told me it would have to stay on for at least six weeks. I remembered the stories my father used to tell about his injuries when he was a jump jockey. He always claimed that he was a quick healer, and he often told of how he would start trying to remove a plaster with scissors only about a week after breaking a bone. But jump jockeys are mad, everyone knows that.

  As instructed, I kept my right arm raised on a pillow throughout the night to reduce swelling under the cast. It wasn’t great for romance, but it did keep the pain to a minimum.

  Saturday came and went with me spending most of the time horizontal on the bed in Caroline’s hotel room. I watched some televised baseball, which was not very exciting, and then some motor racing that was more so.

  I ordered some room service Caesar salad for a midafternoon left-handed lunch and then called Carl using the hotel phone.

  ‘Where are you?’ he said. ‘I’ve had three phone calls from people saying they need to contact you urgently.’

  ‘Who are they?’ I asked.

  ‘One was your mother,’ he said. ‘One said they were from the Inland Revenue, and the third wouldn’t say.’

  ‘Did you get their numbers?’ I asked.

  ‘You must know your mother’s number, surely,’ he said. ‘The others didn’t leave one. They said they would call back. Where shall I tell them you are?’

  I wondered again if I could trust Carl.

  ‘Just tell them that I’m away,’ I said. ‘And I will be for at least another week.’

  ‘And will you?’ he asked.

  ‘Will I what?’ I said.

  ‘Will you be away for at least another week?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Could you cope if I was?’

  ‘I could cope even if you stayed away for ever,’ he said, and I wasn’t quite sure if he was expressing confidence in his own ability or contempt for mine.

  ‘I’ll take that to mean that everything’s all right at the restaurant then,’ I said.

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘Then I’ll call you again on Monday,’ I said.

  ‘OK,’ he said. ‘But where are you exactly? You told me you were going to your mother, so how come she called for you?’

  ‘Better if you don’t know,’ I said rather theatrically, which must have added to his suspicion.

  ‘If you say so,’ he said, sounding somewhat miffed. ‘But don’t forget to go and see your mother, she seemed very insistent that you should.’

  ‘OK, I will,’ I said, and hung up.

  My mother wasn’t at home. I knew that because the night before I left for Chicago I had told her to go and stay with another cousin in Devon, and she never needed telling twice to go down there because she loved it. I also told her not to call me as I would be away. But she almost never phoned me anyway; it was always me who phoned her.

  I called my mother’s cousin’s house in Torquay, again using the hotel phone. She answered at the second ring.

  ‘Hello, Max,’ she said in her usual deep voice. ‘I expect you want to talk to Diane.’ Diane was my mother.

  ‘Yes, please,’ I said.

  ‘Hold on a minute.’ She put the phone down and I could hear her calling for my mother.

  ‘Hello, darling,’ my mother said. ‘I’m having a wonderful time. It’s so beautiful down here.’ She had always wanted to move to Torquay but had never actually got round to it. My mother didn’t actually get round to much really.

  ‘Hello, Mum,’ I said. ‘Have you been trying to call me at the restaurant?’

  ‘No,’ she said. I knew she wouldn’t have. ‘Should I have been?’

  ‘No, of course not,’ I said. ‘I’m just calling to make sure you’re fine.’

  ‘Oh yes, darling,’ she said. ‘Everything is fine here. Janet has asked me to stay for another week.’ Good old Janet, I thought. Janet was my mother’s cousin.

  ‘Fine, Mum,’ I said. ‘Have a nice time. I’ll call you in a few days.’

  ‘Bye, darling,’ she trilled, and hung up.

  I lay back on the bed and wondered who it was who had told Carl she was my mother?

  I used my mobile to call my brother. Toby and I hardly ever spoke, but it was not due to any animosity, just a result of us never having been close as children and less so as adults.

  ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘Long time no see.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘How are Sally and the children?’

  ‘Fine, thanks,’ he said. ‘The kids are growing up fast.’ I don’t think he said it as a criticism of me for neglecting my two nephews and a niece. We both knew that for some unknown reason his wife, Sally, and I didn’t really get on very well. He and I were both content with the fact that we saw each other only very occasionally and usually at Newmarket when he was there alone for the bloodstock sales.

  ‘Mum’s in Torquay,’ I told him.

  ‘So I’ve heard,’ he said.

  ‘She’ll be there for another week, at least,’ I said.

  ‘Thanks for letting me know,’ he said. I knew that he popped in to see her fairly often. He lived in my father’s old house, next to the training stables, while our mother now lived in a cottage down the road.

  ‘Toby,’ I said, ‘can I see you sometime this coming week?’

  ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘When?’

  ‘I’m not certain,’ I said. ‘Monday probably. Maybe Tuesday.’

  ‘Fine,’ he said.

  ‘Can I stay the night?’ I asked him.

  There was a pause before he answered. ‘Is everything all right?’

  ‘My house burned down,’ I said.

  ‘Oh my God, Max,’ he said. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘I don’t think it was an accident,’ I said.

  There was another pause, longer this time. ‘Are you asking for my help?’ he said.

  ‘Yes, I am, but it’s not financial help I need.’

  ‘Good.’ He sounded relieved. ‘Come when you like,’ he said. ‘And stay as long as you want. I’ll fix it with Sally.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Can I bring someone with me?’

  ‘A girl?’ he asked. He knew me better than I imagined.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘One room or two?’

  ‘One,’ I said.

  ‘OK,’ he said, amused. ‘Give me a call when you know when you’re coming.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said again, and I meant it. ‘I will.’

  Caroline and I both flew back to London on Sunday night but, annoyingly, on different aeroplanes. I couldn’t get a seat on the same flight as the orchestra in spite of being number one on the stand-by list, so I followed them into the Illinois evening blue sky some fifty minutes later. The airline had shown pity on my injured wrist and had provided me with an empty seat on my right so that I could rest the cast on a pile of aircraft pillows and blankets. Even so, I slept only in fits and starts, and was thankful when we touched down gently at Heathrow on time at seven o’clock on Monday morning.

  Caroline was waiting for me just beyond passport control, sitting on a bench alongside Viola, who was safely stashed away out of sight in her made-to-measure black case. While she was not quite a Stradivarius, Viola was s
till much too valuable to have travelled across the Atlantic in the aircraft hold.

  ‘Where do we go from here?’ she asked, as I sat down next to her.

  ‘What do you mean?’ I said.

  ‘Do you think it’s safe to go back to my place?’ she said.

  ‘When do you have to be back with the orchestra?’ I asked her.

  ‘Wednesday lunchtime,’ she said. ‘We have a couple of days off now before rehearsals for the concerts on Thursday and Friday at Cadogan Hall. But I’ve got to do some personal preparation before then.’

  ‘We are going to stay with my brother for a couple of days,’ I said.

  ‘Are we, indeed? And where does he live?’

  ‘East Hendred,’ I said. ‘It’s near Didcot in Oxfordshire.’

  I had no intention of using my mobile for a while, so I called Toby on an airport pay phone in the baggage hall to tell him we were coming today.

  ‘Will it be safe?’ Caroline said.

  ‘I don’t know.’ It worried me that it might not be totally safe for my brother’s family either. But it was a chance I had to take. ‘I don’t know if anywhere could be totally safe,’ I said to her. ‘But I can’t hide for ever. I need to find out why Komarov is trying to kill me.’

  ‘If you’re sure it’s him,’ she said, ‘don’t you think it’s time you talked to the police?’

  ‘I will,’ I said. ‘After I’ve spoken to my brother and showed him the metal ball. Then I’ll call the police.’

  So it wasn’t the boys in blue I called next from the pay phone. It was Bernard Sims, my irrepressible lawyer.

  We collected first our luggage and then the rented Ford Mondeo from the airport hotel car park where I had left it the previous Wednesday. Fortunately it had an automatic gearbox and driving mostly one handed was relatively simple, so we joined the crawl-crawl, non-rush rush-hour traffic along the M4 into London. Caroline insisted on going to her flat to get some fresh clothes even though I wasn’t very keen on the idea, if only because East Hendred was in the opposite direction. I, personally, didn’t have any fresh clothes. Other than a couple of items I had abandoned at Carl’s house, all the clothes I owned were here in my suitcase.

  ‘I absolutely have to go home,’ said Caroline. ‘I also need some fresh strings for my viola, I have only two left.’

  ‘Can’t we just buy some?’ I asked her.

  She just looked at me for an answer, her head on its side, her mouth pursed.

  ‘OK, OK,’ I said. ‘I’ll take you home.’

  So we went to Fulham, but I insisted on driving up and down Tamworth Street at least three times to see if anyone was sitting in any of the parked cars watching her flat. Neither of us could spot anyone, so I stopped the car on the corner and Caroline went into her flat while I sat outside keeping watch with the engine running. No one came and there were no shouts, but I felt uneasy nevertheless.

  I was beginning to think that Caroline had been rather a long time when she reappeared and came sprinting back to the car. She threw a holdall on to the back seat as she jumped in. There was something urgent about her movements.

  ‘Go,’ she said, slamming the door. I didn’t need telling twice and we sped away. ‘Someone’s been in my flat,’ she said.

  ‘How do you know?’ I asked.

  ‘I thought it was a bit odd when I went in,’ she said, turning her head to see if we were being followed. ‘There was a dirty footprint on one of my letters on the mat under the letter box. 1 told myself that I was being paranoid. That footprint could have been on the letter before it was pushed through the door. But I am also certain someone’s been in my bathroom, in my medicine cabinet.’

  ‘How?’ I asked again.

  ‘My bathroom cabinet is so full of stuff that it tends to all fall out when you open the door. It takes a knack to stop it happening, and someone didn’t have it. Everything in there is now in a slightly different place.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ she said. ‘Trust me. I know exactly what’s in my bathroom cabinet and where. I went to get some aspirin and everything had definitely been moved. Only slightly, mind, but I’m sure.’ She looked around again. ‘Max, I’m scared.’

  So was I. ‘It’s fine,’ I said, trying to sound calm. ‘There’s no one in there now and no one’s following us.’ I was repeatedly looking in the rear-view mirror to make sure I was right. We pulled down another quiet residential street and I stopped the car. We both looked back. Nothing moved. We waited but no one came round the corner after us.

  ‘Why would someone have been in my flat?’ she asked. ‘And how did they get in?’

  ‘Maybe they wanted to find out when you were getting back.’

  ‘How would they do that?’ she said.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Perhaps they planted something to tell them.’ It all sounded so James Bondish. It was all so unlikely, but why else would anyone go into the flat?

  We drove westward out of London and back on to the M4 motorway. I stopped at the services at Heston, and Caroline called her upstairs neighbour using a pay phone outside while I sat nearby in the car.

  ‘They said they were sent by the landlords,’ Caroline said, getting back in. ‘Checking for water leaks or something. Mrs Stack, that’s her upstairs, says she let them in all right, but at least she did wait there while they checked the kitchen and bathroom. There were two of them. Well-dressed men and not very old, she said, but she’s half blind and anyone to her is not old if they are under seventy-five. She seems to think that I’m still at primary school. She keeps asking me about my mummy and daddy.’ She rolled her eyes.

  ‘I wonder how they knew she had a key,’ I said.

  ‘I asked her that,’ said Caroline. ‘Apparently, they didn’t. Seems they knocked on her door and asked her if she knew where I was. She asked them why they wanted to know, and that’s when they said something about a possible water leak in my flat. That’s when she told them about having a key. Apparently they didn’t bother checking her flat for anything, though.’

  ‘Then we shall assume that one of them was Mr Komarov, or, at least, that he sent them even if he wasn’t there himself,’ I said. ‘I wonder who the other one was?’

  *

  By the time we reached East Hendred, my wrist was hurting badly again, and I could hardly keep my eyes open due to tiredness. I had driven down the motorway watching the cars behind me almost as much as the road in front, and Caroline had gone to sleep, in spite of promising she wouldn’t. I, meanwhile, had continually speeded up, then slowed down all the way from London, and had even left the motorway at Reading to go twice round the roundabout at junction n, to ensure that no one was following us.

  I wakened Caroline as we approached the village, and Toby came out to meet us as the car scrunched across the gravel driveway in front of the house. It was always a strange experience for me to come back here, my childhood home, to find that it was my brother and his family, rather than my parents, who were the residents. Perhaps it was another of the reasons why Toby and I saw so little of each other.

  ‘Toby,’ I said, climbing out of the car, ‘may I introduce Caroline, Caroline Aston.’

  They shook hands. ‘You’re so alike,’ Caroline said, looking back and forth at us both.

  ‘No, we’re not,’ I said, purposely sounding offended. ‘He’s much older than me.’

  ‘And more distinguished,’ said Toby, laughing. He put a hand on my shoulder ‘Come on in, little brother.’

  It was as good a greeting as we had shared in years.

  I went in through the so familiar front door and was greeted by Sally in the hallway. We kissed, cheek to cheek. Politeness only.

  ‘Sally,’ I said, ‘how lovely to see you. This is Caroline.’

  They smiled at each other and Sally, ever well-mannered, leaned forward for a kiss.

  ‘Max,’ she said, ‘how lovely.’ I didn’t know whether she meant it was lovely to see me, or whether Carolin
e was lovely. I didn’t particularly care, just as long as we weren’t fighting. ‘I’m so sorry to hear about your house,’ she said, almost sincerely. ‘And your arm.’ She looked at the end of the cast sticking out below the cuff of my shirt. I smiled my thanks to her. I had told Toby on the phone that I had a broken wrist, but not how I came by it.

  ‘Where are the children?’ I asked, looking around.

  ‘At school, of course,’ said Sally. ‘Philippa, our youngest, is now six.’

  ‘Really,’ I said. It must have been a long time since I was there. My niece had been a toddler on my last visit.

  Toby jumped into the awkward pause. ‘Well, I expect you two would like to get your heads down for a few hours.’ I had explained to him from the airport that we had both hardly slept on our flights.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Caroline. ‘I think we would.’

  On my way upstairs I looked briefly into the room that had been mine for the first eighteen years of my life. It didn’t really appear much different. My elder nephew was the current occupant, as was clear from the JACK’S ROOM plaque screwed firmly to the door. His bed was in the same position as mine had always been and his chest of drawers in the corner was the very same one that had held my clothes for so long. It made me yearn for my childhood, for the happy years spent growing up in this house, and for the assurance of youth that nothing nasty can ever happen. That Utopia had lasted only until the brick lorry had broken the spell.

  Caroline and I went to bed, and straight to sleep, in the guest bedroom.

  *

  I slept sporadically for a couple of hours or so before the discomfort of the cast woke me up for good. I dressed quietly, left Caroline sleeping peacefully, and went downstairs in my stockinged feet. Toby was in his office off the main hallway. I stood silently in the doorway watching him as he studied the Racing Calendar, as my father had done every single day of the year without fail. The Racing Calendar was the industry bible for trainers, allowing them to look at the terms and conditions of every upcoming race so that they could determine which of their horses to enter, and where. In my father’s day, it had been a weekly broadsheet printed on yellow paper that he would spread out wide on his desk and study for hours on end. Now Toby sat looking through a smaller stapled booklet with blue type on white paper, yet it performed much the same function as the old newspaper version. But the computer age was taking over and, no doubt, the booklet version would soon be consigned to history as well.