Dead Heat - By Dick Francis & Felix Francis Page 0,91

had booked myself in for the night under a false name, using cash to pay in advance for my room. The staff raised a questioning eyebrow but they accepted my, fictional, explanation that I had stupidly left my passport and credit cards at home and that my wife was bringing them to me at the airport in the morning. Maybe I was being rather over-dramatic, but I was taking no chances that I could be traced through my credit card. If someone really had been in my house at three in the morning to start a fire at the bottom of my stairs, then it didn’t stretch the imagination much further to realize they might have taken my old phone and credit cards from my blazer’s pockets before striking the match, with all the access that the numbers could then bring to my accounts, and maybe to my whereabouts if I used them. I had turned off my new phone, just in case.

On Wednesday morning, I had left the hired Mondeo in the hotel car park where, according to the hotel reception staff, it would be quite safe but would incur charges. Fine, I’d said, and I had paid them up front for one week’s parking with the remains of my cash. I had then taken the hotel shuttle bus to the airport terminal and had, reluctantly, used my new credit card to purchase an airline ticket. If someone could then find out I was at Heathrow buying a ticket, it was too bad. I just hoped that they wouldn’t be able to get to the airport before my flight departed. If they could further discover that the ticket was to Chicago, well… it’s a big city. I planned to stay hidden.

I had decided not to sit in some dark corner of the departure lounge while I waited for the flight. Instead, I’d sat in the open next to an American family with three small children who played around my feet with brmmm brmmm noises and miniature London black taxis, souvenir toys of their trip. It had felt safer.

Departure had been uneventful and I now dozed at forty thousand feet above the Atlantic. I had not slept particularly well in the hotel and three times during the night had checked that the chair I had propped under the door handle was still there. So, as the aeroplane rushed westwards, I lay back and caught up on my lack of sleep from the previous two nights, and had to be woken by one of the cabin staff as we made our final approach to O’Hare airport in Chicago.

I knew that Caroline would not be waiting for me at the airport. She had told me that she had a rehearsal all afternoon, ready for that evening’s first night, and I had told her not to try to come anyway. I had somehow thought it might be safer. However, I still looked out for her when I emerged from immigration and customs.

She wasn’t there. Of course, she wasn’t there. I hadn’t really expected her to be, but I felt a little disappointed nevertheless. There were several couples greeting each other with hugs and kisses, with I Love You or Welcome Home printed helium-filled balloons attached to their wrists or to the handles of pushchairs full of smiling babies. Airport arrival halls are joyful places, good for the soul.

However, the source of my particular joy was not there. I knew that she would be deep into Elgar and Sibelius, and I was jealous of them, jealous of long-dead composers. Was that another example of irrational behaviour?

I took a yellow cab from the airport to downtown, specifically to the Hyatt Hotel, where I knew the orchestra were staying, and sank into a deep leather armchair in the lobby that faced the entrance. I sat and waited for Caroline to return, and promptly went straight back to sleep.

She woke me by stroking my head and running her hands through my hair.

‘Hello, my sleeping beauty,’ she said.

‘You’re the beautiful one,’ I said, slowly opening my eyes.

‘I see you’re keeping a good look-out for potential mur-cerers,’ she said.

‘Don’t even joke about it,’ I said. But she was right. Going to sleep in plain view of the hotel entrance and the street beyond was not the most clever thing I had done in the last twenty-four hours if I wanted to stay alive.

‘Where’s the rest of the orchestra?’ I asked.

‘Some are upstairs. Others – boring boring- are still hanging