In the Frame - By Dick Francis Page 0,62

he could. ‘Thank you very much,’ I said. ‘And goodnight.’

Sarah and Jik both looked heavy-eyed and languorous in the morning. A successful night, I judged.

We checked out of the motel, packed my suitcase into the boot of the car, and sat in the passenger seats to plan the day.

‘Can’t we please get our clothes from the Hilton?’ Sarah said, sounding depressed.

Jik and I said ‘No’ together.

‘I’ll ring them now,’ Jik said. ‘I’ll get them to pack all our things and keep them safe for us, and I’ll tell them I’ll send a cheque for the bill.’ He levered himself out of the car again and went off on the errand.

‘Buy what you need out of my winnings,’ I said to Sarah.

She shook her head. ‘I’ve got some money. It’s not that. It’s just… I wish all this was over.’

‘It will be, soon,’ I said neutrally. She sighed heavily. ‘What’s your idea of a perfect life?’ I asked.

‘Oh…’ she seemed surprised. ‘I suppose right now I just want to be with Jik on the boat and have fun, like before you came.’

‘And for ever?’

She looked at me broodingly. ‘You may think, Todd, that I don’t know Jik is a complicated character, but you’ve only got to look at his paintings… They make me shudder. They’re a side of Jik I don’t know because he hasn’t painted anything since we met. You may think that this world will be worse off if Jik is happy for a bit, but I’m no fool, I know that in the end whatever it is that drives him to paint like that will come back again… I think these first few months together are frantically precious… and it isn’t just the physical dangers you’ve dragged us into that I hate, but the feeling that I’ve lost the rest of that golden time… that you remind him of his painting, and that after you’ve gone he’ll go straight back to it… weeks and weeks before he might have done.’

‘Get him to go sailing,’ I said. ‘He’s always happy at sea.’

‘You don’t care, do you?’

I looked straight into her clouded brown eyes. ‘I care for you both, very much.’

‘Then God help the people you hate.’

And God help me, I thought, if I became any fonder of my oldest friend’s wife. I looked away from her, out of the window. Affection wouldn’t matter. Anything else would be a mess.

Jik came back with a satisfied air. ‘That’s all fixed. They said there’s a letter for you, Todd, delivered by hand a few minutes ago. They asked me for a forwarding address.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I said you’d call them yourself.’

‘Right… Well, let’s get going.’

‘Where to?’

‘New Zealand, don’t you think?’

‘That should be far enough,’ Jik said dryly.

He drove us to the airport, which was packed with people going home from the Cup.

‘If Wexford and Greene are looking for us,’ Sarah said, ‘They will surely be watching at the airport.’

If they weren’t, I thought, we’d have to lay a trail: but Jik, who knew that, didn’t tell her.

‘They can’t do much in public,’ he said comfortingly.

We bought tickets and found we could either fly to Auckland direct at lunchtime, or via Sydney leaving within half an hour.

‘Sydney,’ said Sarah positively, clearly drawing strength from the chance of putting her feet down on her own safe doorstep.

I shook my head. ‘Auckland direct. Let’s see if the restaurant’s still open for breakfast.’

We squeezed in under the waitresses’ pointed consultation of clocks and watches and ordered bacon and eggs lavishly.

‘Why are we going to New Zealand?’ Sarah said.

‘To see a man about a painting and advise him to take out extra insurance.’

‘Are you actually making sense?’

‘Actually,’ I said, ‘yes.’

‘I don’t see why we have to go so far, when Jik said you found enough in the gallery to blow the whole thing wide open.’

‘Um…’ I said. ‘Because we don’t want to blow it wide open. Because we want to hand it to the police in full working order.’

She studied my face. ‘You are very devious.’

‘Not on canvas,’ Jik said.

After we’d eaten we wandered around the airport shops, buying yet more toothbrushes and so on for Jik and Sarah, and another airline bag. There was no sign of Wexford or Greene or the boy or Beetle-brows or Renbo, or the tough who’d been on watch at Alice Springs. If they’d seen us without us seeing them, we couldn’t tell.

‘I think I’ll ring the Hilton,’ I said.

Jik nodded. I put the call through with him and Sarah sitting