Knock Down - By Dick Francis Page 0,5

packets of money on her expensive suede lap and unadulterated exasperation in her manner.

‘Well, I couldn’t just sit there and watch them putting you through a wringer,’ she said crossly. ‘Someone had to get you out of that fix, didn’t they?’

I said nothing. She had stepped out of the car and picked up the money and told the thugs to leave me alone. She said they could have the goddam horse and much good might it do them. She had not tried screaming for help or running away or anything equally constructive, but had acted on the great modern dictum that you became less of a hospital case if you gave in to threats of violence right away.

‘You looked as grey as death,’ she said. ‘What did you expect me to do? Sit and applaud?’

I didn’t answer.

‘What’s the matter with your goddam arm, anyway?’

‘It dislocates,’ I said. ‘The shoulder dislocates.’

‘All the time?’

‘Oh no. Not often. Only if it gets into one certain position. Then it falls apart, which is very boring. I wear the strap to prevent that happening.’

‘It isn’t dislocated now, is it?’

‘No.’ I smiled involuntarily. I tended not to be able to sit comfortably in cars whenever it went out.

‘Thanks to you,’ I added.

‘As long as you realise.’

‘Mm.’

They had taken the certificate of sale out of my pocket and had made Kerry Sanders write a receipt for the cash. Then they had simply walked away towards the centre of operations to claim their prize. Kerry Sanders had not felt like trying to stop them and I had still hardly been able to put one foot in front of the other with any certainty, and the one sure thing on that unsure afternoon was that Frizzy Hair and his pal would waste no time in driving off with Hearse Puller to destinations unknown. No one would question their right to the horse. Rapid post-sale sales were common.

‘Why?’ she said for the twentieth time. ‘Why did they want that goddam horse? Why that one?’

‘I absolutely don’t know.’

She sat fidgeting.

‘You said you’d be able to drive by four.’

I glanced at the clock on the dashboard. Five past.

‘Right.’ I removed my head from the window and gave it a small tentative shake. Reasonable order seemed to have returned in that department so I started the engine and turned out towards London. She made a rapid assessment of my ability to drive and relaxed a shade after we had gone half a mile without hitting anything. At that point grievance took over from shock.

‘I’m going to complain,’ she said with vigour.

‘Good idea. Who to?’

‘Who to?’ She sounded surprised. ‘To the auctioneers, of course.’

‘They’ll commiserate and do nothing.’

‘Of course they will. They’ll have to.’

I knew they wouldn’t. I said so.

She turned to look at me. ‘The Jockey Club, then. The racing authorities.’

‘They have no control… no jurisdiction… over the Sales.’

‘Who does, then?’

‘No one.’

Her voice sharpened with frustration. ‘We’ll tell the police.’

‘If you like.’

‘The Ascot police?’

‘All right.’

So I stopped at the police station and we told our story. Statements were taken and signed and no doubt filed as soon as we left, because as an overworked sergeant tiredly pointed out, we had not been robbed. A bang on the head, very nasty, very reprehensible, a lot of it about. But my wallet hadn’t been stolen, had it? Not even my watch? And these rough customers had actually given Mrs Sanders a profit of two hundred pounds. Where was the crime in that, might one ask?

We drove away, me in resignation, Kerry Sanders in a boiling fury.

‘I will not be pushed around,’ she exploded. ‘Someone… someone has got to do something.’

‘Mr Brevett?’ I suggested.

She gave me one of her sharp glances and noticeably cooled her voice.

‘I don’t want him bothered with this.’

‘No,’ I said.

We drove ten miles in thoughtful silence. She said eventually, ‘Can you find me another horse by Friday?’

‘I could try.’

‘Try, then.’

‘If I succeed can you guarantee that no one else will knock me on the head and pinch it?’

‘For a man who’s supposed to be tough,’ she said, ‘You’re soft.’

This dampening opinion led to a further five miles of silence. Then she said, ‘You didn’t know those two men, did you?’

‘No.’

‘But they knew you. They knew about your shoulder.’

‘They did indeed.’

‘You’d thought of that, had you?’ She sounded disappointed.

‘Mm,’ I said.

I steered with care through the London traffic and stopped outside the Berkeley Hotel, where she was staying.

‘Come in for a drink,’ she said. ‘You look as if you could use one.’

‘Er…’

‘Aw, c’mon,’