After breakfast I called the Cheltenham police and asked for Chief Inspector Carlisle. Sorry, they said, he’s unavailable at the moment, did I want to leave a message? When would he be available? I asked. They didn’t know. Was he on duty? Yes, he was, but he was still unavailable. Could they pass him a message that he would actually get? Yes, they would. ‘Good,’ I said. ‘Ask him to call Sid Halley. He has the number,’ but I gave it to them again just in case.
He called me less than five minutes later. Good old Cheltenham police.
‘I meant to call you yesterday,’ he said, ‘but things are a bit hectic down here at the moment.’
‘Busy catching villains?’ I said rather flippantly.
‘Wish I were,’ he sounded grave. ‘Have you heard the news today?’
‘No.’
‘Well, that little girl that went missing from Gloucester in the week has turned up dead. At least, we’ve found a child’s body and it’s probably her. Still waiting for the official ID but there’s not much doubt. Poor little mite. Don’t know the cause of death yet but it has to be murder. How can anyone do such things to a 10-year-old? Makes me physically sick.’
‘I’m sorry.’ He had obviously had a lousy Saturday morning.
‘I hate this job when it’s kids. I’m glad they’re rare. Only my third in twenty-five years.’
‘What were you going to phone me about yesterday?’ I asked.
‘Forensics came back with the results. It was the same gun that killed Walker, and Burton definitely did fire it on the day he died. There was gunpowder residue all over his hands and on his sleeve.’
Oh, I thought. Oh, shit.
‘So you believe that it was suicide?’
‘That is the consensus of opinion in the Thames Valley force but it will be up to the coroner to decide.’
‘Don’t you think it was odd that he still had the gun in his hand? Surely it would fly out when he fired it?’
‘It is not that unusual for a suicide to grip so tightly to the gun that it stays there. Like a reflex. The hand closes tightly at death and stays that way. Inspector Johnson said it was really quite difficult to prise the gun out of Burton’s hand. Rigor mortis and all that.’
It was more information than I needed.
‘Are you still investigating Huw Walker’s death?’ I asked.
‘We are waiting for the inquest now.’
I took that to mean ‘no’.
‘How about if Bill Burton was already dead when he fired the gun?’ I asked.
‘What do you mean? How could he fire the gun if he was already dead?’
‘Suppose you wanted to make murder look like suicide. First you shoot Bill through the mouth. Then you put the gun in his dead hand and pull the trigger again with his finger. Bingo, residue all over his hand and suicide it is.’
‘But there was only one shot fired from the revolver?’
‘How do you know?’ I asked him.
‘According to Johnson, there was only one spent cartridge in the cylinder.’
‘But the murderer could have replaced one of the empty cartridges with a new one.’
‘Then why wasn’t a second bullet found?’ Carlisle asked.
‘Perhaps Inspector Johnson wasn’t really looking for one.’
CHAPTER 11
I went to Newbury races still turning over and over in my head whether I should, or would, ask around about Huw Walker and Bill Burton again. It was one thing to discuss the matter with Carlisle but somehow to continue to sow seeds of doubt over the guilt-driven suicide theory here at the races might be considered reckless and ill-advised after the previous evening’s little message to Marina.
I waved my plastic hand at the man at the gate who waved back and beckoned me in like a long-lost friend. I parked in the trainers’ and jockeys’ car park, as usual.
A large Jaguar pulled up alongside my car and Andrew Woodward climbed out.
‘Hello, Sid,’ he said. ‘How are things?’
‘Fine, thank you, Mr Woodward.’ I’d never called him Andrew.
‘Good.’ He didn’t really sound as if he meant it. ‘I’m told that I should consult you.’
‘What about?’ I asked.
‘A reference. I’m appointing a second assistant at my yard. I’ve too many horses for just one now.’
I remembered that Jonny Enstone had transferred his allegiance and there were probably others too.
‘What can I do for you?’
‘Everyone tells me that I should get the applicants checked out by Halley.’ His tone implied that he didn’t agree. ‘I reckon I’m a good judge of character and I think I’ve made up my mind but, as you’re here, will you?’
‘Will I what?’
‘Will you give me an opinion of my chosen candidate?’
‘I’ll give you one for free if I know anything about him.’
‘Her, actually. Girl called Juliet Burns. Used to work for Burton.’
‘I know her,’ I said.
Hasn’t taken her long to look for a new job, I thought.
‘Well, what do you think?’
‘I don’t know her very well, but I was a friend of her father and I knew her as a child. I’ve met her at Burton’s place a couple of times recently.’ I didn’t tell him that one of them was immediately after she had found her boss with half his head blown away.
I recalled the evening she did the stable round. ‘She seems to get on with the horses all right. I could do a more detailed check on her references, if you’d like.’
‘I knew it would be a waste of time to ask you. Anyone could have told me that,’ he sneered. ‘I don’t know what people see in you — you’re just an ex-jockey.’
He turned to walk away.
‘I know that two of your lady owners pay you no training fees and that you only use their names to market your yard.’
He turned back slowly. ‘That’s rubbish,’ he said.
‘You own the horses yourself.’
There was nothing illegal in it but it was a minor deceit of the betting public that was not approved of by the Jockey Club. I decided it would be prudent not to mention to him that I also knew he was having an affair with one of the ladies in question.
‘You’re only guessing,’ he said.
‘As you like.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I just know.’ I didn’t tell him that the lady owner he was not having the affair with had supplied me with both bits of information because she was jealous of the other.
‘Who else knows this?’ he demanded.
‘No one,’ I said, ‘not yet.’
‘Keep your bloody mouth shut, do you hear, or you’ll regret it.’ He turned and strode away towards the racecourse entrance.
Damn, I thought. Why did I rise to that little insult? Why did I feel the need to show him that I was not just an ex-jockey? Why had I made an enemy of him when friends are what I needed to do my job? That was stupid, very stupid.
I spent a depressing afternoon avoiding Andrew Woodward and not mentioning Huw Walker or Bill Burton to anyone. Even the weather conspired to deepen my depression by turning from a bright crisp morning into a cold damp dull afternoon and I had no coat. I’d left it in London due to our hasty departure the previous evening.
Andrew Woodward won the big race and stood beaming in the rain as he received the trophy on behalf of one of his non-paying owners who had had the good sense not to be present.
Beaming, that is, until he saw me watching him. I had carelessly allowed myself to be in view and his expression of thunder showed that his antipathy towards me had deepened.
I’d actually been daydreaming about how I might pluck out one of his unsuspecting hairs to check on his DNA. He had very few remaining on the top of his head and kept those firmly out of sight beneath a brown trilby. It wasn’t going to be as easy as Marina had suggested to acquire the necessary follicles, not from him anyway.