by Dick Francis
“Dave can do the Gloucestershire broodmares, instead of Pat,” I said. Dave was a slow driver, and I didn’t send him out behind the wheel unless I had to. “Those mares have no deadline.”
“Yeah. OK.”
“I want him here first though. When he turns up at the farm, send him along here. Brett too.”
“Will do,” he said. “Is it about the dead man?”
“It is.”
“Silly sods.”
“And tell Jogger I need him p.d.q. Tell him to bring his slider.”
“He won’t be in for half an hour.”
“That will do.”
“Anything else?”
“Sure to be, in five minutes.”
He laughed and went away, leaving me thinking, as I often did, that I was lucky to have him. When I’d been a jockey Harve had been my weighing-room valet, bringing my cleaned saddles and fresh breeches to the races every day. Valets were a bit like theatrical dressers, although one valet would “do” ten or so jockeys regularly. It was a close personal service: one could keep few physical secrets from one’s valet.
When I’d hung up my boots and bought the transport business he’d appeared to my surprise on my doorstep.
“I’m here to see if you’ll give me a job,” he said for openers, coming straight to the point.
“But I don’t need a valet anymore.”
“Not that. I don’t want to keep on with that. My old dad’s died and the weighing room’s not the same as when he was there, and I want a change. I’m sick of the washtub. How about it if I drive for you? I drive hundreds of miles every week anyway; have for years.”
“But,” I said slowly, “you’d need a Heavy Goods Vehicle license.”
“I’ll get one.”
“The vans aren’t like cars. You’d have to take a course.”
“If I get the license, will you give me a job?”
I’d said I would because we’d always got on easily together, and in that casual way I’d acquired the best lieutenant one could imagine.
He was sandy-haired, strong-armed, about my own age, an inch or two taller. Dryly disillusioned, he was quick to denigrate but in a way that made one smile. Brett, he had remarked to me once, shifted the blame before you even realized there was a fault. “He carries a bagful of alibis around with him, ready to pull one out.”
I went upstairs, showered, shaved, tweaked the duvet straight on my bed and returned in short time to my desk and the uninterrupted view of the horse van.
Jogger, the company mechanic, swept up the drive in his truck and squeaked to a halt nose to nose with the horse van. Spry, bowlegged, bald and cockney, he eeled out of the truck and stood looking at the horse van while scratching his head. Then he came over to the house in the peculiar gait that had earned him his nickname, a rolling motion like that of speed walkers, almost running but with one foot on the ground all the time, elbows tucked in.
I went to the door to meet him and we walked back to the van together, he impatiently slowing his scuttling progress to match mine.
“What’s the boil, then?” he said.
He spoke his own sort of cockney rhyming slang, and indeed I often thought he made most of it up himself, but I was used to it by that time. For boil, read boil and bubble, trouble.
“Just check it all over, will you?” I answered. “Take a good look at the engine. Then slide under, make sure we’re not leaking or carrying additions.”
“Gor,” he said.
I watched him check the engine, his eyes swift, fingers delicate, head nodding with certainties.
“All hunky-dory,” he said.
“Good. Go over the rest.”
He went along to his truck and brought out the flexible stick, with mirror attached, that could be angled to reveal invisibilities round corners, and also the low platform on casters, on which he lay on his back to slide under the vans for quick underguts inspections.
“When you’re done, I’ll be in the house,” I said.
“Am I looking for anything particular?”
“Just for anything you don’t understand.”
He peered at me speculatively. “This van went to Italy earlier, dinnit?”
I agreed that it had. “Went last Friday, returned by Tuesday evening.” There had been no problems or holdups, though; as far as I knew, of course.
“That Brett never cleans it proper. Got no Jekyll.”
Jekyll and Hyde, I thought: pride.
“Brett had Wednesday off,” I said. “Harve drove a load of colts to Newmarket that day in this van. Brett took it to Newmarket and back yesterday. A couple of odd things have happened, so . . . carry on with the check.”
“You talking about that stiff?”
“Partly.”
“He didn’t have no chance to duff the van up, though, did he?”
“I don’t know any more than you,” I said. “And get a move on, Jogger, I’ve got to get this thing cleaned and out on the road within an hour.”
He lay down philosophically and shoved himself trustingly out of sight, except for his feet, under ten or so tons of steel. Just the prospect of it gave me a sort of claustrophobia, which Jogger knew about but loftily forgave. My failing increased his self-esteem: it did no harm.
I went back to the house and Harve phoned.
“Dave’s on his way along to you now,” he said with agitation. “But he says Brett’s packing his bags.”
“He’s doing what?”
“Dave says Brett’s not a complete thicko, he knows his trial three months is nearly up and that you won’t keep him on. He’s ducking out first. That way he can go around saying he gave you the chuck, not the other way round. He’ll be whining all over the place about how hard he worked here, Dave says, and how you never appreciated him.”
“He can get on with it,” I said. “The thing is, what about today?”
“The Marigold shuttle,” Harve said. “Brett was doing that.”
“Exactly. Who else have we got?” I knew the answer as soon as I asked. We had me.
“Well . . .” He hesitated.
“Yes, all right. I’ll do it if there’s no one else.”
“It’s not just the shuttle,” he went on unhappily. “Vic’s wife says he’s got a temperature of a hundred and three and no way is he driving to Sandown.”
One of those days.
“They’re both here at the farm,” Harve went on, “Vic and his missus. He says he wants to go, she says she’ll divorce him. You can see he’s got a fever, though.”
“Send him home, he’ll just spread the flu around more.”
“OK. But . . .”
“Give me a minute. Inspiration will strike.”
He laughed. “Hurry it up,” he said, disconnecting.
I sucked my teeth. If racehorse trainers hadn’t been as fussy as they normally were, I could have traveled the two Surrey-bound broodmares in one of the vans taking ’chasers to Sandown. The van could have dropped off the two racers, taken the mares to their destination and returned to Sandown to bring the ’chasers home. I might have risked it if I hadn’t been sure the trainer in question would get to hear of it from his grooms: and the trainer in question would never ever let his own horses travel with any horses from any other stables. Sending his runners in company with broodmares would lose me his custom instantly and evermore.
I went out to the nine-horse van. Jogger was nowhere to be seen but when I yelled his name a pair of boots slid out into view, followed by grease-clogged trousers, filthy army sweater and a dirt-streaked face.
“You’re right, we’ve picked up a stranger,” he reported, and added, grinning with yellow teeth, “Did you know? You must have known.”
“No, I didn’t.” Nor was I pleased. Very put out, in fact.
“Have a decko,” he encouraged me, removing himself from the slider and slyly offering me his place.
“I’ll take your word for it,” I said, staying upright. “What have you found?”
“Shiny?” I asked.
“Course not. Want it out?”
“Yes, but wait . . . um . . . we’ve got three drivers now with flu. Would you do a run yourself, just to help out?”
He rubbed his greasy hands down his trousers and looked dubious. Driving meant cleaning and there was no doubt he felt happier dirty. I seldom asked him to drive more than his regular test runs on all the vans, when he listened to their resonances as to a language and heard trouble before it happened.
“Broodmares, not to the races,” I explained.
“Well, then . . . when?”
“Lunchtime.”
“Bonus?”
“Sure, if you do your regular maintenance work as well.”
He shrugged, lay down again on the slider and disappeared. I went back to my desk, phoned Harve and told him, “Jogger.”
“He’s driving?” He sounded incredulous. “He agreed?”
“The broodmares to Surrey,” I confirmed. “It’s Phil whose van is in for maintenance, isn’t it? Wake him up, twist his arm, sob stuff if you like, tell him his day off’s postponed, we need him to take Vic’s van to Sandown.”
“OK.”
“That should cover it,” I said.
“Fingers crossed.”
“Come down here yourself, would you, when you have a minute?”
After the briefest of pauses he said, “Right.”
He would be wondering what I wanted but not to the level of worry. At least, I hoped not.
Dave at that point bicycled in across the tarmac and leaned his rusty conveyance against my woodpile. Dave did have a car, even rustier than the bike, but it spent most of the time out of action. One day, he’d been saying for months, he would equip it with retreads and get it back on the road. No one believed him. He spent his money on greyhounds.
He knocked on the outside door on his way in and appeared in the sitting-room doorway with the martyred air of having stepped out of a tumbril.
“You wanted me, Freddie?” He was nervous but trying for bravado; not a success.
“I want you and Brett to clean that van. It’s due out again before nine.”
“But, Brett . . .” He stopped.
“Go on.”
“Harve told you, didn’t he? Brett says he’ll be waiting at the office door for his P45 the second Isobel gets there, then he’s off.”
“He’s due some wages and holiday money,” I said, unruffled. “You get back on your bike and go and tell him he can have it now, here, in cash, but cleaning that van is yesterday’s job, and if he doesn’t finish it, his unemployment dates from yesterday morning. No pay for yesterday, understand?”
“You can’t do that,” Dave said uncertainly.
“Want to bet? By rights, he should give me a week’s notice. And ask him if he thinks he might ever need a r eference.”
Dave gave me a hollow look.
“Hurry and fetch him,” I said. “And come back yourself.”
When he’d gone I switched on the computer and brought Brett and his affairs to the screen. Every journey he’d done for me was listed there, with dates, times, horses’ names, expenses and notes. The day before’s journey of nine two-year-olds to Newmarket had been entered only as “proposed”: no dead bodies yet cluttered the entry.
His terms of employment were there, along with days worked and holiday entitlement earned: no problem at all to put together his present due. I printed a copy of the income information, ready to give to him.
Through the window I watched Jogger heel-and-toe his way towards the house, a grayish-brown shape like a big shoe box in his hands. He came into the sitting room and plonked the object down on my chart, not caring about mundane considerations like dirt. He looked surprised when I asked him to lift the box up again so that I could spread a newspaper under it.
“I had a hell of a job getting it off,” he said. “Like a limpet mine, it was.”
“Where’s the magnet?” I asked.
“Still stuck to the chassis, behind the second fuel tank. Super-glue job, most like. This box came off in the end, though I had to use a tire iron. No one meant it to move, I’m telling you.”
“How long would you say it’s been there?”
The box was thick with grime except for a clean circular saucer-sized patch on its underside where it had been in contact with the magnet.
Jogger shrugged unhappily. “It’s not in a place I need to inspect all that often.”
“A week? A month? More?”
“Dunno,” he said.
I picked the box up in the newspaper and shook it. It was comparatively light, with no rattle.
“Empty,” Jogger said, nodding.
About fifteen inches by ten by six deep, it was a strong old-fashioned gray metal cash box with rounded corners, a recessed carrying handle and a sturdy lock. No key, naturally. A dent on one edge from the tire iron. The carrying handle, stuck into its recess, wouldn’t lift up.
“Can you open it?” I asked. “Without breaking it.”
Jogger gave me a sideways look. “I could pick the lock if I fetch my tools and you squint the other way.”
“Go on, then.”
He decided to take the box out to his truck for the job and presently with a yellow grin returned with it open.
Nothing inside, not even dust. I put my nose down to it. It smelt surprisingly clean inside considering the grime on the outside. It smelt even fresh, like talcum powder or soap.
“How difficult was it to search underneath?” I asked.
“Easy, on a slider. Very easy over an inspection pit, if you knew where to look. I nearly missed it, though. It’s the same color as everything else under there. See, that’s it, you wouldn’t expect to see it, unless you knew it was there. You’d have to park that bit over the pit, too, which you wouldn’t normally do.”
“How long since you had Brett’s van over the inspection pit?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Did an oil change, checked the air brakes, say five weeks ago. Total overhaul must’ve been before Christmas. Don’t remember the day.”
“The computer will have it,” I said.
Jogger looked across at the dark screen without favor. He liked to be able to invent memories, not have them checked.
“Thanks anyway,” I said warmly. “I wouldn’t have found this cash box myself in a million years.”
The yellow teeth made a brief appearance. “You want to get under there,” he said.
But no, I didn’t.
Dave came back on his bicycle followed by Brett, slowly, in his car, neither of them showing much appetite for the morning. They came into the sitting room, greeted Jogger unenthusiastically and looked without reaction at the dirty gray cash box lying open on the newspaper.
“Has either of you seen that before?” I asked neutrally.
Uninterestedly, they said they hadn’t.
“It’s not my fault the horse van wasn’t cleaned,” Brett said defensively. “Sandy Smith wouldn’t let me near it last night.”
“Clean it now, will you, while I assemble your pay packet?”
“It was Dave’s idea to give that man a lift.”
“Yes, so you said.”
“I wouldn’t have done it on my own.”
“That’s bloody unfair,” Dave protested furiously.
“Both of you shut up,” I said. “Clean the van.” Seething, they both went out and through the window I watched the rigidity of their anger as they marched towards the task. Undoubtedly the picking up of the hitchhiker had been Dave’s doing, but I found I could forgive his irresponsibility more easily than Brett’s self-righteousness. They had both for sure pocketed Kevin Keith Ogden’s money, although nothing would get them to say how much.
Jogger said, pointing at the cash box, “What do you want me to do with that?”
> “Oh . . . just leave it here. And thanks.”
“Where’s Brett off to in that rig today?” he asked, following my gaze through the window.
“Nowhere. He’s leaving the firm. I’ll be driving it myself.”
“Straight up? Then I’ll do you a favor.”
I switched my attention to his grubby, lined, fifty-three-year-old face, the wily exterior of an old soldier who knew every skiving trick of the trade but lived by his own code of strict honesty in some respects, notably for anything that moved on wheels.
“You’ve got a strong active uncovered magnet under that rig,” he informed me. “If you’re not careful, it’ll pick up iron bars and such and you could catch them on something or back onto them and maybe pierce a fuel tank or worse.”
I moved my head in appreciation. “What’s best to do?”
“I’ll stick something over it, if you like.”
“Thanks, Jogger.”
He heard the real gratitude in my voice and nodded briefly. “What’ve we been carrying, eh?” he asked. “Carpets?”
I was mystified. “Carpets?”
“And rugs. Drugs.”
“Oh.” I understood belatedly. “I hope not.” I pondered briefly. “Keep it to yourself for now, Jogger, will you? Until I get it sorted out.”
He said he would, a promise easily given that might last into the third pint that evening up in the pub, but no further.
At close quarters he smelled of oil and dust, those constant companions, and also of stale smoke and a general earthiness. I found it less objectionable than the overpoweringly sweet aftershave and clashing medicinal mouthwash of one of the other drivers, whose odor pervaded his whole horse van, even overriding the scent of horses.
As far as possible, each driver drove one particular horse van all the time, making it his own. I’d found they all preferred it like that, and they also looked after the vehicles better that way, kept them cleaner, understood their idiosyncrasies and generally treated them with pride as their personal property. Each driver kept the keys of his own van in his possession and could personalize his own cab if he cared to. Several of them who liked to sleep on board had rigged curtains for the windows. Pat, now sick with flu, carried fresh flowers and an ingenious folding changing room in hers. I could almost infallibly have told which van I was in simply by the cab.
