Dick Francis's Gamble - Felix Francis [84]
“Mother dear,” I said. “I’ve done nothing but eat since we arrived. I think fading away is the least of my worries.” But she didn’t like it, and I could already feel an extra large portion of lamb coming on for dinner.
The phone was ringing when we arrived back at the cottage and my mother rushed in to answer it.
“It’s for you,” she said, handing over the receiver to me.
“Hello,” I said.
“It was definitely a heart attack,” said Chief Inspector Tomlinson down the line. “While he was swimming in his own pool. Then he drowned as a result. A full postmortem was carried out at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead on Tuesday afternoon. Seems Colonel Roberts had a history of heart problems.”
“Oh,” I said. “Such are the perils of early-morning swimming.”
“It was late-night swimming, apparently, and on his own. And he’d been drinking. Stupid fool. His blood alcohol level was more than twice that for drunk driving.”
“But he wasn’t driving,” I said.
“No,” said the detective, “but he was swimming, and in my experience alcohol and water don’t mix.” He chuckled at his own joke, and I found it slightly irritating. But it reminded me of Jolyon Roberts doing just the same thing during our meeting in the Chasers Bar at Sandown Races.
“Hold on a minute,” I said, suddenly remembering something else from that meeting. “Colonel Roberts told me categorically that he didn’t drink alcohol. And that he never had.”
14
I’ll get back to you,” said Chief Inspector Tomlinson suddenly.
“I need to call in a few favors.”
He hung up, and I was cross I hadn’t asked him about Billy Searle. But it would wait.
The phone rang again in my hand.
“Hello,” I said, answering it. “Did you forget something?”
“Sorry?” said a female voice. “Is that you, Mr. Nicholas?”
“Mrs. McDowd,” I said. “How lovely to hear from you.”
There was a slight pause at the other end as Mrs. McDowd worked out that I was being sarcastic.
“I have a message from Mr. Patrick,” she said.
“How did you get this number?” I asked.
“He wants you to . . .” she started, but I interrupted her.
“Mrs. McDowd,” I said again loudly. “How did you get this number?”
“It was on the caller ID when you called in this morning,” she said.
That was careless, I thought, for someone meant to be in hiding.
“Anyway,” she said, “I know that number. You’re staying with your mother. How is she?”
Bloody Mrs. McDowd, I thought. How does she know so much about me?
“She’s fine, thank you,” I said, biting my tongue. “Now, what does Mr. Patrick want?”
“He wants you to call him in the morning before you come into the office. Something about arranging a meeting between you and Mr. Gregory.”
“Did he say what the meeting was about?” I asked.
“No,” she said, but I bet she knew. Mrs. McDowd knew everything.
“Please tell Mr. Patrick that I won’t be in the office very early tomorrow.”
“I’ve already told him that,” she said. “Not with you being down in Gloucestershire.”
Who else had she told?
In particular, had she told Mr. Gregory?
I spent much of the afternoon catching up on the changing price of derivatives and futures, and on how a recent fall in the Dow Jones Index in the United States had affected markets in the Far East more than those in Europe, and on fluctuations in the value of gold in pounds as a result of changes in the cost of a barrel of oil in dollars.
It was like a balancing act.
Some economies grew and others contracted; stock markets moved at different paces or in opposite ways; some currencies went up and others went down. The trick to winning in the great global financial game was to invest in the things about to go up in real value while selling those about to go down. Then there were hedge funds and short selling, both designed to make you money when the values went in the wrong direction.
But it was all a bit like gambling with a bookmaker. For you to win, he had to lose. So it was in the markets—there were winners and losers. The winners had big houses and the losers went bust, losing their big houses to the banks,