Tip Off (10 page)

 

Once more there was no surprise at Toby's winner. I had diligently photographed most of the people round the ring, and snapped the horses going down, but had spotted nothing to suggest any fixing. It occurred to me that on this occasion too the horse had won entirely on its own merits.

When I got back to my car, I made a phone call to the Equine Forensic Laboratory. I pulled out of the Midland course at four-twenty and headed south-east towards Newmarket. A little over an hour later, I was driving along a straight, tree-lined road towards the old red-brick town that had been the headquarters of British racing since the reign of Charles II.

Before I reached the High Street, I stopped to ask how to get to the laboratory, and was directed to a short cul-de-sac beside the heath on the west side of town.

I identified the place from a pair of tall, iron gates with a rearing horse motif centred in each, behind which was a long, overblown cottage-style building, like a rural Tesco's. I parked and walked down a fine gravel path between beautifully kept lawns and juvenile silver birches.

The entrance was a user-friendly timber and glass porch which opened into an area floored with natural coir and liberally adorned with large potted plants.

A receptionist who looked as if she'd had the same smile pinned to her face since she'd got up that morning, greeted me and asked me how she could help.

‘I wonder if I could have a word with Dr Poulton. I phoned earlier.'

‘Yes, of course, sir. Your name?'

‘Simon Jeffries.'

‘Won't keep you a moment, Simon.' She grinned and fluttered her eye-lashes while she pushed buttons on her switch-board.

I speculated on whether I could have been interested in a girl like that – as good-looking as any cat-walk model, though with a healthier figure, long black hair gathered up behind her head, big brown eyes and obviously well-shaped breasts beneath a cream silk blouse. A few weeks ago, I could have overlooked the fixed grin she put on for work and might even have persuaded her to meet me for a drink later, but now, I realised with a jolt, I had no desire to do any such thing.

She interrupted my reverie with the announcement that she was going home now, and Dr Poulton was on his way out to see me.

I sat down to wait and started to flip through the literature about the place that was stacked on a table beside me.

The Equine Forensic Lab took samples from race meetings and a whole cross-section of horse events all around the world, from show-jumping to endurance riding. From English racing alone they received over seven and a half thousand samples a year, of which, on average, a tenth of one percent proved positive – about ten a year. More recently, the Jockey Club had ordered random tests of horses in training, to prevent the use of long-acting performance-enhancing drugs.

It was a sophisticated laboratory that cost over a million pounds a year to run. Dr Philip Poulton was operations manager.

He was a bespectacled, mousy man who shook my hand weakly but welcomed me warmly enough.

‘I had a message from Portman Square that you might be coming.'

I was grudgingly impressed that Tintern had bothered to do that.

‘We'll go somewhere where we can be a little more private,' Dr Poulton went on.

He showed me into a small, general purpose room, furnished only with an oak table, chairs, a telephone and a couple of eighteenth-century racing prints.

‘I won't keep you long,' I said. ‘I just wanted to check out your standard procedures when samples arrive here.'

‘You mean, from British race-courses?'

‘Yes.'

‘It's very straightforward, really. We're sent the sample containers and run tests for every known drug that might have been administered. If a sample tests positive for anything, we inform the Jockey Club.'

‘And how do you know which horse's sample you're dealing with?'

‘We don't. Samples are taken from horses chosen arbitrarily after a race – not necessarily the winner. The bottles we get are only marked with a bar-code label; the Jockey Club issue these, and no one else knows which horse or race-course they refer to. We give them the test print-out with the bar-code; they identify the horse.'

‘So you have no idea what's coming in here?'

‘No. It's an obvious but very effective precaution against malpractice. Of course, it's absolutely essential that the system is incorruptible, and I'm glad to say that there's never been a failure.'

I nodded my head, and asked him, by way of small talk, what were the oddest drugs he'd detected in his time.

‘Well, of course, these days, it's very seldom anyone bothers to use anything to stop or stimulate a horse because they know it will be routinely detected. From time to time they try masking with other substances, but I don't think anyone's got away with it for years.'

‘What sort of stimulants did they use, when they still thought they could get away with it?'

Dr Poulton seemed to savour the question with a pursing of his thin lips. ‘All sorts of things,' he said, ‘most of which wouldn't have made a lot of difference anyway. Quite commonly they'd use cocaine, administered through the mouth or nostrils, or caffeine, which can be injected. But it's a long time since anyone used either.'

I left Newmarket and drove home, turning over what Poulton had told me. On the face of it, he was right; the system was fool-proof as we'd always been told and confirmed our conclusion that whatever Toby was doing, he wasn't doping the horses he'd napped. The best hope of discovering the secret of his success must lie on the race-course itself.

 

To my annoyance, when I phoned Toby's line for his nap the following morning, it was running at Haydock.

But as I'd decided to log all the attendances I could of other parties at the affected races, the more distant ones were almost more significant. The northern tracks had their own followers, and it took a lot to get a southerner up for a normal day's racing.

I had to use the digital camera myself, as discreetly as I could, especially when I was down near the start. The race-courses had stringent rules about who was and who wasn't allowed to take pictures on the course itself.

At the back of my mind was the thought that I could always claim the protection of Lord Tintern and the Jockey Club if anyone remonstrated with me. At the same time, I didn't want to be conspicuous by photographing without an official badge.

I arrived back late and exhausted on Tuesday night but was in the office first thing next morning.

Just after nine, Matt arrived, looking annoyed and perplexed.

‘What's happened?' I asked.

‘I can't believe it, but Toby's jacked in his tipping line.'

‘What? You must be joking!'

‘I'm not. I just phoned the line and the message says that, as of today, there's no more service.'

With my mind racing between frustration at losing the Jockey Club job and speculation about Toby's reasons for suddenly abandoning a large, easy income, I picked up the phone and dialled his London number. A machine answered; I didn't leave a message. I tried the number at Yew Tree Lodge. Not even a machine answered.

I was still stunned by the news. ‘I can't understand it – he was making an absolute fortune. I can't see Toby giving it all up for no reason. Somebody must have put him up to it.'

Matt nodded slowly. ‘That's what I'd have said.'

‘But who?'

Matt shrugged. ‘And how?'

‘I wonder if he's okay?' I said, surprised to find myself suddenly concerned for Toby's welfare.

‘If he's gone out of business, the Jockey Club won't need us to carry on our investigation,' my partner said flatly.

‘I should think they'll still want some kind of report to justify the money they'll have to pay us.'

‘Maybe,' he said, unconvinced. ‘We might as well get hold of the tapes from his cottage and the flat. I could do it,' he added unexpectedly. ‘I'm meeting up with Sara from Chapman's office for a drink this evening.'

‘No,' I said. ‘I'll do it. I might catch Toby if he's in and find out what's happened.' I also had plans to be in London.

Matt didn't object and we arranged to meet at six that evening at my sister's place to update each other.

 

As I drove up the M4, I rang Jane.

‘Any sign of Toby?' I asked when she came on the line.

‘No, and you're not the first to ask.'

‘I'm sure I'm not. I hope he's okay.'

‘Why shouldn't he be?' Jane asked sharply.

‘You know Toby. It seems very strange for him to close down a lucrative line without a bloody good reason.'

‘I also know that he was getting worried about it. So do you. I think he's probably decided to call it a day and take a break, though he normally phones to let me know when he does. The blasted bookies must be happy, at least.'

I agreed with her, extracted a promise that if she heard from Toby she'd tell him to contact me, and rang off.

 

I found a place to park right outside the building where Toby's flat occupied the second floor. I phoned his number but there was still no reply. Two minutes later I was pressing the button marked ‘Porter'.

When he arrived, I blagged my way into the building, retrieved the tape from the recorder hidden behind the fire-hose under the stairs, and left.

I arrived at my sister's house shortly before six. I hadn't expected Matt to bring Sara with him, but when they turned up together, he said they were having dinner later, and he wanted me to hear from her directly what she'd just been telling him.

I sensed that Sara was already regretting her indiscretion but had let herself get caught up in Matt's urgency to find out what had happened to Toby.

We sat around the table in the basement office, but Sara couldn't sit for long. She gratefully took the drink I offered her and started to walk up and down the room.

‘I shouldn't be telling you this,' she started. ‘But after what's happened . . .'

‘Come on,' Matt said quietly. ‘No one's ever going to know it came from you.'

‘They'd better not,' she said, and took a deep breath. ‘Yesterday, Toby Brown napped a horse that opened in the morning at ten to one. Of course, a pile of money went on it in the first few minutes, and every one pulled it in to fives then twos. The small firms were all phoning, desperate to unload some of it. It won, of course. Matt knows because he backed it.' She glanced at him with marked fondness. ‘Right after that, Leslie, the finance director, came in to see Harry. He was white as a sheet. He told Harry they were going to have to do something, and spelt out what the firm had lost on Toby's naps over the last three weeks.'

‘How much was that?' I asked.

‘Over ten million.'

‘Bloody hell!' I said, looking at Matt, who nodded.

‘I know,' he said, ‘it sounds incredible, but you can believe it. The punters are hardly bothering with the other races now.'

‘That's right.' Sara nodded. ‘I heard Harry shouting, “How much longer can we go on losing like this?” And Leslie said no more than a week, or they were going to have to realise some assets.' Sara shrugged. ‘I don't know the state of their balance sheet from day to day, but I should think it very likely they've swallowed up all their cash reserves and cranked up their borrowings to near the limit.

‘It's a very tricky situation. You see, the profit from the betting shops is what paid for the hotel chain. Historically, they've consistently made a lot of money – until now, that is. But if they decided to sell the shops, they'd have to sell them very cheap because of the losses they're making; and if they didn't sell, and Toby's run continued, they would go bust.

‘They've had buyers knocking at their door for most of the individual hotels, and several for the group as a whole. I guess the UK hotel market is still undersubscribed.'

‘That's why they can charge such ridiculous prices,' I said, nodding.

‘But Harry wouldn't let that happen. Don't forget – he came with the hotels.'

‘So what did he do?'

‘He came out and asked me to arrange a meeting yesterday afternoon with the chief executives of the other three big bookmakers. I made damn' sure I was around when they got there. I didn't hear everything they said, but the gist of it was that they were going to deal with Toby. They reckoned they had no other choice.'

‘How were they going to deal with him?' I urged.

‘I'm afraid I don't know. I missed the details; they clammed up when I was in the room.'

I looked at Matt. ‘What do you think it means?'

‘Could be anything. Did you get the tape from his flat?'

‘Yes, but I haven't listened to it yet.'

‘Have you talked to Tintern?'

‘No,' I admitted. I'd been trying to put it off until I had something constructive to report. I couldn't help thinking that we should find Toby before we spoke to Lord Tintern. ‘Let's play the tape first,' I said, hoping that might reveal something.

I pulled the small cassette from my pocket and slotted it into a DAT-deck.

It looked from the amount of tape used as if about an hour of material had been recorded since Matt had placed the mikes there four days before.

On the Saturday evening there had been a short conversation in the flat – more of an argument – with another man whom Toby referred to as Link. I didn't recognise the nasal London voice but it was clear that whoever it was resented the fact that Toby had arranged to have dinner with other people that evening.