To the Hilt

Table of Contents

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hailed as the “master of crime fiction and equine thrills” (
Newsday
)
, New York Times
bestselling author Dick Francis delivers one of his most engrossing novels—the story of a self-imposed outcast who must refresh his detection skills in order to save himself and his family...

 

The black sheep of a prominent family, Alexander Kinloch is content to paint pictures and play the bagpipes in his ramshackle Scottish home. But the artist’s peaceful life is suddenly interrupted—first by a savage, mysterious beating, and then by a sudden call from his near-bankrupt family, asking for his help. Now Alexander is trying to keep several family treasures safe from harm—including a steeplechaser called Golden Malt. But if he wants to prevent a cold-blooded killer from sending him straight to his grave, he’s going to have to get the hang of the art of detection...

“NOBODY SETS UP A MYSTERY BETTER THAN DICK FRANCIS.”

 

 

“STEPS OUT SMARTLY ON THE VERY FIRST PAGE...
To the Hilt
delivers the pleasures people pay for.”

 

“DICK FRANCIS’S BOOKS KEEP GETTING BETTER ... Kinloch is altruistic and warmly likable, like all of Francis’s heroes, but he becomes a real person on the pages, not a generic good guy.”—The Associated Press

 

“TYPICALLY ENJOYABLE. Francis keeps the action bouncing from heather to hearth, painting a delightful portrait of his own luscious British countryside and a doddering aristocracy.”
—Chicago Tribune

 

“LIKABLE CHARACTERS ABOUND.”

—
Publishers
Weekly

 

“REMARKABLY, AFTER MORE THAN THIRTY-FIVE NOVELS, DICK FRANCIS IS STILL GETTING BETTER.”
—Booklist

 

“BY TURNS UNEXPECTEDLY HUMOROUS AND MOVING.”
—Kirkus Reviews

 

“THE PLOT SKIPS RIGHT ALONG ... just what Dick Francis fans expect.”—
San Antonio Express-News

“BRAVE AND RESOURCEFUL, level-headed and modest, Alexander makes an engaging hero... a host of winning characters ... Like his hero, Francis is steadfast and dependable, someone you can always turn to when in need of a good rousing mystery.”—
San Francisco Chronicle

 

“It’s either hard or impossible to read Mr. Francis without growing pleased with
yourself.
not only the thrill of vicarious competence imparted by the company of his heroes, but also the lore you collect as you go, feel like a field trip with the perfect guide.”—
The New York Times Book Review

 

“One of the most reliable mystery writers working today... Francis’s secret weapons are his protagonists. They are the kind of people you want for friends.”

 

“After writing dozens of thrillers, Dick Francis always retains a first-novel freshness.”—
The Indianapolis Star

 

“He writes about the basic building blocks of life—obligation, honor, love, courage, and pleasure. Those discussions come disguised in adventure novels so gripping that they cry out to be read in one gulp-then quickly reread to savor the details skipped in the first gallop through the pages.”—
Houston Chronicle

 

“Dick Francis stands head and shoulders above the rest.”

—
Ottawa Citizen

 

“Francis just gets better and better ... It can’t be as easy as he makes it look, or all mystery writers would be as addictive.” —
The Charlotte Observer

 

“[Francis] has the uncanny ability to turn out simply plotted yet charmingly addictive mysteries.”

 

“A rare and magical talent ... who never writes the same story twice ... Few writers have maintained such a high standard of excellence for as long as Dick Francis.”

FICTION BY DICK FRANCIS & FELIX FRANCIS

 

 

FICTION BY DICK FRANCIS

 

 

 

ANTHOLOGY

 

 

 

NONFICTION

 

 

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

TO THE HILT

 

A Berkley Book / published by arrangement with the author

 

PRINTING HISTORY

Jove mass-market edition / October 1997

Berkley mass-market edition / June 2004

Copyright © 1996 by Dick Francis.

Penguin Books USA, Inc.

 

 

All rights reserved.

This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

For information address: The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

 

eISBN : 978-1-101-00724-2

 

BERKLEY®

Berkley Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

BERKLEY and the “B” design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

 

 

BEDE’S DEATH SONG

Fore thaem neidfaerae naenig uuirthit thoncsnotturra, than him tharf sie to ymbhycggannae aer his hiniongae hwaet his gastae godaes aeththae yflaes aefter deothdaege doemid uueorthae

 

 

 

 

ENGLISH TRANSLATION BY MICHAEL ALEXANDER

I don’t think my stepfather much minded dying. That he almost took me with him wasn’t really his fault.

My mother sent me a postcard—“Perhaps I’d better tell you your stepfather has had a heart attack”—which I read in disbelief outside the remote Scottish post office where I went every two weeks to collect my letters. The postcard had lain there unread for approximately ten days.

Somewhat distractedly, though my stepfather and I were hardly intimate, I went back into the cluttered little shop and begged use of the telephone.

“You’ll be reimbursing us as usual, Mr. Kinloch?”

“Of course.”

Dour old Donald Cameron, nodding, lifted a flap of counter and allowed me through to his own jealously protected and wall-mounted instrument. As the official public telephone, thoughtfully provided outside for the few surrounding inhabitants, survived vandalism for roughly thirty minutes each time it was mended, old Donald was accustomed to extending to customers the courtesy of his own phone. Since he charged an extra fee for its use, I privately reckoned it was Donald himself who regularly disabled the less profitable technology on his doorstep.

“Mother?” I said, eventually connected to her in London. “This is Al.”

“Alexander,” she corrected automatically, not liking my abbreviation, “are you in Scotland?”

“I am, yes. What about the old man?”

“Your stepfather,” she said reprovingly, “is resting.”

“Er ...
where
is he resting?” In hospital? In
peace?

“In bed,” she said.

“So he is alive.”

“Of course he’s alive.”

“But your postcard ...”

“There’s nothing to panic about,” she said calmly.

“He had some chest pains and spent a week in the Clinic for stabilization and tests, and now he is home with me, resting.”

“Do you want me to come?” I asked blankly. “Do you need any help?”

“He has a nurse,” she said.

My mother’s unvarying composure, I sometimes thought, stemmed from a genuine deficiency of emotion. I had never seen her cry, had never heard tears in her voice, not even after her first husband, my father, had been killed in a shooting accident out on the moors. To me, at seventeen, his sudden loss had been devastating. My mother, dry-eyed, had told me to pull myself together.

A year later, still cool at the ceremony, she had married Ivan George Westering, baronet, brewer, pillar of the British Jockey Club, my stepfather. He was not domineering; had been generous, even; but he disapproved of the way I lived. We were polite to each other.

“How ill is he?” I asked.

“You can come if you like,” my mother said. “It’s entirely up to you.”

Despite the casual voice, the carefully maintained distance, it sounded closer to a plea than I was used to.

“I’ll arrive tomorrow,” I said, making up my mind.

“If you’re sure?” She betrayed no relief however; no welcome.

“I’m sure.”

“Very well.”

I paid the phone call’s ransom into Donald’s stringy outstretched palm and returned to my laden, ancient and battered four-wheel drive outside. It had good gears, good brakes, good tires and little remaining color on its thin metal flanks. It contained, at that moment, food for two weeks, a big cylinder of butane gas, supplies of batteries, bottled water and insect killer and three brown cardboard boxes, parcel delivery, replenishing the tools of my trade.