Crossfire by Dick;Felix Francis Francis Page B

Were there co-conspirators, or did he work alone? There were so many questions. Now it was time for answers.
    I called Isabella Warren from the phone in the drawing room.
    “Oh, hello,” she said. “We’re still speaking, then?”
    “Why shouldn’t we be?” I asked.
    “No reason,” she said. “Just thought you were disappointed.”
    I had been, but if I didn’t speak to people who disappointed me, then I’d hardly speak to anyone.
    “What are you up to today?” I asked her.
    “Nothing,” she said, “as usual.”
    Did I detect a touch of irritation?
    “Do you fancy helping me with something?”
    “No bonus payments involved?”
    “No,” I said. “I promise. And none will even be requested.”
    “I don’t mind you asking,” she said with a laugh. “As long as you don’t mind being refused.”
    I wouldn’t ask, though, I thought, because I did mind being refused.
    “Can you pick me up at ten?” I asked.
    “I thought you said you’d never let me drive you again.” She was still laughing.
    “I’ll chance it,” I said. “I need to go into Newbury, and the parking is dreadful.”
    “Can’t you park anywhere,” she said, “with that leg?”
    “I haven’t applied for a disabled permit,” I said. “And I don’t intend being qualified to.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I want to be able to walk as well as the next man,” I said. “I don’t want to be identified as ‘disabled.’ ”
    “But parking is so much easier with a blue badge. You can park almost anywhere.”
    “No matter,” I said. “I don’t have one today, and I need a driver. Are you on?”
    “Definitely,” she said. “I’ll be there at ten.”
    I went out into the kitchen to find my mother coming in from the stables.
    “Good morning,” I said to her, still employing my friendlier tone from the previous evening.
    “What’s good about it?” she said.
    “We’re both alive,” I said.
    She gave me a look that made me wonder if she had thought about not being alive this morning. Was suicide really on her mind?
    “We will sort out this problem,” I said in reassurance. “You’ve done the hard bit by admitting it to me.”
    “I didn’t have any choice, did I?” she said angrily. “You snooped through my office.”
    “Please don’t be annoyed with me,” I said in my most calming way. “I’m here to help you.”
    Her shoulders drooped and she slumped onto a chair at the kitchen table.
    “I’m tired,” she said. “I don’t feel I can carry on.”
    “What, with the training?”
    “With life,” she said.
    “Now, don’t be ridiculous.”
    “I’m not,” she said. “I’ve spent most of the night thinking about it. If I died it would solve all the problems.”
    “That’s crazy,” I said. “What would Derek do, for a start?”
    She placed her arms on the table and rested her head on them. “It would clear all the problems for him.”
    “No, it wouldn’t,” I said with certainty. “It would just create more. The training business would still have to pay the tax it owes. The house and stables would then definitely have to be sold. You dying would leave Derek homeless and alone as well as broke. Is that what you want?”
    She looked up at me. “I don’t know what I want.”
    How strange, I thought. I had said the same thing to myself in the night. Neither of us was happy with the futures we saw staring us in the face.
    “Don’t you want to go on training?” I asked.
    She didn’t reply but placed her head back down on her arms.
    “Assuming the tax problems were solved and the blackmailer was stopped, would you still want to go on training?”
    “I suppose so,” she said without looking up. “It’s all I know.”
    “And you are so good at it,” I said, trying my best to raise her spirits. “But tell me, how did you stop Pharmacist winning on Saturday?”
    She sat back in the chair and almost smiled. “I gave him a tummy ache.”
    “But how?” I asked.
    “I fed him some rotten