up enquiringly.
‘Detective Sergeant Judy Johnson,’ says Judy.
‘Len Harris, Head Lad. Can you excuse me a moment? I’m just getting the declarations done.’
Judy nods and settles down to read the
‘Sorry about that,’ says Harris. ‘Everything’s a bit frantic at the moment.’
Judy looks up from the paper. ‘Jumping Jack hasn’t got a hope in the 2.10 at Newmarket.’
For a second, Len Harris looks angry, then he grins. ‘No, but we don’t want him handicapped too heavily for Cheltenham. Do him good to lose a few races.’
‘What will the owners say?’
Len Harris shrugs. ‘They’re in Dubai. They won’t know.’
Judy stands up. ‘I’m sorry about your boss.’
Harris’s face doesn’t show emotions very easily but, for a second, he looks genuinely bereft. ‘It’s hard. He was a one-off, the governor. Some people thought he was stuck-up, but around the yard he was one of the lads. And he loved the horses, he really understood them.’
‘What will happen with the yard now?’
Harris’s face darkens. ‘That’s up to the kids, I suppose. Caroline would probably like to take over but she hasn’t got the experience. Randolph’s a waste of space. Tamsin’s up in London. I suppose the yard’ll be sold. Owners are already taking their horses away.’
‘Already?’
‘Oh yes. There’s not much sentiment in racing, you know.’
Judy does know. She wonders what will happen to Len Harris if the business is sold. Plenty of racing stables in Norfolk but he looks a little old to go job hunting.
‘I’ve been asked to look at the CCTV footage,’ she says. ‘Is there anywhere I can do that?’
‘Yes. There’s a room in Caroline’s cottage. I’ve got the key.’ He fumbles through sets of keys hanging over the desk. Not a very secure system, thinks Judy.
As they go out into the yard, there is a tremendous banging and clattering from one of the boxes in the far corner. Harris sets off at a run. Judy follows him.
Inside the box, a bay horse is sprawled awkwardly on the ground, almost sitting, front legs straight, back legs collapsed. Its eyes are rolling and it’s clearly in agony. Two stable lads are struggling to get the horse on its feet, hauling on ropes, pushing at its rump. Len goes into the box and joins in the effort, bracing his legs against the wall to push with his back.
‘What’s happened?’ asks Judy.
‘Cast himself,’ pants Len. ‘Probably colic.’
Judy can see that the animal’s stomach does look distended, a symptom of colic. The horse appears in terrible pain, almost bellowing, the white of his eyes yellow. She looks at the laminated card on the stable door. The horse is called Fancy, she reads, and he’s a four-year-old colt.
‘Shouldn’t you get the vet?’
‘He’s coming,’ says Len shortly. ‘Now, please, can you leave us to get on? The cottage is by the gates.’
Judy walks back through the yard with Fancy’s tormented neighing ringing in her ears. She feels very shaken. It’s part and parcel of looking after horses, she knows, but she can’t forget the look in the poor animal’s eyes. She hopes the vet gets there soon. She’d wanted to be a vet once too, before she’d realised that you needed three As at A-Level.
Judy had imagined Caroline very elegant, a grown-up version of the sort of girl who used to intimidate her in her pony club days. But the woman who greets her at the cottage door couldn’t be further from the twin-setted Home Counties lady of her imagination. To be frank, Caroline looks a mess; her dark hair is unbrushed and her eyes are red and swollen. She is wearing jeans and her top is on inside out. She hardly seems to take in Judy’s explanation about who she is and what she wants to do.
‘I thought you were my sister Tamsin,’ says Caroline. ‘She’s coming from London.’
‘I’m so sorry about your dad,’ says Judy.
Caroline’s eyes fill with tears. ‘It just doesn’t seem possible that he’s gone. I keep expecting him to walk in.’
‘It’s hard, I know,’ says Judy. Empathetic echoing, the books call it.
‘I just feel so terrible…’
It must be awful to lose your dad, thinks Judy, however old you are. She hopes that Caroline’s family gives her some support, but she doubts it somehow.
‘The tapes?’ she prompts gently.
‘Oh, yes…’ Caroline gives her a tremulous smile. She keeps looking towards the door, which is freaking Judy out slightly. ‘This way.’
The room by the front door is full of screens. There are five cameras in different parts of the yard: one by the main gates, one by the house gates, one in each quadrangle and one at the far gates, ‘where the original house once stood’ Caroline explains.
Judy settles down to look, gratefully accepting the offer of coffee. Look at last night’s footage, the boss said. She starts at eight p.m. It’s incredibly boring. Hours of night vision camera showing empty driveways. The only distraction is when Lester the cat appears, walking delicately along the footpath, sitting to wash himself in the empty courtyard. Occasionally a horse’s head looks out over one of the stable doors, but, for the most part, Lester is the only living thing to be seen. Judy’s eyes start to blur. She sips her cold coffee. Outside she hears a car draw up and voices talking. This must be the famous Tamsin. She hears a woman’s voice, very loud and upper-class. ‘For fuck’s sake have some respect, Randolph.’ Happy families.
She fast-forwards to ten o’clock. At twenty past midnight, the camera by the house starts to get interesting. A car draws up and a man gets out. He’s carrying a case, so Judy assumes he’s the doctor. The door opens to let him in. A few minutes later, a sports car screeches to a halt by the house. A Porsche, thinks Judy. She likes cars as well as horses. Really, there’s a speed demon in there somewhere trying to get out. A man gets out of the sports car. She can’t see his face but she thinks it might be the son. What was his name? Randolph. The one Len Harris thinks is useless. The one who needs to have more respect. Ten minutes later and an ambulance is through the gates. Lights, running footsteps, a sense of urgency. A figure is carried out on a stretcher. A woman climbs into the ambulance and the man follows in the Porsche. Then the gates shut behind them and she’s back to Lester and the empty yard. Where was Caroline when all this was going on? she wonders. More footage of silent horse boxes. What is she looking for anyway? The boss didn’t seem convinced that there was anything suspicious about Danforth Smith’s death. Does he really believe that someone sneaked in and shot him a poisoned dart or something? He’s getting fanciful in his old age. She’ll tell him so when she gets back to the station. She won’t, of course.
More empty pathways. An owl hooting. Lester prowling through the long grass. A clock striking. Then – Oh my God. The main gates opening and a man appearing.
Judy peers closer. ‘Bloody hell,’ she says aloud. ‘I don’t believe it.’
CHAPTER 15
Although Ruth has lived in Norfolk for thirteen years now, she has never before been to Norwich Cathedral. It’s more the sort of thing tourists do, and one way or another she isn’t really into churches, though she has a sneaking liking for vast Catholic edifices full of pictures of the end of the world. So, although she has often shopped in the lanes nearby, the evocatively named Tombland, and she has seen the cathedral’s spire pointing up through the rooftops like a medieval space rocket, this is the first time she has entered the building.
They walk through the cathedral close across manicured green lawns. Janet Meadows has absolutely no truck with any sign saying ‘Private’. At the main entrance, Janet points at two modern statues on either side of the door.
