Bloodline

‘A long time ago. I don’t think she meant to tell me. It just, sort of, slipped out. She swore me to silence.’

‘How come she was even speaking to you in the first place? I thought she despised all journalists.’

‘She didn’t despise me.’

I wondered if Jim had been one of the string of unsuitable older men that Clare had bedded.

‘Were you sleeping with her?’ I asked.

‘That’s none of your business,’ he replied.

‘I think it is,’ I said, staring him in the eye.

‘OK. I was,’ he said. ‘But it was a couple of years ago now, and it only lasted a month or two.’ He laughed. ‘Only until Clare realized the error of her ways and dumped me.’

So Jim Metcalf wasn’t the ‘new man’ that Clare had been so flattering about at our last dinner.

‘But I still loved her enough,’ he went on, ‘to keep her confidence about you and Sarah Stacey. But it amused me to watch you both.’

‘Well, for your further amusement, and information,’ I said, ‘Mrs Stacey and I are no longer an item. It’s over. Finished. I’ve also moved on.’

‘But was it Mitchell who tried to kill you? I hear on the press grapevine that he’d found out about your affair and I, for one, wouldn’t want to be on the wrong end of that temper.’

‘No, you’re probably very wise,’ I said, remembering my encounters with him in the racecourse car parks. ‘I don’t know if it was him but I doubt it. Whoever it was went to great lengths to remain hidden, and that doesn’t smack to me of Mitchell’s methods. He’s more of a confrontational sort of guy.’

‘So how did this person try to kill you?’

‘On the record or off it?’ I asked.

‘Either way,’ he said. ‘You choose.’

I handed him my witness statement and he read it through from start to finish.

‘Blimey,’ he said. ‘It really was attempted murder.’

‘It sure was,’ I agreed.

‘I never realized being a racing journalist could be so dangerous, what with that creep Woodley getting himself murdered.’

‘The police seem to think that might have been a robbery that went too far.’

‘What was stolen?’ Jim asked.

‘It seems his briefcase is missing.’

‘Ah, the famous Woodley briefcase.’

‘What’s famous about it?’ I asked.

‘Don’t you know? He’d always go berserk if anyone went near it in the press room. That’s partly why he was so unpopular with the rest of the racing press. He treated that briefcase as if it was a bloody baby. He was obsessed by it.’

‘What was in it?’ I asked.

‘God knows,’ said Jim. ‘Probably just his sandwiches.’

‘Somebody must have thought it was valuable if they killed him for it.’

‘I can’t imagine why,’ said Jim, laughing. ‘I’d have happily killed him for nothing.’

‘I wouldn’t say that if the police can hear you.’ I thought back to my interview with Superintendent Cullen. I hadn’t done myself any favours telling him that I hadn’t liked the victim.

I looked at the clock on the wall. I was late for the production meeting.

‘Jim, could you witness my signature? The police will be here soon to collect it.’

I signed the paper at the bottom, and Jim added his signature alongside as the witness.

‘So, can I use any of this?’ he asked, pointing at my statement.

‘Why not?’ I said. ‘It can’t do any harm.’

16

I went out to meet Emily immediately after the production meeting, just in case she was early.

I realized that I had no idea what type of car she drove so I stood next to the entry road staring intently at the driver of every vehicle that passed me in case I missed her. But I needn’t have worried. Bang on time, at precisely twelve thirty, she arrived flashing her lights and sounding her horn as soon as she saw me.

And I should have guessed her choice of car. She drove a metallic-red Mercedes SLK sports roadster, and she had the roof down.

I was laughing as I climbed in beside her, in the sure knowledge there was no strangler lurking in a back seat because there were no back seats.

‘Hello, gorgeous,’ I said, leaning over and giving her a brief kiss.

‘Where to?’ she asked, grinning broadly.

‘Straight on down to the end,’ I said. ‘We’ll park in the press area, it’s nearer to the entrance than the public car park.’

What was it that Jim Metcalf had said about me not being very discreet in my private life? Well, there was nothing in the slightest bit discreet about Emily’s and my arrival in the Newmarket racecourse press car park.

For a start, not many members of the press drive Mercedes sports cars and even fewer arrive for a race meeting in October with the roof down. Then there was the spin of the rear wheels on the gravel by the entrance, and the slight drift of the back end on the damp grass as she turned sharply into the parking space.

Next came the dramatic closing of the electric roof and, as if there were not enough of the press watching already, there was Emily’s loud squeal of delight as she came round the back of the car, enveloped me in her arms and kissed me passionately, full on the mouth.