Bloodline

‘Good surprises?’ I asked.

‘Absolutely,’ she said with a smile. ‘Wonderful surprises.’ She suddenly sat up straight. ‘Do you have any wine? I’ve never been to the races before and not had a drink.’

I laughed. ‘I’ll go and see.’

I picked up my shirt and boxers from where they had fallen on the landing and put them back on. Somehow it didn’t seem quite right for me to be wandering around this house without any clothes on.

‘Red or white?’ I called.

‘How about champagne?’

‘I’ll check.’

I went downstairs and looked in Clare’s fridge for some cold bubbles.

There were plenty of things that were out of date, and even some that were growing a nice covering of mould, but there were no bottles of champagne. I did find one, however, in her drinks cupboard in the sitting room, a nice bottle of Bolinger Special Cuvée, but it was decidedly warm.

‘Do you mind if the champagne’s warm?’ I shouted up the stairs.

‘Isn’t there an ice bucket?’ came the reply.

There was, a silver one, sitting on the mantelpiece along with Clare’s other trophies.

I took the ice bucket back to the fridge and looked in the freezer section. It was one of those American-style refrigerators with an internal ice maker. The hopper was only half full so I lifted it out and poured the contents into the bucket.

I was returning the empty hopper to the freezer when I noticed a flat plastic case stuck to its inside with some tape.

I pulled the case away and opened it.

It contained a DVD and a folded sheet of ordinary white copy paper.

I sat on a stool at Clare’s breakfast bar and carefully unfolded the paper. There were three lines of printed text across the middle:

I KNOW YOU DID THIS ON PURPOSE.

A CONTRIBUTION OF JUST £200 WILL MAKE THE STORY GO AWAY.

GET THE CASH READY. PAYMENT INSTRUCTIONS WILL FOLLOW.

I sat there staring at the words, turning the disc over and over in my fingers.

So, it wasn’t only Austin Reynolds who had been blackmailed.

17

‘Are you going to sit there all day? I’m thirsty.’

I turned round to find Emily standing provocatively in the kitchen doorway and, unlike me, she obviously had no qualms about being naked in this house.

She walked over and ran her fingers through my hair. ‘Are you coming back to bed, or do I have to go and play with myself?’

‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘I’m just coming.’

‘What are you looking at, anyway?’

‘Oh, nothing,’ I said, starting to fold the paper, but Emily was already reading it over my shoulder.

‘Oh my God!’ she screamed. ‘It’s a blackmail note. Who sent you that?’

‘No one,’ I said.

‘And what was it that you did on purpose?’

‘It wasn’t sent to me,’ I said. ‘I found it in the freezer.’

‘In the freezer? Where?’

‘In amongst the ice. It was taped to the inside of the hopper with this DVD. Clare must have hidden them in there.’

‘Were they sent to her?’

‘I assume so.’

‘Who by?’ Emily asked. ‘And what was it that she did?’

‘It can’t have been very much, not if two hundred pounds is all the blackmailer asked for. Perhaps the DVD will give us a clue.’

‘Oh, yes,’ she said breathlessly. ‘How exciting.’

Excitement wasn’t the first thing that came to my mind but I was intrigued nonetheless.

‘There’s a DVD player in the sitting room,’ I said. ‘Let’s go and see.’

Emily ran upstairs and then quickly reappeared wearing one of Clare’s dressing gowns, while I loaded the disc.

I was a bit apprehensive as I pushed the play button. Did I really want to know what Clare had been up to? And, in particular, did I want Emily to find out as well? But it was too late to stop now. I had to see, and there was no way I was going to get Emily to go back upstairs and wait for me in the bedroom while I had a quick look at the DVD on my own. She was perched on the edge of the sofa in eager anticipation, bouncing up and down gently like a child waiting for Christmas presents.

I thought it quite likely that the DVD would contain a recording of a race, but I was really surprised that it was the one at Wolverhampton the previous April when Clare had ridden Brain of Brixham into second place while mistaking the camera-support pole for the winning post.

‘What’s so special about that?’ Emily asked, obviously disappointed not to have seen some more salacious footage.

‘Nothing,’ I said.

‘So what’s she supposed to have done on purpose?’

‘I presume it was that she didn’t win.’

I played the film through again and explained to Emily what had happened.

‘But how can you blackmail someone for making a silly mistake?’

‘That’s a very good question.’

I went up the stairs a little to retrieve my shoes and trousers from where they had been discarded earlier.

‘Where are you going?’

‘I need my laptop. It’s in your car.’

I went out to get it, and then looked up on the Racing Post website to see who trained Brain of Brixham.

Why was I not surprised to discover that it was Austin Reynolds?

Time, I thought, for me to go and ask him some more questions.