‘That may have once been true, but time passes and people forget. And it doesn’t change the fact that Valance will have covered his tracks. You mark my words, if we go to the authorities now, nothing will stick to him and he’ll simply be free to entrap new jockeys and trainers to do his dirty work. We need to get something on him that will stand up, if not in a court of law, at least at a BHA enquiry.’

‘And how are we goin’ to do that?’

‘I don’t know yet, but I’m working on it.’

Indeed, throughout my long night on guard in the kitchen, I had thought of little else.

‘But if what you say is true,’ Chico said, ‘and he or his heavies murdered this Bremner bloke, won’t the police find him out?’

‘The police don’t believe it was murder. They think Gary killed himself. Seems they found a suicide note, but it was not written on paper, it was typed into his phone.’

‘So anyone could have done it.’

‘Exactly.’

‘How stupid can you get? But the police have always been far more interested in closin’ cases than actually findin’ out what really happened. Like those murders in Barking a few years back. Happened right close to where I live. What was his name? Stephen somethin’. Killed four young blokes with drugs. Left their bodies almost in the same place, but still the cops thought the lads had accidently overdosed themselves. They even said one of them did it on purpose, because they also found a suicide note next to his body, but that one had definitely been written by the killer. I ask you. Didn’t they check the bleedin’ handwriting? Port. That was it. His name was Stephen Port. Saw a TV programme about it recently. Right weird bastard, he is. And barking mad if you ask me.’ He laughed.

‘So what do we do about this Valance man and his pair of goons? Do we wait here for them to come back or go lookin’?’

‘Neither at the moment. Instead, we go in search of more of his victims. I’ve already spoken to the trainer Simon Paulson and to the jockey Marcus Capes, but I’m also keen to have words with Jimmy Shilstone.’

‘And who’s he when he’s at home?’

‘He’s the jockey that definitely stopped the two Paulson horses at Catterick last week, and Paulson told me that the two of them together had done it eight times in total.’

‘So where do we find this Shilstone fella?’ Chico asked.

‘He’s got rides at Ayr in Scotland today, but he’s booked for two more at Market Rasen tomorrow. One of them for Simon Paulson.’

‘And where the hell is Market Rasen?’

‘North Lincolnshire. About two and a half hours’ drive away from here.’

‘But if we go all that way, will he even speak to you?’