‘Where’s his bank?’ I’d asked.

‘How the hell should I know?’

‘You told me you pay his trainers’ premium by bank transfer, so what’s the sort code?’

‘I’ll have to look.’

I had waited patiently for him to log on to his online banking.

‘Twenty, thirty-seven, thirteen.’

I typed the code into Google—Barclays Bank in Harrogate.

‘What’s the account number?’

‘I surely shouldn’t be giving you someone else’s bank details.’

‘So you’d rather I called the mobile number you gave me and tell him that you’ve given me his sort code but you said to ring him for the actual account number?’

‘You wouldn’t do that.’

‘Okay. Maybe I wouldn’t. But I still need it.’

‘But those things are private.’

‘No, they’re not. Every time you write someone a cheque it has your sort code and account number printed along the bottom. There’s nothing private in that.’

‘I don’t write many cheques these days.’ He’d said it wistfully, as if yearning after some long-gone, simpler life.

In the end, and after much procrastinating, Simon had finally given me Valance’s account number, not that it did me much good. Knowing his sort code and account number didn’t give me access to anything, and certainly not how much he was raking off the trainers, or making on bets from the fixed races—that was if he had been stupid enough to use the same account for his gambling activities, which I very much doubted.

‘So what’s the plan?’ Chico asked as we joined the M1 northbound at Leicester.

‘We’re on our way to Malton,’ I said, ‘to speak with one Jimmy Shilstone, jockey of that parish.’

‘The one that you said has stopped eight of Paulson’s horses?’

‘Indeed, and possibly many more for other trainers. I want to catch him between him riding out for a local Malton trainer and him leaving for Market Rasen. That’s assuming he does go home between the two. If not, we’re in trouble, but I think he probably will, as he’d have to drive right past his house anyway.’

‘What time will he leave for the races?’

‘He’s due to ride in the first—not one of Paulson’s—and that’s at two o’clock, so he’ll probably aim to get there by one. According to Google Maps it takes an hour and forty minutes from Malton to Market Rasen Racecourse. If I were him, I’d allow an extra half hour for traffic near the racecourse or for some other sort of holdup. So I reckon he’ll leave home between ten thirty and eleven o’clock. But, to be on the safe side, I plan to be outside his house from nine.’

‘What will you do if he won’t speak to you?’