I had to take my anti-rejection pills, and they were in the bathroom cabinet at home. I should keep some in the car, I thought, just in case.

‘As you like.’ But he poured himself another generous measure.

‘So what have you discovered?’ he asked, sitting back down in his armchair.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Come on, Sid, I know you too well. You didn’t drive all the way to Yorkshire twice in three days just for the view. You’ve been investigating something, so what is it?’

‘Have you been watching the television news over the past three days?’

‘Of course.’

‘The story about a stable fire in Middleham, and then the discovery of the body of the trainer?’

He nodded. ‘Suicide.’

‘That’s what the police think.’

‘But you don’t?’

‘No.’

I told him about Gary Bremner calling me on Friday, the day before the fire, and then again on Saturday after it, when everyone believed he had died in the flames. I described my trip to meet with Gary on Sunday and my subsequent visit to Simon Paulson’s yard and our discussion about jockeys’ agents and trainers’ premiums.

Charles’s eyes grew wide with astonishment, and his eyebrows rose closer and closer to his hairline.

‘There’s more,’ I said, and went on to describe my encounter with the detective chief inspector in Gary Bremner’s garden after Gary’s body had been found, and then my trip to Catterick races and my firm belief that the results of at least two of the races there had been manipulated. I finished by recounting the details of my encounter with the two masked men in the racecourse car park.

By the time I’d finished, Charles was sitting there with his mouth hanging open in disbelief, his glass of whisky undrunk in his hand.

‘Does Marina know what you’re doing?’ he asked eventually.

‘She knows some of it,’ I replied. ‘But please don’t tell her about the men with baseball bats.’

‘Are you going to report them to the police?’

‘What do you think?’ I asked sarcastically. ‘It would be a total waste of time. No one got hurt, so the police wouldn’t do anything, even if they could find them. Anyway, I’m grateful to them.’

‘Grateful?’

‘Yes, because they have confirmed that what Gary told me is true.’

‘So what will you do now?’

It was a good question.

Did I have enough to take to the racing authorities?

Hardly.

So what else did I need?

‘I think I might go and see someone.’

‘That policeman?’ Charles said.

I laughed. ‘Maybe I should, but he wasn’t who I had in mind.’

‘Who then?’

‘Jimmy Shilstone.’

‘And who is he?’

‘The jockey who rode the two losers today at Catterick.’

I drove Rosie back to our dark and lonely home in Nutwell.