Would You Believe Him?

by Jack Hollinson

  The next day, in the afternoon, Charles was out but Victor was at work. Barry was sitting quietly in his office when the phone rang. Miranda answered it and Barry’s extension rang.

  ‘It’s the police wanting to speak to you, Barry.’ Victor would hear every word but Barry answered the call and was forced to say a few things that made him suspicious. When Barry put the phone down he knew that Victor would tell Charles all that had happened because he was the same age as Charles and eternally grateful to him for employing him. His wife was away a lot and he lived in a small, country village miles from anywhere and he would have been very bored without a job. Charles had seen that he would bring in a profit so allowed him to work four days a week. All weekend Barry was hoping that he wouldn’t tell Charles but he realised that this could be a false hope.

  Monday came and the phone rang at ten o’clock

  ‘It’s for you Charles,’ said Miranda, who answered the phone in the morning. ‘It’s the police.’

  Charles took the call, not looking at Barry, who was sitting opposite him.

  ‘I see, yes, all right,’ he answered gruffly. ‘Come on, Barry, we’re wanted at the police station.’

  They went the half mile to the station in two cars, and were immediately shown into a small, bare room.

  ‘Mr Triton?’ said the detective. ‘Barry says that he has been feeling pains after drinking coffee at the office. What do you know about this?’

  Charles feigned his look of surprise and shock - the way Barry had seen him do a hundred times before.

  ‘What - feeling ill in our office. Barry you never told me this!’ Barry was about to say something but the detective stopped him.

  ‘No - he didn’t tell you because you are the main suspect.’ Charles sat forwards in his chair - the look of shock being developed nicely to one of horror.

  ‘Me? Well, I just don’t know what to say.’

  At first Barry was pleased with the detective’s sharp tone of voice.

  Barry could read Charles’ face like a book. It was obvious that Charles had been told of the telephone call on Friday and that he had been preparing all weekend for this. It was clear that he knew what was coming and how to react.

  Barry knew what he looked like when he was really shocked and this wasn’t one of those times.

  ‘Have you seen anyone tampering with the food at the office?’ The detective’s tone was becoming softer.

  ‘No - I never have! I honestly can’t believe that I’m down here,’ said Charles, hoping that he would soon be allowed to go, in case the truth was unearthed.

  ‘Well, Barry, I don’t think Mr Triton poisoned you,’ said the detective. ‘Maybe it was just an impurity in the water.’

  Barry realised that Charles had won again for his forty years of telling white lies to people in his business life - and outside - had made him a master of deception. The detective asked Barry if he wanted the investigations to continue but Barry felt defeated and thought that the police would not have many more lines of enquiry. He would have been thrown out of his job, he assumed, and had no plans of what to do if this happened. The detective held out a pen for Barry to sign a form to stop the allegation, so, with a heavy heart, he signed.

  The detective asked Barry to wait outside whilst he had a few more words with Charles and, as Barry waited, he could just imagine what was being said. Motorcycle accident... Brain damage... Rehabilitation not complete... Given a job because Charles was his uncle... Couldn’t be believed. Barry felt sick as he wondered if Charles would sue him for the accusation.

  Charles came out and he went back to the office where Barry tried to gloss over the event.

  ‘I’m sorry, Charles, but I know someone’s trying to poison me.’

  ‘Let’s pretend it didn’t happen. Let’s forget if completely,’ said Charles, with a smug look of satisfaction on his face.

  Barry knew exactly the reason for this look but there was absolutely nothing that he could do about it - nothing. He would have expected Charles to blow up under normal circumstances and give Barry his notice or kick him out of the door. He had seen Charles very angry before and there wasn’t much that could hold him down, but not now -just that smug look.

  Barry now only had to wait until Friday to know if there was evidence from the lab. Friday came, and Barry spoke to the laboratory from a phone box outside his office

  ‘Barry Connors here. Did you find anything in the coffee I gave you?’

  ‘Well, we completed all the preliminary tests and we did find one unusual substance.’

  ‘What was it?’

  ‘Oh, for that, we would have to make extensive tests and it would cost a lot more. If you could just give us an area to test in, it would be easier and cheaper.’

  ‘No, I’m sorry, I just don’t know what it could he. I’ll come and collect the coffee next week.’

  Barry hung up. Now what? He decided to go back to the doctor’s the next day to tell them of his findings and try and get them to test for a poison on the NHS. Meanwhile, he had told everyone at the office that he wouldn’t be drinking or eating anything there.

  He was not going to let them give him more poison - no way! He would eat and drink in the pub nearby and this would prove if he was right - or wrong.

  Barry went to the doctor’s the next day and saw a senior doctor at the practice and at last this man seemed to give Barry’s ideas some credence.

  The doctor sat and thought, for what seemed ages to Barry and then said, ‘I’ll send you up to St Matthew’s Hospital in the city for they have a very advanced laboratory up there and if there is anything in the coffee, they’ll find it. Wait outside whilst the appointment is made and you’ll be given a card by my assistant.’

  Barry was overjoyed. He did as the doctor had said, collected the card and sauntered back to his car. He had to go up to St Matthews the following week, on the Friday, and so he decided that, as he would be in town on the Monday, he would go to the laboratory on the way back and pick up the coffee.

  Things were humming! He told Shu the laboratory’s findings but she was still reticent about believing him. She had just had a test at the hospital to find out whether or not she could give birth.

  ‘My test results are due in a couple of weeks so maybe we’ll find out then,’ she said, dismissing Barry’s ideas.

  ‘You’ll see. You’ll see that I’m right.’ Barry felt sure that he was onto a winner.

  Barry picked up the coffee on Monday and carefully hid it in the loft of his house. Somehow, he couldn’t be certain that his house was totally secure and sure enough, three days before the Friday, Charmaine was out of the office. At times Barry drove home during the day to see if anyone was in the house but they never were.

  Friday came and he went by train to the City. The hospital was right next door to the railway station so Barry had a quick journey. He waited for a short while and then was called in - not to see a doctor, but to see a psychiatrist.

  ‘And so what do you think is wrong with this coffee? Looks all right to me.’ He was a young psychiatrist with a bright personality and Barry could see that he would have to try to prove himself again, but he wasn’t disheartened.

  ‘It’s impossible to see the poison but a laboratory has told me that there is something apart from coffee in there!’

  ‘Something else?’

  ‘Yes, and that something is preventing me from fathering a child. I have tried to find out from doctors what it could be, but they don’t know.’

  ‘That’s serious. Do you know why anyone should want to do that to you?’

  ‘No - I don’t know why but I know who!’

  ‘And who’s that?’

  ‘My boss.’

  A disbelieving look came across the psychiatrist’s face.

  ‘You don’t
believe me,’ said Barry, reading the psychiatrist’s face accurately.

  ‘Well, it’s very unusual. Most bosses don’t interfere with employees like this.’

  ‘I’ve said, I don’t know why, but I used to eat and drink at the office and I got pains in my testicles - the very place responsible for making children.’

  ‘How long has this been going on?’

  ‘About two and a half years. My wife had tests, but they’ve found nothing wrong yet. I only started getting the pains in April so he must have changed the poison or something.’

  The psychiatrist still looked as if he didn’t believe Barry but he stopped quizzing him and sent him in to see the doctor. There, Barry told the doctor what he thought the coffee was doing and the doctor promised to find out if there was anything foreign in the coffee and then Barry left.

  He knew that he would be waiting and worrying about whether they would find anything but he was glad he had got that far. The good thing about Barry was that he was a ‘doer’ and if things puzzled him, he would find out why, if at all possible. He couldn’t sit and do nothing and put things to the back of his mind - that would only irritate him. No, he had to sort things out.

  Barry was now active on another front. After the event at the police station he knew that he had to leave the firm. He wasn’t being made to feel embarrassed, but he knew that he could no longer work with those evil people.

  He had applied for a few posts he saw advertised in the Industries Press, but without luck. Time was passing so he decided to start up his own firm.

  He bought a book which told him all the details and now all he needed was the business. He was rather fortunate in this respect because he had been handling three accounts almost single-handed for a year and knew the contacts quite well. In fact, he and Shu had visited one client, at home, stayed the night and left the next day and they had got on well and formed a good relationship.

  Barry wrote to his clients offering them a reasonable discount if they transferred their business to his new firm and he was quite sure of two, but not the other. Luckily, Shu had just started work again after staying at home for a year, trying to become pregnant. They thought that she may be too stressed at work and that could be the reason for their inability to have a child. She had kept herself busy by knitting beautiful jumpers but had found them extremely difficult to sell. Now, she was back in the City with a bank and earning as much as Barry which meant that if his business failed, they wouldn’t be left without any money coming in.

  Shu started her job on the first of November and the time came for her to ovulate at the end of the month.

  ‘Barry,’ she said, lying in bed. ‘I don’t want to try for a baby, at the moment. I’ve just started work and I could be sacked because I am on a trial period for six months, learning the job, so I think we’d better stop trying.’

  ‘We’ll be all right. Look, we’ve been trying for two and a half years and we’ve had no luck yet - we’ve got to keep trying. Besides, you’re thirty-four and at thirty-five, things may get more difficult for a first-birth and we do not want a deformed baby. I feel good now I haven’t been eating or drinking at Triton’s. I’ve got no pain in my balls, so let’s go for it.’

  They made love, but Shu had a worried look on her face. Was it a woman’s intuition or just nerves?

  Barry handed his resignation and Charles seemed almost to expect it. He didn’t even worry when Barry told him that he was taking his business accounts with him.

  ‘That’s okay, but you’ll need our help to buy the artwork. We’ll take three per cent commission, which is the standard fee and we’ll charge you or the client, whichever you wish,’ said Charles.

  Barry was perplexed. He didn’t understand how Charles could lose the clients so willingly or, maybe Charles actually felt some guilt and was trying to be Mr Nice Guy to make amends. The clients had never spent a vast amount so their loss, plus Barry’s leaving, more or less equalled each other out.

  The last month passed fairly quickly with Charles making the odd sarcastic comment - but Barry’s mind was made up. He was ready to go out on his own and he had even used some Triton stationery to make his own design - that was useful!

  Before he left, Barry found that one of his clients wanted a special, new design to start the marketing campaigns in the New Year. Charles offered to handle the business for two months so that Barry could take advantage of a government scheme that paid £60 a week for the first year of any new business, providing the proprietor had been unemployed for two months. It was a good offer but Barry no longer trusted Charles as he felt sure that he would do or say something to the client to keep the business and make Barry fall flat on his face, so he refused the offer and began the initial work whilst he was at Triton’s.

  The time for Shu’s period had come, a week before Barry left work.

  ‘Has your period come yet?’ he asked, in the evening.

  ‘No, not yet.’

  The ‘not yet’ part of the sentence made Barry remember that she didn’t want the pregnancy or expect it.

  Barry’s last day came and he was getting excited, Shu still hadn’t had her period.

  ‘Sometimes it’s late,’ she kept protesting, but Barry was feeling good.

  There was nothing to do at the office so the staff were going to have a small party and leave at about 2 p.m. Charles saw this as his last chance to poison Barry for he feared that if Barry left and Shu immediately became pregnant, suspicion would fall on him.

  ‘Surely, you’re not going to continue this farce of not eating anything, Barry,’ said Charles, trying to make Barry feel stupid. Of course, Barry thought Shu was pregnant so he saw no point in refusing to eat all that party food.

  ‘It’s all right Charles. I shall join in the party today.’

  ‘Oh, good, I’m sure you will like it,’ said Charles, with a gleam in his eye.

  The food had been prepared the previous night, with small amounts of the poison scattered over it. The drug had only slight side effects for women and men who were not trying for babies, so no-one else would notice.

  Everyone enjoyed the party and Barry laughed and joked with the rest of the staff. He left at 2.30 p.m. feeling very happy and he rushed home to set up an office in the third bedroom of his house - the box room. He had already added an extension to his telephone, put up two shelves on the wall and found an old desk and chairs in the loft. He had a compact office, but he could operate from there.

  Shu had to work until 1 p.m. on the twenty-fourth of December and as they were going to spend Christmas with Barry’s mother, he tidied the house up so that they could leave as soon as Shu arrived home. Barry had been allowed to keep the two litre company car after he had left Triton’s and so they had a fast journey up there.

  On Christmas Day, Barry’s brother and his wife, who lived nearby, had lunch with Shu, Barry and his mother. It was after the meal when Barry started to get worried.

  ‘Come on Shu, have another drink,’ said Ivan, swaying distinctly as he stood in the room. He started to pour out a Southern Comfort.

  ‘Hang on Ivan, just a small one,’ said Barry, putting his hand over the bottle to prevent the flow.

  ‘Why? What’s the matter? You’re not driving anywhere.’

  ‘Err... no - shall we tell them Shu?’

  Shu’s eyes shone but her shyness didn’t allow her to say anything.

  ‘I believe Shu is pregnant’

  ‘That’s wonderful - oh marvellous,’ said Patricia.

  ‘Well, it’s not confirmed yet,’ said Shu.

  ‘How late are you?’ asked Heather.

  ‘Two and a half weeks - I could just have missed one.’

  ‘Anyway, no booze - or very little until we know,’ said Barry. ‘Well make an appointment for you to see the doctor when we get back and I’d
like to tell you something, as well. I haven’t been eating or drinking a single thing at the office for these past two months and I feel better and I’m not as tired and look, Shu is pregnant. I’m sure that Charles was putting something in my food!’

  There was a stunned silence.

  ‘Maybe you’re allergic to the water,’ said Ivan. ‘Anyway, if she’s pregnant, it’s now you should start worrying!’

  The drink was taking over. Barry looked at his mother, Heather, and Shu, and they were all looking at the floor, thinking.

  ‘Have you got any proof?’ asked Heather.

  ‘Well, no - the only proof I could get would be to photograph him putting the poison in my food - and that’s impossible!’

  No-one said anything else. Barry didn’t realise that it was extremely difficult for people to think that a relation could be guilty of committing such a heinous crime, especially when that person was as plausible as Charles.

  ‘What do you think Shu?’ asked Heather. Shu, shook her head in disbelief.

  ‘I almost caught him trying to put something into my food at the office, once,’ said Barry.

  ‘Almost?’ said Ivan.

  ‘Yes - I just couldn’t snatch the packet away from him, and now I’m worried that the poison may have affected me and may produce a deformed baby.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure everything will be all right,’ said Patricia soothingly.

  It was obvious that no-one believed Barry. Was it that they thought that he was still affected by his brain damage or did they think that because he was about to start his own company, he was under too much pressure? The subject was changed, leaving Barry to dwell on his own thoughts. He would show them! He would confront them with the coffee that was being tested in town. Oh please, let them find something, he thought.

  Chapter Twelve

  Barry started the New Year with a flourish. He had the income from the business that had gone through in January and also an opportunity to gain a new client. This client was an electrical manufacturer who had been given Barry’s name at Triton’s before he left. Barry did wonder whether he should tell Charles, but decided to take a stab at it himself.