Unsafe Deposit

by J. E. Kellenberger

  Air traffic control for the Athens region received a single mayday call when the flight from London Heathrow was about thirty minutes from its destination. There was no reply to the controller’s immediate response to the distress call. The airwaves had gone dead and shortly afterwards the flashing orange glow that was flight 209 disappeared from the radar screens. Despite their training it was an unnerving shock for both the controller and his supervisor. There was blanket coverage by the media of the loss of the commercial aircraft and its subsequent crash in the foothills surrounding the Pindus range. Debris was scattered over a corridor of more than a mile from the foothills to the plains and dramatic views of some recognisable chunks of the fuselage were transmitted all over the world by helicopters hovering over the channel of wreckage. No survivors were expected and when rescue crews got to the scene none were found. The black box was recovered in largely undamaged shape but until its data had been analysed speculation of the cause of the crash centred mainly on the possibility of some catastrophic systems failure. It was a bleak day for the airline whose spokesman had to announce the loss of almost two hundred lives including a vastly experienced flight deck crew. The passenger manifest was released and countries with nationals aboard the flight broadcast their numbers, picking out and detailing some of their lives with ages and occupations. The names of Thomas Cahill and Jane Catherine Meares appeared on the manifest. Tommy’s new wife had travelled on her existing passport, there having been insufficient time to submit a new marriage certificate and receive an updated passport.

  The last words Stan Cahill had with his son turned out to be the telephone call from Heathrow when a high-spirited Tommy rang to tell him that there had been no hitch in the civil marriage ceremony that morning and that he and his wife Jane were at the airport and about to go airside. The short conversation was joyful and Stan had to wipe away the beginnings of a tear when he put down the receiver, so thankful was he that he no longer had to fret about his son’s future. He had met Jane and although she was of a different strata in life to his own he could clearly see the love and trust between them and thoroughly approved of her as his daughter-in-law. Stan’s life of retirement was not governed by watching the television news or reading anything other than the sports pages of his daily newspaper and thus it was some hours after the fatal crash before he learned the awful fate of his son. It had taken the airline a period of time to discover his telephone number via a roundabout route, there having been no answer to their calls on the contact number Tommy had given when booking the flight. An explanation by the airline of the dramatic events had persuaded the contract server of Tommy’s mobile to release details of telephone numbers Tommy had rung in the last fortnight. One number had been telephoned regularly and when the airline rang it Stan answered. A widower of less than six months, the news of the death of his only remaining close relative caused Stan’s world to disintegrate in one savage coup. With unerring clarity of purpose he made his way to the medicine cabinet and removed the small, white tub containing his arthritis medication. He poured a tumbler semi-full with neat whisky and gulped down all the tablets. Settled into his armchair, he tuned in to a repeat of a football match. He fell asleep shortly after and was dead when the telephone rang again.

  Already shocked to the core, Daniel replaced the handset slowly with a gnawing gut feeling that something else was amiss. He had asked to be left alone in his office while he telephoned Tommy’s father for the delicate and dreaded task of enquiring whether he had already been informed of Tommy’s apparent death. Now with no reply he rang his mother for advice. Should he contact the police with his suspicions or go immediately to Stan’s house in person, he asked her. Andreé was the right person to ask; she had known Tommy since she was a kid and cared for him almost as much as had her brother Rolf. Greatly upset too by the loss, she felt it almost a relief to have something positive to do. She would leave with John immediately and could be at Stan’s house in north London in just over an hour. They would assess the situation and call the police if necessary. However matters were it would be a dismal conclusion. With Marian’s help Daniel composed a brief internal communiqué of the facts known to them at the time.

  To: All WareWork personnel

  From: Daniel Walker, CEO

  It is with great sadness that I must inform you of the apparent death of Thomas Cahill, known affectionately as Tommy. According to the passenger manifest he was on board flight 209 to Athens when it crashed forty-eight hours ago. No survivors are expected but confirmation of death will only be issued when the bodies have been recovered.

  Tommy had recently become a non-executive director of our company and he was on his first assignment as roving ambassador for WareWork. He was also going on his honeymoon having married for the first time on the morning of his departure. His wife, Jane, is also assumed to have died.

  Tommy had been associated with WareWork since its formation in the days of joint founder Max Berghoff. In his youth he worked to earn pocket money with his great friend and confidante, our former CEO Rolf Berghoff, doing odd jobs for the general maintenance department and dealing with hefting goods in the loading bays. In his early twenties he started his own business as a car dealer in the London area and later set up a successful partnership. He inherited a large block of WareWork shares from his great friend when Rolf died unexpectedly. Steeped in the company’s history he had become a valuable and trusted member of the board in his comparatively short time as a director.

  We will be arranging a gathering of current and former employees who knew or worked with Tommy so that we may remember and celebrate his life. His cheerful and cordial presence will be missed by many.

  After examination by the police pathologist and various toxicology tests the coroner found that the deceased, Stanley Cahill, had taken his own life while the balance of his mind was unstable. He believed that no foul play had been involved. The body was released at approximately the same time as the human remains of Tommy and his wife Jane were flown home to England. Andreé and John took charge of the funeral arrangements knowing that Tommy and his father had no close relatives. All they knew about his wife apart from her first name was that she was a divorcee. If they had looked closely at the passenger manifest they would have learned that Meares was Jane’s surname by her first marriage but they had assumed that she was travelling with a passport in her new name. It was only when certain official documents came into their possession via the undertaker that an amazing coincidence became apparent. John read out loud snippets from the various legal papers they had received. Tommy’s passport had not been salvaged but Jane’s had although it was in partial tatters. The front cover was mostly missing and several of the top pages badly mutilated. John flipped through the remnants to the last two pages and back cover. They were largely intact. With some deciphering he was able to read the surname, given names and date of birth of the passport holder. Her photo was also discernible. Inside the back cover in the area in which the holder is urged to list below particulars of two relatives or friends who may be contacted in the event of an accident he read “Arthur Meares” with an address in Winchester and “Angela Watts” with a different address but in the same town. Looking back at the full face in regulation-stern pose, he told Andreé that Tommy’s new wife had been the former wife of Arthur Meares, the one they had met on the day out in Windsor. After a moment’s astonishment Andreé asked the very valid question as to why the remains of Jane had been sent to them and not to one of the persons listed. ‘A bold, diagonal line is crossed through Arthur’s name,’ John told her. ‘Why they haven’t contacted the other person I don’t know, possibly because Tommy booked both tickets and told them that although they would be man and wife when they travelled, Jane might have to travel on her current passport with her previous surname. Or maybe they found the wedding certificate folded up in Angela’s passport but it disintegrated when they opened it up to read. Your guess is as good as mine,’ he co
ncluded, ‘but we both know that Angela Watts is her daughter.’

  Arthur’s knowledge of the plane crash in Greece was of passing interest only as he had no reason to believe he had a connection with any of the passengers or crew on board and Angela’s continuing struggle to regain her emotional equilibrium meant that her thoughts were focused almost entirely egocentrically and events outside her own little sphere were of no palpable concern.

  ‘Who will inform her?’ asked Andreé.

  ‘Presumably that’s the responsibility of the airline,’ John replied, ‘although we can’t be sure that they have. I think they have special counsellors for such occasions.’

  ‘We barely know her,’ said Andreé, ‘but I think we ought to check that she has been told. After all we are dealing with the funeral for Tommy and Jane is now his wife.’

  ‘Maybe you should ring her,’ suggested John.

  ‘Nobody wants to receive that sort of news via the phone. We should go to her home and if she is not there we must go to the shop,’ said Andreé. ‘I think we should leave straightaway.’

  Their journey south was full of foreboding. It was a dreary day, low stratus cloud and intermittently spitting rain. Everything looked grey. The monotonous drive anti-clockwise around the London orbital road seemed never-ending and matched their low spirits. There was little conversation, each trying to work out how best to tackle telling Angela and each dreading having to do so. ‘There is no right way to tell a daughter that her mother is dead,’ Andreé had said, ‘if she doesn’t yet know we must just say it in simple, plain words and without prevarication.’ The meeting with Angela at her home proved as draining as they had feared. The airline had not been in touch, confused by the surname. Andreé gave comfort while John summoned Angela’s husband back from his work to support his wife in her definite hour of need. John was able to explain the course of events to the ashen-faced pair including the subsequent suicide of the father of Jane’s new husband. He went on to give details of the arrangements he was making for the funerals. There would be a joint funeral for Tommy and Jane which would be immediately followed by one for Stan. Angela was in no state to take in the information but, on her behalf, her husband queried whether Angela would wish her mother to be sent to her maker with someone she had known for only a short time and far away from what had been her family home and longstanding milieu. John pointed out quietly and sympathetically that Tommy was, in fact, Jane’s next of kin and that it was usual for husband and wife to have a joint ceremony when they both died at the same time. He explained that he believed Tommy died intestate and therefore he had no idea whether Tommy wished to be cremated or buried. He asked Angela’s husband to try to discover from her whether her mother had made a will. If so there might be a desire expressed within it for how she wished her mortal body to be disposed. He said he would but was unsure if Angela would go along with the explanation. She might prove stubborn on the issue, especially now that she was pregnant. He thanked the Walkers for all that they were doing and made a note of the date and time of the service. A wake, John said, would be held in a hotel near one of Tommy’s places of work so that friends and employees could attend and Stan’s neighbours and old-time pals could get there too. Later, there would be a gathering in the modern canteen at WareWork as many employees who knew Tommy from his younger days would wish to drink a toast to him. He felt sure it would be what Tommy would have wanted. Should Angela wish for anything more for her mother then he would try to oblige. Andreé and John departed, thankful for the moment that their sensitive task was over.

  ‘Intestacy rules in England and Wales,’ said the company’s legal advisor, ‘are very specific.’ Daniel and Marian looked glumly at one another. Since the crash the subject of what would happen to Tommy’s shares in WareWork had never been far from their lips but had remained largely unspoken about while awaiting recovery and repatriation of the bodies to England. The process was necessarily slow and methodical and after a period of time Marian deemed that they could not wait for the niceties of the funerals and wakes to be over before earnestly discussing the position. ‘Inheritance by the Crown, or “bona vacantia” in legalise,’ said the legal advisor looking over his half-moon spectacles, ‘is the end game, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that! But with no knowledge of a will they had to work through all the possibilities.’

  ‘I take it that no will has been found so far,’ said the legal advisor.

  ‘Not so far,’ replied Daniel, ‘but it’s early days and we will have to explore all the possibilities of where Tommy might have kept one in safekeeping, like his bank or with his solicitor or stashed away somewhere in his house.’

  ‘Just so,’ replied the legal advisor, ‘but you might find it difficult applying to his bank or any government bodies for information if you are not a relative or the administrator of his estate. Administrators of estates are usually close kin of the deceased and it is far from easy for non-relatives to get official bodies to give them such information let alone be allowed to oversee the disposal of an intestate’s assets.’

  With the aid of a diagram he started to go through with them the sequence of inheritance. No surviving partner, nobody could prove whether Tommy died before Jane or vice versa, no surviving children, step-children had no legal claim on the estate as they were not blood relatives, any living parents? Here the steps down the path of the estate passing to the crown stopped. Stan was still living when Tommy died.

  ‘Everything he had will go to his father,’ said the legal advisor, ‘it’s the father’s will that you need to find but from what you’ve told me it’s a pound to a penny that he left everything to his son!’

  ‘Does that mean back to square one?’ asked Marian.

  ‘Yes,’ he replied flatly, ‘that would be a closed loop.’

  ‘And the Crown would inherit everything!’ said Marian crossly.

  ‘Your worst nightmare I think,’ said the legal advisor, looking at Marian’s furrowed brow, ‘you’d better pin your hopes on either finding a will that Tommy made or hoping that his father left some of his estate to someone other than his son in which case the whole lot would go to that person. In the meantime, as you believe you have good reason, I shall start the process of applying for a grant of administration on your behalf Daniel. Legal wheels turn exceedingly slowly.’

  The gathering at the crematorium was select. On a cold but sunny day heralding the onset of winter, the small group of mourners took their seats either side of the central aisle. In addition to Andreé, John and Daniel, Rolf’s widow Sylvia was also present. She had known and liked Tommy ever since her wedding to Rolf so many decades before. Accompanying Sylvia was her eldest daughter who had flown over from her home in the United States. Tommy had been her godfather. It was a bittersweet meeting for Daniel rekindling his feelings of love. At a distance of three thousand miles or so he thought he was gradually learning to master his emotions but, face to face with her, he found it difficult to hide his feelings of futility. Marian and Adam were present on WareWork’s behalf with Jack Dawes representing Tommy’s car dealing partnership. Apart from three longstanding friends from his greyhound racing hobby and a couple of mates from his local there was, additionally, just his house cleaner present. She had spent many years faithfully cleaning the house and doing Tommy’s washing. John looked around anxiously for any sign of Angela. He was greatly relieved when she entered with her husband, her parents-in-law, another couple who turned out to be Jane’s sister and brother-in-law and a young woman who was her niece, all taking their respective places on the front pew. But of Arthur there was no sign. Daniel had arranged for a taxi to bring Stan’s three elderly neighbours to the crematorium. He was thankful that he had been able to find people who knew Stan to attend the service. Somehow Stan’s last hurrah would have felt very bleak without someone who actually knew him. They would sit through both services as would everyone else except Angela’s party.
Her husband had telephoned John to say he believed Angela would attend but there was always the last-minute possibility that she would change her mind. However, they would leave immediately after the curtains closed around Jane’s coffin and would travel straight home. Later, they would hold their own memorial ceremony to her in Winchester. They hadn’t bargained with the press who waited outside in numbers. The crash had been a big story in the dailies and in its aftermath the families of victims were used as human interest stories and no story was more marketable than a newly married husband and wife dying in one another’s arms. The sound and sight of cameras clicking and flashing greeted their exit. Too upset to speak, they hurried to their cars pursued by reporters calling out Angela’s name and asking for an interview. Slamming the doors, they drove off without comment. Angela was in tears.