The Money Makers

by Harry Bingham

  Eventually she relented and, as they left, she allowed Matthew to put his arm around her. She swayed into his embrace, letting him know her promise held good.

  They made their way to the cloakroom booth. Except for the red glow of a smoke alarm, the room was dark and the buxom Italian had disappeared.

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll just hop over the counter and get the coats myself,’ said Matthew.

  ‘No need,’ said a man’s voice from within. Tm just rummaging round for mine.’

  The figure approached the counter, where the light in the hallway provided some brightness. With a rush of horror, Matthew recognised him. It was Belial. Looking as neat as ever, in a snug little dinner jacket, the repulsive man pumped Matthew’s hand.

  ‘Matthew! How good to see you! And who’s this very lovely lady, may I ask? Let me introduce myself. I’m James Belial,’ he said, turning the attentions of his hairy little handshake to Fiona.

  Belial grinned at Matthew, squeezed Fiona’s hand too tight and too long, then bounded around the interior of the cloakroom looking for their coats. He insisted on wriggling back over the counter with the coats, kicking with his absurd short legs to lift himself up.

  ‘Pardon me. Pardon me. This counter’s not designed for the smaller gentleman. There you are. Let me help you with your coat.’

  Before Matthew’s appalled eyes, the ugly little man helped Fiona on with her coat, his thick brown nails grazing the back of her neck. All the while he chattered away, unstoppably.

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t catch your name? Fiona? Fiona Shepperton. Pleased to meet you. No, no. Matthew and I are just business acquaintances, eh, Matthew?’ Belial gave Matthew a leer and a wink. ‘Yes, I’d quite forgotten you lived in this part of town. Still up at Blenheim Court, I suppose. Yes, I always come here when I’m in London, which is quite a lot, you know. All my best clients live here. Splendid restaurant, isn’t it? One of my favourites. Used to come here lots while I was at Madison. You work there too, Miss Shepperton? Or should I say Ms? You American women are so formidable. Yes, I enjoyed working there, but I’m happier where I am now - let me give you my card, there you are. Yes, I meet a much better class of person, now. Ha, ha.’

  Eventually, Matthew was able to tug Fiona away. Belial stood at the door and watched them go. He bobbed up and down on his stumpy legs, a dapper little figure with a twisted face.

  ‘Who the hell was that?’ asked Fiona.

  ‘Forget him. Just a guy I met at a conference once, who kind of glued himself on to me. Wanted me to invest some money with him.’

  ‘And did you?’

  ‘Think I’d give him my money? Not likely.’

  They spoke no more of it, but Matthew was horrified. Throughout the year he had succeeded in keeping Belial and Switzerland International totally away from Madison. And now this repulsive man had barged in on his girlfriend and boss, shoved a card in her hand and made out that he and Matthew were practically bosom buddies. Fiona believed Matthew’s denials, he was sure of that. But all the same, before this evening, the dark side of his life had dwelled in its own world, unseen. Today it had erupted, leaving a huge ugly thumbprint on the part of his life Matthew most wanted to keep pure. They got back to Fiona’s flat and made love. It was pleasurable, of course, but Matthew was upset by the encounter with Belial and Fiona felt it. What should have been a perfect end to the evening was spoiled.

  Three or four more trades with Belial. Five or six if necessary. Then that was it. For ever.

  2

  It was half past midnight as the taxi drew up outside Zack and Sarah’s Chelsea home, a two-storey, three­ bedroom apartment in a quiet street near Sloane Square. The lights were still on, and Zack walked upstairs and let himself in.

  He expected to find Sarah curled up on a living­room sofa, ready for bed and smiling welcome, but the room was empty. He walked on into the kitchen. Perhaps she was there, making bed-time decaf. She was there, but not making coffee. The kitchen was L-shaped and in the long arm of the L, a cream-panelled dining area stretched away from the pots and pans of the kitchen. The mahogany dining table was usually swathed in felted tablecloth, to protect the polished surface beneath, but not tonight. Sarah had stripped it away, laid the table with glass and silver and fine crockery. The stumps of two candles guttered in silver candlesticks. Two platefuls of Sarah’s cooking at its most elegant lay disregarded and cold on a tray to the side. Sarah had changed, not into her normal jeans and T-shirt, but into a blue silk blouse, long velvet skirt and pearls. Her face, normally so spring-like, was dejected.

  ‘Hello beautiful. I’m so sorry. I had no idea you were doing this,’ said Zack.

  ‘You told me you’d be back at nine.’

  ‘Did I? Hell, you’re right. I’m afraid something came up right after that and I’ve been ploughing away at it ever since.’

  Dejected or not, Sarah in silk and velvet attracted Zack as strongly as Sarah in jodhpurs and a sweaty T-shirt, or Sarah in pretty much anything, or nothing if it came to that. Zack didn’t mind missing dinner, but he felt an urgent desire for his favourite after-dinner pleasure.

  ‘Can we rescue anything?’ he asked. ‘Do you want a brandy?’

  She shook her head and tucked her hair behind her ears, both ears. That was a pretty much fatal sign. If her dark blonde hair covered both ears, she was feeling relaxed and warm, with sex only a short nuzzle away. If one ear was uncovered, there was hope. But if both ears peeped out, it was hopeless. Zack went to the fridge for a beer and sat down opposite his wife. It had been another long day at work and, used to it though he was, Zack was weary. His dark, angular face always seemed darker and narrower when he was tired, and a full day’s growth of stubble and the creases of a hard day’s work marked him.

  ‘What’s up? It’s more than just me being late, isn’t it?’

  Sarah nodded. Her blunt chin was manlier than many men’s and her frankness likewise greater.

  ‘I’m not angry. You had work to do, so you did it. You forgot to phone, but I could have called you. You didn’t know I was planning a surprise dinner. It’s just . . . well, it’s just where does this end? When are our lives going to stop being like this? When was the last time we had a proper dinner together during the week?’

  Zack swigged his beer, and dropped his jacket over the back of his chair. Without the padding in the shoulders, he looked more round-shouldered, like the sedentary man he was.

  ‘It’s extra bad at the moment. There’s your dad’s takeover of South China which is taking buckets of time. Then I’ve got my big tax project going full steam ahead at the moment. Then there are lots of other bits and pieces. It all mounts up. But once I finish your dad’s deal, things will settle down again.’

  ‘Don’t kid yourself. Once you complete the South China deal, there’ll be another. Then another after that. That’s the way Weinstein Lukes works. It’s the way Coburg’s works too, except we knock off at nine in the evening, not midnight, and we try not to work weekends.’

  Zack sighed. She was right, of course, and they both knew it.

  ‘Well, short of quitting, I don’t see what option I have. They won’t take any notice if I say I’m doing too much.’

  ‘I know. Do the senior guys work less hard?’

  ‘No. Just as hard. Just as much travel.’

  ‘Oh, God, the travel! Don’t even remind me.’

  What with the Hatherleigh Pacific deal and the RosEs tax gimmick, Zack was travelling to the Far East once a fortnight or more. Because the flights to Hong Kong were often full, Zack had had his secretary book him on the Sunday evening flight every week for the next twenty weeks. If he didn’t need the booking, he didn’t turn up.

  ‘What do you want to do?’

  Sarah tucked her hair behind her ears again, though it was already quite well tucked.

  ‘I don’t know. All I know is I don’t want us to be one of those awful banking couples who never see each other. And when we have babies, I don’t want to chuck th
em at a nanny and reintroduce myself when they’ve graduated from college.’

  Zack’s lust had ebbed away, dampened by the message from Sarah’s hair and by his own tiredness. But now he felt something unexpected. He realised that Sarah was one of the most straightforward, honest, easy to live with people he had ever met. How many other women would have picked a fight with him over the spoiled dinner, instead of simply tackling the issue they both faced? Zack tuned out from her words and sat mesmerised by this vision of her.

  ‘I love you, Sarah. I think you’re an amazing person and I’m delighted to be married to you.’

  Sarah leaned forward, one wing of her bob falling away from her ear and hanging loose again. She laughed her clear healthy laugh at him.

  ‘What on earth made you say that?’

  Zack shrugged. ‘I thought it, so I said it.’

  ‘What a strange man you are.’ Sarah smiled at him, her eyes tracing a path up and down the outline of his face. ‘So what are we going to do?’

  ‘Well,’ said Zack, ‘I promise that I’m not going to stay at Weinstein Lukes for long. I enjoy it, but I don’t enjoy it enough to do it for ever. I’ll hand in my notice when you produce your first baby.’

  That was an easy enough promise to make. Zack’s banking career didn’t need to last beyond winning his father’s money. As for babies ... well, they might feature in Sarah’s life-plan, but they weren’t a part of Zack’s.

  ‘What about now? These are meant to be our best years and we’re not even seeing each other.’

  ‘I’ll try to work fewer weekends.’

  ‘You already try.’

  Sarah’s hair was entirely free of her left ear, and was beginning to struggle free of the right one. She was still in silk and velvet and Zack’s feelings for Sarah started to take a more familiar turn. He reached over the table and clasped her hands.

  ‘Sarah, I don’t want to give up on Weinstein Lukes yet, but I’m no more a career banker than you are. I want to finish your dad’s deal. I want to finish my big tax project. I might want to do another two or three years after that, but no more.’

  Sarah played with Zack’s hands across the table.

  ‘Why did you become a banker, sweetheart?’ she asked.

  ‘Had to do something after Dad died. And I wanted to prove that I could make the grade. I don’t know what I’ll do afterwards. Maybe go back to philosophy.’

  ‘Don’t do that. I hated you as a philosopher. You’ve been as sweet as a teddy bear since you started banking.’

  Zack smiled back at her. However in the end he extricated himself from this marriage, he would do his utmost not to hurt this wonderful woman. ‘How come you went into banking?’ he asked.

  ‘That’s easy. I knew Dad would love me to become involved in Hatherleigh Pacific in some way, even if it was just to sit on the Board after he’s moved on. I wanted to learn what I could about business to prepare myself. But I’m not wedded to it either.’

  ‘Sounds like we were made for each other,’ said Zack. His hand massaged hers, with strokes which became slower and deeper. Her hair was free of both ears and her face was no longer dejected. She saw the question in his eyes.

  ‘It’s a bit late for that,’ she said.

  ‘Best get started, then,’ he said.

  3

  One Monday morning, nine months after his departure from Gissings and three and a half months after his disappearance from the Aspertons, Darren turned up at work. His former workmates crowded round him, shaking his hand and clapping his back like a celebrity on walkabout. Dave leaped for joy, turned the radio up to full volume and started to dance round like a lunatic. A thousand questions greeted the returnee. ‘Have you made it up with George, then?’, ‘Where’ve you been all this time, mate?’ and ‘Are you back for good now?’

  Darren didn’t answer in detail. ‘I got bored pissing round, so I called George and said sorry. He said I could come back, so here I am.’ And that was all anyone was ever to get out of him.

  Apart from George and Darren himself, the only other person who knew more was Jeff Wilmot. Going through the accounts a few weeks previously, he had discovered that George had been making a series of payments to Darren ever since his departure. Wilmot brought the matter up. ‘I hope that we’re not employing Darren in some - er- informal capacity,’ he said. ‘We would be in very serious breach of our obligation to pay national insurance, to make deductions for income tax, to apprise him of pertinent health and safety requirements, to ... well, many things. I hope, I mean ... it would be quite improper ... we should ... at once,’ he stopped, aghast at George’s complacent criminality.

  ‘Don’t worry about it, Jeff,’ George had said. ‘Just mark it down as research and development and let it be.’ Wilmot had gone straight back to his office, eaten three biscuits one after the other without so much as tidying the crumbs, and fired off a strongly worded memo. George threw the memo away. Wilmot was too nervous to gossip, and that was all that concerned George. He didn’t want the Aspertons to reconsider their generosity. The only other person to put two and two together was Val, who had happened to see Darren being mobbed by his crowd of well-wishers. She strode upstairs. It had been raining outside and Val’s heavy brown shoes scattered water in her wake. At the top landing, just before turning into the grandly named management suite, she shook her black umbrella out with needless energy. She seemed perturbed. Since George had left Gissings in his wild goose chase for Kiki, she hadn’t spoken a civil word to him except on routine business matters. It was time to break her own rule.

  ‘George, excuse me.’ She was nervous about this, actually nervous. Her voice hardened as she continued.

  ‘Darren’s disappearance, this libel from the Aspertons, you stuffing the libel back down their throats, Darren coming back - it’s all connected, isn’t it? The whole thing was a set-up.’

  George nodded. Val sounded angry to him, but she’d been angry ever since he’d run off. Still, however much she knew, she’d never say anything which might put Gissings at risk. He could trust her with the secret. He bit his lip and nodded. ‘Yes. Start to finish. My idea. Darren’s flawless execution.’

  Val breathed out deeply. ‘Then I owe you an apology. I owe you ... Well, sorry. Sorry for the things I said.’

  George watched her. She obviously found it hard to apologise. She must still be furious with him, and George was hurt. Ever since Kiki had helped him find his own feelings for Val, they had grown inside him with every passing day. Doubt had given way to certainty, or almost certainty. But for all the change that had taken place in him, it seemed as though Val was as changeless as the Yorkshire gritstone.

  ‘Yeah, well, we need to keep it quiet,’ he grunted.

  ‘The Aspertons won’t stay tame if they get wind of what happened.’

  ‘I understand. But I do apologise. I think you did a wonderful thing. I’m sorry if I made it harder for you.’ Val’s deep-set blue eyes were looking down and away from him. Anywhere but into his eyes. Her mouth was trembling.

  George reached out a hand towards her. He longed to touch her, to draw her into his arms and comfort her, but he held back. He tried to help her with his words.

  ‘Thank you, Val. I ... I knew you wouldn’t have been angry if you’d known. And I certainly did make myself look a bit of a bastard.’

  She looked up, her lips still quivering. Like this, tearful and emotional, George saw a Val which few had ever seen. Her broad, slightly crooked face, her deep intelligent eyes, her boyish ginger hair - to George, they were all entirely beautiful.

  ‘Val ... I ...’ he began and broke off.

  Val stood there, not moving away, but not approaching him either. How was he to read this?

  ‘Val,’ he said, ‘I know it was awful of me running away from you like that. You deserved, well you do deserve much better than that. But is it possible for you to give me a second chance?’

  She struggled with herself.

  ‘We were livi
ng together, George. We were lovers.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You hurt me so much. I swore I would never forgive you.’

  Ever so gently, George lifted Val’s chin until her swimming eyes gazed straight into his.

  ‘I know how much I hurt you. I’ve grown up since then, grown up a lot. You wouldn’t have to pardon me, just give me a second chance.’

  Val stared ahead of her, fear and hope struggling in her face. Kiki had phoned her in the summer, after George’s brother’s wedding. Kiki had told Val that George really loved her, that she should give him a second chance. Val’s pride and her anger at George’s treatment of Darren had kept her aloof, but it had been hard. What was she to make of this man?

  She reached out to George’s jacket. She felt in his pockets until she found the weight of his wallet, and she picked it out. She opened it up. Inside were some credit cards, a couple of receipts, boring stuff mostly. And there were some photos. At the front of the wallet, framed in a clear plastic panel, was the photo of Val which she had given him that summer when they were first together. There was also a passport photo which George must have swiped from her desk drawer at some point. She hadn’t missed it. There were also the photos of Kiki which George had long kept in his wallet. They were tucked away at the back. When Val pulled at them, they came unstuck with a jerk. They hadn’t been moved for months.

  Val didn’t say anything, couldn’t, just nodded. He reached for her, she for him. They embraced with the intensity of prisoners finding freedom. They kissed again and again until they’d had enough to pause awhile. Val sat on his lap, each of them giving or receiving kisses as they felt the need.