The Money Makers

by Harry Bingham

  ‘I’ve missed you so much.’

  ‘I hated not speaking to you. I knew I had to be firm with myself, because I’d be putty in your hands otherwise.’

  ‘God, I wish I’d known. It would have made waiting easier.’

  ‘Oh, George.’

  Neither of them yet dared call the other what they wanted to: sweetheart, darling, my love. They were reunited, lovers again, but were they more? Neither of them had ever spoken deeply about their relationship while it had lasted, and they hadn’t spoken so much as a word since it had ended. Where did they stand now? All this time, George had kept a ring tucked away against his heart and now it clamoured out its question, like cathedral bells.

  ‘Val,’ said George. ‘If it’s too soon, if you need more time, then . . . then, it’s OK. I still want whatever you feel alright with, but ... is it possible? ... will you marry me?’

  Her mouth was wordless, but her eyes said everything. He hugged her. ‘Val, dearest, dearest, Val.’ Eventually they pulled apart. She was still on his lap and there they sat: a plain, ginger, overweight pair. George pulled the ring from his breast pocket.

  It’s hard to pay thirty thousand pounds for a ring. Diamonds big enough to be worth that much look like high-class knuckle-dusters on the finger. George had managed to find a genuine pink diamond which had once belonged to a movie star and that had pushed the price up. All the same, the stone was large for any woman. On Kiki’s tiny hand, it would have looked ridiculous. Val looked at the ring, the big stone on the little gold band, and tried to squeeze it on. She got it as far as the first joint of her ring finger. She turned her hand, catching the light, watching the precious reflective magic inside the stone, and smiled.

  ‘Have you been lugging this around with you all the time?’

  George nodded. ‘Every day.’

  ‘It must have cost you an arm and a leg.’

  ‘More than that. It almost cost the bloody factory.’ And George explained when he had bought it and why. Val stared into the ice-cold heart of the ring.

  ‘To be honest, George, I don’t want Kiki’s cast-offs. I’d sooner have something which is more me.’

  George nodded.

  ‘It is a bit big,’ he said.

  ‘And a bit flashy.’

  ‘Yes, that too.’ George sighed. ‘I didn’t really think you’d want it, to be honest, but I offered it to Kiki, so I owed it to you to offer it to you too.’

  ‘Maybe we could drive into Leeds together tomorrow. Look around for something there,’ Val said as she kissed her fiancé.

  He smiled. ‘Let’s do that, my love.’

  4

  Christmas has come. The goose has grown fat, and heads for the oven with all the other birds who wish that Christ had never bothered.

  Josephine and Helen spend Christmas week at Ovenden House. Because Helen is there, George and Val, and Matthew and Fiona come to visit as well. Lord and Lady Hatherleigh are perfect hosts. They welcome their new family as their own and aren’t put out in the slightest by Helen’s disability. What’s more, Josie can’t help noticing that, as before at the wedding, Helen is very well here. Something about Ovenden House comforts her. Her speech is slow but distinct; she walks strongly, albeit slowly; her stamina is better than it ever has been at home. When she does tire though, her understanding fades. She persists in forgetting that Zack and Sarah are married, but she believes that George and Val are, and she likes that. She calls Val, ‘Val’, and she calls Sarah, ‘that girl’. Fiona she doesn’t mention at all.

  Zack and Josephine declare a kind of truce. She doesn’t complain about his stinginess or neglect in front of Sarah or her family. She’s also agreed to leave her beloved portable computer at home. To everyone’s surprise, she’s showing every sign of turning into a computer nerd, something no one could have imagined three years ago. For his part, Zack marks the suspension of hostilities with politeness, and by doing his fair share of looking after Helen. He’s not very good at it though, and his stints often end in tears, which only Josephine or Val are competent to deal with.

  Val feels out of place, despite the warmth of her welcome. She doesn’t have a posh dress to wear at the black-tie dinners, and, despite Sarah’s offers of help, she doesn’t have a hope of fitting into even Sarah’s loosest frocks. So she puts on the best thing she’s got, sits in the candlelight by George and looks at the pearls and diamonds all around. Something like this used to be George’s scene. It’s a bit posher and a bit more British.

  However, he’s outgrown dinner tables like this one, and even though he knows which way to pass the port, he feels out of place too. He and Val will be pleased to get back to Yorkshire.

  Matthew is comfortable enough. He likes the affluence that surrounds him: the immaculately kept house and gardens, the litre bottles of Penhaligon’s aftershave in the bathrooms, the genial assumption that money and wealth and family will just go on and on for ever. This is what motivates him. This is why he trades on the inside and jeopardises his wealth, his relationship and even his freedom. His father’s fortune wouldn’t buy wealth of the kind that Lord Hatherleigh so effortlessly commands, but it would be plenty. Matthew’s not greedy.

  Fiona, on the other hand, is as brittle as glass. She’s stranded in the bosom of her partner’s family. Matthew’s eldest brother is married. His brother is engaged. Fiona feels as though the world’s looking at her and Matthew, waiting for them to tie the knot. What’s more, she has to share a room and a bed with Matthew. They do most nights now anyway and they’ll be moving into their new home soon as well - but she likes to have the option. She likes an escape route, which Ovenden House, for all its rooms, can’t provide. She is distant, strange, hard as nails. She leaves as soon as she can, before Matthew’s ready.

  It’s not a great Christmas, but not too bad. Josephine has a real holiday and her mum feels relaxed and easy. The three brothers all have business matters to worry about and all three scoot back to work while the rest of the country is still regretting last night’s turkey curry and making short-lived resolutions to drink less. This is the last Christmas before Bernard Gradley’s three-year deadline. Next year, everything will be different.

  5

  The strange battle is drawing to a close.

  For months now, the two contestants have done their worst. Hatherleigh Pacific has slagged off South China. After reading one of Zack’s masterpieces, you wondered how South China’s management managed to get to the bathroom on their own, let alone run a company. But South China hasn’t been idle. They’ve hit back as hard as they can, and their new-found profitability is certainly eye-catching. Where does the profit come from? Hatherleigh Pacific calls it ‘dangerous speculation which the current management is ill-equipped to handle’. South China calls it ‘years of investment bearing fruit’. Who do you believe? It’s time to decide. The shareholders must vote, and the day for voting is today.

  Once again, Zack, Lord Hatherleigh, Scottie and Phyllis Wang were gathered in Hatherleigh Pacific’s Hong Kong boardroom. Through the windows, a three-masted wooden-built sailing ship was gliding up Victoria Harbour, heading east. Tugboats and fire-fighters danced around it, pumping jets of water up into the midday sky, celebrating something.

  The four executives watched it idly. There was nothing for them to do. The deadline had passed. The votes had been cast and were now being counted. All they had to do was wait.

  ‘You’re sure your phone’s switched on?’ asked Scottie. Phyllis nodded. ‘My team will call me as soon as they get the message through from the count. If for any reason they can’t get through, they’ll call Zack. And they know where we are, so they can come through the switchboard if they have to.’

  Scottie nodded. He knew all that anyway. ‘I don’t understand how you folks do this for a living.’ His crimson face had burned brighter with every day of this takeover battle. The end wasn’t coming a minute too soon for his blood pressure.

  In the comer, two bottles of champagne shifted
in their ice buckets as the ice melted into water. The count was running behind schedule. Scottie drifted back to the plate-glass windows to watch the sailing ship, when Phyllis’s phone rang. She leaped to it.

  ‘Phyllis Wang here.’

  She listened for a moment, then shook her head. ‘They haven’t heard anything.’ She went on talking in a low voice. Just because one deal was coming to a close, didn’t mean she didn’t have other things to be getting on with.

  The other three lapsed back into expectant silence. Phyllis wound up her call. The sailing ship came to the eastern end of Victoria Harbour and began to head for the narrow strait of Lei Yue Mun and the sheltered waters of Junk Bay beyond. Zack’s phone rang.

  ‘Gradley,’ he barked. His voice was snappish and his dark face was broody and drawn with tension. He was acutely nervous. Lord Hatherleigh thought it was the Hatherleigh family fortune that Zack cared about, but the thought hadn’t crossed his son-in-law’s calculating mind. Zack was concerned about his forty million dollar success fee. With the success fee and the ever-increasing success of RosEs, came his partnership.

  ‘Hi, darling, it’s me.’

  ‘Sarah! Hi. We haven’t heard anything yet. We’re all here, still waiting.’

  ‘I thought you were going to hear by eleven at the latest.’

  ‘Yeah, I thought so too. It’s gone twelve here now.’

  ‘Is that a good sign or a bad sign?’

  ‘It’s a sign we should have chosen someone else to run the count.’

  ‘Anyone ever tell you that you’re very sexy when you’re grumpy?’

  ‘You do quite often.’

  ‘Your fault for being grumpy so often. Well, I’m going back to sleep. It’s five in the morning here. Ring me when you hear anything, and good luck.’

  ‘Thanks, I will.’

  Zack rang off. Sarah sounded calm, like she didn’t have fifty million quid invested in the outcome. The four executives watched the clock and waited. The sailing ship was now almost out of sight, only its stern still visible amongst the jumble of traffic and the dancing light on the water. Phyllis’s phone rang once again. She leaped to it and listened.

  Her face broke into a smile of joy and her little hand clenched into a fist, thumb up.

  ‘Fifty-two percent,’ she said. ‘We won with fifty-two percent.’

  6

  Val wasn’t keen to make a fuss, but George insisted. ‘It’ll be fun,’ he said.

  His first move wasn’t all that smart, recruiting Darren and Dave to help with the preparations. He told them to close the museum-turned-showroom and clear it of furniture, except for a few tables and chairs at one end. He also gave them five hundred pounds for ‘refreshments and stuff’, which in Darren’s hands bought a surprisingly large amount of alcohol, no food at all, and the hire of a sound system which would have caused hearing loss on the far side of Leeds.

  George persuaded a deeply sceptical Darren that the showroom’s own music system would be adequate and coaxed Val into spending another £200 on nibbles at the nearest Waitrose. By this time, all effort at secrecy had vanished and it was a matter of open speculation what the fuss was about. By five o’clock, the shop floor was pretty much empty, despite Gissings’ groaning order book, and knots of workers milled around outside the showroom waiting for George to tell them what was happening.

  ‘You’d better go and tell them,’ said Val, peering out of an upstairs window.

  ‘You’d better come with me.’

  ‘I’m not coming out there. I’ll die of embarrassment. I’ll come down after you’ve told them.’

  George took his fiancée’s hands. They had chosen her an engagement ring, but it had to be sent away for fitting and her hands were bare.

  ‘There’s nothing to be embarrassed about. Unless you mean me, of course.’

  ‘Do I look alright?’

  George looked at her, up and down. ‘You look absolutely beautiful.’ He meant it.

  ‘Idiot.’

  ‘Well, why ask?’

  Still nervous, Val walked downstairs after George. Before they went out into the yard, George tried to take her hand, but she shook free. George walked in front of her over to the showroom.

  ‘Come on in, then, you lot,’ he said, and everybody flooded into the familiar room.

  At the far end, there was a platform where the Gissings Select products usually sat, and George climbed up. Val stood close to him, but down a step, with everybody else. The crowd fell completely silent, waiting.

  ‘Thanks for coming. I’ve got a bit of an announcement,’ he said, suddenly embarrassed himself. He glanced down. Val was half smiling to support him, half longing to be somewhere else. ‘I’ve got some good news,’ he said. ‘I’m - er - well, Val and I are engaged, engaged to be married, that is. And-’

  Anything else he was going to add was drowned out in a din of cheering and stamping, started by Darren and Dave, but immediately filling the whole room. Before either Val or George could react, Val was being bundled up on to the platform and Darren had started yelling a chant of ‘Kiss, kiss, kiss.’

  George turned to face his now truly blushing fiancée. He brushed a strand of hair away from her face and drew her close. ‘I love you,’ he said, and kissed her. The cheering and clapping and stamping continued. George, too, was as red as a beetroot, and over the swelling chorus of ‘For they are jolly good fellows’ he yelled, ‘Now sod off and get something to drink.’

  As Darren’s investment in alcohol began to bear fruit, George and Val were repeatedly touched by the number of people who came up earnestly offering them their delighted congratulations. In a rare quiet moment, Val turned to George.

  ‘I’ve never been so embarrassed in my whole life, but I’m pleased you made me do it. It’s been amazing.’

  He was about to reply, when Jeff Wilmot, drunk already on two glasses of white wine, came to add his goodwill to the mounting heap. George listened patiently to Jeff, while Val was ambushed by some girls from marketing who wanted to hear all about the proposal, the ring and the wedding plans. David Ballard came along too, having been invited by George to drop in if he could.

  ‘I can’t stay long. I’ve got a dinner to go to in Leeds. But I wanted to give you both my very best. Val’s a smashing girl, you couldn’t have done better.’

  ‘Thanks, David. Is that a personal opinion, or a professional one?’

  ‘Both actually, but I meant it personally. Here, come outside a moment, I’ve something to give you.’

  George walked out into the dirty yard. The Gissings Transit van he’d once lived in was there, now restored to its proper use. Three other vans stood alongside it, all of them busy now, six days a week. George felt a glow of pride, at his factory, his success, and, inside the crowded showroom, at his soon-to-be wife. Ballard’s BMW flashed and clicked at their approach.

  ‘Picked up another fine on my way over. These bloody cameras don’t give you a chance.’ Ballard opened the front passenger door and searched around inside the glove compartment. He pulled something out and handed it to George. By the light from the car, George could see what it was: an old-fashioned die-cast model of a forklift truck, mounted on a black plastic pedestal.

  ‘I’m touched, David, but-’

  ‘Look underneath.’

  George looked underneath, where an engraved brass plate was glued on. The engraving read, ‘To David Ballard. With thanks for your help on the Harrogate deal, Bernard Gradley, October 1976’.

  ‘Your dad gave it to me after I helped him buy a dying plant-hire company in Harrogate. I think you should have it now. You’re the businessman of the family.’

  ‘Yeah, well my brothers are probably happy just being the millionaires of the family.’

  The older man looked at the younger. George Gradley was the spitting image of his dad, but a much nicer man. Ballard felt paternal towards him. He jerked his thumb in the direction of the noisy showroom. Noise and light was spilling out. The shadows against the
windows were moving faster, as Darren did what he could to test the limits of the showroom’s sound system.

  ‘If either of your brothers went into their place of work and announced their engagement, do you think they’d get that kind of reception?’

  ‘Probably, if they’d spent as much on booze as I have.’

  ‘That’s bollocks and you know it, Master Gradley.’ George shrugged. He looked towards the showroom again. Val was in there somewhere, explaining for the hundredth time about the engagement ring and promising to show it off as soon as it came back from the workshop. He longed for her, longed to be alone with her.

  ‘All the same, David, I’ll take you up on that offer you made. About finding people who might be interested in buying this place. I just want to test the possibility, you know. I’m not committed one way or the other.’

  ‘Have you talked to Val about this?’

  ‘Not yet. Been too busy with the engagement and everything.’

  Ballard raised his eyebrows, so George added, ‘And anyway, nothing’s definite. Obviously, I won’t do anything without her on board, but before I do that, I’d like to know if it’s even realistic.’

  ‘OK, George. I promised you help if you wanted it, and I’ll stick to that. I’ll phone you with some names and numbers in a week or two.’ The two men closed up the car and walked back towards the noise and light of the showroom. Just before re-entering, Ballard tapped the toy truck on its black pedestal, which George still carried in his hand.

  ‘When your dad did that deal, George, I remember him telling me that he couldn’t understand anyone who sold their business, whatever state it was in. He said to me he thought he’d sooner die than sell his.’

  George sighed and walked inside.

  7

  Brian McAllister had a meeting in Frankfurt that afternoon. As usual, he was late to leave. The taxi outside already had twenty pounds on the meter. His secretary had moved from impatience to despair and began to look up the time of the next flight. So far, so normal.