The Namedropper

by Brian Freemantle

  Waiting there for him were all the credit and store cards – one from Harrods, which he could see from the apartment window – credit reference file replies and pin and ATM withdrawal numbers, everything he’d applied for in the name of plastic surgeon Paul Maculloch. Jordan put it all in his combination-locked briefcase, pausing at the moment of leaving to look around the flat he was never going to use, thinking how comfortable his brief stay there might have been.

  John Blake hurried from behind his reception desk the moment Jordan entered the Marylebone apartment block. ‘No one’s enquired after you all day,’ the man reported at once. ‘There haven’t been any telephone calls, either.’

  ‘I’m hoping to hear something soon,’ said Jordan, caught by how honest he was continuing to be.

  All the intrusion traps inside the apartment were undisturbed. Jordan was on the verge of shredding everything in Paul Maculloch’s name when a sudden need to keep the rental overtook him, a warming and satisfying confirmation that he had definitely recovered from the understandable shock of the recent news. It still took the increasingly confident Jordan an hour to minutely shred most of what he’d accumulated to pass himself off as Paul Maculloch and which now had a very important although quite different purpose. At the end of that hour he was left with a copy of the man’s birth certificate, parental marriage certificates, passport, proof of rental occupancy of the Hans Crescent apartment and a single Al credit reference file. With difficulty he managed to get it all into the already over-crammed bedroom concealed safe in the closet, containing, in varying denominations, the £154,000 profit from his countrywide tour as Peter Wightman.

  There would be substantial inroads into that, Jordan accepted, his mind now fully concentrated upon the financial cost with which he was confronted. The short let and now very necessary rental of Hans Crescent would amount to £21,000, which objectively he didn’t begrudge as a complete loss. The further £200 he’d spent getting all the Maculloch credit information wasn’t totally wasted, either. The big uncertainty – although objectively again perhaps not the biggest – was how much all the legal advice was going to cost him. This was why he had to bury the tax-free profit from fifteen years of identity stealing as deeply and as untraceably as possible.

  Harvey Jordan had left Lesley Corbin with the understanding that she would find an American attorney fully licensed and qualified to protect – and if necessary represent – him at every degree and level of every linked North Carolina claim. And as he insisted on the best he would have to wait for her to come back to him after a careful selection. Jordan hadn’t waited upon the convenience of others for more years than he could remember and had already decided not to allow Lesley Corbin more than one more full day before calling her back, irrespective of any agreement. But, now he needed the time, maybe even more than one day, to keep things in the satisfactorily protective sequence he had to establish.

  While he was still at school Jordan had mentally tested himself – and invariably won – against chip-speeded computers to work out complicated arithmetical percentages and currency fluctuations and aggregates, and from his early programming career, concentrating on internet gambling games, he knew to the last penny the amount of his carefully hoarded and, hopefully, totally hidden fortune. The majority of it was beyond investigative reach in the tax-avoiding and secret haven of Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands, to which he could literally carry cases of cash on the short sea crossing from England without any danger from putting hand baggage through X-ray airport security checks. The current, untraceable amount in safe deposit boxes in the island’s capital, St Helier, was £2,805,000. In addition, in separate boxes, was the Chagall painting, an assortment of seventeen uncut and unset, but officially provenanced, diamonds and three diamond-set antique bracelets which conservatively, building in the fluctuations of jewellery prices, brought the stash up to £3,600,000. Jordan intended this stash, short of physical imprisonment which Lesley Corbin insisted impossible, to remain untouched and officially unplundered, whatever the outcome of his current predicament.

  The risk, despite Leslie Corbin’s assurances, was closer to home. In London, at Coutts, Lloyds TSB and NatWest, there were bank accounts, none of which exceeded £5,000, maintained for the access to safe deposit facilities at all three and in which was spread close to £1,800,000, which he’d looked forward to increasing to more than £2,000,000 by distributing among them the £154,000 profit from the most recent sting. But Jordan didn’t think he could do this any longer because all three accounts – and safe deposit facilities – were in his genuine name against his genuine Marylebone address, which was known to the litigious Alfred Jerome Appleton and his bulldozing legal team of Brinkmeyer, Hartley and Bernstein. All this had to be kept from Appleton and his lawyers, despite whatever financial recovery opinion was offered by Lesley Corbin, who had already freely admitted being unqualified in American–English exchange agreement law.

  Jordan quit his booby-trapped apartment even earlier the following morning, using the rush-hour congestion to ensure he was not followed; he spent an entire cab-and-tube dodging hour before finally arranging from a public street telephone a meeting, in the name of Paul Maculloch, with Royston and Jones, a private bank in Leadenhall Street in the financial square mile of the City of London. It was the sort of interview with which Jordan was thoroughly familiar, every document supporting his Maculloch identity ready when it was demanded. He opened the Maculloch account with £4,500 – below the amount legally required to be officially reported under drug trafficking legislation – from his most recent expedition and was promised that the safe deposit facilities would be available as early as the following day because of the advantages of it being a private bank, which was precisely why Jordan had chosen it. His personally appointed manager hoped it was the beginning of a long association and Jordan said he hoped so, too.

  There was still no waiting message from Lesley Corbin when he returned to Marylebone, for which Jordan was grateful, and from which he left the following morning again before recognized office hours. By ten Jordan was sure once more that he remained unaccompanied and unwatched and by eleven opened the first of his deposit boxes at Royston and Jones with the contents of all but £3,000 each from what had been in safe deposit in Lloyds TSB and NatWest. He left £4,500 in Coutts in the second exchange that afternoon.

  He was back in Marylebone in time to return Lesley Corbin’s waiting message, telling her he had an early appointment the following day and couldn’t get to her until the afternoon, which she said would be perfect because she’d set up a conference call exchange with a lawyer in New York, where it would still only be morning.

  ‘I finally managed to get the names of two lawyers qualified to appear in North Carolina courts: oddly, both now have firms working in New York. The first was Daniel Beckwith. The other is David Bartle, who Dan knows has been engaged to represent Appleton.’

  ‘So we don’t have a choice?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘How good is Beckwith?’

  ‘The recommendation said he was very good. That’s all I’ve got to go by. If he wasn’t, I guess he’d still be practising in North Carolina.’

  ‘I hope you’re right,’ accepted Jordan. ‘Will you run the best check you can on him?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Unsure how much ready cash he might need in the immediate future, the next morning Jordan broke an – until now – unbreakable rule and left £40,000 in his apartment safe, putting the rest, as well as all the Paul Maculloch identity documents and passport, in the Royston and Jones vaults before noon. It left him enough time for lunch at the conveniently close Joe Allens in Covent Garden, where he drank one gin martini and ordered a hamburger, wondering if it would be a diet to which he would become accustomed in the coming weeks. He hoped not.

  But it easily could have been if Jordan chose.

  Jordan arrived early to be told that Daniel Beckwith, to whom he was going to talk by telephone link-up,
was the senior partner in the firm of Beckwith, Pryke and Samuelson, whose offices on Lexington Avenue were two block across and two down from those of David Bartle on Madison Avenue. Lesley Corbin insisted that Beckwith was one of the best attorneys in Manhattan – ‘and therefore one of the most expensive, $500 an hour with additional daily courtroom refreshers I didn’t ask about’ – with a ninety percent success rate for his clients.

  ‘I’m looking for a 100 percent in my case.’

  ‘I’ve already emailed him a full account of our discussion,’ said the woman, who was again dressed in black, which Jordan decided had to be her working uniform.

  ‘I’m grateful for what you’re doing,’ thanked Jordan, sincerely, an unusual emotion for him.

  ‘It’s what you engaged me to do,’ she reminded.

  ‘What did he say? Think, I mean?’

  ‘He knows the other lawyer, which is hardly surprising as they both qualified in Raleigh, North Carolina. When Dan and I spoke he said he and Bartle liked to play hardball.’

  ‘I’d already worked that out for myself. Did he think that Appleton had a case?’

  ‘All he’s got is what I told him, which obviously isn’t enough to give an opinion. It won’t be until you hire him – if you hire him – and he gets all the papers from the other side. We haven’t really begun yet.’

  Maybe even £40,000 wasn’t going to be enough, Jordan thought. ‘Did he say …’ he started but was stopped by the jar of the telephone.

  Lesley Corbin cupped the receiver with a hand and said, ‘It’s the New York call. The switchboard are holding it. The speaker phones are in the boardroom.’

  Jordan followed her into the adjoining room and took the seat she indicated. The red light on the speaker in front of him clicked on when she fitted her telephone receiver into its master holder, set up in front of where she sat. She said, ‘Morning, Dan. Harvey’s here with me.’

  ‘Afternoon, Lesley. Afternoon, Harv,’ came a relaxed American voice.

  ‘Good morning,’ said Jordan. It was the first time he had ever used such equipment and he felt self-conscious on it. He hated the abbreviation of his name.

  ‘I’ve read what Lesley mailed me. Might need to expand upon it a little today. This’ll be pro bono. The timer starts if you decide to engage me.’ Beckwith’s voice was very measured, every word carefully enunciated.

  Seeing the frown on the face of the man who had always avoided any contact with the law, Lesley Corbin mouthed, ‘No charge.’

  Jordan said, ‘That’s very good of you. I’m very anxious to sort it all out. It reads like they’re driving an express train at me.’

  ‘That’s exactly what it’s meant to read like,’ said the American. ‘Don’t let it frighten you, which is also what it’s meant to do. Let’s go through a few things.’

  ‘Alienation of affection I understand, although I don’t think I am guilty of it,’ said Jordan. ‘What the hell is criminal conversations!’

  ‘Potentially the most expensive lay you ever had,’ said Beckwith. ‘It used to be on every statute in every state and made the female spouse a chattel of the husband. Which was why it’s been struck off in most states now. Your bad luck is that it still exists in North Carolina – the state in which Appleton and Alyce were married – and therefore the state in which Appleton is bringing suit.’

  ‘Because it still exists there?’

  ‘Obviously,’ said Beckwith.

  ‘How much is potentially very expensive, thousands or millions?’

  ‘Millions.’

  ‘You’re joking!’

  ‘There’s nothing amusing about being accused of alienation of affections and criminal conversation in North Carolina.’

  ‘What can I do?’

  ‘Talk some more,’ said the American. ‘Lesley’s notes told me these divorce proceedings had already been initiated before you began this affair with Alyce?’

  ‘That’s what Alyce told me.’

  ‘But you had slept together before she told you?’

  Jordan felt hot with embarrassment, aware of the woman studying him from across the table, and wondered if he was actually colouring. ‘Yes. But before it started I’d seen her writing upon – signing, I suppose – a lot of documents she later told me were divorce papers.’

  ‘But you didn’t actually see them: know for yourself that they were divorce papers?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Lesley told me you thought of it as a vacation romance, that you didn’t even exchange addresses when she flew back here to New York?’

  ‘That’s what I did – still do – regard it as. And no, we didn’t exchange addresses.’

  ‘You often have vacation romances, Harv?’

  Jordan hesitated. ‘I’ve had them before, yes.’

  ‘Often?’

  Jordan shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Lesley Corbin was expressionless on the other side of the table. ‘Two or three times. It’s not a crime, is it?’

  ‘According to section 1-52(5) of North Carolina law that’s exactly what it is,’ reminded the American lawyer. ‘You never kept in touch with any of the others?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Let’s hope Alfred Appleton’s detective agency hasn’t found any of them,’ remarked Beckwith.

  ‘Why?’ demanded Jordan. ‘I don’t see how they could have found anyone with whom I had an affair in the past. But I don’t see the point of your saying what you just have!’

  ‘You’re probably not going to see the point of a hell of a lot you’re going to be asked before all this is over, Harv. You’ve read the claims; you know where they’re coming from. You’re accused of being a home wrecker, a womanizing rich guy. It would help Appleton’s case a whole lot if he could produce another wronged, abandoned woman.’

  ‘I didn’t abandon Alyce Appleton or anyone else I met in the circumstances we’re discussing! It was a passing thing, for both of us! That’s why we didn’t swop numbers or addresses. It’s not the way it happens.’

  ‘You’re sounding angry, Harv. Indignant.’

  ‘I am indignant!’

  ‘And angry?’

  ‘OK. And angry. Something that happens all the time, not hurting anyone, is being blown up out of all proportion into my being responsible for the crime of this or any other century.’

  ‘OK, Harv. I think we’ve taken it far enough. Maybe it was a little unfair.’

  ‘What the …?’

  ‘I’ve been testing you out, in case you do engage me. And if you do, we’ve got a whole bunch of work to do getting you ready. It took me about thirty seconds, sixty tops, to make you lose your temper and start trying to justify yourself. You lose your temper in a court in which you’re accused of wrecking another guy’s marriage – try to justify what you did and say it’s no big deal because no one got hurt – you’re a dead man. You understand what I’m telling you?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jordan, meek voiced but still angry. ‘I still think it was a shitty trick.’

  Beckwith laughed, sounding genuinely amused. ‘Us lawyers got bagfuls of shitty tricks. If we go forwards you’re going to have to learn every one of them, so you don’t get caught out again. And what I’ve just done wasn’t entirely a trick. You sounded just right to convince me that you believe yourself the fall guy. Lesley set out some questions you’d raised, about jurisdiction?’

  ‘Can you answer them?’ asked Jordan, eagerly.

  ‘In a nutshell, I hope. Any decision or verdict reached in a North Carolina divorce court couldn’t be exacted against you, personally, in England if you chose to ignore the claims and didn’t turn up. The inference, however, would be that everything alleged against you has a basis of truth. And I know Lesley has warned you how judges feel if they consider they are being treated with contempt?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And Lesley’s right, about the possible use of publicity. You duck and run you stand the very real – almost inevitable – chance of having your skin nailed to the barn d
oor, for everyone to see. You fight it and we knock away the foundations of every claim and allegation, one by one, you’re a guy who’s done what thousands of married guys and married gals are doing right now, even as we speak. And Appleton loses, not you. But here’s a very necessary warning. This particular divorce legislation in this particular state is an absolute bastard, everything in favour of the plaintiff.’

  ‘If I contest it I have to come to New York?’

  ‘And North Carolina, to face everything down like the wrongly accused man that you are.’

  ‘I’d like you to represent me and defend me against this action,’ decided Jordan, formally.

  ‘And I’d like to do it,’ accepted Beckwith. ‘I want all the original correspondence from Bartle couriered to me, today if possible, so that I can issue an official response. I’ll courier my contractual terms and conditions back, to be completed with you by Lesley, who can also take a preliminary personal statement, telling me all about you, and when we’ve got the wheels turning we can meet here, in New York. Everything will obviously be decided in Raleigh, the capital of North Carolina.’

  ‘I’ll handle everything from this end,’ promised the woman. ‘I think it’s been a good meeting.’

  ‘So do I,’ said the American.

  ‘Don’t you, Harvey?’ she encouraged.

  ‘Very good indeed,’ said Jordan, recognizing his first lie but knowing there were going to be a lot more.

  ‘I really did think it went well,’ said Lesley Corbin, as she disconnected the telephone link.

  ‘I wasn’t very comfortable,’ admitted Jordan.

  ‘Men never are when they’re caught in public with their trousers down; women, neither,’ she said and smiled. ‘You’d better get used to it, Harvey. It’s going to get a hell of a lot more embarrassing. What you’ve got to hope is that it’s contained within the four walls of a closed divorce court.’

  Seven

  After the constant bustle of the week’s beginning, particularly the dodging and weaving that started off each day, Harvey Jordan welcomed his first opportunity to remain the following morning in his flat, his next appointment with Lesley Corbin not until the afternoon. But it wasn’t a chance to relax; the opposite, in fact. The forthcoming meeting was to provide the personal information the American lawyer had asked for during their transatlantic telephone conversation and Jordan recognized how well and how carefully he had to evaluate – but most importantly of all, not to forget – anything and everything he told the woman. Jordan worked hard to convince himself that after going through most of his life successfully being somebody else it shouldn’t be overwhelmingly difficult for him to keep his story straight. But it had been a bad mistake not to realize how he was being ensnared in France. And he was determined against any further disasters, most definitely in any courtroom setting where any information he provided today could be publicly challenged and shown to be a lie.