'All of it? Every penny?' He was more than a bit taken aback.
I shrugged. 'We've got to show confidence. Anyway it's the best investment going. That's what I've told those clients who'll keep quiet about it. What's good for them should be good for us too.'
He argued for a while, about trusting all of his eggs to the Greek's basket, but in the end he agreed and we called Jean in to take a minute of the decision. Despite that, the days slipped by and with fifteen left before Pickard's deadline, Emanuel and I were still four million short of the thirty needed to pay Pepalasis. Our daily conferences became increasingly desperate.
'Hell, all we're looking for is a short term bridging!' he said one evening. 'We've got corporate finance for the best part of the deal and we're still stuck.'
We combed our combined contact lists for the tenth time before admitting that we had tried everyone we could rely on to keep quiet about it. Or who wouldn't take too long making a decision. Or who had access to that kind of money. The constraints of time and secrecy seemed to be combining to cheat us of a once in a lifetime opportunity. Until Emanuel surprised me by saying: 'There is one man I know.' We had been at my office for a couple of hours or so, and had sunk a few drinks while searching for inspiration. 'Not top drawer banking, or anything like that, but I think he could raise the money.'
'All of it?' I gave him the kind of look I normally reserve for the slow-witted.
He nodded, and then said: 'Simmy Drachman.'
'You know him?'
'The bank's even done business with him.' His smile was a shade self-conscious. 'Kept bloody quiet about it, mind you.'
'I bet.'
Drachman's name had the aroma of an open sewer. A North London jobbing builder who had moved into property at the right time, converting rat infested tenements into bijou residences for short haul commuters. After that he had blossomed out into betting shops for a while, then he had sold out, and funnelled his cash into strip joints, sex emporiums and porn. And those were his legitimate interests! There were plenty of rumours of his involvement in the drug scene around Soho and out in the provinces. I had never met the man, but his reputation would send Harry Smithers and Tommy Richardson racing each other for the front door. I said as much to Emanuel.
'So we keep his name out of it,' Emanuel didn't even hesitate.
'Let Drachman put the money up through us. You and me. We get a cut on the profit and no one's any the wiser.'
We drank whisky until it made sense and once Emanuel had latched onto the idea he fell in love with it. 'He's not as bad as he's painted and it's the sort of deal he'd jump at. And he's used to keeping his mouth shut. We wouldn't be marrying the bastard. Just this one transaction, that's all.'
I thought what the hell? No one else that I knew would be able to find four million in a hurry.
We went to see Drachman the following evening. I was sober by then and a good deal more hesitant than the night before, instinct telling me that I was a fool to get involved with a man like Drachman. But as the same instinct failed to provide a source for the other four million I went along - especially as Emanuel had fixed the appointment.
Drachman's office was the basement of a club he owned in Paddington. We were shown into a big, square room, artificially lit, well furnished in ultra modern on knee deep carpet. The air conditioning, set at morgue temperature, just failed to dispel the combined smells of cologne, sweat and fear. But the room itself was less arresting than the people in it. Drachman peering up suspiciously from behind a six-foot-wide desk, a little man of around fifty with a bald head, broken nose and strong eyes; and flanked by two men capable of winning the world heavyweight championship single-handed.
Emanuel outlined the proposition so casually that investing four million sounded less important than borrowing a car for the weekend. Still, it was his way of telling the story and he knew best how to hook a man like Drachman. When he got to the other participants he listed them like a roll of honour and produced the letter from Pickard with a conjurer's flourish.
Drachman feigned indifference while his fish eyes psyched me out: 'I've heard of you,' his voice was a soft growl. 'You've a nice reputation Mr Townsend, yes, very nice, very nice indeed.'
I tried to return the compliment but gagged on the words.
'Are you interested?' asked Emanuel bluntly;
'I might be.' Drachman was still studying me. 'What's my cut?'
Emanuel pretended to consider the matter for the first time. 'Well, we'll only need the money for a month or so. And it's safer than houses. Shall we say ten per cent?'
'Say that and you can go fuck yourself.'
Emanuel barely blinked: 'So, you got any ideas?'
Drachman took a cigar from a sandalwood box on his desk and spent a long time working it over with a steel-bladed gold cutter. We watched as the plump white hands fluttered about their task, gold rings on two fingers of each hand picking up light signals from the desk lamp. 'A deal this big?' His eyes remained fixed on the cigar. 'I'd want to double my money.'
'In a few weeks?' I snorted. 'We're, wasting each other's time, Mr Drachman. Come on Peter.'
Emanuel's feigned indignation extended to half rising from his chair, as the goon on Drachman's left glared at me and his mate busied himself lighting Drachman's cigar.
'Too much for you, Mr Townsend?' Drachman asked, invisible behind a cloud of blue smoke.
'Too much time,' I answered quickly, 'putting this thing together, to throw it away now.'
'I doubt you've any alternative.'
'And I doubt you could raise four million.'
The left hand goon stopped filing his nails long enough to fix me with a look of total disbelief before the smoke parted and Drachman beamed out from the other side. 'Four million? For a few weeks? Difficult, but it could be done. It would need organising though, and that costs money Mr Townsend which is why it's so expensive.'
'So? You were offered four hundred thousand profit. Take it out of that.'
'It's not enough. Really it's not.' His thin lips removed themselves from the cigar and split into a wolfish smile. 'You wouldn't be here now, Mr Townsend, if the profit wasn't very big. Or if you could raise the money elsewhere.'
There was no answer to that.
'And there's the risk factor to consider,' he added.
'What risk? U.S. Steel won't go broke. There's no risk and you know it.'
'There's always a risk.' His face flushed angrily. 'U.S. Steel pay your consortium they pay you, you pay me. I'm tail end Charlie. Anything goes wrong and I'm bad luck Charlie.'
'What could go wrong?'
'You might forget to pay me?'
For Emanuel's sake and the sake of the deal I kept hold of my temper. 'So sue me.'
His lips smiled, but the amusement never reached his eyes. They stayed as hard as ever while he said: 'Of course, I know that wouldn't happen - not with gentlemen like you involved.'
We skirmished for a while longer and then the hard bargaining began. The weekend arguing with Pickard must have sharpened us up a bit, though, because an hour later Emanuel and I had a deal we were a lot happier with than showed on our faces.
'Before you go, Mr Townsend,' Drachman said as we stood to leave. 'There's something I'd like you to see. Please don't be offended, but I show it to everyone I do business with. After all, it was you who mentioned the possibility of legal action.' He pushed his chair back and stood up, adding less than a foot to his height but giving me a chance to inspect the sharp tailoring of his suit as he moved from behind the desk. He slid back a panel in the wall behind him to reveal a display case, its glass front reflecting the lighting in the room and making it impossible to see the interior. I crossed to the desk for a closer view.
'You see I don't much hold with the processes of law,' he stood me to one side. 'They're too slow. Too risky. If someone forgets to pay me I deliver my own judgement.'
I was still having difficulty seeing what was in the case, so I put both hands t
o the glass to 'make a spy-hole. And at exactly that moment Drachman switched on an interior light to reveal the contents with nauseating clarity. For an instant my mind rejected the evidence of my own eyes, until a second look convinced me of what I had seen. Even then I prayed that it might be some macabre piece of sculpture, a black joke of some kind.
'The genuine article, Mr Townsend,' Drachman murmured in direct answer to my thoughts. 'Sprayed with quick drying cement within minutes of -' he hesitated, and then smiled his thin smile, 'within minutes of the operation taking place.'
Sickened to the pit of my stomach, I turned my eyes away from the sight of a man's genitals nailed to a block of wood and glimpsed Emanuel's white face next to me. 'Legal agreements,' my voice croaked unnaturally, 'drawn up by my solicitor.'
'Of course,' Drachman was still smiling as he slid the panel back into place. 'But you'll remember my views on the courts, won't you?'
We left.
'Gave you the creeps, did he?' Emanuel asked on the way back. 'Me too. But I knew he'd have the cash.'
'This one deal - that's all. Then I never want to see that filthy bastard again. And another thing, Peter, keep this to ourselves, eh? I wouldn't want it known that we're keeping company with a man like that.'
Two
So that's how we put the money together. It took exactly two weeks and by Friday the sixteenth of September we were as good as ready.
People abuse lawyers - and I'm as guilty as most -. forever complaining that they charge too much, take too long, do too little. But in the days and nights following the meetings with Pickard, Poignton and the team of A.W.F. lawyers worked non-stop - forming the enlarged consortium, drafting the agreement with Pepalasis, and preparing another one for U.S. Steel. I got my own man to draw up the agreement with Drachman and sat back to count my profit.
'There's a tide in the affairs of men which taken at the flood leads on to fortune.' It's always been true of business. Most of the world's commercial empires were founded on just one deal - and this was to be mine. Not just mine of course; Hallsworth, Smithers, Emanuel, even McNeil to a lesser extent, all stood shoulder to shoulder with me in the land of the big profit which stretched all the way from Pepalasis to the United States Steel Corporation.
U.S. Steel's first million pounds was to be paid jointly to A.W.F. Weisman's (Emanuel's bank) and Townsend and Partner as a management fee, after which the remaining nineteen million pounds would be divided between the investors in the proportion of just over six hundred and thirty thousand for every million invested. Thus the true earnings on Drachman's four million was a staggering two and a half million. And he'd settled for one and a half which left Emanuel and me with a personal profit of half a million each. So add the hundred and fifty thousand which would come my way from Townsend and Partner, and I reckoned I'd just about got it made.
Only one surprise occurred and predictably the Greek produced it. All along I'd been nervous about his title to the island but when it came to it, providing ownership was quite simple. The whole area of the Pacific had once been a French protectorate, then British with Australian trimmings. And finally something called the Central and Western Pacific Commission, and that had more or less disintegrated in the fifties with the surge towards independence by the larger, more populated areas. About then, dozens of the smaller islands had passed into private ownership. The Greek's island had even changed hands twice before he acquired it in seventy-four. Poignton despatched an assistant to Noumea and another to Sydney and both cabled back satisfaction of clear title as far as Pepalasis was concerned. So I breathed a sigh of relief and forgot about it.
No, the surprise came when Pepalasis announced that he had formed a British company to handle the transaction. Everyone had assumed that he would want the purchase price paid to a Greek outfit or at least paid outside of the U.K. It made no difference to us of course. In a way it even removed a complication. The lawyers had anticipated holding our money in escrow until Bank of England consent was obtained to transfer funds outside the sterling area which, apart from the time it would take, was not considered a problem - not with fifty million pounds worth of very acceptable U.S. dollars flowing back within the same accounting period. But it puzzled me when I heard about it. A British company could only complicate life for Pepalasis later when he wanted to move the money abroad. And if he didn't want it overseas what the hell was he going to do with it here? Still, it was none of my business and it quickly lost itself in the pace of events.
And so the afternoon of Friday the sixteenth of September. I was alone in my office, tired and triumphant, and looking forward to a weekend off for a change, when Paul Seckleman put his head round my door. He managed to look even more worried and flustered than usual, and every bit as exhausted as I felt.
'Sorry to trouble you, Mr Townsend, but I need Mr Hallsworth urgently. Do you know where he is?'
'Yes, but telling you won't help. He's gone until Monday.' Hallsworth had taken the Greek off for the weekend. Grouse shooting in Scotland I think, though I hadn't paid much attention when he'd told me. I looked at Seckleman's worried face and said, 'Can I help you?'
He hesitated, a study in indecision, until shuffling forward and closing the door behind him. 'I'm not sure. Er, well perhaps. With advice if you wouldn't mind. It's about this shipment. I've had Leyland on three times this afternoon. They must have our confirmation that we'll take the RangeRovers definitely next week. Otherwise they'll re-allocate them.'
'I didn't know what the devil he was talking about, but he was in such an obvious state that I reckoned talking might help.
'So what's the problem?'
'I can't give it to them. Not definite confirmation. All I can say is what I've told the other suppliers. Shipping is imminent - probably the end of next week. Stand by for firm delivery instructions.'
'That sounds pretty positive.'
'But Leyland insists on knowing this afternoon,' he said, almost plaintively. 'Seems that if we don't take the vehicles definitely next week they'll be re-allocated. And we'll be three weeks back in the queue.'
I didn't know what to do. Hallsworth's export order was none of my concern but I felt obliged to help if I could. And clearly Seckleman was out of his depth. So when I offered to speak to Leyland's he grabbed the suggestion like a drowning man.
'You'd better tell me more about it.' I waved him into a chair while we waited for the call to come through. 'How many vehicles are we talking about?'
I'd no preconception of his answer but when he said three hundred, I nearly fell out of my chair.
'And spare parts,' he added proudly. 'All together it's about two million quid's worth.'
The call came through and I succeeded in persuading the man on the other end to hold his decision until Monday winning equal measures of his bad temper and Seckleman's admiration in the process - and when I put the phone down, I asked Seckleman, 'What's the hold-up anyway?'
'Shipping. Mr Hallsworth is handling that himself. I've worked to a provisional date, but as it gets nearer all of the suppliers are getting nervous about exact confirmation.' He looked greatly relieved, as if his weekend now wouldn't be ruined by worry. At the door he said. 'It's bound to be all sorted out next week. Thanks very much for your help - I suppose I flapped a bit.'
'So did Leyland,' I said, trying.to cheer him up. 'How big's the total shipment, by the way ?'
'Oh, it's huge. Biggest thing I've ever worked on.' He brushed his hair back from his forehead with the back of his hand. 'Almost thirty million pounds worth now.'
After he had gone I sat thinking about Hallsworth. Sue's description came to mind - about him being some kind of business genius. He was certainly that. A thirty million pound export. His contract with U.S. Steel. The Pepalasis project. Townsend and Partner. I grinned, remembering his answer to my question about all of his business interests. 'Just juggling, Mike,' he'd said. 'Just juggling. Keeping all the balls in the air without losing your own.'
'Do you often
do that?' Jean startled me from the open door.
'Do what?'
'Sit grinning at yourself.'
'I was thinking. And looking forward to the weekend. Three nights and two whole days without as much as a single thought about business.'
It was true. We were taking Bob Harrison and his wife to see 'Chorus Line' and out to supper afterwards. It promised to be a pleasant evening, I liked Bob and Amy and I was still enjoying showing Jean off to my friends. And as for the rest of the weekend, Jean and I planned to do nothing. Except lounge around in her flat. Eat and sleep, talk and make love.
Three
'Chorus Line' was everything they said it was and afterwards we had a supper at the Twenty-One before going on to Churchill's for the floor show. Bob had just got his half-colonel's pip and was out to paint the town red and I suppose I was celebrating too. After all I had just been made a Director of the new consortium, my bank account promised to groan with riches, and Jean looked like a million dollars. So we danced and had fun until two in the morning. I think I had just about everything I wanted in life that night. Money, status, an exciting enough life style, and the most wonderful girl in the world. Until Bob gave me his news.
He dropped his bombshell while the girls were collecting their coats. He and I had just been arguing, in a bantering sort of way, about who was who's guest as far as the bill was concerned, when he said, 'Remember some time back, asking me about a Brigadier Hallsworth?' His words slurred slightly, but we both had had a few. 'Well, I ran into someone who knew him the other day. Did you know that he committed suicide?'
I said yes, while keeping an eye out for the girls.
'Oh?' His voice echoed the disappointment of discovering that his gossip was already known. 'Bloody funny business. What d'you make of it?'
I admitted to knowing none of the details, signed the bill and left a tip.
'All his son's fault apparently. Involved in a big fraud case and implicated the old man. Bad business from what I heard.'
The Money Stones Page 16
