The City Dealer

by Neil Rowland

  “What did you do to me, eh?” He rubbed a flake of skin from his sunburnt nose.

  “You haven’t changed so much,” Pixie said. “Anyhow, you needed somewhere to hide away from Septimus and his associates. They were very keen to talk to you, after you threatened to scupper their landmark agreement.”

  “How come they didn’t follow you home?” Clive asked.

  “I still shared a place in Camden... we made sure that I moved about... and I would take a cab to you in the evening. Jane and the other girls would cover for me. Even though they had no idea what they were hiding. That was a strange and dangerous period. We always took precautions.”

  “You’re still taking a risk, aren’t you?” he concluded, savouring the short strong coffee.

  “They didn’t suspect me. They blamed you, even if they did suspect. Septimus regarded me as another of your gullible victims.”

  “Well Pix, I’ve definitely lost communication now,” Clive bemoaned. “I’m totally cut off from all sources and contacts.”

  “You can have a try with my devices later, if you’d like.”

  “Thanks Pix, I appreciate that. I’ll try to set up a VPN.”

  “You can get around security,” she encouraged.

  “I don’t remember that flat in Hampstead.” He began to rub his features in bemusement again. “How can you tolerate this new place? I like the flowers and contemporary art, but it’s like a doctor’s surgery here.”

  “Trust you to think of flowers!” she exclaimed. “As for the art, it cost me a small fortune and...and no matter what you think...this isn’t your home.”

  “Why should I particularly mention flowers?” he wondered.

  “When we were together,” she explained, “you were buying me flowers all the time. Literally all the time,” she emphasised. She turned away to conceal the rise of colour to her face.

  “Was I really? Me? Flowers?” he repeated in amazement.

  “Why not, Clive?” She returned her attention with widened eyes.

  “I’m not in the habit of buying women flowers, am I? Wasn’t I the ‘love em and leave em’ type?” he rebutted.

  “Certainly the leave them type,” she agreed, mysteriously.

  “Fair point,” he stated.

  “Maybe you don’t understand yourself as well as you think.”

  Pixie leant back into a relaxed posture and watched him down her pert nose. “You should believe me, as I was gracious enough to accept your little story.”

  “Exactly what kind of bloke was I then... back then... when we knew each other... from your point of view, like?”

  She glittered nervously. “To tell the truth you were more in love with me,” she explained. “Yes, Clive, you were quite intense... passionate actually... but sweet too. You definitely enjoyed giving love tokens...yes, buying me flowers. You seemed happy and relaxed with me... when we could be. Although we had a terrible lot on our minds,” she recalled.

  “That’s a safe enough proposition.”

  “But I can be quite tough too, and I can take pressure. We brought work home with us. Yes, we were afraid they’d follow me...that I’d lead them back to you. We loved each other and we took risks. You were very loyal, strong, until you let us down and ran away.”

  “Don’t you believe me, when I say you have nothing to fear?” Clive emphasised. “I wouldn’t hurt you or anyone. Not deliberately.”

  “What if I can’t believe your version?”

  “Now I’m history. Do you believe that?”

  Clive noticed a photograph of her dark handsome Frenchman, in a heavy silver frame on a Noguchi coffee table. Pixie had an entire archive of soundtracks and videos of them together.

  “That’s a photograph of Bertrand,” she said, following him.

  “So you bought this guy at a spot auction,” he complained.

  “Hardly, as you were out of circulation... and on the run from a rape charge.”

  “You can’t let me forget.”

  How could he be envious? Was he really crazy? He didn’t consciously know this woman. This episode was related back to him. He couldn’t recall being intimate with her, or even drinking coffee with her. Why should he care about her new lover at this stage? In the long term she wasn’t even his type.

  “Now you’re going to have to do some talking?”

  “How? I’ve been doing my best,” she told him.

  “I need your help to fill in some mental blanks,” Clive argued.

  “How many do you have?” she said.

  “Please, you know, talk as much as you like. Tell me everything you know. Will you? I’ll just pour myself a bit more coffee...sit back for a while and listen. I won’t even interrupt, I promise.”

  “All right then, Clive, if you’d like.”

  17

  So Pixie continued her narrative. She began to describe his recent past as accurately as she could, while trying to relax; to remove stiffness from her legs and her neck. She related how Pitt had been made an associate; how she was assigned to work on his team, in regard to the deal.

  “You approved that I had been thrown out of finishing school,” she reminded him. “I swore you to secrecy that I never obtained my diploma,” she quipped. This was a reference to an unfortunate experience in a restaurant that had her expelled.

  They struggled to keep their colleagues in the dark about their assignations; nor to arouse suspicions about their professional collaboration. They tried to meet in unlikely places to maintain secrecy, such as the church at Greenwich Hospital, in a disused corner of Smithfield market, the planetarium at the Observatory, the Serpentine Gallery, the Freud museum; as well as numerous quiet pubs and restaurants in the district around their flat.

  “It literally added an edge of excitement,” she recalled - she shuddered involuntarily. “Sounds like that, doesn’t it?”

  Clive had brought along incriminating evidence against their company and ZNT executives, for her to verify. This evidence included many stolen documents, hacked emails and other recorded messages, all copied and categorised. They were operating within a sense of peril, as if security guys could burst in with Uzis or Kalashnikovs at any moment, to curtail their activities.

  Yet Septimus had invested too much in her; on a personal and professional basis, to connect her to Pitt; or couldn’t bring himself to do so. To doubt either of them in fact was to doubt his own judgement, in appointing and rapidly promoting them, almost as a pair. While his company’s survival was at stake after the crash of 2008, then fighting for survival in the financial shake down, he was focussed on trying to restructure. He was working twenty four seven to rescue his world famous family business; to achieve that vital ZNT deal, and the lucrative partnerships it offered in future, even if concessions were required.

  Septimus couldn’t imagine that Pitt, so deeply trusted and respected, so crucial to negotiations, would turn into a traitor. He had taken Pitt under his wing, as a virtual college boy (he liked to think), from offering him an internship, recognising his talent and making him an associate. Sep went on his instincts, his trusted hunches, even though Pitt was a raw provincial recruit. The financier had confidence in more than Pitt’s ability to conclude the deal. The young banker had Sep to thank for his position, for everything he had achieved. Therefore the financier had no suspicion concerning his employee’s underhand activities, just as it was an illusion to say that the City could be successful and clean, after the crash and global readjustment of power and currency reserves.

  “You became besotted with me, as we worked together,” Pixie explained.

  No doubt intense danger had encouraged their attachment. He even followed her home after work, to feel close, when it was too dangerous to be seen publicly together.

  “The situation resembled this evening... except y
ou didn’t throw me into the shrubbery in those days,” she recalled.

  “For the record, I believe that you threw me. Did our office affair destroy my marriage?” he asked.

  “You enjoyed spending time with me. Also it was essential to develop our case against Winchurch. You needed my help to compile a water-tight dossier... which could be presented to the FCA or SFS... or whoever we decided. I was the only person on the team you could trust. But I’m not sure of the exact sequence of events.”

  “If you’re not, then how can I know? Did my wife leave me because she found out about us? Or she was unable to manage the stress involved?” he wondered.

  “Your wife was also having an affair. She decided to leave for the States, taking your son with her... you explained as much to me. You were reluctant to talk to me about her... or about your marriage in detail. You preferred to keep quiet about your family as a whole. I assumed that was normal practice,” she argued.

  “Well, sounds as if we were a proper couple, even sharing our work responsibilities,” he suggested.

  “I didn’t want to pry, but there was more going on under the surface,” she suggested. “That was my feeling.”

  Even though Clive kept silent about his marriage, as if it was too painful to mention, he would grow depressed about the break up.

  “You were equally obsessed with exposing Septimus and in love with me,” she claimed, arranging ivory chiffon over her thighs.

  “It looks as if I didn’t refuse your charms for long,” he admitted, squeezing his jaw.

  He may or may not have been the innocent party in the break-up of his marriage. This wasn’t the first time, by all accounts, that he’d pursued Miss Wright. The idea of lacking control or judgement was disgusting to him. Had he recited those vows at a country church for nothing, as deceitful as a mynah bird, as he sought to impress that flock of friends and family, bearing pointless witness? He considered himself still in love with Noreen. He still possessed all the essential feelings, a deep bond of trust. So that abandoning the lad and his wonderful lady felt entirely brutal and worthless.

  “How could I be so callous?” he brooded, shaking his head.

  “You were determined we would break the deal together,” she recalled.

  He regarded Pixie as a smart, sexy girl, whose sophisticated, somewhat elite background appealed to him; himself coming from a more regular provincial background. He remembered the impact she had made on him, on first introduction at an internees luncheon. As an already married man, with his first child on the way, he was ashamed of his wide eyed excitement about her. Could he be so impressed with a bit of high polished glamour?

  A predatory attitude was a part of the often testosterone-fuelled atmosphere at Winchurch’s. He didn’t know directly, but there was probably a similar macho culture at other City firms.

  But he didn’t blame that culture entirely, as he could always choose. Pixie herself was stirred by his rough northern machismo, as she saw it (compared to the sons of government ministers and financiers perhaps) just as she was impressed by his bright mind and professional confidence (contrasting with his gauche social persona - on joining). Her life experience made her identity with his upright northern values and his type of principled rebellious stance.

  After the disgrace of his affair (Clive reasoned) Noreen must have put their house on the market. She’d found solace with that local guy and emigrated to Seattle. They must have got around the considerable legal problems. These had surely been complicated and time consuming, unless they had a contact to speed up procedures. He meanwhile was shacking up with Pixie Wright, showing a heedless teenage enthusiasm.

  Did he really sacrifice everything for that crusade against corruption in the square mile?

  At this point they were startled by the chime of her doorbell.

  They exchanged looks, swapped terrible scenarios, until finally she got up to investigate. Pit slipped away to hide in a bedroom, as she silently indicated. But the caller turned out to be a female friend, from the same apartment block, calling around to say hi. As the conversation dragged on she offered Pixie a spare theatre ticket for that very evening, which was accepted.

  Clive was troubled, yet remained hidden behind the bedroom door. Finally, after a lengthy chitchat, the girl withdrew. Pitt came back into the living room, struggling not to panic. But he dissembled his objections and presented an ironical front.

  “D’you expect me to hang around here all evening?”

  “Relax. Shouldn’t we behave as normal?” she told him.

  “What are you going out for?” he asked, beginning to pace.

  “I want to see this play at the Donmar. The last time I saw a production of Pirandello was on a school trip. She would be suspicious if I refused now. She’s a trustworthy woman. We have to maintain our safety screen, Clive. I will continue with the story tomorrow.”

  “I can’t believe this,” he objected. “Don’t you understand the peril we could be in? Are you crazy...thinking about an evening out?” he protested.

  “I would advise you to set your alarm for very early tomorrow...when I might continue my account...of your recent past...if you’d like.”

  “I don’t even have an alarm,” Clive commented. “Maybe I’ll get up when the cock crows, as I did at the weekend.”

  She sighed and averted her gaze. “You poor man. You’ve been through a lot. Why don’t you take a shower? Change out of those grubby clothes? Read something, watch something,” she suggested.

  “I guess there’s no other prospect,” he replied.

  “The sun’s caught your face,” she told him, peering to examine. “There’s some special cream in the cabinet. I also have some drops for your eyes.”

  “Maybe I should tie you up, as they do in the movies,” he joked.

  “Be a good boy, Clive, won’t you?” she urged him.

  “You’re not going to undo that button in your top lip, are you?” he quipped.

  “We need me to sew back a few missing buttons, don’t we?”

  “Perhaps your father made a wise choice after all,” he replied.

  “Let’s concentrate on your painful memories, shall we?” she told him, trailing away.

  She’d been packed off to an expensive boarding school at the most tender age available. She was the illegitimate daughter of a Norwegian shipping heiress (she inherited a portion) and an English PhD student, who’d been completing a project on the genome of slugs. The question of illegitimacy and chance shouldn’t have mattered.

  Her parents had met each other while studying at Leeds University: he was on his first internship project (with his slugs) and she was studying fine arts, infatuated with Edvard Munch and expressionism. She enjoyed her student infatuation, but she was afraid of ruining her future.

  Consequently the infant Pixie was parcelled off to relatives of her English father, while her mother’s Norwegian family refused any bonds. But they financed a quixotic European education for her that was designed to establish complete independence and self-sufficiency. She grew up privileged and out of the way. She had a relationship with her family that was like an old fashioned relationship with a local bank manager.

  In rapid time Pixie was made-up, done-up and out of the apartment.

  Pitt meanwhile was left to roam and to brood over his situation. He began to speculate about what other revelations would come, when she resumed her narrative in the morning. But he trusted Pixie already, like an instinct. He felt that he knew her well; although that was mysterious, as his fidelity had no rational basis. She was not deceitful or dishonest; he could vouch for that fact. In his profession he didn’t trust to feelings alone, any more than to pure rationality. He had worked closely with Pixie Wright, sharing sensitive information, even before he went rogue against the deal. On that evidence they must have been harmonious a
s a couple as well, he considered. The only thing was to follow her advice and to wait, even knowing that; meanwhile, their enemies were not standing still.

  Clive stood at the long narrow window of her living room, gazing out towards the penumbral city lights. He was offered a familiar metropolitan scene, except that London and all its contents were placed a whole year hence. Or there was a year sized gap in his brain like a financial bubble. His stomach tightened at such a strange and dislocating awareness.

  Night time thunderstorms gathered again across the velvety heavy sky, and he noticed a violent drama of a storm, unfolding over the park and adjacent streets.

  18

  When Pixie returned home she wore a blankly anxious expression. Her mobile rang again and, turning her eyes away from Pitt, she began to chat to the French boyfriend, Bertrand whatever his name was, cupping her hand. She slipped away to take the call privately in her bedroom; her muffled voice sounding dissatisfied and miserable.

  When this cross channel contretemps ended she insisted on going to bed straight away. Evidently she’d had a mild lovers’ tiff with Bertrand, brought on by the tension no doubt, but also related to her spontaneous outing to the theatre.

  “Don’t think about disturbing me in the night,” Pixie warned him. “I have a double inside lock and a pistol under my bed.”

  Pitt was taken aback. “What do you take me for?” Clive said. He assumed she was joking about the gun.

  “There are unresolved places in your character,” she said; signs of strain around her eyes.

  “Are there? So that’s what you’d call it?” he returned, disconcerted.

  “Sleep peacefully, Clive, knowing that you are in the best place.”

  “I really appreciate it,” he admitted. “You’ve risked a lot for me already. Now it seems I have put you into fresh danger.”

  “We’ve got to protect each other, as far as possible,” she said, smiling.

  “I suspect we are vulnerable even now,” Pitt observed.