The birthday girl

by Stephen Leather

  'Maury, get a grip on yourself,' Freeman said.

  Anderson took a deep breath. When he spoke it was slowly with a distinct pause between each word. 'You… have… to … sell,' he said, as if he could persuade Freeman to do what he wanted by the sheer force of his willpower.

  'Go home,' Freeman said. 'You're sick or something. You're not yourself.' He shook his head sadly and walked out of the office. He heard Anderson call his name but he didn't look back.

  Anderson controlled his Corvette with one hand as he called up Sal Sabatino on the car phone. He accelerated past a huge truck belching black smoke.

  'Mr Sabatino? It's Maury. Freeman isn't going for it. There's no way he'll agree to sell.'

  'Maury, this isn't my problem,' Sabatino said. 'It's yours.'

  'Oh, come on, I've spoken to Freeman, what else can I do?'

  Anderson whined.

  'You know what my brother told you,' Sabatino said. 'It's up to you.'

  'Shit, it's not up to me any more. I've given it my best shot.'

  'So your best isn't good enough. You want I should call my brother and tell him?'

  'No!' Anderson exclaimed. 'Just give me a chance. Give me a fucking chance.'

  'Maury, get off my back, will ya?' Sabatino sighed. 'You made your bed, you fucking lie in it.'

  'Look, just listen to me, will you? I've told Freeman that I think he should sell out, I've run the figures by him, but he's not interested, he says…' ¦ 'You're starting to bore me, Maury,' Sabatino interrupted.

  'He says it's a family business and the family is always going to be involved,' Anderson continued. 'So, I think you should talk with him. Explain the error of his ways. If he hears it from the horse's mouth… Not that I'm calling you a horse's mouth. You know what I mean.'

  'Yeah, I know what you mean,' Sabatino said wearily.

  'So what I was thinking was, maybe you should spell it out to Freeman. Tell him the way things stand.'

  'That's what my brother is planning to do. Look, Maury, I don't see how my presence would change things.'

  'Because I could introduce you as one of the investors. You could tell him that you're planning to keep the business running.

  Tell him anything he wants to hear, just so he'll persuade his wife to sell.'

  'Have you spoken to the wife?'

  'Not yet, no.'

  'So take her to bed, screw her brains out, and tell her to sell.'

  'You don't know Katherine Freeman.'

  'Not as well as you do, no. But I know human nature.'

  'I had another thought,' Anderson added.

  'God help me,' Sabatino said.

  'Yeah. When Lennie Nelson was on our backs, he kept saying that we should look for a buyer. What if we went direct to the bank and put the deal to them?'

  'No,' Sabatino said sharply. 'The last thing we want is for the bank to go over the assets with a view to selling. Don't say a fucking word to the bank, okay?'

  'Sure. Whatever you say.'

  Sabatino went quiet and after a while Anderson wondered if he'd lost the connection. 'Mr Sabatino? Are you there?'

  'Yeah, I'm still here. Okay, Maury. Let's give it a shot. You fix up a meeting.'

  'Great. Fantastic' Anderson ended the call. A young guy in a red Mazda was trying to overtake but he put his foot down hard and the Corvette accelerated away. He hated being overtaken almost as much as he hated talking to Sal Sabatino.

  Mersiha was sitting at the kitchen table, her school books spread out in front of her, when Freeman walked in. 'Hiya, pumpkin,' he said, ruffling her hair. 'What's up?' Buffy looked up from the floor, gave a welcoming wag of her tail, then lay down again.

  'The Civil War. Causes and effects. I'm trying to finish it before dinner.'

  'Hramm. You realise that some academics have devoted their whole lives to the subject?'

  'Yeah, yeah, yeah. But all I'm prepared to give it is two hours, max.'

  'My daughter the historian. And I thought I told you not to call me Max.'

  'Ha, ha, ha, thump. Oh, sorry, that was the sound of my head falling off.'

  The telephone rang and Freeman raised an eyebrow. 'Shall I get that?' he asked sarcastically.

  'It won't be for me.'

  'Where's Katherine?'

  'Shopping.'

  'With the girls?'

  'Afraid so.'

  Freeman picked up the phone. It was Anderson. 'Hiya, Maury,' Freeman said. 'Are you still in the office?'

  'Just about to go. Are you around this evening?'

  'Around? You mean at home?'

  'Yeah. Are you gonna be there?'

  'Sure. Why?'

  'One of the Ventura people wants a word. We were wondering if we could come around and see you this evening.'

  Freeman frowned and leaned against the kitchen wall. Mersiha was sucking the end of her pen as she read. 'Why can't we do this in the office, Maury?'

  'He doesn't want it official, he just wants a chat.'

  'I don't know. If he's got anything to say, I think he should say it to the whole board.'

  'Hell, Tony, you, me and Katherine pretty much are the board.'

  'Yeah, well there's a few notable exceptions who might take offence at not being consulted.'

  'Walter won't mind. And I doubt if Bill or Josh care either way. Look, just a few minutes, that's all.'

  'Katherine isn't here,' Freeman said.

  'It's really you he wants to talk to.'

  'I don't think it's a good idea.'

  'Please, Tony.'

  Freeman sighed deeply. There didn't seem to be any way to put the man off, short of a direct refusal. 'Okay,' he agreed. 'But keep it short.' "Terrific, Tony. Thanks. We'll be there at seven, okay?'

  'I suppose so,' Freeman said, still unhappy at the prospect of his evening being disturbed. He hung up the phone. 'What time's Katherine getting back?' he asked Mersiha.

  She shrugged. 'Who knows? She went looking for shoes.'

  'Ouch,' Freeman said. Shoes were one of his wife's biggest vices. She had several closets full of them but never passed up an opportunity to buy more.

  'Someone coming round?' Mersiha asked.

  'Business. Maury and a guy who wants to buy a piece of our company. Boring stuff.' He opened the refrigerator. 'Do you want a soda?'

  'Diet Coke, decaf,' she said.

  'No calories, no kick. Why don't you just drink water?' He tossed a can to her and she caught it one-handed.

  Mersiha groaned and leaned back in her chair. 'Nag, nag, nag,' she laughed, popping the tab and drinking from the can.

  'Did she leave anything to eat?'

  Mersiha shook her head. 'You know Katherine. Once she's on the trail of a hot pair of shoes…'

  'Yeah, I guess.' Freeman looked inside the refrigerator again.

  There was half a cooked chicken and plastic containers of potato salad and coleslaw, and he found tomatoes, cucumber and an Iceberg lettuce still in brown paper bags. 'Ah, she came through,' he said. 'Chicken salad?'

  Mersiha was loading their dirty plates into the dishwasher when the doorbell rang. 'We'll be in the study, pumpkin,'

  Freeman said as he went out into the hall, Buffy following at his heels.

  He opened the front door to find Anderson about to ring the bell again. Standing next to him was an overweight man in a cashmere overcoat. 'This is Mr Sabatino, Tony,' Anderson said.

  'Tony. Good to meet ya,' Sabatino said, stepping forward and gripping Freeman's hand. He pumped it vigorously, grinning with fake bonhomie. He was wearing a large gold ring which bit into Freeman's hand, and Freeman wondered if the man deliberately wore it to hurt. There was something about him that provoked instant dislike, though he couldn't quite work out what it was. It wasn't his looks – Freeman had more than his fair share of overweight friends with double chins – it was something to do with his attitude. He had the look of a man who was used to getting his own way, usually by what he thought passed for charm, and if that didn't work Freeman felt
that he'd be prepared to use other, less civilised methods.

  'Come in, Mr Sabatino,' he said, stepping to the side.

  'It's Sal,' Sabatino said.

  There were two cars on the road outside the house: Anderson's Corvette and a large sedan. There were two men in the sedan.

  Two large men. Mr Sabatino obviously wasn't a man who enjoyed travelling alone. One of the large men was chewing on a cigar.

  He studied Freeman the way an entomologist might look at an insect he already had in his collection. Freeman shuddered and closed the door. As soon as he showed his visitors into the study, Sabatino made himself comfortable on the leather sofa by the door. Buffy sniffed at his trousers and he scowled at her. She got the message and went off to find Mersiha. Sabatino looked at the gun cabinet and then at Freeman. 'You shoot, Tony?'

  'Not really,' Freeman said. Anderson paced up and down, clearly nervous. 'Do you want a drink, Maury?' he asked.

  'A drink? No. No, thanks.'

  'What about you, Mr Sabatino? Sal, I mean.' Freeman had difficulty referring to the man by his first name. It implied a closeness and familiarity that he wasn't keen to encourage.

  'Nothing for me, Tony.' Sabatino interlinked his fingers and cracked his knuckles. The noise reminded Freeman of twigs snapping underfoot. It wasn't a pleasant sound. 'Maury tells me that you're unhappy with our plan to increase our investment in your company.'

  'The way Maury explained it, you're talking about a takeover.'

  Sabatino made a shrugging gesture that suggested that it was all a matter of semantics. 'You've a cash-flow problem, we've got cash.'

  'We?'

  'Ventura Investments.'

  'Which as far as we're concerned is a venture capital company.

  Why would a venture capital company want to own a manufacturing company?'

  Sabatino pulled at the lobe of his left ear like an acupuncturist looking for a nerve centre. 'I didn't come here to justify myself.'

  Freeman smiled thinly. 'So what did you come for?'

  Sabatino leant forward, fingering his gold ring. 'We really want your company, and we're not going to take no for an answer.'

  'What business are you in, actually?' Freeman asked.

  'We're a group of investors, you know that.'

  'Maury tells me that you own a nightclub in Baltimore. What was it called, Maury? The Firehouse?'

  Sabatino turned to look at Anderson, a slow swivelling of the neck like a badly operated marionette. Anderson seemed to shrink against the wall. Freeman wondered what the hell was going on. Anderson was clearly scared to death of the man.

  'It's true that I have entertainment interests, Tony. I run a multi-faceted organisation. Entertainment. Leisure. Property.'

  'Manufacturing?'

  'No. Not manufacturing.'

  Freeman went to stand behind his desk. He wanted something substantial between the two of them, a barrier. 'What you're suggesting doesn't make sense, Mr Sabatino. CRW is a manufacturer. A manufacturer of specialist equipment. An outsider couldn't run the company.'

  'I think you'd be surprised at what we can do, Tony.'

  'That may be. But you're not going to get the opportunity.'

  Sabatino's eyelids half closed and from his coat pocket he took out a sheaf of papers. He stood up and walked slowly over to the

  desk. 'I had my lawyer draw up the papers, Tony. It's a very generous offer.'

  'It is,' parroted Anderson. 'It's very generous.'

  'I couldn't sign that even if I wanted to,' Freeman said. 'It would need the agreement of the majority of the shareholders.'

  'So call a shareholders' meeting.'

  'There isn't time. I'm going on vacation this weekend.'

  Sabatino dropped the papers on Freeman's blotter. 'Cancel it.

  Your health is a lot more important than a vacation.'

  At first Freeman thought he'd misheard. 'What?' he said, stunned. 'What did you say?'

  Sabatino smiled, like a tiger contemplating a meal. 'I mean that running a company like CRW must put a strain on you. On your marriage. On your family. I could take that strain off you.

  You're too close to the company. You're not able to do what's necessary to save it.'

  'You sound just like Lennie Nelson,' Freeman said.

  'Yeah? Never thought I'd have anything in common with a nigger.'

  Freeman looked at Anderson in astonishment, unable to believe what Sabatino had said.

  'I think you should leave, Mr Sabatino.'

  'Not until you've signed the papers.' Sabatino stretched his arms along the back of the sofa as if he was settling in for a long wait.

  Freeman stood up. 'No, I'd like you to go now. I don't like your attitude, and I don't like you, Mr Sabatino.'

  Sabatino's upper lip curled back in a sneer. 'Maybe I should wait for Mrs Freeman.'

  'You keep away from my wife. If you've anything to say to the board, you can do it officially.'

  Sabatino nodded slowly. 'You're going to regret this.'

  'So you are here to threaten me?'

  'I don't bother making threats, Mr Freeman.' Sabatino hauled himself to his feet. He glared at Freeman as he adjusted the sleeves of his jacket. He looked as if he was about to say something else, but then appeared to change his mind and walked out of the house without a word.

  Anderson started after Sabatino, but stopped at the door to the study. He flinched as the front door slammed. 'That wasn't smart, Tony.'

  'I think you should go too, Maury.'

  Anderson paced up and down, rubbing the bridge of his nose.

  'You've no idea what you've done,' he whined.

  Mersiha peered through her bedroom curtains to watch Sabatino walk back to his car. The driver scurried to open the car door for him but Sabatino got to the handle first. Even from fifty yards away it was clear that he was furious. He was glaring at the house, and Mersiha backed away from the window, afraid that he'd seen her. She tiptoed back down the stairs. Earlier she'd had to press her ear to the closed door in order to hear Sabatino and her father, but now the door to the study was wide open and she didn't have to eavesdrop to hear her father and Maury Anderson arguing.

  'What's going on with you two?' her father said.

  'You shouldn't have spoken to him that way,' Anderson responded, his voice shaking.

  'Why are you so scared of him? What is he, some sort of gangster?'

  Anderson laughed harshly. Mersiha shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. It was the first time she'd ever heard her father argue with his partner. 'Sabatino has some very dangerous friends, Tony. He's connected.'

  'Connected? You mean he's in the Mafia?'

  'I don't know if he's in the Mafia, but he's got associates who are.'

  'And you let this man invest in our company? What the hell were you playing at?'

  For a while there was silence. Mersiha could hear someone pacing up and down on the carpet. 'I didn't have any choice, Tony. You weren't here. You were in Sarajevo, remember?'

  'What are you saying?'

  'I'm saying that when you were held hostage, I needed to raise money quickly. We had a ransom to pay, remember? And when that went wrong, we had to pay to send people in to get you out.

  The government didn't pay for that. CRW did. I had to keep the company running, and we had to raise money to get you out.

  Do you think the banks were queuing up to lend me the money?

  Even your beloved Walter wouldn't help. He'd have let you rot in that basement so long as we met our interest payments.'

  'So you went to a gangster? Is that it?'

  'No, that's not it. I was approached by an accountant, on behalf of Ventura Investments. Everything seemed just hunkydory.

  It was only afterwards that I met Sabatino. By then it was too late.'

  Freeman sighed deeply. 'So you're saying it's my fault for being kidnapped?'

  'I'm not saying it's your fault, no. But if you'd been here, things might have happened differ
ently.'

  'Yeah? Well whose idea was it to send me to Bosnia in the first place, Maury? Answer me that.'

  Mersiha flinched as her father began to shout. She felt a sudden rush of guilt. If what Anderson was saying was true, she was partly to blame for her father's situation. She rocked backwards and forwards on the stairs nervously.

  'Look, blaming each other isn't going to get us anywhere,'

  Anderson said. 'Sabatino wants to buy CRW. I think we should sell.'

  'Fine. That's your opinion and you're entitled to it. But first the directors have to discuss it, then it goes to a full shareholders' meeting. And you know what Katherine and I are going to say.'

  'Then you'll be making a big mistake, Tony. A big mistake.'

  'That sounds like a threat. I'm starting to resent being threatened.'

  'Take it any way you want. But I'll tell you now, if Sabatino wants the company, he'll get it. One way or another. He's a bully, a bully who's used to getting what he wants, and the more you try to deny him, the worse he gets.'

  'What do you think he'll do?' Freeman asked, his voice quieter this time. Mersiha had to strain to hear.

  'Best you don't wait to find out. Call him tomorrow and tell him you'll sell.'

  'No.'

  'At least sleep on it.'

  'No. And I think you should consider your position with the company.'

  'You mean you're sacking me?'

  'I mean I don't think you can justify your place on the board any longer. If you wanted to leave, I wouldn't stand in your way.'

  'You can't force me to resign.'

  'Maybe you should sleep on it too.'

  Mersiha heard Anderson walk towards the hallway and she scampered upstairs. She hid in the bathroom as Anderson left the house, then went back downstairs. Her father was sitting at his desk, his head in his hands.

  'Dad?' she said, her voice trembling.

  He looked up and smiled. 'Hiya, pumpkin. What's up?'

  She walked into the middle of the room, rubbing her hands together as if washing them. 'Is everything okay?' she asked.

  'Sure.' Realisation dawned. 'Oh, you heard us arguing?'

  'Yeah. I guess.'

  Freeman stood up and went over to her, putting his hands on her shoulders. 'It's just business, pumpkin. Nothing's wrong.