Cut Out

by Marcia Woolf

  We shook hands and I left, aware of Lucy’s eyes fixing the back of my head like a nail gun at full pelt. It was only when I got to the front step that it occurred to me I should have asked about salary. What PA could afford to take a job offer without knowing about the pay? He would have noticed, would have thought it strange. Very strange, in fact, because no woman in her right mind would work for a man like that if she didn’t need the money or have an ulterior motive. I’d have to try harder to look like the money was the thing.

  14th July, nine months later

  Day Two - Transcript

  Miss Helena Chung, QC (Prosecuting Counsel)

  Miss Chung:

  To recap from yesterday’s proceedings, members of the jury will recall that, in October 2012, a programme called The Alphabet Game first appeared on British television, in which pairs of contestants complete a series of challenges. By mid 2014, the programme had been syndicated to seven European states: Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Belgium, Malta and Estonia. By December of 2014, the show had also been bought by France, Latvia, Lithuania and Iceland. By the end of last year, point nine per cent of all EU citizens had either appeared on, or applied to appear on, The Alphabet Game.

  The winning couple’s prize was somewhat unusual: an investment portfolio. The larger the contestants’ winnings during the game, the bigger their portfolio. Their prize on the day was only a plastic trophy, but their nominal winnings were transferred by the hosting television company to Claus Berthold Investment Bank, and specifically to a Mr Lars Henning Nilsson, who is one of the defendants in this case. Mr Henning Nilsson, who was credited as an advisor on the programme, at that time ran the private equity arm of CBIB, which is headquartered in London, just off Threadneedle Street.

  Members of the jury will also recall that Mr Henning Nilsson’s role was then to use his expertise to invest the contestants’ prize money and generate an income for them which was paid out each month, in proportion to the size of their original winnings. The winners, however, had no say in how or where the money was invested, nor did they receive progress reports on the portfolio. The proceeds arrived as untaxed income and the contestants were responsible for declaring it to the Inland Revenue and for paying tax on it.

  DCI Sullivan, when you were first put in charge of the investigation into the alleged financial mishandling of The Alphabet Game’s investment portfolio, you held a briefing meeting on 31st October last year at the request of Dame Sally Dannatt, who was present, in her official capacity as acting head of Overseas Revenue Investigations at HMRC, is that correct?

  DCI Oliver Sullivan, London Metropolitan Police, Serious Fraud and Financial Crime Unit:

  That’s correct. It was a meeting to bring Dame Sally up to speed on the case.

  Miss Chung:

  And aside from Dame Sally and yourself, who else was present at that meeting?

  DCI Sullivan:

  Mr David Finchcock, who was then deputy head of Forensic Accountancy at the Financial Conduct Authority, Miss Fancy Goodheart who is head of New Programming for TV Syndication Australia, DI Dawn Sayler and DC Ashok Kumar.

  Miss Chung:

  And the meeting was called by Dame Sally in order to discuss what, exactly?

  DCI Sullivan:

  According to Dame Sally, because The Alphabet Game’s investments were being managed out of CBIB’s London office, she was concerned at potential breaches of European tax law. CBIB was about to be appointed by the UK Government to finance an Anglo-Swiss defence IT procurement project and Dame Sally wanted to make sure there weren’t any skeletons in the closet.

  Miss Chung:

  Is that the expression Dame Sally used – ‘skeletons in the closet’?

  DCI Sullivan:

  It is, actually.

  Miss Chung:

  I see. For the benefit of the members of the jury, could you please outline what was discussed at that meeting?

  DCI Sullivan:

  Certainly. Mr Finchcock gave some background on how the case came to the attention of the Financial Conduct Authority, and Miss Goodheart explained how TV Syndication Australia was working with the FCA. Then I summarised what our unit was doing in order to facilitate the investigation.

  Miss Chung:

  And, to the best of your recollection, DCI Sullivan, what did Mr Finchcock say at that meeting? You may consult your notes.

  DCI Sullivan:

  Mr Finchcock said that, in May last year, the FCA received a letter from a Mr Douglas Noonan. He’d appeared on The Alphabet Game in December 2012 and had quite a big win, just over forty thousand pounds. Mr Noonan said he was very happy with the income he started to receive from it. Then Mr Noonan got a letter from CBIB, purporting to be from Mr Henning Nilsson himself, saying that the portfolio wasn’t doing as well as expected and it might be that his income would start to fall off. Nilsson was very apologetic and said he would try to reinvest the funds.

  Mr Finchcock added that Mr Noonan was surprised by this, since Mr Henning Nilsson had such an excellent reputation, but he accepted the situation. However, Mr Noonan, who was a small investor himself, continued to keep an eye on the financial press, and he noted that every so often there would be an article reporting fantastic returns on CBIB’s private equity deals, although every month Mr Noonan found his own income was falling. Then, by coincidence, Mr Noonan got a new neighbour, Mr Bryan Heritage. In conversation, it transpired that Mr Heritage had also been a contestant on The Alphabet Game, and Mr Heritage remarked that his income from the winnings had declined substantially. He had also received an apologetic letter from Nilsson. As a result of that discussion, Mr Noonan wrote to the Financial Conduct Authority expressing his concern at the disparity between CBIB’s apparent success and what was actually happening to his own investment.

  Miss Chung:

  Thank you, DCI Sullivan. We shall be calling Mr Finchcock at a later date but, in the meantime, could you also tell us what Miss Goodheart’s role was in this investigation?

  DCI Sullivan:

  Miss Goodheart was representing her organisation in discussions with the FCA. TV Syndication Australia, at that time, was negotiating an option with the programme makers, Green Dog Media, on syndication of the Alphabet Game across Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand. The UK Financial Conduct Authority contacted them to ask that they work with the investigation to find out how the deal with CBIB operated. Green Dog Media, which is based in London, made an estimated seven million US dollars from the programme within the first two years. Because of the sensitive nature of the negotiations, we took a decision early on not to make Green Dog Media aware of our concerns.

  Miss Chung:

  Because you believed that Green Dog Media might be complicit in any wrongdoing?

  DCI Sullivan:

  At the time, we had to remain cautious, although we have now ascertained that Green Dog were totally unaware of CBIB’s activities. The TV companies that had already syndicated the show had paid out millions directly to CBIB. At the time, we didn’t know exactly how many millions, because each TV company had drawn up their own individual contracts with the bank.

  Miss Chung:

  During that meeting on 31st October, at which Dame Sally Dannatt was present, what information was she given about the police investigation?

  DCI Sullivan:

  She was made aware that Mr Henning Nilsson and his firm had been under external surveillance for a couple of months. CBIB’s offices are in a building shared with seven other financial businesses, which was a hindrance to us in terms of observation. Another issue was disclosure: although CBIB has its headquarters in London, all the deals are done overseas and all the investors are private individuals or institutions. I told Dame Sally that we didn’t have the resources or the authority to look into who these investors are or where their money is invested. We knew which deals Mr Henning Nilsson was involved in once they were announced, but there’s not much data available in the public domain for private equity activity.
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br />   Miss Chung:

  Thank you, DCI Sullivan. And can you please tell the court what steps you were taking to obtain more information specifically on Project Alphabet?

  DCI Sullivan:

  Yes, we had managed to get an undercover officer into the bank as an administrative employee.

  Miss Chung:

  You are referring to DC Sam Dillon?

  DCI Sullivan:

  Yes.

  Miss Chung:

  And was Dame Sally made aware of the name of the undercover officer and the position in which DC Dillon was employed at the bank?

  DCI Sullivan:

  She was, yes.

  Miss Chung:

  Thank you, DCI Sullivan. I have no further questions at this point.

  Chapter Three

  Tuesday 4th/Wednesday 5th November

  In at the Deep End

  On my way back to the flat, I stopped off at a couple of shops and acquired the basics of a working wardrobe: the sort of suit I’d normally keep at home for funerals of staff. I also bought two pairs of cheapish shoes, which pained me in all senses but I guessed that a PA wouldn’t stretch to Manolos for the day job. When I got home, the phone was ringing.

  “Cookie! Where have you been? I’ve been calling your mobile for hours.”

  I looked. The mobile, in its usual place on the coffee table, was flashing its little red light on and off like fury.

  “I’m sorry, Ollie. I went out and forgot to take it with me.”

  “I was worried. Where have you been?”

  “Oh, just out. Shopping.”

  “I was worried.”

  “So you said. How are you?”

  “Better. I hope you like men with scars.”

  “Of course. The scarier the better.”

  He laughed, but then stopped abruptly.

  “It hurts when I do that.”

  “Best stay miserable then. When are they letting you go home?”

  “A day or two. Listen, you made a statement to the police, didn’t you?”

  Aha. So he’d had a visit from Sayler.

  “Yes.”

  “You didn’t say anything about…?”

  “Of course not. I’m not stupid, Ollie. I don’t want to drop you in the shit. They know who I am, or they can find out pretty quickly, so there was no point in pretending. I said you were hoping to recruit me as an informant.”

  “Why would I be doing that? I work in Fraud, Cookie.”

  “So? I could be very useful to you as an undercover informant. A secret agent.”

  “Look, I just want you to keep out of all this, okay? There are some very tricky people I’m dealing with and it won’t help if you go getting mixed up in it. Especially not if any of my colleagues find out. I want you to stay away, hands off, eyes and ears shut. You’ve got to promise me, Cookie, please.”

  “Fine. If you don’t want my help you can just handle it on your own.”

  “For Christ’s sake! I’m not on my own, I’ve got half the bloody Met minding my back. I’m more worried about that lot finding out about you, about us. It’ll be the end for me if it becomes common knowledge. You’re a lever, Cookie. And I don’t like being levered, don’t like being blackmailed, and certainly don’t like having to take my eye off the ball to keep it on you.”

  “I see. Well, perhaps you’ll let me know when this case is over and we can get back together?”

  There was a silence while he interpreted what I’d said. I accept it was a threat, possibly even an ultimatum, but Ollie was definitely trying to have his Cookie and eat it.

  “I can still see you.”

  “I don’t see how that’s possible at the moment. Look, Ollie, I understand. You’re busy, you’ve got a case to solve. I’ll be fine, and I really will keep out of your hair until this is all done with. And I’m sorry if I said the wrong thing in my statement. It seemed like a plausible reason for us to be meeting up.”

  I could hear him relenting.

  “It wasn’t totally off the wall, I accept that.”

  There was a noise in the background, and somebody speaking. I realised he must be hogging the ward payphone.

  “I have to go. I’ll call you tomorrow, around six. I meant what I said the other day.”

  “That you love me?”

  “Yes. Very much.”

  He lowered his voice.

  “And there’s something I would really like to do right now.”

  “Hmm. Might undo the stitches.”

  He laughed and then said ouch again.

  “Tomorrow?”

  “Six. I’ll be here.”

  I ordered a takeaway and sat eating it in front of the TV. There was a game show on, and a young couple were gurning and prancing about for the cameras. For some reason he was wearing a large label with a number seven on it, and she was wearing a similar label bearing the letter Y. I couldn’t work out what the hell they were supposed to be doing, but the audience were all highly amused so no doubt I was missing a key component by watching with the sound off. This is what a sense of discernment does for you, I thought. You start looking at everything as if it’s from another planet. Which it might well be. I should stop being so... elitist. So detached. I should probably get out and mingle more; find out what was so funny about 7 and Y. While I was weighing up the merits of observer versus participant, something at the end of the show caught my eye. Lars Henning Nilsson was credited as an advisor to the programme. How unlikely was that?

  The next morning, just after nine-thirty, the phone rang. It was Lucinda Fleming.

  “Mr Nilsson was hoping you might come in for a second interview. To meet Mr Leach.”

  She sounded quite annoyed at having to relay this request, although maybe that’s how she sounded generally. I said I could be there for his suggested time of 11am. He was certainly keen.

  It was five minutes to eleven when I pushed the buzzer on the intercom. I waited, and then waited a bit more. There was a security camera positioned over the entrance, and I wondered if Ms Fleming was watching me. Just in case, I checked my watch, patted my hair and straightened the hem of my skirt. I resisted the urge to stick my tongue out and give the spycam a two-fingered salute. Finally, she came scurrying across the beige carpet and opened the door using some sort of key card.

  “Sorry, I was in the back office. Only just heard the buzzer.”

  She gestured to me to follow, and we trotted over to the rear of the building where Nilsson and a short round man in a pink shirt were occupying the two seats at the far end of a long black lacquered table. There was an open can of Diet Coke in front of Nilsson, and on the table next to the man in the pink shirt was a dark blue folder, a cup and saucer and a rather fancy fountain pen. They stood up when we arrived and there was the usual round of hand-shaking and name-swapping. Pink Shirt, as I’d expected, turned out to be Simon Leach. He was ruddier and rounder than the photo on their website, and a good four inches shorter than I’d imagined. He looked me up and down approvingly. We all sat, apart from Lucinda who clearly knew her place in the scheme of things and backed out of the room, bowing and fawning as she went.

  Leach had a list of questions. He’d written them in pencil, so even with my eyesight it was hard to make out much from two feet away, but I did notice that he’d numbered each point. He went down the list methodically, ticking each one off as I answered. Most of them were fairly transparent. Did I have a long journey? (Was I going to be late every morning?) Was I a ‘self-starter’? (Could I be trusted actually to do any work if left to my own devices?) Did I have a robust sense of humour? (Did I mind that my future colleagues were sexist public school arseholes with no concept of personal space?) I nodded and assured and smiled and gave appropriate responses in all the right places. Eventually Nilsson got bored with this game and interrupted.

  “What would you say was your main asset as an employee?”

  Leach put down his pen.

  “Discretion.”

  Nilsson smiled. “
That’s a start. Anything else?”

  “I like to finish things.”

  “Finish things? You mean you enjoy completing tasks?”

  “Yes: I like to do a job properly, tie up all the loose ends.”

  Leach looked across at his boss.

  “Sounds good. We need someone who can get down to details.”

  Nilsson smiled again, although he seemed slightly uneasy. There was a smear on the table in front of him, where something had been spilt and carelessly wiped away. He ran his finger over the mark, but it only made it spread further. He rubbed at it again. After a moment he looked up.

  “Very well. If you are happy, Simon?”

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “Good. And you, Miss Bronski?”

  For a split second I wondered who the hell Miss Bronski was. I’d have to stop doing that.

  “Perfectly.”

  “Excellent. And so we need to discuss salary. What would be acceptable?”

  I’d done a bit of research but I was reluctant to stick my neck out with a round number.

  “I think perhaps a little below what the previous incumbent was earning? Given that I still have a lot to learn.”

  Leach looked very pleased at this reply; smug, even. He consulted his notes, though I suspected he knew down to the penny what his last PA had cost him. He cleared his throat.

  “Shall we say forty-five? To start, that is.”

  I provided the lack of reaction I’d been practicing in the mirror all morning.

  “That sounds very fair.”

  Nilsson stood. He was plainly uninterested in the minutiae of the salaries paid to underlings.

  “Great. I’ll leave it to Simon here to sort out all the details with you. Or for you to sort out all the details with him, since that’s what you’re good at.”