Unnatural Justice ob-7

by Quintin Jardine

  I didn't want him to get any nearer the truth, or I'd have had trouble keeping up my act. So I shut him up, as Jay Yuille had silenced me.

  "And your last," I said, icily. "I warn you, Dad, don't ever talk to me about this again, or it'll be many a day before you and I stand up on this tee again. Let the police get on with their investigation, for I promise you it will not come back to you. If they phone you looking for dental ID, send it to them without a word. Yes?" I snapped. He nodded, looking at the ground like a chidden schoolboy.

  "Right. Now in case you've forgotten you're two down and I've got a twenty-footer for a birdie waiting down there."

  "How did your golf go anyway?" Susie asked.

  I smiled. "My Dad played shite. Never won a hole; he didn't even manage a half till the sixth."

  "That's not like him. He'll be losing to Jonny next."

  "He does that already."

  "I suppose so. I always forget how big he's getting." She squeezed my arm as we lay on the couch, nursing a couple of glasses of Gran Sangre de Toro… one of the best sleeping potions we know. "Sorry I was grumpy when you came in. It's been a trying week."

  "I know it has, love. Did you go for your check-up, by the way?" She nodded. "All okay?" She nodded again, but avoided my eye. "Susie?" I demanded.

  "It's nothing. My blood pressure was a bit raised, that's all. Only a wee bit, honest."

  I put down my glass and turned her to face me. "What did your consultant say?" I asked her, a little urgently I guessed, for she twisted in my grasp.

  "Och, Oz, it's all right, really. She said she'd keep an eye on it, but it was only a couple of points up."

  "Well it's getting no higher. That's it; now that Culshaw's agreed to deputise for you, you're off on maternity leave as of now."

  "I knew you'd say that. I'm all right, really, and so's the baby."

  I made her look at me again. "Susie, my love, I usually think four or five times before trying to lay down the law to you, but not this time.

  You are out of there."

  She must have been tired, for she gave up the fight. "Okay," she conceded. "It'll take me a few days next week to hand over to Phil, but once that's done, I'll stay at home."

  "You mean that?"

  "I mean it; cross my heart." She settled down beside me again on the couch. "Now, how was the rest of your day?" she asked. "Anything interesting happen?" She giggled. "Apart from making a movie, that is."

  "As a matter of fact…" I told her about my encounter on the Glasgow plane with Mr. W H Smith of Kendall McGuire.

  "There's a coincidence," she murmured. "I wonder how he managed that?"

  "What?"

  "To get sat next to you."

  "Aw come on, that was pure chance. You can't just go to the check-in and ask to sit next to someone."

  "Maybe he saw you check in, then went up and asked for the same row."

  "No way."

  "Oh no? Were all the window seats taken?"

  I thought back to the flight. The plane had been less than half full.

  "No, but not everyone likes one. Anyway, the guy was sweating like a horse when he got on board, as if he'd had to run for it."

  "That means nothing. You know how hot that departure lounge can get."

  That was true enough, I conceded; it had been like a furnace at lunchtime. Then I stopped myself. She was as paranoid as I was.

  "Maybe so, but I still don't think the guy was a plant."

  "Maybe he just saw you and took a chance."

  "Forget it. He didn't strike me as that smart."

  "What did you talk about?" Susie asked.

  "Football at first, then business. Actually, when I think of it, I began the business chat. I clocked him as a lawyer; it was only after that that he told me who he was with. We got talking and I asked him who they represented; the interesting thing was that he denied any knowledge of a Torrent link."

  "That was a lie for a start, if he's a partner like he said."

  "I don't think so. I'm an actor, remember; I should know when someone's hamming it up. Has it occurred to you that Duncan Kendall might have been representing someone else at Natalie's Atrium lunch?"

  "It might have, if Ricky hadn't told me that she's been to his office half a dozen times over the last week or so. No, love, that confirms what we already knew; the bitch is at it. They're playing it really close to their chest, especially if Kendall's keeping secrets from his partners. Did you talk to the guy all the way up to Glasgow?"

  "No, he told me that he'd met Nat Morgan socially, I gave him my opinion of her, and that more or less terminated our discussion."

  Susie grinned. "I should imagine it would have. Now, are you going to ask about my day?"

  "Yes. Consider yourself asked."

  She pinched her nose. "Four highlights, really. First, your son has been kicking hell out of me all day."

  "Good for wee Mac. Now you know what sleeping with you's like just now."

  She gave me a mock frown. "Second," she said, heavily, 'about three tons of crated up playground equipment arrived this afternoon. So you and Mr. Yuille can spend this weekend drawing up a plan of how it's going to look, and deciding where you want to put it."

  "We more or less know already. We just need to size the stuff up."

  "Fine, you do that. Oh yes, and your sister phoned, wanting to know, and I quote, "what the bloody hell" she's supposed to do with her delivery… I told her to get a local builder to set it all up for her and Uncle Oz would pay. Highlight three, we've been invited to a posh Scottish Enterprise Dinner on the Saturday after next, in the Old Course Hotel in St. Andrews. I've said we'll go, provided I'm not in labour. I've turned down the accommodation they offered, though. It was just a double en suite, so I'd rather stay with Mac and Mary."

  "Me too. And fourth?"

  "Mrs. Perry's lawyer called Greg. He said that he thought our offer was an insult, but that he'd consult his client and see how insulted she felt."

  "Did Greg get the impression she'd find ten grand less insulting?"

  "He didn't know. All he said was that we'd have an answer by Monday or Tuesday."

  "Let's hope it's the right one."

  "Fuck 'em if it isn't. I'm past caring. Last and finally, but this isn't a highlight. Fisher's investigation has ended, like the dampest of squibs. He's cost us a good agent and a couple of foremen who've gone as well as Aidan, but he hasn't got near finding our mole."

  "If there ever was one,"I muttered.

  "What do you mean by that?"

  "I don't know," I confessed. "But it's been a week. You'd have thought he'd have popped up for air by now."

  "Are you saying that this might not have been information leaked, but something set up from the outside all along?"

  I shook my head, trying to clear it as much as anything else. "To be truthful, my darling, it's been a long, hard week. I don't have a fucking clue what I'm saying."

  Twenty-Nine.

  We didn't have to wait till Monday or Tuesday to find out the reaction of the Three Bears' wives to the compensation offer. That fine organ, the Sunday Herald, told us twenty-four hours later.

  It had been a quiet Saturday; Jay and I had obeyed orders and completed our detailed planning of Janet and wee Mac's playground. It was going to look pretty good, I reckoned, and I had no safety worries with the equipment. It was all first class and solidly put together…

  Clyde-built as they used to say, when that meant something.

  We had done more than that, actually. I had helped him fit a new double gate to the back entrance to the estate, making sure that the lock worked and that the bolts held it secure. It's not that it's used much, indeed hardly ever, but there's some pretty dangerous boggy ground near Loch Lomond, and the track which leads from the gate down to the road runs through some of the worst of it. It's said to be virtually bottomless; when they were building the new golf course, they lost an earth mover… and almost the course architect himself.

 
So, you see, the entrance had to be secure not to prevent people from getting into the estate, but to prevent small people, like my reckless nephew Colin, Janet, and her wee brother eventually, from getting out.

  With that job done, Jay and I hit a few golf balls, then I headed back to the house to take Janet for a swim. At first I couldn't find her, until I wandered towards the office conservatory and heard her chirping away us usual, but being 'shoosh'-ed, by Susie. As I walked in, I saw that my wife was on the phone, and from the look on her face I did not fancy being the person on the other end.

  At once, I thought about her blood pressure. "Who's that?" I asked.

  She said a quick, "Hold on," then covered the mouthpiece. "Press.

  Sunday Herald," she whispered.

  I reached out a hand. "Gimme the phone."

  "No!"

  "Susie, you're red in the face. Please give me the phone and make me happy. Take Janet to the pool and let me deal with this."

  She shrugged, then gave me a quick smile. "I like it when you're masterful." She handed me the phone.

  "Hello," I said, 'this is Oz Blackstone. My wife's pregnant and she isn't taking business calls today. Now who is this, please?"

  "It's Arnott Buchan, Sunday Herald, and she was taking business calls a minute ago."

  "Not any more, Mr. Buchan. You can either phone Alison Goodchild, our PR consultant, or you can try it on me. Susie's effectively on maternity leave from now on."

  "Do you speak for the Gantry Group, Mr. Blackstone?"

  "I speak for my wife, mate, and she is the Gantry Group."

  "That's a sweeping statement. I don't know if Sir Graeme Fisher would agree with you."

  "I could give a fuck about that." Irony is almost as difficult to convey over the phone as on the printed page, but I think I managed it.

  "Do you want to carry on this discussion, or call Alison?"

  "No," said the reporter. "I'll speak to you. It's about the New Bearsden situation. I've spoken to the lawyers acting for the Three Bears."

  "That's not quite accurate," I pointed out. "Those three gentlemen are not the purchasers. For reasons best known to them, all three of the deals in question were done in their wives' names."

  "Yeah," said Buchan, 'but we both know the score, Mr. Blackstone. It's all about asset sheltering, isn't it."

  "Call me Oz, everyone else does. And you said that, not me. The fact is, I don't care what it's about. I only know that the publicity surrounding these purchases is harming the Gantry Group."

  "Is that why your wife's lawyer tried to bribe them to withdraw?"

  "Your lawyer wouldn't even let you hint at that in print. Because of the tabloid furore we've found it necessary to ask these ladies if they'd be prepared to withdraw from their agreements, and we've offered them a small premium. Effectively we've offered to buy those plots back at terms advantageous to them."

  "That may be how you put it, but all three of them, and I've spoken to them separately, claim that you've stigmatised them and their families."

  I laughed; I didn't mean to, it just came out. "That's bloody rich.

  We've never discussed these purchases, other than in private. We've never said anything about these three people to any reporters. The offers that were made were and remain, on our part, confidential, lawyer to lawyer. The only people doing any stigmatising are you guys in the media, in the way you've run the story, and the three families themselves, in feeding you with quotes."

  I paused. "Stigmata's a dangerous topic for them anyway; I seem to remember a story a while back about a guy whom your sister newspaper, the Herald, said had fallen out with Mark Ravens. Does it ring any bells with you?"

  "I think so."

  "I'll bet it does. They found the guy alive, but nailed to a wall in a flat in Paisley. Crucified. A crown of barbed wire jammed on his head. He'll bear the stigmata, the marks of the Cross, for the rest of his life."

  "What are you saying to me?"

  "Nothing you can ever print. I'm just telling you not to get fucking sanctimonious with me, mate. Now what do you want to say to me? What's the bottom line on this story?"

  "Okay," said Buchan, "I take your point. What I was in the middle of telling your wife is that all three families…"

  "Are we speaking Sicilian here?"

  "Nice one, but no comment… that all three families have rejected your offer. They intend to proceed with their purchases, on the basis that, as respectable business people, they have as much right as anyone else to live on what you yourself claim will be the finest modern housing development in Scotland. Their solicitors have also told me…"

  "Wait a minute." I interrupted him. "Are you saying there's been collusion here? Are the three acting in concert?"

  "As far as I'm concerned, Oz, they're acting separately. I've asked each of them that same question, and they've all denied it."

  "As they would."

  "Maybe, but it'll be down to the Gantry Group to prove otherwise. What they've each said… individually… is that they're not prepared to back out at any price. They've also said that if the Gantry Group attempts to withdraw from the agreements unilaterally, or tries to pull any tricks like redesigning the development to take these three plots out…"

  "Damn it!" I thought. That had been an option under discussion.

  '… they will go straight to court to seek interdicts preventing them.

  I should tell you that each of the three lawyers expressed complete confidence that they would be granted."

  That was our legal advice too, but I wasn't going to tell the Sunday Herald that.

  "Can I ask you a few formal questions, Oz?"

  "Sure."

  "First, can you confirm that such offers were made to the three buyers?"

  "Yes, in the terms I expressed to you earlier. In the light of media coverage, which I'm sure the families found as unfortunate and embarrassing as we did, we've offered to buy the plots back, at a premium."

  "What's your reaction to the rejection of that offer?"

  "If that's true, and it won't be till our lawyers hear from their lawyers, I'd say that it's unfortunate too."

  "Finally, in the light of their threat to go to court, what does the Gantry Group intend to do next?"

  "The board will discuss that next week."

  "Will New Bearsden go ahead?"

  "Too bloody right it will."

  "What about Sir Graeme Fisher's investigation?"

  "What happened to "finally"?"

  "There are always a few more."

  "The investigation's over."

  "Has it resulted in any disciplinary action?"

  "Go and take a look outside the New Bearsden site office, or the Gantry Group HQ building. If you see any heads on poles you can run the photo on page one."

  "I'd heard that one of the heads might belong to a guy called Aidan Keane."

  "You've been drinking in the wrong pub, then. Aidan's resigned, but he's neither suspected of anything nor accused of anything."

  "I hear he's got a new job, though. He won't start for a few weeks, and it's not official, so much as I'd like to I can't run it."

  "What's that, then?" Suddenly I was interested.

  "Mr. Keane's going to be property manager for a pub chain called Caiystane Inns."

  "Never heard of them."

  "Wouldn't have expected you to. But if you look it up, you'll find that the chairman and managing director is a Mr. Mark Ravens."

  I whistled. "Thank you for that, Arnott," I told the journalist. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I must go and see if I can find a pole."

  Thirty.

  I filled Susie in on most of my conversation, but I didn't tell her about Aidan Keane's rumoured new employer. That information I kept for Phil Culshaw, when I phoned to ask him if he could take over as acting managing director with immediate effect. Susie had agreed that they could manage without a formal han dover and that if there was anything on which he needed her advice he could either call her or
drive out to the estate.

  He and I discussed Aidan Keane, then we linked in a three-way conference call to Des Lancaster. The poor old project manager had been enjoying a quiet day in his garden till we ruined it for him.

  "Are you sure about this?" he exclaimed when I told him about his departed lieutenant.

  "It came from a journalist, but I don't think he'd have volunteered it if he wasn't pretty sure of his sources. I gave him some straight answers; I think it was his way of thanking me."

  "I can see it now," said Des, slowly. "Aidan acted as a negotiator sometimes; he closed the deal with Cornwell, and that was why Sir Graeme asked him some heavy questions, but he had nothing to do with Perry or Ravens, so he was stood down as a suspect. But when I think about it, he was in a position to keep the three sales files well apart, to cut down the chances of any connection being made." He sighed. "On top of that there's his writing."

  "What do you mean?" asked Phil.

  "There's a master lay-out of the project on a wall of the sales office; every time a sale's made, the buyer's name's supposed to be written on that particular plot. Aidan was responsible for making sure it was kept up to date. The trouble is, his blooming handwriting is very close to being illegible. For example, on the board, "Ravens" looked more like "Rawlings" and "Corawell" and "Perry" looked like they were spelt with an "a" rather than with an "e". Oh dear." Lancaster sighed again, even more deeply. "Sir Graeme will have me this time, when he hears this."

  "No he won't," I told him. "Fisher's had a week to look at that board himself, and ask questions about it. You're in the clear, Des."

  "I don't know, Oz. The truth is, I'm almost at the end of my rope with this job. I think I may well chuck it anyway."

  "I'll tell you what," said Phil. "How would you feel if…" He floated the idea of the job swap with Brian Shaw that Susie had discussed with me.

  "Do you think Brian would go for that?" Des exclaimed, not quite managing to disguise his eagerness.