by Sam Sparks
a bit tight at the moment? Even we are feeling the pinch. They had to lay someone off a couple of months back. Between you and me, I’ve been doing a few unofficial deals on the side, just in case things go pear-shaped’ Nigel confided. This was good news, or at least it boded well.
I couldn’t quite bring myself to tell the full sorry story, so just agreed that business for everyone was tough.
‘Did you get married, Nige?’
He looked at me askance, didn’t he like being called that I wondered? But that wasn’t it at all.
‘Ha nobody’s called me that in a while. No I didn’t get hitched. Not my thing. There was someone but he, well it didn’t work out.’
Now there was a revelation, to the best of my recollection he had been a bit of ladies man.
‘You look surprised, James?’
I didn’t know what to say, so changed the subject.
‘I need some help with some diamonds.’
The upshot of our meet was a positive offer of help. Nigel worked for an old Hatton Garden firm called Koenig’s. He would get a sample appraised.
He didn’t ask how I’d come by them. But when I elaborated and asked him how I could realise cash for them without attracting attention, he wanted to know why. I had no alternative. I told him the truth about my financial situation and the incumbent necessity to declare any monies. When the words came out of my mouth, I thought what a fool I had been in declaring my hand so baldly. Now I was in a spot. At that moment, and for the foreseeable future, Nigel was the only show in town.
‘I see, don’t worry James, we’ve been down similar roads before.’
We met out of office hours at his place of work in Hatton Garden. Not the front door, but a side entrance reminiscent of a dodgy nightclub venue. I pressed a buzzer and heard a whirr above my head. This revealed a CCTV camera in motion, first one way, then the other. The door clicked and in I went, down a dark corridor to the end, where the door was opened by Nigel. An older man who looked remarkably like the sinister noir actor, Peter Lorre, sat on a high stool at a workbench. He was introduced to me as Tilo, the appraiser, who sounded as if he hailed from the Netherlands.
His tweezers held the only diamond I had provided. He brought the loupe to his eye and after what seemed an age he returned the diamond to the desk.
‘You have a special stone here; five K.’
It was so tiny and I had thirty-seven of them.
‘Are there more?’ enquired Tilo.
Nigel nodded, he only knew there were more as I’d used the plural; he had no idea that I had as many as I did. If I was going to use Nigel’s firm’s services I obviously had to fess-up on quantity.
I cleared my throat; the tension of it all had rendered my throat a little on the dry side. ‘Yes, thirty six more in fact.’
I pulled the remainder from my jacket pocket.
‘Bloody hell, James, you shouldn’t be walking round London with them about your person. We’d best put them in the safe once Tilo’s finished. OK?’
I agreed. It was a chancy thing to do, but I didn’t see I had much alternative.
It was getting on for ten o’ clock when Tilo finished. The full valuation was in the region of one hundred and seventy five thousand pounds. That was the worst case after commission and included paying Tilo who shuffled off soon after. Nigel gave me a receipt for the goods. He took them through to what I assumed was the safe and once out in the street, he suggested we went to a pub.
‘Why didn’t you tell me you had so many of them?’
I had no answer. I felt out of my depth and a little tainted if I’m honest, not a good feeling.
‘What now, Nige?’
‘I can place them, at the right price and get you cash.’
The moral dilemma had been exercising my mind. I had to at least make a token effort to find the intended beneficiary. That was presumably Grandad’s love child, or the mother (if she was still alive) to salve my conscience.
If found, I would determine an amount of conscience money and keep the rest. To take all the money without at least trying to do the right thing was not acceptable.
I reasoned to myself that after expenses, I should come out with just over one hundred k.
The next day I went to the travel agent to book my flight to Amsterdam for the following day. The sooner I could get away the better.
The KLM plane was full, lots of youths heading to the Damm for its obvious attraction, to get out of their heads.
The place I headed for was the public records office. All I had was a name, a location and a date from more than fifty years ago.
I guessed Grandad’s girlfriend would be in her eighties, with her offspring around mid-fifties to sixty years of age.
Armed with only a name and a rough date wasn’t really enough to start tracking someone down from that long ago. However, after spending a good portion of the morning with a helpful clerk, I found the information I sought. If I'm honest, a part of me was disappointed and the other was intrigued. The quest had taken me out of my troubles and given me a focus.
I had what I needed. Grandad’s one night stand had conceived a daughter called Michaela, and my Grandad’s name was Michael. A nice touch, given the desertion circumstances. Gretl’s surname changed to De Groot when she had married Ernst De Groot, whose family were pharmacists. It transpired that the De Groots had built a successful chain of pharmacies, sadly Gretl had passed away. Her death was recorded in 1962. That would have made her in the ballpark of forty I imagined. Her daughter Michaela must have been late teens, or early twenties at the time. With a point in the right direction from my helpful civil servant in the records office, I made for the nearest De Groot Apotheek. I found one not far from the railway station. A young man was folding up a shop canopy with the De Groot company logo on it.
I was about to follow him inside, but he bade me enter, standing aside and making a bold sweep of his arm inviting me first. In I went and having established that the young man spoke English I proceeded. In my best, “would you mind awfully” polite British accent I asked:
‘I wonder if you could help me?’
I’m looking for a girl, sorry woman, called Michaela Oudes. I believe she has a step father by the name of De Groot, who is a pharmacist?’
He made no reply, which was strange given my warm greeting and his invitation to step inside. For a second, I thought he’d overplayed his speak English credentials. He disappeared into a back room. So there I was, looking around, and feeling a little uncomfortable. The level of my discomfort was only to increase when he returned with an older man.
‘What is it you want with my father?’ asked the older man.
‘I‘m trying to trace a female relative, or her offspring, called Michaela. I think she married into the De Groot family and I am hoping you can help. Allow me to introduce myself, my name is James Lister, my grandfather...’
I was stopped in my tracks as the older man interrupted.
‘We cannot help you. Goodbye.’
He returned to his work and I was left with the young man, who could see by my face that I was a little shocked. He looked a bit unsettled himself as he looked at the door the older guy had just gone through, he returned his gaze to me.
‘What is it you want with her? You don’t look that desperate.’
‘Excuse me? There is no need to be rude’ said I.
‘We can’t help you, please leave.’
I was all but bundled out of the shop with a “we don’t want your sort in here” for good measure.
This had all been witnessed by an easy on the eye middle-aged female shop assistant stocking the shelves. Out in the street and feeling somewhat chastened by my experience, I tried and failed to make sense of what had just happened. Then I heard my name being called, a female voice.
It was the shop assistant. I walked back to her as she was still in the throes of putting on her jacket. She must have made a quick departure. We took an outside table at a nearby cafe.
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sp; She told me she had shared rooms with Michaela many years before.
‘Why do you want to contact her?’
I explained the familial connection with a potted history. She scribbled on a piece of paper bearing the De Groot logo.
‘That is the last address I have for her. But, I think she is still there. She’s had, still has I think a life that is hard.’
All this said with such a sad expression on her face, that I felt moved. She continued: ‘You look a kind man, I hope you it is good news that you bring for her.’
Her eyes held my gaze; it became almost a case of who blinked first. For some reason, I wasn’t going to let it be me. This was going on too long, I was, I have to say a bit smitten and blinked first.
‘Vaarwel’ she said.
‘Hang on, why did the DeGroots give me a bad time in there?’
She shrugged. It was only to clear I wasn’t going to get any more information from her.
‘OK. But your name? So I can say how I found her?’
‘Anna.’
‘I’m James.’
‘Goodbye James.’ She said as she made a slow turn back to her place of employment. I wanted to ask her out. Especially as I noticed we had something in common, a tell tale ring mark where once precious metal had resided.
Dusk was already turning to night, when I found the address on the scrap of paper. It was in the Red Light district. A fact that wasn’t immediately obvious to me. Now I thought I might be getting a handle on how hard a life it might have been for Michaela. I’d have felt a lot happier if I’d had Anna from the pharmacy with me. From the doorway I looked up at