Part 35 (1/2)

I picked up the huge cheque and looked at it. It would solve all immediate problems: pay the interest already due, the cost of cutting the diamonds and more than a fifth of the capital debt. If I didn't take it, we would no doubt sell the diamonds later to someone else, but they had been cut especially for Prospero Jenks's fantasies and might not easily fit necklaces and rings A plea. A bargain. A chance that the remorse was at least half real. Or was he taking me again for a sucker?

I did some sums with a calculator and when Annette came in with the day's letters I showed her my figures and the cheque and asked her what she thought.

'That's the cost price,' I pointed. 'That's the cost of cutting and polis.h.i.+ng. That's for delivery charges. That's for loan interest and VAT. If you add those together and subtract them from the figure on this cheque, is that the sort of profit margin Greville would have asked?'

Setting prices was something she well understood, and she repeated my steps on the calculator.

'Yes,' she said finally: 'it looks about right. Not overgenerous, but Mr Franklin would have seen this as a service for commission, I think. Not like the rock crystal, which he bought on spec, which had to help pay for his journeys.' She looked at me anxiously. 'You understand the difference?'

'Yes,' I said. 'Prospero Jenks says this is what he and Greville agreed on.'

'Well then,' she said, relieved, 'he wouldn't cheat you.'

I smiled with irony at her faith. 'We'd better bank this cheque, I suppose,' I said, 'before it evaporates.'

'I'll do it at once: she declared. 'With a loan as big as you said, every minute costs us money.'

She put on her coat and took an umbrella to go out with, as the day had started off raining and showed no signs of relenting.

It had been raining the previous night when Clarissa had been ready to leave, and I'd had to ring three times for a taxi, a problem Cinderella didn't seem to have encountered. Midnight had come and gone when the wheels had finally arrived, and I'd suggested meanwhile that I lend her Brad and my car for going to her wedding.

I didn't need to, she said. When she and Henry were in London, they were driven about by a hired car firm.

The car was already ordered to take her to the wedding which was in Surrey. The driver would wait for her and return her to the hotel, and she'd better stick to the plan, she said, because the bill for it would be sent to her husband.

'I always do what Henry expects,' she said, 'then there are no questions.'

'Suppose Brad picks you up from the Selfridge after you get back?' I said, packing the little stone bears and giving them to her in a carrier. 'The forecast is lousy and if it's raining you'll have a terrible job getting a taxi at that time of day.'

She liked the idea except for Brad's knowing her name. I a.s.sured her he never spoke unless he couldn't avoid it, but I told her I would ask Brad to park somewhere near the hotel. Then she could call the car phone's number when she was ready to leave, and Brad would beetle up at the right moment and not need to know her name or ask for her at the desk.

As that pleased her, I wrote down the phone number and the car's number plate so that she would recognize the right pumpkin, and described Brad to her; going bald, a bit morose, an open-necked s.h.i.+rt, a very good driver.

I couldn't tell Brad's own opinion of the arrangement.

When I'd suggested it in the morning on the rainy way to the office, he had merely grunted which I'd taken as preliminary a.s.sent.

When h;'d brought Clarissa, I thought as I looked through the letters Annette had given me, he could go on home, to Hungerford, and Clarissa and I might walk along to the restaurant at the end of Greville's street where he could have been known but I was not, and after an early dinner we would return to Greville's bed, this time for us, and we'd order the taxi in better time . . . perhaps.

I was awoken from this pleasant daydream by the ever-demanding telephone, this time with Nicholas Loder on the other end spluttering with rage.

'Milo says you had the confounded cheek,' he said, 'to have Dozen Roses dope-tested.'

'For barbiturates, yes. He seemed very sleepy. Our vet said he'd be happier to know the horse hadn't been tranquillized for the journey before he gave him an allclear certificate.'

'I'd never give a horse tranquillizers,' he declared.

'No, none of us really thought so,' I said pacifyingly, 'but we decided to make sure.'

'It's shabby of you. Offensive. I expect an apology.'

'I apologize,' I said sincerely enough, and thought guiltily of the further checks going on at that moment.

'That's not good enough,' Nicholas Loder said huffily.

'I was selling the horse to good owners of Milo, people I ride for,' I said reasonably. 'We all know you disapproved. In the same circ.u.mstances, confronted by a sleepy horse, you'd have done the same, wouldn't you? You'd want to be sure what you were selling.'

Weigh the merchandise, I thought. Cubic zirconia, size for size, was one point seven times heavier than diamond. Greville had carried jewellers' scares in his car on his way to Harwich, presumably to check what the Koningin Beatrix was bringing.

'You've behaved disgustingly,' Nicholas Loder said.

'When did you see the horse last? And when next?'

'Monday evening, last. Don't know when next. As I told you, I'm tied up a bit with Greville's affairs.'

'Milo's secretary said I'd find you in Greville's office,'

he grumbled. 'You're never at home. I've got a buyer for Gemstones, I think, though you don't deserve it.

Where will you be this evening, if he makes a definite offer?'

'In Greville's house, perhaps.'

'Right, I have the number. And I want a written apology from you about those dope tests. I'm so angry I can hardly be civil to you.'

He hardly was, I thought, but I was pleased enough about Gemstones The money would go into the firm's coffers and hold off bankruptcy a little while longer. I still held the Ostermeyers' cheque for Dozen Roses, waiting for Phil Urquhart's final clearance before cas.h.i.+ng it. The horses would make up for a few of the missing diamonds. Looking at it optimistically, saying it quickly, the millstone had been reduced to near one million dollars June out of habit brought me a sandwich for lunch.

She was walking with an extra bounce, with unashamed excitement. Way down the line, I thought, if we made it through the ”crisis, what then? Would I simply sell the whole of Saxony Franklin as I'd meant or keep it and borrow against it to finance a stable, as Greville had financed the diamonds? I wouldn't hide the $table! Perhaps I would know enough by then to manage both businesses on a sound basis: I'd learned a good deal in ten days. I had also, though I found it surprising, grown fond of Greville's firm. If we saved it, I wouldn't want to let it go.

If I went on-riding until solvency dawned I might be the oldest jump jockey in history . .

Again the telephone interrupted the daydreams, and I'd barely made a start on the letters It was a man with a long order for cabochons and beads. I hopped to the door and yelled for June to pick up the phone and to put the order on the computer, and Alfie came along to complain we were running out of heavy duty binding tape and to ask why we'd ever needed Jason. Tina did his work in half the time without the swear words Annette almost with gaiety hoovered everywhere, though I thought I would soon ask Tina to do it instead.

Lily came with dowocast eyes to ask meekly if she could have a t.i.tle also. Stock-room Manager? she suggested.

'Done!' I said with sincere pleasure; and before the day was out we had a s.h.i.+pment Manager (Alfie) and an Enabling Manager (Tina), and it seemed to me that such a spirit had been released there that the enterprise was now flying. Whether the euphoria would last or not was next week's problem.

I telephoned Maarten-Pagnier in Antwerp and discussed the transit of twelve tear drops, eight stars and five fakes.

'Our customer has paid us for the diamonds,' I said.

'I'd like to be able to tell him when we could get them to him.'

'Do you want them sent direct to him, monsieur?'

'No. Here to us We'll pa.s.s them on.' I &sked if he would insure them for the journey and send them by Euro-Securo; no need to trouble his partner again personally as we did not dispute that five of the stones sent to him had been cubic zirconia. The real stones had been returned to us, I said.

'I rejoice for you, monsieur. And shall we expect a further consignment for cutting? Monsieur Franklin intended it.'