Stone's Fall (22 page)

He held up his hand to ask for patience. “I asked second cousin Henry…”

I groaned.

“… who also works in the office, to keep a look out, and eventually the chance came along. Henry couldn’t take the thing, obviously, but he did copy it out, with the address for payment.”

“Can you remember what the address was?”

“Of course. The one I told Lord Ravenscliff. Fifteen Newark Street, London, E.”

The house I had seen Jan the Builder going into.

Steptoe had got up, and vanished. He returned a few moments later with an envelope.

I looked at the piece of paper inside. It was a bill, for £27 13s 6d, in respect of miscellaneous goods supplied. Dated 15 January 1909, with a number in the top right-hand corner, which Steptoe explained was the invoice number on the file, and which was duplicated on another, legitimate bill. At the bottom was a note: “c. pay B ham 3752.” I asked what that was.

“That’s another way of tracking money,” he explained. “This indicates that the money was ultimately to be drawn from a bank account belonging to a different part of the organisation.”

“I see. So this means…”

“Cash payment drawn on Bank of Hamburg account no. 3752.”

I thought. So this young man had discovered that payments were being made frequently to this bunch of anarchists in London, using a loophole in Ravenscliff ’s pride and joy, the organisational structure he had set up over the years. It was being done by someone who understood it well, perhaps even better than Ravenscliff did.

“Who was responsible for this? Do you know?”

The young man nodded. “I do.”

“And you told the company?”

“I did not.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s not my job to betray my workmates to the bosses. I was happy to clear my own name, but not at the cost of blackening someone else’s.”

All around the table nodded in agreement. I had quite forgotten they were there, but evidently what Steptoe had said had been discussed by them. This was a family decision, not his alone. So I nodded in approval as well, as though it was exactly the decision I thought he should have taken. In fact, it probably was.

“I can tell you who was behind it all, though.”

I looked at him. “Well, let me take a guess, then. Obviously not one of your workmates. So, you are about to tell me it was one of the bosses themselves. Otherwise you wouldn’t say a word. Correct?”

He grinned at me, in a fetchingly boyish fashion. “That’s right,” he said with some satisfaction. “He told me everything, once I’d figured it out. He was brought in one day, about six months ago, and told that he had to do this. Slip fake invoices into the piles and remove them afterwards. Naturally, he asked why, although he didn’t expect to get a reply.”

“Why not?”

“Because we’re expected to do as we’re told. Not understand the reasoning for it. He expected that he’d be told off, and told that he was just to do it, not wonder what it was all about. What business of his was it? Instead, he got a long explanation.”

“And who was this from?”

“Mr. Xanthos, who’s a boss. Very high up, he is.”

“I see. Go on, then.”

“Anyway, Mr. Xanthos said that people think selling things like battleships and guns is easy. It isn’t, says he. You have to persuade people. And that involves things that people had best not know about. Like helping to make up their minds with little presents. Doing the necessary.”

“And that’s what these payments were?”

“That’s what he said. Little presents to people with influence, which would bring in the orders, and guarantee jobs right along Tyneside for years. Of course, it wasn’t a good idea for people to know about this. It had to be done secretly. And it had to be kept quiet if anyone found out about it.”

“So this friend of yours went away, thinking he was helping the company to bend the rules a little to secure jobs. And that it was all being done with the company’s approval?”

“That’s right. But Xanthos had told him that no one was to know. Mr. Williams and all the others didn’t want to know and wouldn’t thank him for saying anything. He only told me when I asked him a question in the pub. Difficult that was; I’m not welcome in pubs anymore. Not ones used by the factory. That was a week or so before the accident.”

“What accident was that?”

“Bad thing. Shouldn’t have happened, poor kid. But he was going through one of the steel yards at the end of the day, and there was a slip, so it seems. A post holding the girders in place gave way, and they came tumbling down across the floor. He was in the way. Never stood a chance.”

“And this was?”

“About three weeks ago. They had the funeral, and a lovely thing it was. The company paid and gave money to his mother, because he was her only support. And so they should have, but many wouldn’t have. They’d have said it was his own fault, that he shouldn’t have been there.”

There was a moment’s silence as he finished. “Are there many accidents? In the yards, I mean?”

The father shrugged. “Some, of course. It’s only to be expected. Two or three a year. Mostly it’s people’s own fault.”

“This man, the one who died, he’s not going to be telling anyone else about these payments now, is he? Did he tell anyone else except you?”

Steptoe shook his head. “No. He was too frightened of losing his job. And who could he tell? I only got it out of him because he felt bad about what had happened to me.”

“So if he hadn’t told you, then no one would ever have been able to find out about this? And if the accident had happened only a little bit earlier…”

Steptoe nodded.

“Have you told anyone else? Apart from your entire family, that is?”

He grinned. “Not even them. Not all of them.”

“May I suggest that you keep it that way? I do not want you to have a pile of girders falling on you as well.”

The smile faded. “What do you mean?”

“The only other person to know anything about this was Lord Ravenscliff, and he fell out of a window.”

I stood up, and dusted the cake crumbs from my lap. “Thank you, Mr. Steptoe, and thank you all, ladies and gentlemen,” I said, bowing to the entire table. “It was most kind of you to talk to me and feed me such excellent cake. Now, is there anything I can do for you?”

“I want my job back.”

“I will talk to Lady Ravenscliff,” I said, “and get her to intervene. Do not worry on that score. In the meantime, please write down your account in careful, meticulous detail, and send it to me. I will suggest to her that she offer you payment for your services. That seems only fair.”

CHAPTER
24

The annual meeting of the Rialto Investment Trust was to be held on the morning after I returned at eleven. I had only been to such an event once before, and it had been deadly and interminably dull. A South African mining company, that had been, and I had been sent because the poor soul who normally attended such things was off sick. Ever since the Boer War, South African mining companies had a claim to be news, in the way that the doings of most coal mines or cotton companies were not. So I went, with strict instructions not to fall asleep. “Just spell the name of the chairman right and remember—profits for this year and last, dividend for this year and last. That’s all anyone is ever interested in.”

So I went and did as I was told, sitting alone—the real shareholders avoided me as though I had a strange smell and I didn’t get any of the tea and biscuits either—and took down everything I was told to take down. I still maintain it wasn’t my fault that I missed a share issue to raise more capital. Even had I been awake, I would not then have understood what they were talking about.

But now I considered myself almost an expert in all matters financial. Words and phrases like “scrip issue” and “debenture stock” could trip from my tongue with the same facility that “grievous bodily harm” or “assault and battery” had done only a few weeks before. And, just to be on the safe side, I persuaded Wilf Cornford to come along as an interpreter. I was there with a notebook pretending to be a reporter once more; how Wilf got in I do not know. Apart from us there were about ten other journalists—itself notable as such meetings normally only attracted one or two—and at least a hundred shareholders. This, said Wilf, was unprecedented. Something, he said, was up.

And so it was, although while it was going on it was about as thrilling as a committee meeting at a town council, all motions to amend and comments from the floor so densely wrapped up in convoluted phrases that their import was somewhat lost. The nominal chairman of the event was Mr. Cardano, the executor of Ravenscliff ’s will. He did a good enough job, I thought; he made a brief and entirely empty speech about Ravenscliff ’s great qualities and abilities—which I noted was met with suspicious silence—before passing matters over to Bartoli, who sat on his left looking studiously neutral. This gentleman then rattled through the annual accounts at such speed that he was back in his chair only a few moments later. The only bit I properly appreciated was his closing sentence—“and in view of the excellent year and good prospects for the coming year, we recommend an increase of dividend of 25 per cent, to four shillings and a penny per every one pound nominal.” He sat down to a smattering of applause.

There then followed questions—although not from the journalists, who were not allowed to speak, an unnatural state which made them chatter amongst themselves to indicate their discomfort. When would the Ravenscliff estate be wound up? Very soon, promised Mr. Cardano. Could the executor reassure investors about the state of Rialto’s finances? Absolutely yes: the figures were there for all to see; reassurance was surely unnecessary. And what about the companies Rialto invested in? On that he could not reply, but application must be made to those companies. However, their published accounts suggested they were all doing splendidly. And so it went on; there were votes on this, and votes on that. Hands were raised and lowered again. Cardano periodically muttered words like “Carried” or “Not carried.” Wilf squiggled in his seat. And finally there was a motion to adjourn and everyone stood up.

I tried to sidle up to Cardano at the end, but he was surrounded by other members of the board almost like an emperor being shielded by a praetorian guard, and no journalist got near. Only one man approached; he got to a few feet away, and Cardano looked at him—how did I do? was clearly on his face. This man nodded, and Cardano relaxed, and left the room.

An important figure, then, but who was he? I kept him in sight as he stood, being buffeted by those making their way to the door. Not remarkable really: middle-aged; slim, short dark hair thinning on the top; of average size. A clear, open face, clean-shaven, a vague smile on a generous, well-proportioned mouth. He turned, and nodded a brief bow as a stout man, about seventy, with a round face and white toothbrush moustache looking like a retired lieutenant colonel in a county regiment tapped him on the shoulder. I could not hear the conversation, but I grasped enough. “Good to see you, Cort,” said the ex-officer in a booming voice. Then they moved out of earshot. I would have loved to have heard more, but it was enough: I had a face for the name. I now knew what the mysterious Henry Cort looked like. He didn’t look so frightening to me.

Then I was dragged off by Wilf, who seemed properly agitated, and said—in a quite unprecedented display of emotion—that he needed a drink. I could not imagine him drinking at all, let alone needing one, but who was I to refuse?

“Well!” he said, when we were settled into our chairs in a pub round the corner, usually frequented by Schroder’s people after hours but now empty. “That was a battle to remember!”

I frowned, bemused. “What was?”

“The meeting, boy! I’ve never witnessed anything like it!”

“Were we both in the same room?”

He stared. “Did you not see what was going on?”

“I saw enough to make me drop off my chair with boredom, if that’s what you mean.”

“Oh, for heavens sake!”

“Well? What? What did I miss?”

“The ambush, man! The counterattack! The routing of the forces of dissent! Didn’t you understand anything?”

I shook my head.

Wilf sighed sorrowfully. “You are really not up to this, you know.”

“Just tell me,” I snapped.

“Oh, very well. You noticed, I hope, that the board bought off the shareholders by bunging money at them?”

“The dividend?”

“Precisely. It was clear from the accounts that they should only really increase the payout by about 10 per cent. But they increased it by 25 per cent, and they will have to go heavily into reserves to do it. The idea, I’m sure, was to keep the shareholders quiet until the money is paid out in about six weeks’ time. That dealt with some of them, and it was clever; cut the ground from under the enemy from the start. But they kept on coming.”

“Did they? How?”

“What do you think all those motions and proposals and questions were about?”

“I’ve no idea whatsoever.”

“A number of shareholders are suspicious, and others want to take control of the Trust. They banded together; there must have been meetings all over the City for the last week. I’m sure they did a deal they thought would hold. Vote in new management, then have a good look at the books. Then, perhaps, dissolve the Trust and pay out the money. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter, because they were defeated.”

“Really?”

“Yes. They were. That Cardano is not daft; takes after his father, no doubt. But clearly there were other discussions going on as well. The 25 per cent he controls as executor, and other groups of votes, blocked every motion, and voted instead to postpone all decisions until the Ravenscliff estate is settled. Quite a lot of the shareholders were voting against their own best interests, if you ask me.”

“And you are going to tell me you don’t know why. I know you are.”

“Precisely. But I will find out, so help me. And I can tell you who, or at least a bit of who. It was Barings, for one. I couldn’t quite figure it out, but they seem to have amassed a stake of about 5 per cent. That’s a guess, of course. I will be able to confirm that in a few days. I didn’t know they had any. They handled the flotation but I assumed they had long since sold any shares.”

“They bought some the day after Ravenscliff died,” I said, feeling quite proud that I knew something Wilf did not. And gratified by his look of interest as a result.

“How do you know it was Barings?” I persisted.

“Oh, well, it was a show of strength, wasn’t it? Tom Baring himself came along to cast the votes. So keep your noses out, you’re wasting your time. That was the message.”

“Which one was he?”

“About seventy, receding hair, the one with an orchid in his button hole.”

“The retired major talking to Cort?”

“Who’s Cort?”

“Nothing. It’s not important. This Tom Baring, who is he, exactly?”

“One of the Baring clan. Extraordinary man. I know what you mean about being a retired major. He looks the part. But he is one of the country’s great experts on Chinese porcelain. Not that I care about that, of course.”

“Of course. So he’s a big cheese?”

“One of directors; it’s not a family partnership anymore, of course. It’s been a company ever since the disaster twenty years ago, but the family still has huge influence. The thing about Tom Baring is that he’s lazy. Very good, very effective when he can be roused, but he can’t be roused very often. For him to come here is a powerful message. Barings thinks this is important enough for him to abandon his porcelain, get up to London and appear. He only does that when it’s really vital.”

“The stuff of dinner conversations for years,” I commented.

“It is. So don’t be frivolous. People will be trying to figure all this out for a long time.”

“So what do you think it means?”

“I have no idea. Only that, for the time being, Barings is behind Rialto and wants everyone to know. But there is obviously more to it than that. Someone was trying to launch a coup. Much of the lead was taken by a man from Anderson’s…”

“Who were
also
buying Rialto shares shortly after Ravenscliff died,” I put in. Again, Wilf looked impressed. I was rather pleased with myself.

“But who are Anderson’s fronting for, eh?” he asked.

“What about the man they proposed as chairman?”

Wilf looked contemptuous. “A nothing. A face, that’s all. No, my friend, it is someone else. And he won’t escape me for long. You wait and see.”

He drummed his fingers on the table. A strange light was glimmering in his eyes as he took an enormous swig at his glass. “Barings wishes to make it clear it is convinced there is nothing wrong with Rialto. But perhaps it is only doing this because it knows full well that there is something very wrong indeed, and it is prepared to risk losing its stake to keep it hidden. What motive could a bank have for being prepared to lose money? Eh? Tell me that.”

“The prospect of losing even more money?”

He rubbed his hands together. “Ah, this will be fun.”

Well, I thought, I’ll let him get on with it. I didn’t want to share the crown jewels of my knowledge with him. But I knew, so I thought, what it was all about. In fact, it was obvious. Any proper investigation of Rialto would throw up the fact that the accounts were fictitious, that millions had been siphoned off the underlying companies. But—and it was a fairly sizeable but—what was the point? Wasn’t it just postponing the in evitable?

I wandered home, thinking I would have a quiet hour before dinner. A whole evening when I did not have to think about money or aristocrats at all. I almost felt pleasure as I turned the key in the lock of Paradise Walk, and breathed in the foul air of the entrance.

But not for long. Mrs. Morrison shot into the hall the moment she heard the door, and bore down on me with a severe, distressed look, quite unlike her normal air of amiability.

“Mr. Braddock,” she began, “I am most upset. Most upset. How you could be so disrespectful, I do not know. I am very disappointed in you. I’m afraid I must ask you to leave my house.”

“What?” I said in shock, pausing as I took my coat off. “What on earth is the matter?”

“I have always given my boys complete freedom, and expect them to respect this house. To invite unsuitable people is unacceptable.”

“Mrs. Morrison, what are you talking about?”

“That woman.”

“What woman?”

“The one in the parlour.”

Lady Ravenscliff, I thought, but the surge of pleasure was quickly tempered by feelings of dismay that she should see the circumstances in which I lived. The meanness, the shabbiness. I looked around, at the brown painted wood, the dingy wallpaper, the cheap prints on the wall, at Mrs. Morrison herself, and almost blushed.

“I am sorry she came here,” I said fervently. “But have no fears. She is entirely respectable. Certainly not unsuitable in any way.”

“She’s a trollop,” she said, hesitating a moment before she used the word, and then deciding it was justified. “Don’t pretend to me, Mr. Braddock. I know one when I see one, and she is. I won’t have it.”

I had rather expected Mrs. Morrison to be overcome with the flusters at the idea of having a real lady in the house, and my relief that Elizabeth had not got the tea and cakes routine was only matched by my dismay that she should be characterised in such a way. Had she been a trollop, she would have been far beyond my purse, even at £350 a year.

“But Mrs. Morrison, she is my employer.”

Now she stared at me in blank astonishment. We had reached an impasse, with neither understanding what the other was going on about, until a noise of movement resolved the matter. The girl coming through the door of the parlour was no lady. In fact, Mrs. Morrison’s characterisation seemed pretty judicious. She was about twenty, I guessed, garishly and shabbily dressed, and moved with an air of cheeky insolence mingled with caution and suspicion. Why I say that, I do not know; but that was my impression.

“Who the hell are you?” I asked incredulously.

“Well, you asked for me, didn’t you?”

“No.”

“I was told you’d pay me a guinea.”

A guinea? For her? I wasn’t that desperate. I could see why Mrs. Morrison was so angry with me. Women were the one thing she did not allow. Certainly not one like that.

“I can assure you I…” And then an idea came into my head. “Who said I’d pay you a guinea?”

“Jimmy.”

“Who’s Jimmy?”

“Never met him before. He’s a kid.”

Finally, I understood. “Is your name Mary?”

“Course it is.”

I breathed a sigh. “Go back in there and wait for me, please.”