The Money Stones Read online

  Contents

  Title

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Part One

  Part Two

  Part Three

  Part Four

  Part Five

  Part Six

  The Money Stones

  Ian St James

  Sixty Forty Publishing Ltd

  www.sixtyfortybooks.com

  Copyright © 1980 Ian St. James

  Copyright Digital Edition © 2012 Ian St. James

  The right of Ian St. James to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  First published in 1980 by William Heinemann Ltd

  First issued in Fontana Paperbacks 1986

  Digital Edition first published in 2012 by Sixty Forty Publishing Ltd

  ISBN Mobi 978-0-9571437-2-2

  www.sixtyfortybooks.com

  Dedication

  To my old buddy David Hall, who encouraged me in this madness.

  Prologue

  'Too damn right it's a long time. Two years? Can't we hurry it up a bit?'

  The grey-haired man smiled briefly. 'Perhaps - but I doubt by much. Anyway, why hurry? It's our last job together. And after this one you can retire. Not that you will. Con men never do. And even if it takes two, maybe three years to set up, it makes you more money than you could spend in a lifetime.'

  'Ten million bucks!'

  'Pounds,' the Englishman smiled. 'Ten million pounds.'

  Part One

  One

  To be an accountant is to suffer a social disease. Take parties for instance. Tell someone you're an airline pilot or an actor and there's immediate interest. People ask questions or tell anecdotes about someone else in that line and inevitably end up with: 'and he was a fascinating man too.' Whereas own up to being an accountant and it's a conversation stopper guaranteed to start a panic. As if the entire gathering may be subjected to a lecture on Pythagoras or the law on income tax. I've always put it down to people's lack of numeracy. They figure numbers bore the hell out of them so anyone who spends a lifetime at it must be boring too.

  I remember a party Bertie gave years ago. I was an articled clerk then and shared a flat in Belsize Park with two other refugees from the provinces, Bertie Marks and Terry Abbot. Bertie was in television, still is I expect, behind the cameras not in front of them, but always close enough to the action to be involved in press receptions and parties and the like. Not that we lacked for parties. London in the swinging sixties was full of them - half a dozen a night if you wanted, and more on weekends. But Bertie's were always the most boisterous and full of the weirdest people. Like this actress who was a big name then in some TV thing. Dreadful it was and I only watched it to gaze at her, wistfully and full of longing, like a dog at a bone in a butcher's window. In real life she was even more beautiful. All ash-blonde hair and the kind of tan which comes slowly on expensive holidays. For something to talk about I was asking her about the actors she worked with in the television series.

  'Queers,' she said, her eyes scanning the room, watching who was there and with whom. 'All of them. Bent as a dog's hind legs.'

  'Really?'

  'Most actors are.' Her eyes turned back to me and I swear it was like being on the short end of an electric shock. 'Didn't you know?'

  I didn't know many actors anyway.

  'Lucky old you,' she said when I told her, her gaze drifting again. 'Queers or perverts. Take my word for it. Aren't you in this screwy business?'

  I shook my head, dreading the next question, the one about what I did for a living, but instead she smiled, a big warm smile, so full of happiness that I might just have given her a present.

  'I know,' she seemed suddenly triumphant. 'I know who you are. You're Bertie's friend. Er - no - don't tell me Mike? Mike! Mike something or other. Mike Townley!'

  'Townsend,'I corrected.

  'And you're a fan of mine, aren't you? Bertie told me. You never miss an instalment.'

  I was wondering what else Bertie had told her when she kissed me. I suppose initially I just clung on, but as it developed I must have taken over because when we parted she was looking dazed and shaken.

  'Well!' she remained pressed tight against me and looked up with gratifying approval. 'That was going to be your reward.' Her gaze did another quick circuit of the room before she announced, 'I'm bored with this party. Come on - let's go.'

  'Dinner somewhere?' I asked, all casual, as if kissing actresses at parties and dragging them off somewhere was something I had to live with. —

  'I've eaten.'

  I hesitated. I couldn't afford night clubs then and they were not my scene anyway.

  'And not dancing either,' she squeezed my hand. 'Good looking men either dance badly or turn out to be gigolos. Either way's a disappointment. And don't suggest a quiet drink somewhere - I'm full to the gills already thank you very much.'

  'What then?'

  She seemed puzzled at that, and a bit put out, as if having second thoughts about the whole idea. 'The usual question, my pet, is simply my place or yours?'

  'Oh? Well-er my place is here.'

  'How convenient.'

  Even then I must have looked bewildered because she fairly stamped her foot with impatience. 'Look, do you want to screw me or not?'

  I imagine I conveyed my willingness to that all right and we fumbled our way through the crowd and down the corridor to my room.

  Fifteen years later I can't even remember her name. Not her real name. Only the character she played in the TV epic. Sad in a way. Part of growing up I suppose. The only reason it comes to mind at all is because it typifies the kind of instant happening which passed for life in London and the sixties. But maybe if you're twenty-three and sharing a flat in Belsize Park it's still like that - I wouldn't know. All I know for sure is that Bertie's departure was a relief in a way, when it came some weeks later. Because along with him went all those fascinating distractions, leaving a vacuum to be filled. And Terry and I chose to fill it with work. Real work! So that within a month the flat acquired the calm of cloisters and we slaved at our respective disciplines with the fervour of novice monks. Not an evening passed without clearing the dishes by seven and attacking our books until midnight. And we kept that up for two whole years. It was amazing really, I think when we started neither thought it would last and after a while neither would be the first to give in. If ever two people sincerely wanted to be rich and successful, we did.

  We qualified in the fullness of time, winning just about every prize going, but even after the exams, when we got back into the social swing, with girls and parties, and the occasional novel instead of all-consuming text books, work still came first if we were honest about it.

  Odd really, considering what followed, but I sometimes look back and count those two years as the happiest of my life. Like the last days of a childhood summer, before raw ambition changed 'Consequences' from a child's game to an adult's reality.

  Two

  After qualifying I stayed with the firm where I'd articled for a couple of years before two stints, three ye
ars at the first and five at the second, with two other outfits, both based in London. The first was another professional firm, specialists in liquidations. It was good experience, thickening the skin and toughening the gut for the business of taking risks which is what making money is all about. Then I joined Walpole's, the Merchant Bankers, partly because I'd learned enough about liquidations, but mainly to advance my reputation and increase my earnings.

  I made a name for myself at Walpoles. It was said it was tough making a bargain with me and even tougher breaking one. Those who approved were given a cigar and a pat on the back. Those who didn't were told to try the church next door, money in our shop, compassion in theirs. I'm neither proud nor ashamed of it now, it was simply the way it was with me then. I was a young man in a hurry and I suppose everyone knew it.

  The unprecedented happened when I was thirty-seven and the bank offered me a Directorship. Rumour was the offer had been made from fear and a divided board, some afraid I'd be tempted elsewhere, others prepared to risk it to maintain the boardroom as the preserve of the founding families. If it was true, I think I understood more than resented it. After all I'd no family background, no sizeable capital of my own (though I'd accumulated a fortune by my old man's standards) and was regarded by most as something short of a gentleman. The strange thing was that when the invitation came I hesitated, and to everyone's astonishment, asked for a month to think it over.

  It was during that month, and oddly enough through the Bank, that I met Rupert Hallsworth. He had a small block of shares in a business in which we also had an interest, and he had called at the Bank for some advice. Or so it seemed at the time. I took him to lunch at L'Opera. It was generally fairly quiet there at midday and far enough from the City to avoid bumping into any irritating casual acquaintances.

  Describing Hallsworth is difficult on two counts. Firstly, it's rarely necessary. Those who meet him even once seem able to recapture his image as easily as seeing their own face in the mirror. Even people incapable of remembering their own phone number seem gifted with total recall when it comes to Hallsworth. The second difficulty is not in describing his similarities to others, but in catching whatever it is about him that's so different.

  I suppose it begins with the eyes, though you were never immediately aware of them as being extraordinary. Quite large and dark brown, the colour old mahogany becomes with constant polishing. But I've known other eyes of similar shape and colour, so it's not that. More that when he spoke the eyes joined in, lightening almost imperceptibly, alive with intelligence, and adding persuasiveness to whatever he was saying. And when he listened they darkened and looked so deep in yours you felt him scrape the back of your brain.

  He was my height, six foot or thereabouts, but more slightly built, weighing around thirty pounds less. Hair dark like mine, but nearer the colour of his eyes, healthy skin, well groomed and quietly but expensively dressed.

  When I invited him to lunch I'd intended to make him an offer for his shares. I'd fixed a price in my mind; between three pounds and three-twenty a share, three thirty if pushed. But when I raised the subject he refused point blank, even advising me not to sell ours for as much as twice the price. I was surprised and said so, asking if he had any special information about the Company. But he smiled and shrugged, turning the talk first to the price of similar shares, then to the market generally, and finally even asking how I liked being at Walpoles.

  By then we'd long since finished our meal. Most other people had left and waiters hovered, paying needless visits to nearby tables in hope of catching my eye. Yet I was only dimly aware of them. I found myself explaining things. Investment policies, opportunities, theories about the money market, the like of which I'd not even discussed in the Bank itself. Even my own ambitions. My next step, how I saw myself in ten years time. By no means a monologue either. He'd interrupt, agree, question, argue - and throughout displayed a knowledge of money quite as good as mine.

  I was shaken. I'd been told I was good often enough for me to believe it. Some thought me a bastard, but none doubted my competence. Yet I was blabbing to Hallsworth like a schoolboy, bad enough in itself and quite out of character, especially as when I'd arrived at the Bank that morning I'd not even heard of the man.

  Eventually, and to the undisguised relief of the staff, we left L'Opera and adjourned to his club. I made a brief phone call to my secretary, Jean, to clear the afternoon mail, after which Hallsworth and I found a quiet corner and continued our discussion over old brandy and fresh cigars.

  He was thirty-five, two years my junior. He'd never worked. Not in the sense of having a job, going to an office, relying on a monthly pay cheque. He was divorced, without children, and as I understood, had been born comfortably off and grown rich, mainly by dealing very successfully on the London Stock Exchange. He estimated his current net worth at one point four million pounds, most of it liquid.

  He recited details of his life in a detached, matter-of-fact way, much in the manner of a guide showing visitors over a stately home. I interrupted occasionally but not often; his narrative was so comprehensive where it touched financial matters that it made questions unnecessary, and I was so fascinated by his story that only as he neared the end did I wonder why he was telling it to me. He didn't keep me waiting long for an answer.

  'I'm going into business, Mike.' He puffed the cigar until the end glowed red enough not to need attention for a few minutes. 'The Investment Business. Not as a Bank - the restrictions are too onerous. Too many damned civil servants sticking their noses into things that are none of their business. For want of a better title, call it investment counselling. Advising for investments in return for a fee. Big investments. And investing on our own account as well. Using a million of mine as stake money. And I want you in with me. As a partner. Fifty-Fifty.'

  I was flabbergasted. 'You're joking! I don't have that kind of money. Nothing like. The bank might pay me well but-'

  'No cash needed. We'll use my million as starters. Non-interest bearing loan stock if you like - whatever suits you and the lawyers. But we'll split the earnings down the middle.'

  In effect I was being offered the annual income on half a million. Even with the market as sick as a dog it would yield forty thousand a year - double that when the index rose. And commission on top! I started to say something about not knowing enough about me when he stopped me with a wave of his hand.

  'Born Darlington General, 4th April, thirty-nine. To Gladys and George Townsend. Remmington Road Primary School, then Darlington Grammar. A brother two years younger - a sister sadly killed in a street accident when you were ten. Short service commission in the Army. Then Kingscotts - qualified - three years at Spencers - five at Walpoles, who offered you a seat on the Board three weeks ago.'

  I watched him draw on the cigar and wondered how much I'd told him myself over lunch. But he hadn't finished.

  'Recently you bought a house in Maida Vale for fifty thousand, with the help of a twenty thousand pound loan from your employer. You're white, fit, over twenty-one, heterosexual and unmarried. Need I go on?'

  The eyes mocked as he waited. I suppose by then I wasn't even that surprised. Vaguely irritated perhaps. About being investigated without my knowledge. But it had happened and nothing I could do would change it. And the future sounded very rich indeed.

  We talked it over for perhaps another half an hour and after refusing his offer of dinner I went home. Luckily I had nothing arranged for that evening, and even if I had I would have called it off. I needed to sit and think things through, the way I always did with big decisions. By the time I went to bed I'd made up my mind about Rupert Hallsworth, only for my plans to change the following morning. Hallsworth had been a step ahead. It was the beginning of a pattern.

  Three

  There were five letters on the mat in the morning. I scooped them up on my way to the kitchen, putting them on the table while I made tea and toast. My morning routine had been perfected in the two year stint with
Terry Abbot.

  Forty minutes to bathe, shave and dress for the office, another five minutes for tea and toast, and by seven-thirty I was at the front door, complete with overcoat and briefcase. Invariably I collected the morning paper from the boy, on my way out; and during the journey I glanced first at the headlines, then the closing prices, and finally my morning mail. So that by eight o'clock I was behind my desk with a two hour start on most of the City. I'd work solidly then, free of interruption until ten when my secretary served the first coffee of the morning along with the office mail. It was a good system and by the time I'd swallowed a second cup I was ready for the round of telephone calls and meetings which mark a banker's day.

  So that morning the cab was putting its back to St Paul's and labouring up Cannon Street as I turned to my five letters. The first was from a Chamber of Commerce asking if I'd give a talk in a month's time. I wrote a large 'no' in the margin which meant they'd get a polite refusal from Jean by return. The next was a note from my tailor telling me a suit was ready for collection. And the third was from a well known London bank. They wrote to inform me that the sum of one million pounds had been placed on current account by their client, Mr Rupert Hallsworth. And was at my disposal.

  I read the letter again. Slowly. Chewing every word of it instead of gulping whole sentences. There was no mistake. I checked my own name and address at the top of the page, noticed the date and fumbled for the envelope to examine the postmark. Five p.m. yesterday. Typed, signed, sealed and posted at the very same time Hallsworth and I had been lunching together and drinking at his club afterwards.