Aftershock

Forty-seven

For most of the afternoon, Maggie pushed Drazen Boras to the back of her mind and caught up on the domestic tasks that had been sidelined by her pet project, and on spending quiet quality time with her daughter. As she did so, her sister worked on the desktop computer, using the software that was at the heart of the graphic-design business she had built up in Australia, and was attempting to sustain at very long distance.

As she folded the last ironed garment she thought about Bet’s decision. It was both brave and sensible, and might well prove to be a positive spin-off from her own illness. Having undergone the same procedure she knew that it would be no picnic for her, but at least she would not be going into surgery in the immediate aftermath of childbirth.

She stored her laundered clothes in the drawers where they were kept and returned to the computer room. ‘How are you doing?’ she asked.

‘Almost done,’ her sister replied. ‘The client will find the finished product waiting for him when he comes in tomorrow morning, which will be about eleven p.m. our time.’

‘How much are you losing by being here?’ Maggie asked.

‘Less than you think. I have a core group of loyal customers who pay most of my bills without the need for constant face-to-face meetings. I told them I’d be out of Australia for at least six months, and they were all fine with it. Mind you,’ she continued, ‘while I’ve been here I’ve shown my work to a few Edinburgh design agencies, and to companies; the feedback’s been pretty positive.’

‘Are you telling me you’re thinking about staying?’

‘It’s crossed my mind. You and Stephanie are the only family I have, Sis. I dunno, though. I might find the winter a bit hard to take; that’s one reason why I left in the first place.’ She pushed the chair back from the desk and stood, stretching her long back. ‘You want your machine back?’

‘If you’re sure you’re done. I need to check my email.’

‘Yeah, that’s me finished; you go ahead. I’ll make supper tonight. What do you fancy?’ She clicked the mouse to send her document, then exited her program.

‘Whatever you fancy cooking. It’s been a few days since my last treatment, so my appetite’s back to normal.’

‘You’ve asked for it,’ said Bet, ominously, heading for the kitchen.

As she left, Maggie settled down at the computer, and clicked on the icon that led to her mailbox. As he had promised, there was a message from Maurice Goode: she went to it, downloaded the attachment to her ‘received files’ folder, then opened it.

She found a series of dated documents, each headed ‘A word from Fishheads.com’ with a series number. There were twenty in all, stretching back over a nine-month period. The most recent was the announcement she had already seen, of the board changes and the transfer of Dražen’s shareholding.

She returned to Goode’s covering message and read:

Hi, Maggie. These are the most recent releases from your friends. Let me know if you’d like to go further back. As you can see, their PR consultants are persistent bastards. They must be impressing the City though, for the shares are flying, despite the founder having bailed out of the business and buggered off to parts unknown to enjoy the serious millions he must have got for his stake. If you’re thinking of this as an investment, I wouldn’t put you off. Mind you, Davor Boras’s company, Continental IT, might be an even better bet, in view of never-ending speculation that he’s about to sell out to American interests. Knowing how devious Davor is, the market reckons that this talk might be a ploy to start a bidding war.

‘Mo,’ Maggie whispered, ‘the only thing I would invest in the Boras family is the time it’s going to take me to find Drazen and see him put away.’

She returned to the press releases and opened them one by one. Most of them were bland, announcements of quarterly, half-yearly and annual profit figures. The others dealt with business development across Europe and around the world, and invariably were accompanied by photographs.

Two were expanded versions of stories she had read in the annual report, four others dealt with supply deals struck with major companies, one referred to an international congress in Las Vegas, ‘attended by David Barnes and Ifan Richards’, with a photograph of the pair in front of the black edifice of the Wynn resort, the newest and biggest on the Strip, and another spoke of a ‘successful trip’ to South Africa by Richards, shown in Cape Town, casually dressed, with Table Mountain in the background. Since David/Dražen’s disappearance, there had been only two: the board announcement and a release built around a sales drive on the US eastern seaboard, as part of what was referred to as ‘Fishheads’ American invasion’.

‘And what does all that tell you, Maggie?’ she asked herself aloud. ‘Damn all, so far,’ she replied, ‘but there’s something there, I know it.’