Screen Savers

Chapter 8

‘I didn’t like the boy, Oz. I know I was bound to resent him, given the way my Dad foisted him and his bloody old uncle off on me, after. .’

She broke off for a second or two. ‘All that apart, though, I still didn’t like Stephen. He’s a good-looking guy, a real ladies’ man — I’m not surprised wee Myrtle had a tumble with him — and on the face of it, he’s very pleasant. But I always felt that his smile was painted on the outside; that there was something different going on inside his head.’

Prim and I were sitting at the table in the dining room of Susie’s semi in Clarkston. She and Mike had been talking for two years about moving into the penthouse flat of the redevelopment of a classic City Centre church which her construction division was planning, but the project was still on the drawing-board. The Gantry Group’s influence with the Planning Department was not what it had been in the past.

‘What happened when you fired him?’ Prim asked, as Dylan topped up our wine glasses. ‘How did he take it?’

Susie frowned, as she replayed the event in her mind. ‘He was neither up nor down, as I remember. I saw his Uncle Joe and him together; I told them that I was now in total and permanent control of the Group and that I intended to do everything my way in the future.

‘That included putting my own staff in charge of financial management. I told them that they were being replaced by two people I had head-hunted from a major chartered accountancy firm, I showed them the severance terms. . agreed with my lawyers and watertight, including the confidentiality clause. . and I asked them to sign letters of resignation and clear their desks, there and then.

‘Joe went apeshit; he still thought of me as a wee girl, and thought he could treat me as such. He bawled and shouted that he had given the best years of his life to my Dad and his company, that I was an ungrateful wee whippersnapper, and that I would ruin everything he and my Dad had built up.’

‘Wind up with everything in ashes at your feet?’ I suggested.

‘Not in those very words, but that’s what he implied, yes.’

‘What did you say?’

‘Nothing. I let him shout himself hoarse then I showed him the interim report that Jan did for me. It was very nicely written, tactfully put, but basically it said that Joe was neither qualified nor able to serve as finance director of a major company and listed about twenty different reasons why. When he’d read it I told him that I had shown it to my auditors, and that they agreed.

‘Then I showed him his settlement figure. I pointed out that he’d already had a golden handshake the first time I fired him; and now here he was, thanks to my Dad’s stupidity, in a position to collect another. But I made it clear to him that if he walked out without signing that letter, I’d tear it up and he’d get statutory terms, which in the circumstances would have been bugger all.

‘There was a bit more bluster, but eventually he signed both the letter and the severance agreement, including the confidentiality clause.’

‘And what about Stephen?’ Prim asked. ‘What did he do while his uncle was yelling the place down?’

‘Nothing. He just sat there and let the storm subside. Then, when old Joe was done, he picked up his letter looked at the terms — six months’ pay, and he’d hardly been there any time — said “Fair enough” and signed without another word.’

‘No threats?’

‘Not one. He even shook my hand on the way out, and gave me that wee painted smile.’

I took a sip of my wine, a fairly expensive claret. . I knew that, since I’d brought it. ‘You never thought about firing Myrtle Higgins at that time?’

‘Christ no. Myrtle’s a good secretary, Oz. On top of that it made sense to have her there to help the new guy settle in. When I did let her go I was sorry, but I didn’t have any choice. I could never have trusted her completely after that. Pity. All of it. Even old Joe; if only the silly bugger has decided to go off to a quiet retirement.’ She sighed, and in that moment I saw one of Susie’s strengths as a boss. She hated firing people, even when it was justified.

‘So now Myrtle’s saying it was Stephen who blackmailed her into stealing those documents?’ she asked me.

‘That’s right. She did it to keep her husband out of trouble.’

‘What’s he like, this husband?’

I had to laugh as I thought of the two Malkie Campbells; the one who was going to kick me down the stairs, and one who had come face to face with his worst nightmare. ‘Quiet and chastened. Big Jerry has that effect on most people.’

‘Er. . he didn’t actually damage Campbell, did he?’ Dylan sounded slightly nervous.

I tapped my chest, over my heart. ‘Only in here. It had a hell of an effect on him, thinking that he was a hard man, then coming face to chest with someone who put everything into perspective.’

‘Maybe you should take him when you go to see Stephen,’ said Susie, with a faint grin. ‘Not that he struck me as much of a heavy. On the other hand, if he was mobbed up with my cousin. .’

‘It’s academic,’ I told her. ‘The Behemoth’s off to the States on Monday, after this weekend’s programming. Prim and I will meet Stephen somewhere nice and public. . if we need to see him at all that is.’

‘Why shouldn’t you?’ Mike asked.

‘Because we’re going to talk to Uncle Joe first. He’s already threatened Susie.’

‘I told you I fancy him for it.’

‘Sure, and even with your track record, there’s a fair chance you could be right. So we have to cover the possibility.’ He gave me a mock scowl.

‘Those papers, Susie,’ Prim cut in. ‘The ones Myrtle copied. What were they?’

‘Letters. From my old man to the Chair of the Glasgow Planning Committee. Read in a certain way, you could infer that Dad was trying to lean on him for a consent. I guess that Joe was going to pass them to his tame journo and claim that’s exactly what did happen.’

‘D’you think it might have?’

She grinned across at me over her glass. ‘No way. Read in another way, and forgetting who wrote them, they’re simple enquiries for the record. When my Dad wanted to nobble someone, he did it in private, without witnesses, and never, ever, in writing.’

‘Fine.’ I nodded. ‘That’s how we’ll see his old pal Joe as well: in private. If he did write those letters, then he’s an even bigger fool than his record says he is, and it shouldn’t be too hard to scare him into admitting it.’