Caroline Graham - A Ghost in the Machine

At the time Andrew was in the garden of a large house near Highgate, keeping an eye open for visitors, dogs, roving police cars. The house had been dark when the thief he was covering entered but, after a while, a light came on in an upstairs room. Soon after that there was a lot of shouting and almost simultaneously a siren wailed.

The burglar came racing out of the house, pausing only to stuff something into Andrew’s pocket and drop a bag at his feet before vaulting over the shrubbery wall and vanishing into the night. Andrew watched the police car turn into the gates, saw the officers admitted to the house, then ran like the clappers. He left the bag, which contained tools, having no wish to be charged with “going equipped to steal” and, as soon as the first Tube started running, hopped on to the Piccadilly Line and left London as well.

He still had his “souvenir” of that unpleasant experience – the burglar’s picks thrust into his pocket. If asked why he’d kept them Andrew couldn’t have told you. Certainly he never intended to take up a life of crime. That one close call had completely flaked him out.

Eventually the Tube had fetched up in Uxbridge. With just the clothes he stood up in he registered at an employment agency and the next day started the first of what was to prove a long line of undemanding semi-clerical jobs. He rented a room and then a studio flat, eventually braving a trip back to the Smoke to collect the things he had left behind. But the work was so dreary it drove him half mad with ennui. This naturally led to absenteeism, extended lunch hours and constant sackings. The fact that computers bored him witless didn’t help. They were like a foreign landscape without a map, though he could, just about, cope with simple word processing.

What to do? Andrew had often thought that the most pleasant way out of his dilemma was to meet a rich patronne – someone who would support him in the manner to which he hoped to become accustomed in exchange for witty conversation, immense respect and a lifetime of devotion and gratitude. Now, instead of just dreaming he decided to do something about it. He began to advertise in the lonely hearts columns, describing himself as a managing director (GSOH, own home and car) so no one would think he was after their money. Naturally he was contacted by lots of women who did not have their own home, had a car that wouldn’t start and such a GSOH they laughed like drains when discovering his real circumstances. Apart from the one who threw Baileys Irish Cream all down his tie. He was on the point of jumping off the nearest railway bridge when he met Gilda.

At the time he was working at the extremely upmarket Palm Springs Hotel and had been there nearly two months. The main part of his job was liaising on the telephone between the restaurant chefs and their many suppliers, taking the flak from both sides when something went wrong, which was every day.

Attached to the hotel was a health club and spa. The subscription, ostentatiously costly, kept the numbers down and the riffraff out. Although there were stern rules against any mingling with the guests, when he thought himself unobserved Drew would slip into the changing rooms, disguise himself in expensive goggles and discreet unlogoed trunks, and swim in the pool.

He watched the women while seeming not to. The majority were well preserved rather than young: too thin, baked to a hard caramel under the sun lamps and clanking with money. He caught sight of one doing the crawl, her arm breaking the water and curving upwards, dazzling bracelets falling away from her wrist, then tumbling back as the arm plunged down. She wore rings on every finger, including a wedding ring. They nearly all did.

Gilda stood out from the rest. Even then she was plump. Around a hundred and fifty pounds, Andrew thought as he sat, balanced nicely on a tickling jet, in the Jacuzzi, and watched Gilda walk across artificial grass towards the pool. She wore a heavily boned flowered swimsuit with a frilly skirt attached. Standing at the edge for several minutes she finally attempted a dive but only succeeded in falling clumsily into the water. She swam in circles using a splashy dog paddle.

Andrew began to assess the possibilities. She wore no ring but that didn’t necessarily signify. Her skin was creamy pale, she had a lot of flossy, fair hair and while never likely to turn heads, was not entirely unattractive. He dressed, slipped out of the fire exit and waited for her to leave. As she crossed the hotel car park someone waved and called, “Hi, Gilda,” so then he knew her name. She drove away in a mouthwatering BMW 328i. Andrew looked up her details in the club file and very promising they were too. She was single and lived on Mount Pleasant, a gated cluster of large, many-roomed houses surrounded by lawns and beautifully designed gardens and known locally as Millionaires’ Row. The telephone number was included on the card but the box for her age was blank.

Fraternising with guests and club members might have been forbidden but gossip between members of the staff about them was not. It was rife, and jollied up their mundane office hours no end. Drew had only to mention the magnificent car to hear all about the Berrymans, père et fille.

He was a self-made man. Started with a single broker’s yard in the early seventies, expanded into a chain, sold that. Bought into sports equipment and did very well. Went into business with a couple of creative youths looking for backing for their virtual reality games. One of these took off into the stratosphere, making Charlie Berryman a fortune but leaving the lads somewhat bewildered as to the modesty of their own profits. After this Berryman played the markets, investing shrewdly and selling his investments even more shrewdly.

So far, thought Andrew, so satisfactory. But what of Gilda? Why wasn’t there a husband in the picture? Was a wedding perhaps imminent? Tania Travis, Foreign Booking, was able to put Drew straight on that score. Goes without saying with all that money, men came sniffing round. She’d go out with them for a bit, Gilda, then something always went wrong. Obviously Tarn couldn’t say exactly what, not being in the picture, so to speak. What was Gilda like? Well, like most rich people everything had to go her way and she could be a bit sharp if it didn’t. But Tarn’d come across worse. Take that cow Melanie Bradstock…

Andrew went out to view the house but without much success. The estate was surrounded by a circular twelve-foot-high wall joined by huge, ornately styled gates. These hung between bronze pillars and in one of them was set an electronic checking system. Close by stood a sentry box. When Drew, in his shabby Fiesta, prepared to park for a closer look, a man in a uniform came out of the box, stared at him and wrote something down in a little book.

Effecting an introduction to Gilda seemed impossible. The circles in which they moved could hardly be further apart. He would have to rely on the old bumping into her “accidentally on purpose” trick. This wasn’t easy either. He had one day off a week and spent it parked in Mount Pleasant Drive, planning to tail her when she came out. He did this for a month: result nil.

Then he decided to follow her next time she came to the club. This would involve leaving work in the middle of a shift, which would mean the sack, but there was everything to play for and it was a crap job anyway.

Gilda drove into Amersham to have her hair dried at Mane Line after the swim. Drew blocked her way on the narrow pavement just as she was coming out. They dodged one way then the other, saying, “Sorry.”

“My fault,” said Andrew. Then: “Haven’t we…that is…I’m sure I’ve seen you. Was it at the Springs Hotel? It’s…Gilda, right?”