by Francis - TO THE HILT

She said, 'The bank manager said that nothing you have done is for your own benefit.'

'He's wrong. What benefits the brewery benefits Ivan, and what benefits Ivan benefits my mother, which benefits me.'

'Yes,' she said gravely, mocking me, 'I do see.'

She spread out the agreement papers on her desk and showed me where to put my name, bringing in her secretary to witness every signature. She then said she would have copies run off for all the creditors, which I would initial, and for Ivan and for Tobias, and for the brewery in the shape of Desmond Finch.

While all the copying was in hand she asked me why Ivan and my uncle had planned to send the King Alfred Gold Cup to me . Why to Alexander on his mountain?

I said I supposed it was because of Prince Charles Edward's sword hilt, and I told her of the ancient Honour of the Kinlochs, and about my uncle's ongoing disagreement with the castle's administrators.

'I'm afraid,' I said lightly, 'that now, owing to the incautious tongues of two men who would never knowingly harm me, any number of people may learn that whether or not I may know where to find the King Alfred chalice, I do have in my care the Kinloch golden hilt, which is infinitely more valuable, as apart from its historical uniqueness, it is oozing with emeralds and rubies.'

'Al!'

'So it looks as if it is time to bounce that on to someone else.'

'Immediately!'

Immediately. But to whom?

Not to James: and Andrew was too young.

Himself would have to decide.

Margaret's secretary returned with the copy agreements for copious initialling, and I asked if protocol would stretch to a pub lunch for three, Margaret, Tobias and me.

Margaret thought it might. Tobe, when telephoned, agreed. Accordingly we sat round a small table in a dark discreet corner and toasted the brewery's survival in a bottle of good Bordeaux.

I said to Margaret, 'You mentioned something to me about a twitch of unease. Is it for our auditor's ears?'

Margaret considered Tobias and slowly nodded. 'He might help.'

'What twitch of unease?' he asked, searching his pockets for toothpicks. To do with the brewery's prospects?'

'No, with its past.'

His search drew a blank. He walked over to the bar and returned with a whole small pot of picks. 'Go on, then,' he said. 'What twitch?'

'I think,' Margaret said tentatively, 'that Norman Quorn may have done a trial run.'

Tobias blinked. 'A what?'

'You remember I asked you for the accounts for the past five years?'

'Yes, you had them.'

Margaret nodded. 'Immaculate work. But I just got a teeniest whiff of what I call a "beach towel and hotel" job, only that one seems to have gone full circle, which of course doesn't usually happen, and didn't happen this time.'

'You've lost me,' I said. 'What's a "beach towel and hotel" job?'

I looked enquiringly at Tobias, but he shook his head. 'Never heard of it.'

Margaret, smiling, explained. 'I got the idea one day on holiday, while I was lying sunbathing on a beach chair round a hotel pool, watching people come and go. They would put a towel on a chair and go off and leave it, maybe for hours, and then come back and pick it up and wander off… and no one working for the hotel would think of asking who the towel belonged to. Do you see?'

'No,' I said, but Tobias thoughtfully nodded.

'Suppose,' Margaret said, 'that you were Norman Quorn, and you wanted to retire with a pension big enough to give you all the luxuries you'd never had - not just a bungalow on the south coast, counting the cost of things like postage stamps - but round-the-world cruises and a big new car and a bejewelled companion and caviare and playing the tables in a casino or whatever excites his dry conventional old bachelor mind. Suppose you got the sparkling explosive idea of taking enough for a glorious sunset, and you know how easy and fast it is now to send money whizzing round the world impersonally by wire… then you open small banking accounts here and there… you sort of book into hotels… and every so often you leave a beach towel on a sunbed for a while… and then move it onward to another hotel… and no one pays much notice, because the beach towel never goes missing, and comes safely home.'

'Only one day it doesn't,' Tobias said. 'I lost him in Panama.'

We drank the substantial red wine and ordered fried brie and cranberries with another half-bottle.

Margaret's job fascinated her. 'Almost everyone sees when their bankruptcy's looming,' she said, 'and nearly everyone makes the giveaway mistake of removing their most valuable possessions before torching the premises. Insurance fraud is the worst way out of bankruptcy. It never works. I won't take those cases. I tell them to go to jail and get it over with. Most insolvencies are caused by bad luck, bad management and changing times. Last year's rage is this year's ruin. And then sometimes you get a Norman Quorn. Ingenious, careful. A small trial run, to get the hotels used to the arrival of his beach towel… and they give the towel a sunbed to lie on for a day or so, and send it on unsuspectingly when the right instruction arrives - right codes, right signatures… lovely job.'

'And no one asks questions?' I said.

'Of course not. Millions of transactions take place round the world every day. Hotel guests arrive and leave by the hundred thousand.'

'And beach towels,' Tobias grinned, 'get sent to the laundry.'

I went to see Young and Uttley.

Neither Mr Young (moustache, suit and hat) nor Mr Uttley (football coach, ball and whistle) was in the office, and nor was the skinhead. Alone in occupation I found a secretary at work at a computer, a young woman with dark curly hair, black tights, short black skirt, loose bright blue sweater, scarlet lips and fingernails.

Giving me a flick of a glance, she said, 'Can I help you?' and went on working.

'Well…' I looked at her carefully, 'you can tell me why the hell you made sure Surtees Benchmark saw you following him.'

The busy fingers stilled. The bright eyes looked at my face. The familiar voice deepened and said in exasperation, 'How the shit do you know ?

'Eye sockets.'

'What?'

'I draw people. I look at their bones. Your eye sockets slant down in a particular way at the outer corners. Also your wrists are male. You should wear frilled cuffs.'

'Bugger you.'

I laughed. 'So why did you let Surtees see you?'

'Let him? I made sure he did, like you said, I got him real worried. See, if someone knows they're being followed, they're dead careful, but when they don't see their shadow they think they're safe, so they go at once and do what you could wait weeks for them to do otherwise, and you'd never know, either, what things he didn't care about anyone watching, and what he really wanted to keep hidden. See?'

'I guess I do.'

'So I got him busy looking out for a skinhead.'

'And,' I suggested, 'he then doesn't notice a secretary in a dark brown wig?'

'You got it.'

'What did the secretary see?'

'Ah.' Young, Uttley (and associates) enjoyed himself. 'Yon bonnie Surtees has a lady wife who keeps him on a throttling leash. Some men enjoy subjugation, I'm not saying they don't, but Wednesday afternoons it seems Mrs Surtees chairs some sort of local women's action committee and her Mister bolts into Guildford to consult his business colleague. Seems Surtees runs a stud farm that's half owned by his wife and half by someone else, the business colleague. Anyway, Wednesday afternoon - yesterday - Surtees drives round in a circle or two looking out for the skinhead, and when he thinks it's safe he steers not to any business office but to a terrace house on the outskirts of Guildford. That's to say, he parks in the next street and looks all around carefully - a dead giveaway, he's stupid - and then he walks to the little house and opens the front door with a key.'