Gemma Townley - When in Rome...

“Call him,” instructs my mother, and I take out my mobile. As expected, Mike’s home phone rings until the answerphone picks up.

“I told you. He’s in the office waiting for the disk to arrive. He won’t be coming round here for ages, if at all.” I wish Mum would just take my word for it sometimes.

“Right, I’m going in.”

Mum lets herself out of the car and walks purposefully down the road. She takes a bunch of keys out of her apron pocket and lets herself into Mike’s house, taking a quick look around her before going in.

“And Mike’s not going to notice that his keys are missing?” James asks me.

“No! He’s in a meeting.”

It wasn’t too difficult getting Mike’s keys. I popped into his office to assure him that the disk would be arriving “any minute” and just accidentally on purpose picked his keys up off his desk on my way out. He’s always losing things so he’ll never notice. If all goes according to plan he will be sitting at his trendy round desk for the next few hours wondering when the postman is going to arrive with the envelope. Which gives us plenty of time. All we need to do is to pick up the disk from his flat, where I actually sent it, and then I can get the keys back to Mike. Easy peasy.

The Mini is getting increasingly uncomfortable. I’m charged with adrenaline, and being cooped up is torture. James and I don’t have a great deal to say to one another, so we sit, waiting.

Suddenly my mobile rings. It’s my mother.

“You’re going to have to come in,” she tells me. “There are lots of letters here and his desk is covered with papers and I don’t know which ones to take.”

“What do you mean?” I ask. “You don’t need papers, just the disk.”

“Darling, I am not going to leave with just a disk. Mike has all sorts of papers here. I’m sure we can find something more interesting than just the disk.”

I can’t decide whether to be terrified that my mother seems intent on searching Mike’s flat, or delighted to have a reason to leave the car. Either way, I have to go in. I give James a quick peck on the cheek and cross the road, looking around me. I know there won’t be anyone looking, but . . . I can’t help feeling like I’m starring in a “Starsky and Hutch” episode as I approach Mike’s building. As soon as I reach the main door, the buzzer goes to let me in. And when I get upstairs Mike’s door opens almost immediately. My package is lying on the floor and I pick it up gratefully, putting it straight in my pocket. I then follow my mother into his study, where piles of paper are all over the floor.

“What a mess!”

“We can tidy up afterward,” says my mother. “Just find what you need.”

I stare at her. “You mean these papers weren’t all over the floor when you arrived?”

“We do not have time to sift through files,” my mother says slowly but firmly. “Now kindly get on with it.”

I start sifting through the papers, but I can’t make head or tail of them. There are investment agreements, letters from banks, business plans, all in piles on the floor. But I have no idea what I need. Banking information must be a good place to start, though, if Mike has been stealing money. I pick up a few credit card statements, but other than proving that Mike eats out a lot, they don’t tell me very much.

“Hurry up!” hisses my mother. “Come on, darling, you work in the City. You must know what these things mean.”

“I do not work in the City,” I say pointedly. “I work in the West End. And I am not a financier. I research stuff.”

“Then do some research! Come on!”

I knew it was a mistake letting my mother come. I sift through a few more papers. And then I see something interesting. It’s a bank statement in Mike’s name, but it isn’t a U.K. bank. It’s a Spanish one. And a lot of money has been deposited in the past month. Like hundreds of thousands of pounds.

And it hasn’t come from Big Base Records, it’s from Proud Promotions. I’ve never even heard of Proud Promotions.

“Proud Promotions,” I mutter to myself as I continue to sift through papers. “Who the fuck are Proud Promotions?”

My mother looks up. “Don’t swear, darling, it’s so unbecoming,” she chides me. “Now, did you say Proud Promotions? There’s an invoice here to Proud Promotions for ?100K. And look, another one for ?50K. And another . . . and another . . . is this what you need? Will this get that Mike what he deserves?”

I want to say yes, that we’ve cracked it, but to tell the truth I have no idea whether these invoices are important or not. I need more information and I have no idea how to get it.

Unless . . . oh, but I couldn’t, could I?

I suppose desperate times call for desperate measures. I take out my phone and dial a number.

“Nigel Lymes.”

“Nigel! You’re there!”

“Of course I’m here. Which you patently aren’t, Georgie. And unless you are ringing to tell me about a serious illness, I am going to be filing a report for HR this very afternoon.”

“Yes, look, I’m sorry I haven’t been at work, but there’s been a bit of an emergency.”

“I see. And would you like to elaborate any further?”

“Nigel, look, forget about this for a minute will you? I need your help.”

Nigel pauses.

“And why would you need my help?”

“I’m in trouble, Nigel. A friend is, too. I need to find out some information about a company—

who runs it and stuff. It’s called Proud Promotions. Could you do a quick search for me?”

“You could go to Company’s House, you know.” Nigel doesn’t appear to want to play ball.

“I know that. I haven’t got the time though. Please, can you just see what you can dig out?”

Nigel acquiesces and I hear him typing furiously.

Mum is scrabbling around on the floor piecing together balance sheets, letters, and bank statements covered in scribbles.

I can’t believe that just a couple of days ago I was in this flat being impressed by Mike’s decor.

How convinced I’d been that Mike had turned his life around just for me. How could I be so naive? I shudder to think of it.

I can hear Nigel’s computer whirring. “Okay,” he says, “we’re getting somewhere now. Not much information, I’m afraid.”

My eyes are scanning the floor for something, anything, that might make some sense of all of this. I wish David was here—he’d know exactly what to take. Except if David was here, the police would probably turn up and then he’d be done for trespassing, too—again, all my fault.

And then I see it. It is a statement of revenues from Proud Promotions, which has a company address in Switzerland. I pull it out from under a pile of press releases about the enormous success enjoyed by BB Records and the recent successful round of investment that had netted the company ?1.2 million.

The revenue statement shows that over the past year and a half, Proud Promotion’s revenues have totaled over a million pounds. All the revenue has come from Big Base Records.

“Nigel, are you still there?” I am breathless with excitement. “The company isn’t a U.K. one—

it’s based in—”

“Geneva,” interrupts Nigel. It’s a holding company, owned and set up by a Mr. Geoffrey Proud.”

Geoffrey Proud. The name is sort of familiar, but I can’t place it.

“Just Geoffrey Proud, or is there a partner?”

“No, just Geoffrey.”

“Nigel, you are so my favorite person, thank you,” I gush.

“Is that all, then? I’d hardly call that an emergency.”

“No, there’s one more thing. Nigel, how easy do you think it would be to break into an airline’s reservation system?”

“You are joking, I presume?”