‘Investment,’ he hissed.
‘Twenty million out of our coffers any way you look at it,’ I shot back. ‘Who are the directors of Babylon Links?’
‘Must we dwell on this?’ he protested.
‘Yes, until I’m reassured about this project.’
He threw his hands up in exasperation, and turned to the company secretary. ‘Wylie, tell her.’
Smith nodded. ‘There are two. Mr Culshaw, and Mr Diego Fabricant.’
I frowned. ‘Diego Fabricant?’ I repeated. ‘Never heard of him. Who the hell is he?’
‘He’s a member of the board of Monsoon Holdings Ltd. Its only director, in fact.’
‘So he owns the land?’
‘Not personally, no. The company owns the land.’
‘Okay, but he owns the company, so same thing.’
‘Actually, he doesn’t,’ Smith said, a little diffidently. ‘He’s an appointed director, but it’s unlikely that he’s actually a shareholder.’
I almost blew up, almost but not quite. ‘So …’ I murmured.
‘All one hundred issued shares of Monsoon Holdings Limited,’ he continued, ‘are held by a company registered in Jersey, where there’s no requirement to disclose the beneficial owner. Nominee shareholders can be used; that’s what Fabricant is.’
‘Fucking hell!’ I glanced at Cathy Black. ‘You can minute that if you like. Wylie, you’re telling me that the Gantry Group has a business partner and we don’t know who he is?’
‘Effectively, yes.’
I turned on Culshaw. ‘Who brought you this deal, Phil? Let me guess. It wasn’t your bloody nephew, was it?’
There followed one of the most eloquent silences I’ve ever not heard. I felt like someone who’d just fired a rifle straight up in the air, and hit my target on the way down. The managing director’s jaw fell a couple of inches ‘How the h …’ he began.
I laughed out loud. ‘I didn’t know. I wasn’t even serious. I think you’re done here. Mr Smith, I need advice on the legal implications of this.’
‘Enough,’ Culshaw shouted. ‘I’ve had enough of this interference. Mrs Black, please minute my withdrawal from this meeting. Note also my request for a general meeting of the company to be held as soon as possible, to consider and pass a vote of no confidence in Mrs Blackstone as chair, and requiring her resignation.’ He pushed himself out of his seat, and leaned over me, right in my face. ‘In case you’ve forgotten, a majority of the shares in this company are now held by two young people who are by marriage my great-niece and great-nephew. How do you think their stepfather is going to vote on their behalf?’
‘Phil,’ I asked him quietly. ‘Did you leak the contents of the management accounts?’
‘No, of course not,’ he blustered. ‘I’m a shareholder in this company myself.’
‘Then who the hell did? It wasn’t Gillian Harvey, it wasn’t Gerry or Audrey Kent, it wasn’t Wylie and it wasn’t me. So who the hell did it and why? Ask yourself that as you plan my downfall.’
Thirteen
After he’d left, I had to ask myself the same question, but I couldn’t come up with a good answer.
There was one prime suspect, of course. As soon as I’d closed the meeting, formally, I called Audrey Kent in Monaco.
‘How did things go?’ she asked, at once.
‘Combustibly,’ I replied. ‘Gillian Harvey resigned and Phil Culshaw’s just walked out in the huff, vowing to have my head in a basket. He’s called for an extraordinary general meeting, as soon as possible.’
‘Can he do that?’
‘Technically, no; Wylie Smith says he doesn’t have enough shares to force it. But I’m going to allow it. This golf course scam that he’s committed us to is a resignation issue; he’s more or less gambled company money with no guarantee of a return. No chair could let that go unchallenged: one of us has to go. I’ve suspended him from his employment pending the meeting, and Gerry Meek will be acting managing director till the EGM takes place.’
‘But will you win?’ Audrey asked, nervously.
‘I don’t know. It’ll depend on who votes Janet and wee Jonathan’s shares and how. My next meeting will be with Greg McPhillips, Susie’s lawyer. I’m going to show him my power of attorney and instruct him to put the trust in place, the one she asked me to set up.’
‘Can it be done in time?’
‘Time shouldn’t be a problem. I can delay the meeting, to an extent. The key question is whether I’ll be able to do it at all; right now I just don’t know what the position is. But to other things. First, how are the kids?’
‘Calmer this morning. Janet’s still a bit tearful; I’m staying close to her and wee Jonathan’s hardly let Conrad out of his sight. At least Mr Murdstone isn’t around …’
‘Who?’ I asked.
‘David Copperfield’s wicked stepfather,’ she replied, chuckling. ‘You should read Dickens, Primavera; it’s full of analogies.’
‘Where’s he gone?’
‘I have no idea. When Conrad and I got up this morning he’d left, without as much as a note on the kitchen table. Is it too much to hope that he won’t be back?’
‘Probably,’ I suggested. ‘As for your Dickensian image, I’d be surprised if he’s at all interested in the kids.’
‘In that case, what’ll happen to them? There’s no role for me here without Susie, and you can forget what Duncan said last week about keeping Conrad on. The two of them had a big argument last night. Conrad tried to speak to him about the children’s needs, and how he should be considerate with them in the wake of their mother’s death, but Duncan blew up at him, told him to mind his own so-and-so business.’
‘What did Conrad say to that?’
‘He got specific, and said that if he ever caught him looking at Janet inappropriately again, or if he frightened the wee chap any more than he does already, he would have to take action to protect them. Duncan yelled at him that from now on he was to have nothing more to do with them, but Conrad replied, very quietly, that he takes his orders from the chair of the Gantry Group, and that isn’t him. Primavera,’ she murmured, ‘I’m glad he’s gone too. You don’t push Conrad one inch.’
‘I wouldn’t worry about that,’ I suggested. ‘Bravery isn’t the man’s trademark. Duplicity is, though. Audrey,’ I went on, ‘do you know if Duncan’s had access to Susie’s private papers?’
‘Physically, no,’ she said, at once, then knocked me back by adding, ‘but he doesn’t need to. He’s had access to her laptop, and I think he’s taken it with him. Everything’s on there, and if he has the password …’
‘Would she have given it to him?’
‘Susie was so erratic in her final days that she might have; or he could simply have watched her key it in. I’m an idiot, Primavera; I knew what it was and I could have changed it after she died. Dammit, I should have. But why do you ask?’
I updated her on what had happened in the Stock Exchange community, and the briefing that had been going on. ‘Gillian Harvey put the boot in me, and got caught, but she wouldn’t have done the other stuff. That golf course information, that’s done real damage; I’ve recovered some of it, but we’re still vulnerable.’
‘Do you reckon Duncan might have done that?’
‘I’d like to pin it on him,’ I admitted. ‘But I’m having trouble working out why he would. After all, it was him that brought the dodgy golf course deal to his Uncle Phil. So why would he want to undermine it? There’s no sense in that. But somebody’s using it to shaft the Gantry Group, that’s for sure.’
I left Audrey to think on that and turned to Wylie Smith. I’d asked him to wait in the boardroom after Gerry Meek and Cathy Black had returned to their offices.
‘Diego Fabricant,’ I fired at him, ‘our partner in Babylon Links. You’re that company’s secretary as well, so tell me about him.’
‘I wish I could, Madam Chair, but …’
‘For God’s sake, call me Primavera. What’s stopping you?’
‘I’ve never met him.’
I frowned. ‘But don’t you attend all the board meetings?’