Believe it or not, I’d become so obsessed with his jumping that I wasn’t interested in how he’d made his fortune through banking. Maybe that was why he persisted with me. I was a challenge.
“If you were to ask me how I did it, I couldn’t tell you straight off,” he said. “It wasn’t dodgy. It was perfectly legit — well, almost. I’m an honest man, Michael. Thanks for the drink, but I have to be going. Next time it’s on me.”
I ran into Sally a couple of days later. She asked if I was any the wiser. I told her I was losing patience with Willy Plumridge. I didn’t believe he’d jumped for England. Ever.
“But are you getting to know him?” she asked.
“A bit. He strikes me as a bullshitter. He was on about making a fortune out of banks. No one does that without a sawn-off shotgun.”
“He’s not kidding,” she said. “He’s fabulously rich. Drives a Porsche and updates it every year. If he offers to let you in on his secret, let me know.”
“Sally, the only thing I want to know—”
“Ask him, then.”
One more possibility came to me during another disturbed night. I broached it next lunchtime in the pub. “You must have done plenty of flying in your life, Willy.”
“Enough.”
“I was wondering if you ever went in for parachuting.”
“Me? No way. What makes you think that?”
“Someone told me you were a very good jumper.”
“That?” he said with a laugh. “That wasn’t parachuting.”
“They said you jumped for England.”
“And it’s true.” He took a sip of his drink.
I waited for more and it didn’t come.
“What do you do to earn a crust, Mike?” he said.
“I’m a freelance illustrator. Kids’ books, mostly.”
“Satisfying work — but not too well-paid, I reckon.”
“That’s about right.”
“Suppose there was a way to set yourself up with a good amount of cash. Would you take it?”
“Depends,” I said. “It would have to be honest.”
“I like you,” he said, “so I’ll tell you how I made my first million. You’ve heard about Swiss bank accounts?”
“Where people salt away money with no questions asked?”
“That’s the myth. Actually, a lot of questions are asked. It’s no simple matter to open a Swiss bank account with a suitcase full of banknotes. The gnomes of Zurich have strict banking laws these days. Customers have to be identified. You have to convince the bank that what you are depositing isn’t the proceeds of a crime. Various money-laundering scandals have led to stringent legislation being introduced. These days you can’t open a numbered account, as you once could, without identifying yourself. The beneficial owners of accounts have to be declared. As they should.”
“Agreed,” I said, uncertain where this was leading.
“They’ve also tightened up on withdrawals. The whole point of using Switzerland is that every account is rigidly protected. Great-Uncle Edward dies and leaves you everything and there’s a rumour that he was stashing away money in a Swiss account. Can you find out from the bank? No. All you get is a petrifying glare and a reminder that they are bound by their banking codes. In another twenty years, the bank can claim the money. There are said to be tens of billions locked away in dormant accounts in Switzerland. The gnomes bide their time and then collect.”
“What a racket,” I said.
“Yes, and as soon as any of the big names gets in trouble and questions are asked about the funds they salted away, the banks freeze the accounts. Noriega, Marcos, Ceausescu, Sukarno. But I don’t care about monsters like that. It’s Great-Uncle Edward I feel sore about. I won’t say the little people because we’re talking serious money here. Let’s say family money, Mike. It should stay in the family, right?”
“Right.”
“Well, I’m uniquely placed to help out people like the family of Great-Uncle Edward. My dad — the banker — had a contact in one of the great Swiss banks. Someone he trusted, a man of honour who had a conscience about these unfortunate families trying to get information. His hands were tied. There was nothing he could do within the Swiss banking system. But he knew the magic numbers the families needed, you see. He passed the numbers to Dad, who passed them to me. Then it was just a matter of matching the right families to the money that rightly belonged to them. It involved some basic research. Anyone can look at a will in most countries of the world. You find the beneficiaries and you offer to help.”
“For a fee?”
“A small commission.”
“A small percentage of a big sum?”
He smiled. “You’re getting the idea, Mike.”
“So you pass on the information about the account numbers?”
“And the sums involved. Dad’s friend listed the balances with the numbers. So I’m the bearer of good news. I’ve made a big difference to some people’s lives.”
Including your own, I thought. Not bad.
I said, “I guess some of this money is ill-gotten gains.”
“I never enquire,” he said. “If Great-Uncle Edward was a train robber, or painted fake Van Goghs, it’s no concern of mine. The way I see it, the family has more right to it than the bank. Are you with me?”
“I think so,” I said.
“I’m only mentioning this because I think you can help me.”
I hesitated. “How?”
“Well, I still have details of a few accounts I haven’t been able to follow up, and time is running out. The twenty-year rule means that the banks will scoop the pool if something isn’t done. I begrudge them that. I feel I owe it to the memories of my old dad and his friend — who also died about the same time — to recover that money. These are families I haven’t traced yet. I’ve found the wills, but the beneficiaries are more elusive.”
“You want someone to do the research, track them down?”
He shook his head. “There isn’t the time. What I need is someone I can trust to approach the bank and show them the documentation and claim the money for the estate.”
“What — go to Switzerland?”
“That isn’t necessary. They have a City of London branch. I’d do it myself, but they know my face from a previous claim.”
“You want me to pretend I’m acting for the family?”
“Pretend? You will be acting for them, Mike. I’ve opened an executors’ account. You show them the copy of the will and the death certificate and they verify that the names match. You give them the account details, which they confirm with Zurich. They write you a cheque, and bingo!”
“Why should they deal with me?”
“To keep them happy, you say you’re one of the executors.”
“I don’t like the sound of that.”
“Don’t worry, Mike. I’ll give you proof of identity.”
“No, this isn’t right.”
“Would five percent make it right?”
I didn’t speak.
“Think it over,” he said. “Let me know tomorrow, or the next day. No sweat.”
Plenty of sweat. Another night of disturbed sleep. This time I was wrestling with my conscience. It was a scam and a clever scam. But the only loser would be a bank that was about to get a fortune that didn’t belong to it.
Much neater than pointing a gun at a cashier. This was beating them at their own game, with account numbers and cheques.
Could I trust Willy Plumridge? He had the lifestyle that backed his story. Good suits, a Porsche, usually parked outside the pub. I hadn’t seen his house, but Sally had told me he had two, and they were both big places.
In the morning my credit-card statement arrived. I owed them three grand and some more.
“If I did this,” I said to Willy, “how much would I make out of it?”