Articulate, his mother, and great-aunt would probably want to use Ralph and some of Ralph’s connections to launder Misk’s gains, now charmingly fictionalised as three legacies. Ralph could increase the Monty booze and cigarette orders, using their money to cover the additions. They would then resell the goods to clubs, pubs, off-licences. Plainly, they’d take an account-book loss, because Ralph required a commission, and the people they sold to would want good profit possibilities. But that was the standard way the market worked for difficult money, even untraceables. Also, as the currency for such trading had been stolen, it became crazy to speak of a loss. This amounted to a loss on treasure Articulate should never have had. Crucially, the wealth must not be spent in a style that drew attention or people would start asking how he and his family grew so rich so fast. Such people might be police people, such as Iles or Harpur. Dangerous. Or they might be villain people who’d decide that if Articulate had a lot they’d get some of it, at least some of it. Dangerous.
But drink and tobacco rated only as marginal elements in this type of business plan. Where there was real, lavish money, the lucky holders might, for instance, think about investing in properties, maybe for occupying themselves, or for renting out, or because, even in tricky economic times, most buildings kept their value or moved up. However, if Articulate and his mother and great-aunt Edna approached a normal estate agent and tried to buy four deluxe, five-bed, heated-pool, Doric-pillared, golf-village houses in the Algarve, Portugal, at 750,000 euros each, offering payment in cash, there would be some surprised, sharp intakes of professional breath and, afterwards, some sharp outgoings of professional breath in gossip about these potential customers who could cough approaching two million pounds sterling in suitcased notes. Potential customers might be as far as it went. Many — most? — normal estate agents would refuse to handle that kind of deal, despite longing for it and their cut, because they’d fear the wealth came from where it did come from, a bust, and that the culprits might one day be identified and their spending projects identified also. These potential customers could make them potential accessories, and possibly destroy the firm’s reputation as upholders of that venerable, wise, holy code of behaviour laid down for estate agents.
But it was fairly generally recognised among Monty members that Ralph Ember knew certain professional people — solicitors, food inspectors, planning officials, and, especially, estate agents — who would find a way around venerable, wise, holy codes of behaviour if those codes seemed malevolently and perversely to be operating against the interests of buoyant trading in special markets. Such services were costly, yes, and so were middleman skills like Ralph’s. Folk who collected heavy legacies could afford the best, though, and should expect to pay for it.
“These legacies we wish to be used positively,” Mrs. Misk said.
“If I may say, this is what I would expect of your family,” Ralph answered. “Positivism.”
“Not frittered,” she said.
This did sound to Ralph like property. Purchase of sizable villas in Portugal could not in any fashion be termed frittering.
“Or to put it briefly, Ralph, we want to share in your vision,” Edna said. Fervour touched her voice.
“In which respect?” Ralph replied. So, not property. He thought he could guess what she might mean instead, but prayed he had this wrong.
“Yes, to be a part of it,” Mrs. Misk said.
“In which respect?” Ralph replied.
Articulate had always seemed a bit passive as well as tongue-tied. His mother, and especially Great-Aunt Edna, handled family policy. Mrs. Rose Misk would be over sixty and Edna well over seventy. Their combined life experience left Articulate trailing. Even now, although Articulate somehow gave off the impression of a new confidence and bounce, he did not speak very much. The women dominated, maybe domineered. Edna almost always wore flashy red or green leather — trousers and tasselled jacket — including to major, formal Monty events such as celebrations of a christening or acquittal on a technicality. Today, red. She said: “We know you have wonderful ambitions for the Monty, Ralph — makeover ambitions.”
“These inspire us,” Rose Misk said.
“Yes,” Articulate said. “Oh, definitely.”
“This is why, as Rose remarked, we wish to be part of it, Ralph,” Edna said.
Hell, he’d been right.
“The money — the legacies, that is — could be so vital here,” Rose Misk said.
“Definitely,” Articulate added.
“Your plan, your brilliant plan, will cost you a bit, Ralph,” Edna said. “I hope you won’t regard this as presumptuous, but we could help bankroll the transformation — would be proud to help bankroll the transformation.”
“Exactly what I meant by not frittering,” Rose said. “A worthwhile and, in our view — Edna’s, Max’s, and mine — a magnificently promising commitment.”
“Definitely,” Articulate said.
Edna said: “Without, I hope, being cruel, Ralph, we look at the club as it is now — the type of member, the need for a bulletproof slab up there to guard you — we look at all this and cannot believe the Monty today satisfies someone of your taste and refinement.”
“No, no, not a shield,” Ember said, with a fair show of amusement. “It’s a board to maximise ventilation by helping control air currents. But please don’t ask me how!”
“All right, all right, we can understand why you don’t want the Monty thought of as a pot-shot range,” Rose said.
“We’re talking of an infusion to the Monty development funds of at least hundreds of thousands, Ralph,” Edna said. “As starters.”
“That’s it,” Articulate said. New self-belief still brightened his features, but a kind of misery clothed these words.
“Your first move has to be expulsion of nearly all the present Monty membership, hasn’t it, Ralph?” Edna said. “You won’t draw the type of people you want while the club still looks like Lowlife Inc. Initially you’ll have to take some mighty losses — ending of membership fees and, obviously, a collapse of bar profits. This could be where our funds became useful.”
Edna’s survey of the problems was spot-on, and Ralph vastly resented it. To him there seemed something indelicate about describing his cull plans with such disgusting accuracy. This was exactly the kind of crude approach to sensitive things that ensured Edna in her damn gear would be an early victim of a Monty clear-out, along with Articulate and his mother. Did Edna, this pushy, leathery, and leather-garbed old intruder, imagine she and the other two were “the type of people” he wanted? Did she think they could buy their way into not just assured membership of the new Monty with their bank loot, but perhaps take a share of the ownership and the profits through the size of their investment? She had her scheming eye on a partnership. Ralph regarded that as farcical, but it infuriated him.
He said with a happy lilt to his tone: “Many people come to me with ideas of development of the Monty, and I’m heartily grateful to them. And I’m heartily grateful to you now, Edna. These approaches — so positive and well-meant — show how fondly some members regard the club.”
“The Monty’s underachieving on its possibilities, Ralph,” Rose Misk said.
And did they imagine he hadn’t realised this? Did they think they could advise him about his own cherished club, cherished even in its present roughhouse state? “To all these proposals I listen with full interest and, as I say, gratitude,” he replied. “It is encouraging to know there’s a groundswell of creative ideas among the Monty’s faithful. I ponder all these ideas, let me assure you, and at some stage ahead I might act on one of them, or perhaps a mixture of several. But at present those ideas have to remain as such — ideas only.” He gave a small, regretful, but determined smile.