Best Kept Secret

20





GILES HAD PROMISED his sister that he’d be on time for the meeting. He skidded to a halt on the gravel outside the main building and parked his Jaguar next to Emma’s Morris Traveller. He was pleased to see she was already there because, although they both owned 11 per cent of the company, Emma took a far greater interest in Barrington Shipping’s affairs than he did, even more since she’d embarked on her degree course at Stanford with that double Pulitzer Prize-winner, whose name he could never remember.

‘You’d remember Cyrus Feldman’s name well enough if he had a vote in your constituency,’ Emma had mocked.

He hadn’t attempted to deny the charge.

Giles smiled as he jumped out of his car and spotted a group of children coming out of Old Jack’s Pullman carriage. Badly neglected in his father’s day, it had recently been returned to its former glory and become a museum in memory of the great man. School parties paid regular visits to see Old Jack’s VC and be given a history lesson on the Boer War. How long would it be, he wondered, before they were giving history lessons on the Second World War?

As he ran towards the building, he wondered why Emma had felt it was so important to meet the new chairman tonight, when the general election was almost upon them.

Giles didn’t know a lot about Ross Buchanan, other than what he’d read about him in the Financial Times. After Fettes he’d studied economics at Edinburgh University and then joined P&O as a graduate trainee. He’d worked his way up from the ground floor to win a place on the board, before being appointed deputy chairman. He’d been tipped for chairman, but was denied the post when a member of the family decided they wanted the position.

When Buchanan accepted the Barrington board’s invitation to succeed Sir William Travers, the company’s shares rose five shillings on the announcement of his appointment, and within months they’d returned to the level they’d reached before Sir William’s death.

Giles glanced at his watch, not just because he was a few minutes late, but because he had three more meetings that evening, including one with the dockers’ union, who didn’t appreciate being kept waiting. Despite his campaigning for a forty-eight-hour week and two weeks’ guaranteed holiday on full pay for every union member, they remained suspicious of their Member of Parliament and his association with the shipping company that bore his name, even though this would be the first time he’d entered the building for over a year.

He noticed that the exterior had been given a lot more than a fresh lick of paint, and as he pushed through the door he stepped on to a thick blue and gold carpet that bore the new Palace Line crest. He stepped into a lift and pressed the button for the top floor, and for once it didn’t feel as if it was being laboriously hauled up by reluctant galley slaves. As he stepped out, his first thought was of his grandfather, a revered chairman who had dragged the company into the twentieth century, before taking it public. But then his thoughts inevitably turned to his father, who had nearly brought the company to its knees in half the time. But his worst recollection, and one of the main reasons he avoided the building, was that this was where his father had been killed. The only good thing to come out of that dreadful incident was Jessica, the Berthe Morisot of the lower fourth.

Giles was the first Barrington not to become chairman of the board, but then he’d wanted to go into politics ever since he’d met Winston Churchill when he’d presented the prizes at Bristol Grammar School and Giles had been school captain. But it was his close friend Corporal Bates, killed while attempting to escape the Germans, who’d unwittingly turned him from blue to red.

He dashed into the chairman’s office and gave his sister a huge hug before shaking hands with Ray Compton, who’d been the company’s managing director for as long as he could remember.

The first thing that struck him as he shook hands with Ross Buchanan was how much younger he looked than his fifty-two years. But then he recalled the Financial Times pointing out that Buchanan didn’t smoke or drink, played squash three times a week, turned the lights out at 10.30 p.m. and rose at 6 o’clock every morning. Not a regime that would suit a politician.

‘It’s a pleasure to meet you at last, Sir Giles,’ said Buchanan.

‘The dock workers call me Giles, so perhaps the management should as well.’

The laughter broke any slight tension that Giles’s political antennae had picked up. He had assumed this was a casual get-together so he could finally meet Buchanan, but from the looks on their faces, something far more serious was on the agenda.

‘This doesn’t look good,’ said Giles as he slumped into a seat next to Emma.

‘I’m afraid it isn’t,’ said Buchanan, ‘and I wouldn’t have bothered you so close to the election if I hadn’t thought you ought to be briefed immediately. I’ll get straight to the point. You may have noticed that the company’s share price fell quite dramatically following my predecessor’s death.’

‘Yes, I did,’ said Giles. ‘But I assumed there was nothing unusual in that.’

‘In normal circumstances you’d be right, but what was unusual was how quickly the shares fell, and how far.’

‘But they seem to have fully recovered since you took over.’

‘They have,’ said the chairman, ‘but I don’t think I was the sole reason for that. And I wondered if there could be another explanation for the inexplicable downturn in the company’s share price after Sir William’s death, especially after Ray brought to my attention that it wasn’t the first time it had happened.’

‘That’s correct, chairman,’ said Compton. ‘The shares dropped just as suddenly when we announced our decision to go into the passenger liner business.’

‘But if I remember correctly,’ said Emma, ‘they also returned to a new high.’

‘They did indeed,’ said Buchanan. ‘But it took several months before they fully recovered, and it didn’t do the company’s reputation any good. While one can accept such an anomaly once, when it happens a second time, one starts to wonder if a pattern is emerging. I don’t have the time to be continually looking over my shoulder, wondering when it might happen again.’ Buchanan ran a hand through his thick, sandy hair. ‘I’m running a public company, not a casino.’

‘You’re going to tell me that both these incidents took place after Alex Fisher joined the board.’

‘You know Major Fisher?’

‘That’s far too involved a story to bore you with right now, Ross. That is, if I’m going to make the dock workers’ meeting before midnight.’

‘All the indications do seem to point in Fisher’s direction,’ said Buchanan. ‘On both occasions a trade of two hundred thousand shares was executed, which happens to be almost exactly the seven and a half per cent of the company he represents. The first was just hours before the AGM at which we announced our change of policy, and the second immediately followed Sir William’s untimely death.’

‘It’s too much of a coincidence,’ said Emma.

‘It gets worse,’ said Buchanan. ‘On each occasion, during the three-week window, after the share price had fallen so precipitously, the broker who sold them repurchased exactly the same amount, making his client a handsome profit.’

‘And you think that client was Fisher?’ asked Emma.

‘No, it’s too large a sum for him,’ said Giles.

‘I’m sure you’re right,’ said Buchanan. ‘He must have been acting on behalf of someone else.’

‘Lady Virginia Barrington would be my guess,’ said Giles.

‘That had crossed my mind,’ admitted Buchanan, ‘but I can prove that Fisher was behind it.’

‘How?’

‘I had the stock exchange records for both three-week periods checked,’ said Compton, ‘and both sales came out of Hong Kong, through a dealer called Benny Driscoll. It didn’t take a lot of research to discover that not so long ago Driscoll left Dublin only a few hours ahead of the Garda, and he certainly won’t be returning to the Emerald Isle in the near future.’

‘It’s thanks to your sister that we were able to get to the bottom of it,’ said Buchanan. Giles looked at Emma in surprise. ‘She recommended that we employ a Mr Derek Mitchell, who had assisted her in the past. Mr Mitchell flew to Hong Kong at our request, and once he located the one bar on the island that serves Guinness, it took him about a week and several emptied crates to find out the name of Benny Driscoll’s biggest client.’

‘So at last we can remove Fisher from the board,’ said Giles.

‘I wish it were that easy,’ said Buchanan. ‘He has the right to a place on the board, as long as he represents seven and a half per cent of the company’s stock. And the only proof we have of his duplicity is a drunken stockbroker living in Hong Kong.’

‘Does that mean there’s nothing we can do?’

‘Far from it,’ said Buchanan. ‘That’s the reason I needed to see you and Mrs Clifton urgently. I believe the time has come to play Major Fisher at his own game.’

‘Count me in.’

‘I’d like to hear what you have in mind before I make a decision,’ said Emma.

‘Of course.’ Buchanan opened a file in front of him. ‘Between the two of you, you own twenty-two per cent of the company’s stock. That makes you by far the largest shareholders, and I wouldn’t consider going ahead with any plan without your blessing.’

‘We have no doubt,’ chipped in Ray Compton, ‘that Lady Virginia’s long-term aim is to cripple the company, making regular raids on our stock position until we lose all credibility.’

‘And you think she’d do that simply to get back at me?’ said Giles.

‘As long as she’s got someone on the inside, she knows exactly when to strike,’ said Buchanan, avoiding Giles’s question.

‘But doesn’t she risk losing a great deal of money using these tactics?’ asked Emma.

‘Virginia won’t give a damn about that,’ said Giles. ‘If she could destroy the company and me along with it, she’d be more than satisfied, as my mother worked out long before I did.’

‘What makes matters worse,’ said the chairman, ‘is that we estimate that her two previous raids on our stock have shown her a profit of over seventy thousand pounds. That’s why we’ve got to move now, before she strikes again.’

‘What do you have in mind?’ asked Emma.

‘Let us assume,’ said Compton, ‘that Fisher is just waiting for another piece of bad news so he can repeat the whole exercise again.’

‘And if we were to supply him with it . . .’ said Buchanan.

‘But how does that help us?’ said Emma.

‘Because this time it would be our turn to be the insider traders,’ said Compton.

‘When Driscoll puts Lady Virginia’s seven and a half per cent on the market, we’ll buy it immediately, and the share price will go up, not down.’

‘But that could cost us a fortune,’ said Emma.

‘Not if we feed Fisher the wrong information,’ said Buchanan. ‘With your blessing, I’m going to try to convince him that the company is facing a financial crisis that might threaten its very existence. I’ll let him know we won’t be declaring a profit this year due to the cost of building the Buckingham, which is already running twenty per cent over budget, so it won’t be possible to offer our shareholders a dividend.’

‘If you do that,’ said Emma, ‘you’re assuming he’ll advise Virginia to sell her stock, with the intention of buying it all back at a lower price during the three-week trading period.’

‘Exactly. But if the share price were to rise during those three weeks,’ continued Ray, ‘Lady Virginia might be unwilling to buy her seven and a half per cent back, in which case Fisher would lose his place on the board, and we’d be rid of both of them.’

‘How much are you going to need to make this happen?’ asked Giles.

‘I’m confident,’ said Buchanan, ‘if I had a war chest of half a million pounds, I could keep them at bay.’

‘And the timing?’

‘I’ll deliver the bad news in confidence at the next board meeting, pointing out that the shareholders will have to be informed at the AGM.’

‘When is the AGM?’

‘That’s where I need your advice, Sir Giles. Do you have any idea when the general election will be called?’

‘The smart money’s on May twenty-sixth, and that’s certainly the date I’m planning on.’

‘When will we know for certain?’ asked Buchanan.

‘There’s usually about a month’s warning before Parliament is prorogued.’

‘Good, then I’ll call the board meeting for –’ he turned some pages in his diary – ‘April eighteenth, and schedule the AGM for May fifth.’

‘Why would you want to hold the AGM in the middle of an election campaign?’ asked Emma.

‘Because it’s the one time I can guarantee that a constituency chairman will not be able to attend.’

‘Chairman?’ queried Giles, showing far more interest.

‘You clearly haven’t read the evening paper,’ said Ray Compton, handing him a copy of the Bristol Evening Post.

Giles read the headline: Former Tobruk hero becomes Bristol Docklands Conservative Chairman. Major Alex Fisher was unanimously voted . . .

‘What’s that man up to?’ he said.

‘He assumes you’re going to lose the election, and wants to be chairman when—’

‘If that was true, he would have backed Neville Simpson and not Greg Dunnett to be the Conservative candidate, because Simpson would have proved a far more formidable opponent. He’s up to something.’

‘What would you like us to do, Mr Buchanan?’ asked Emma, remembering why the chairman had asked to see her and Giles in the first place.

‘I need your authority to buy every share that comes on to the market on May fifth, and to keep on buying for the following three weeks.’

‘How much could we lose?’

‘I’m afraid it might be as much as twenty to thirty thousand pounds. But at least this time we’ve chosen the date of the battle, and the battlefield, so you should break even at worst, and you might possibly make a bob or two.’

‘If it means replacing Fisher on the board,’ said Giles, ‘as well as spiking Virginia’s guns, thirty thousand pounds would be a cheap price to pay.’

‘While we’re on the subject of replacing Fisher as a board member . . .’

‘I’m not available,’ said Giles, ‘even if I do lose my seat at the election.’

‘I wasn’t thinking of you, Sir Giles. I was rather hoping Mrs Clifton might agree to become a member of the board.’



‘The prime minister, Sir Anthony Eden, visited Buckingham Palace at four o’clock this afternoon, for an audience with Her Majesty The Queen. Sir Anthony asked Her Majesty’s permission to dissolve Parliament in order that a General Election could be held on May 26th. Her Majesty graciously agreed to his request.’

‘Just as you predicted,’ said Virginia as she switched off the radio. ‘When do you intend to tell the unfortunate Mr Dunnett what you have in mind for him?’

‘Timing is everything,’ said Fisher. ‘I thought I’d wait until Sunday afternoon before I asked him to come and see me.’

‘Why Sunday afternoon?’

‘I don’t want any other members of the committee to be around at the time.’

‘Machiavelli would have been proud to have you as chairman of his committee,’ said Virginia.

‘Machiavelli didn’t believe in committees.’

Virginia laughed. ‘And when do you plan to ring our friend in Hong Kong?’

‘I’ll call Benny the night before the AGM. It’s important that he places the sell order the moment Buchanan rises to address the meeting.’

Virginia took a Passing Cloud out of her cigarette case, sat back, and waited for the major to strike a match. She inhaled a couple of times before she said, ‘Don’t you think it’s a coincidence, major, that everything is falling so neatly into place on the same day?’