FROM THE WORKS OF DOUGLAS ARNOLD

CHAPTER ONE

   For his sins Geoff had succumbed to the temptation of a third portion of his wife’s fresh cream chocolate sponge cake. It was the seduction of the fresh strawberries, which had been mineswept from the reduced bin in the local supermarket, and arranged sliced on the top of the cake that did it. Then again, the fifth column collaboration of the bed of fresh-whipped cream didn’t help. He had been awake with indigestion for most of the night.
   It was pretty much an ordinary sort of day for finding something useful to do for a change. Life, as the saying goes, is hard, and over the last couple of years, living had become even harder.
   Gone were the heady days of the eighties, with work queuing up to find people to do it. The opposite was the case, with people queuing up to sign the unemployment register. From a very reasonable income indeed, with the usual credibility and self worth, the world of work had collapsed almost overnight. The firm, his family home, and most of all his self respect, went with a bankruptcy court hearing and an insolvency number from the office of the official receiver.
   Life these days consisted of a ceaseless rut of uselessness. The most arduous tasks of the day, since having so little to do, had become; get up, wash, shave, and if he could lift himself to the heights of achievement, make and eat some breakfast. On the whole so far, things had been rather boring, if not actually depressing.
   It was a typical night that follows such overindulgence. His eyes would not stay closed, in a wilfully contrary clash to his body’s need to sleep. He had risen at 4 a.m., for a cigarette and a large mug of tea. His eyes were like dinner plates. His head would not stop thinking of five things at once, and managed to wonder if he had been dragged through a hedge with a bar of soap in his mouth. The only rational solution seemed to be to give up, get up, and try to wake up in an almost tolerant temper.
   True friend as she was, Sally, his Jack Russell bitch, was lying patiently awaiting his move towards his raincoat, to be taken for her morning walk. It was very early, but she thought he would chance her luck, by cocking one ear, and looking as expectant as possible. It worked. Geoff decided to give the old girl a treat. A short drive from the flat is the pebble beach at Devil’s Point, within Plymouth Sound.
   Devil’s Point, regardless of its demonic name, has been a place of peace and serenity for the people of Plymouth for years. The large green sward and the beach are very much like a mini Plymouth Hoe, minus the tourists. Access, like most locally used places anywhere, is off the beaten track. The approach is via the bustle of the world famous night club strip of Union Street, with its glitz and strip joints. A back street turn, bordering the red light district, brings the visitor to the end of the road. Except for a little lane off to the south of the square, almost tucked into the corner, in the hope that none will notice it. One would be forgiven for feeling that it was just another back street. The landscape is a mixture of dockland industrial units, and bedsits.
   The area belies the revelations at the end of the lane. Bordered by a sandstone cliff on one side, and two ninety-degree turns in the narrow lane, skirting the convent on the other, the view opens to reveal the vast natural harbour of Plymouth Sound. The historic Artillery Tower has steps which lead down to the beach below. The vast walls, forts,and the breakwater, hewn in Dartmoor granite, all longstanding monuments to the labours of French Napoleonic prisoners of war, whose forced labour built them all.
    All around this massive natural harbour and oceanic amphitheatre are the forts and pill boxes of defenders of the realm through history. From this famous place, world beating expeditions have departed: From Drake’s dispatch of the Spanish through to Chichester’s lone compass of the globe. The pilgrims departed, and Napoleon himself was imprisoned on a hulk in the waters of Plymouth Sound. The majesty of this historic and beautiful port is as much a feeling as a sight. Standing on the rocks of the foreshore today, the might of The Royal Navy can be seen sailing by every day.
   The view opens out, so that beyond the cliffs of Cornwall, where ravens nest on the crags of Mount Edgecumbe, the winking lonely light on the Eddystone reef can be seen miles out to sea, at once the harbinger of doom, and yet the herald to the homeward bound, and the promise of the shore. The tamed sea laps gently against the paddling pool, which the city built for the benefit of one and all. Every tide washes the pool clean, and sometimes trapped sand eels are chased with enthusiasm and futility by children with small nets.
    The pebble beach lay, as a naked seaside, with kelp and weed exposed, and the sea trapped in the pool. Planks of wood, small pieces of rope, and flotsam and jetsam of passing water traffic are strewn on the strand. The greyness of the day was beginning to show signs of winning over the dark. It was that time, when neither shade nor light, or distance, or hue, were winning the contest of the dawn. Daytime was but a promise. In the changing dimness, part of the sea seemed a little too dark for what it was. There was no form or shape to what appeared to be there, but for a mere hint that part of the sea was filled with that which is somehow out of place.
   Geoff walked around the wall of the pool, trying to reflect some light from perhaps the dockyard, or a streetlight up on the road, off the water and into his eye. There it was - no, there was more than one. Distinct forms of.…
For a moment he thought they were bodies, washed up in the night from a sea accident, but then there would have been searchers for sure. The lifeboat and police launches would be looking for them at least. Then it seemed as though they were just discarded clothes. Perhaps a no longer waterproof jacket from a careless sailor, tossed overboard without a care for the world in which we live. Then anger welled up inside him. It was rubbish, half a dozen black plastic bin liners at least, tied up and chucked overboard by some lazy careless deckhand: some crew, who was too lazy to dispose of the ship’s rubbish properly. No wonder the sea is so filthy that you can’t swim in it anymore.
   The English Channel is no more than a liquid dustbin these days, curse the irresponsible and their arrogance. He decided to grab one, which was just reachable, with a washed up piece of driftwood, and hook it ashore. If he could land them and stack them up at the top of the steps, the refuse collectors would pick them up, and dispose of the waste properly.
   The problem was not that the rubbish was in bin liners, but that it was very symmetrical, and too well wrapped. No-one wrapped and taped up rubbish that carefully. The half inch green tape bound the plastic wrap into a neat package.
    Geoffrey decided to open one up at a corner, to have a look, and to confirm his new fear that these were parcels of drugs, washed ashore from smugglers.
   The import of goods into these islands has been carrying on for 3000 years. Iron age metal workers traded with seafarers from the main continent. The Phoenicians traded for Cornish tin, to alloy with copper, making their bronze ware and weapons. St.Budoc imported Christianity into the region, and wreckers imported their ill-gotten gains from the rocks of the treacherous coast. The barrels of rum stamped George Rex Old Grenadan, or G.R.O.G., surely didn’t all enter via the dutiful channels of the customs house.
   For centuries the coast has been, and probably still is, a smuggler’s paradise. The tiny coves and beaches, connected by inland coastal lanes, are a maze in themselves. Even those who know their way can get lost on a dark and moonless night. Unknown, and probably impossible to assess, is the amount of illicit booze, cigarettes, tobacco, perfume, and jewellery which comes in over the border without having its duty paid. In the latter part of this century, there has been a far more sinister trade. Arguably worse than the murderous and heartless trade in humanity that was the slave trade, the sick barter in human misery, of drugs trafficking, has taken over. The profits of the dealers are immense. The returns make the risks worth taking, and the results denied and lied about, rather than faced. The package was heavy, very heavy, like a sack of potatoes. If this hit the streets, there was enough cannabis here to feed the addicts of Plymouth for a very long time indeed. Geoffrey had always carried a penknife, and he took the two-inch blade out of his pocket, opened it, and locked it with the locking sleeve. The corner of the package sliced open under pressure from the steel blade, which was always as sharp as a razor. He gingerly put his nose to the bag to smell the contents.
   To his surprise there was no spicy, herby smell of cannabis resin, just a stale, pungent stink. He was unsure of himself for a few moments. The smell was acrid and stale, but it was not the stink of dirty dustbins. That sharp tang was familiar on the nose, in a distinct but unrelated way. He had definitely smelled it before, but out of context he could not quite place it. The memory of the scent was locked in his mind, but he could not quite recall where he had smelled that smell before. There was one thing he was sure of, it was not drugs. Cutting a little further into the packaging, and exposing the corner of the contents, it became evident that the bag he was looking at contained paper. He thought it was probably from a computer printer. With all the floating gin palaces that come and go in the Sound, this could easily be the discarded junk from a yuppie sailor, living in some kind of wasteful world of decadent disposability. Opening up a little more of the plastic, the quality of the thin paper revealed the rolls and scrolls of printer’s ink. The flamboyant calligraphy and crisp feel were instantly recognisable, and only ever found on money.
   Carefully wrapped to the point of being waterproof, these modern day Moses baskets had an air of being lost rather than dumped. There was a sudden recollection of where that smell had been in his memory. His father had owned a shop when he had been a boy, and the memory was the odour of the till. That was it: The unmistakable odour of money, but much stronger. The stink of thousands of used notes. It didn’t take an Einstein to work out that five bags - in the end there were five in total - full of money that weigh the same as a sack of potatoes each, comes to more than the price of a round of drinks.
   He thought there must be hundreds of thousands there, if not millions. On the principle that if he had lost say a fifty-pound note, he would probably be searching, with a fine-toothed comb, until he found it, then if someone had lost several large bags of money, they would be out mobhanded, with a large pick axe handle, or worse. At the same moment that he came to that conclusion, a very cold sinking feeling accompanied the tickle of hairs, as they rose on the back of his neck. His mouth suddenly felt dry, and his hands were clammy. There was an overbearing conviction that hidden eyes were watching from the shadows.
   In the half light of the dawn, there were suddenly shadows behind every rock, and movement behind every bush. It came upon him in a mad rush that this was a very open space indeed, and he was amazed that no-one else had come out to see the new day, not even a milkman, on his rounds. He was convinced that he was about to be pounced upon by a gang of desperate roughnecks baying for blood.
   A loud, wailing scream made him freeze in his tracks. His heart jumped in his chest as he instinctively drew in a sharp breath of the cold morning air. Above him a lone seagull, resentful of the man’s intrusion to the morning patrol of his patch of beach, had voiced his protest. The bird had no idea of just how effective was the alarm call at causing alarm. A little involuntary, nervous smile crept over his suddenly chill lips.
   There is a public telephone box at the top of the car park, and he decided to phone the police, and get these parcels dealt with. The quicker the authorities dealt with them, and with the least fuss, the better. It occurred to him that it would be foolish to leave the packages where they were, as someone may well come along and lay claim to them in his absence.
   Carrying each a few yards at a time, and then returning for the next, he worked his way up the beach. Back and forth he struggled until they were eventually at the base of the winding sea wall steps. Sweat from the effort began to run down his face, and he began to regret giving up squash in favour of cigarettes and coffee. Even then he was not convinced that these rivulets were entirely due to the first hard work that he had done in months.
   Trying to move all these shady-looking bags, at 5.30 in the morning, without attracting attention, was proving embarrassing. He was still convinced that he was being watched. He felt a little like a fox in a henhouse, trying to look innocent. He was convinced that he looked about as discreet as a pine tree on a prairie.
   At last they were at the top of the sea wall, and he sat them around the waste bins of the restaurant that was resident in the tower, in a vain attempt at disguise. Nonetheless, they were in sight of the telephone, so that he could see them at all times. He didn’t manage to think about quite what he would do if someone did turn up to collect.
   It is amazing that honesty can be so readily soluble in cash. It only took about thirty seconds to walk across the small tarmac car park to the phone box on the corner of the lane, and in that short space of time, many thoughts went through Geoffrey Wilson’s head. If there were a direct relationship between sainthood on one side and the amount involved on the other, then his mind’s thoughts went off the graph. Granny’s purse, with a pension book, bus pass, and a five-pound note, can be handed in with shovelsful of self-righteousness and pride.
   Several lost sacks full of money, as in this case, can work on the greed button so fast that the mind slips into an overdrive of scheming in no time flat. It wasn’t as if this were anything ordinary. This was, after all, an awful lot of money. His mind began to justify what he knew he was going to do. He had not quite resolved the argument in his head yet. The lost cash had come from what was, in all probability, a none too legitimate source. At least he didn’t think any of the financial institutions transported money like this. So what if he just kept it?
   The next question which arose was, how he would deal with such an amount? And anyway, how much was there? He imagined the questions if he walked into the local branch of his bank with a cheery smile. “Oh good morning, I would like to open an account please. Would five bin liners stuffed with cash do as a deposit?” The police would be there in about two minutes. He needed time to think.
This was all too much.
   He tried to calm himself down. If there was one thing he was certain of, it was that if he panicked he would make mistakes. He had to try to get a clearer perspective of what his situation was, and then to decide what to do next. He felt very much alone.
   This was his penalty kick, in the dying seconds of his personal cup final. Keeping his head to score would mean that he would be a winner. Miss it and he would be a loser, with his ‘if only’ story, for the rest of his life. He looked over to the bags with their treasured secret and wondered what would happen if he did call the police. What if a bent copper turned up? Was he taking too much of a risk in trusting them? After all, they were only human.
   The turning point of his certainty happened when he looked over to his car. The dull creamy brown, set off with rust spots on his 100,000- mile nondescript Lada. It was an M.O.T. failure at £70, which he had desperately struggled to find the money for. The whole family had made sacrifices of their needs, so that his heavily pregnant wife could have a little car. It gave her and the children a tiny bit of freedom at least.
   He was flat broke, unemployed, and his children were dressed in hand-me-downs. They had secondhand toys, and secondhand furniture. The rest of their possessions were from the re-cycled end of the market. Did he and his family not deserve a decent lifestyle? But what if he were caught?
   There are a quarter of a million people living in the city, and as small as that is in terms of cities, it is big enough to slip away without being spotted, and to melt into the background. If he were to load the bags into the car and quietly disappear, who would know? All he had to do was to keep his head down for a while.
   The questions kept ringing around his head in a whirlpool of indecision. What were the legal implications? What if he handed the money in? What if someone claimed it? What if they reported it missing? Who the hell loses that much money in the tide honestly? How much is there? What if he didn’t hand it in and they found him? Where would he go? What would he do?
   The dog and the bags had loaded themselves into the car somehow. In his daze of mental confusion he had carried out the actions that he knew he was going to, whilst still trying to justify them in his mind. Having decided to keep it, he now wanted to get home as quickly as possible. At the same time, breaking the speed limit would be a stupid thing to do. To be stopped now, with a very guilty look on his face, would be a disaster.
   It was normal at this time for Susan Birch to be awake. She worked in a department store in the city centre. It was her responsibility to display all the cakes and pastries of her tidy, ordered, and immaculate counter. She had become well known and respected by her colleagues and customers alike, loved her job and had a trained hawk eye for that which is out of place. Susan always rose early and sat in the front window of her flat, overlooking the Sound. She usually drank an early-morning coffee and gathered her thoughts. She achieved a peace of mind that would enable her to handle the bustle of the day. She had a natural happiness, which was what made her so well liked by everyone.
   She had spotted the unusual car on the car park but taken no particular notice of it. When she saw several black packages being heaved up the steps and hidden around the bins of the restaurant, she became very suspicious indeed. When the furtive and nervous-looking character went to the telephone, and then quickly loaded the parcels and his little dog into the motor, she noted the number. When he had driven off, she thought for a couple of minutes about whether to get involved or not. Her sense of public duty overtook her doubt, and after finishing her drink, she rang the police with the car’s details.
   Sod’s Law says it, and this short journey proved it. Just when you don’t want a police car following you, one arrives, as if queued in by the director of nerve racking experiences. It’s a bit like treating a work colleague to a coffee at lunchtime, who by accident of gender happens to be female. The one day that you decide to do that, you meet your wife in the restaurant, with her mother.
   This particular policeman was simply doing his beat. He took as little notice as possible without being derelict in his duty. At this time of the day, the object was to return to the station, and to finish the shift on time. A policeman’s lot these days was a big enough mass of paperwork. With high crime rates, and so many regulations to follow, the last thing he wanted was to look for an even bigger workload. The beaten up Lada in front looked about as roadworthy as a soapbox on pram wheels. Experience had taught him though that when they looked that bad, they were almost invariably Kosher. The owners wouldn’t have the nerve to drive them on the road otherwise. He turned off right to the station, musing as he went, on the pros and cons of annual number plates. At least you would be able to tell from behind if the vehicle was taxed and insured. He noted the number anyway, just in case.
   Geoff knew that he was being tailed. The police car was just a yard too close to be travelling in the same direction by coincidence. In the rearview mirror, he could tell that he was being given the once-over. He exhaled a long, slow breath when the police car turned off. He had been so nervous that for a few seconds he had forgotten to breathe.
   Within a few minutes, he had reached home. Luckily he was able to park up right outside the flat, in the same spot that he had left earlier. He saw that there was nobody about in the street. The lime trees swayed their soothing dance, their very greenness giving a shade of quiet. He opened the car door and let the dog out. Sally ran gratefully back to the flat. She was cold, and still wet from her run on the sea front. For a dog, Sally was not the outdoor type. She liked to curl up in front of the fire as much as anything. If it was raining, she went out for a walk with dulled enthusiasm.
   The parcels were quickly unloaded and carried up the stairs, to the kitchen of his first floor, two-bedroomed council flat. The table was a secondhand oak affair, with worn veneer, and thick ugly legs. Still, it was solid, and the two leaves pulled out to make it big enough for the job in hand. He took the bag that he had first examined and began to open it properly. The green parcel tape was a pain. It was stuck very firmly to the bags, and he made a mental note of how good it was. Unlike that brown stuff that you can buy, this was good quality tape. Infact, it was so well stuck that he was forced to open the bag with his trusty penknife.
   Strange that ever since he had been a boy, he had carried a penknife. There was no specific purpose that he could put the habit down to. There was no specific reason, like peeling fruit, or sharpening pencils, but he felt naked without it. He used the little blade constantly, for all sorts of jobs. Never had there been such an important task for his little knife than this. Having often lost and replaced them, he decided to treasure this one as a keepsake.
   Tipping the bag out onto the table, there were individual wraps of money, in hermetically sealed packages. Whoever had packed this cash had intended for it to stay dry. The pack from the bottom was the one he had cut into on the beach, and he opened it fully to count it. There were fifties, twenties, and tens, all in Stirling. He raised a couple to the light, to see that they had their watermark, and the telltale strip of metal, which told him that this was the real thing. This was not, as had just crossed his mind, a bag full of forgeries. This was the genuine article. He counted the bundle. Ten grand, in used ones. Here was an awful lot of dosh. Here was the proverbial ‘enough to spend’.
   As is usual when something is going down in the home, the children did not want to be left out. They were beginning to stir from their innocent slumbers. The very last thing that he needed was for them to talking to their friends. It was vital to maintain absolute secrecy, for the moment at least. The subtleties of adult dishonesty were a mystery to them. He stuffed the money into another bin bag, and quickly put them into his bedroom. He wanted to leave his wife to lie in for a while, but decided that she should be woken up, to at least look after the rest of the family whilst he dealt with this problem.
   Holding the bag open, he picked up a packet and threw it on the bed. It bounced off the top of the mound of quilt, and landed on the floor with the thump of a paperback. She groaned her protest at this rude awakening. Chuckling to himself, he bounced another one. She turned over and muttered a complaint in semi-awareness. The third bounced off the top of her head, and she vented her displeasure in a most unladylike way. He laughed and tossed another.
   7quot;What the hell do you think you’re doing, you stupid fool? That’s not funny, you know. Leave me alone." He tossed another pack onto her lap. She picked it up with half-opened eyes and threw it back. It bounced off the door with a loud bang. Her aim never was too good, especially first thing in the morning. He picked it up and gently tossed it back.
   "What the hell is this?"
   "Why don’t you open it and see?"
   She rubbed her eyes, still mumbling about stupid games, and something about time and morning. There was a passing observation about growing up, which was thrown in for good measure. She ripped open the polythene, and her eyes nearly popped out of her head. At the same time, her chin had a falling out from its marriage to her top lip.
   There were two firsts here. In ten years of marriage, Geoffrey Wilson had never seen his wife wake up so fast. He could not recall her ever being totally lost for words before. There was a long, dumbstruck silence, which lasted until her brain managed to put the obvious question together, "What’s this?"
   Despite the obvious and self-evident fact that it was a lot of money, she was also aware that it was a silly question. The plain fact was that she could not think of anything else to say.
   "That, my dear, is a very small part of the rest of this bagful, along with the other four just like it. I know it’s incredible, but I just walked Sally down at Devil’s Point, and there they were, washed up on the beach."
   "Jesus," was all that she could say.
   Recovering slightly, she asked the most important question, "How much is there?"
   "I don’t know, fancy counting it?"
   The next half hour was dedicated to an impatient time of dressing children, finding mislaid kits, lost shoes, and the bolting of breakfast, to avoid the much dreaded detention that would result if they were late for school. It may seem an impossibility to the uninitiated, but counting money, in the end, can be tiresome, and laborious. There has to be an awful lot of it to achieve that status, but £4,521,375 Stirling definitely falls into that category. It also takes a very long time.
   They counted and double-checked, using a block of paper to mark a stroke for each thousand, then crossing out with the fifth, and working in two columns. They were on the fifth sheet when they reached the magic million. It was obvious that they were not a quarter of the way through, mainly because they hadn’t finished the first bag yet.
   The fifth was just as full, but with more of the tens and fives, and less of the twenties and fifties. This explained the loose change of £21,375 in one of the bags. The other four had exactly four million between them. That is if you count £21,375 as change, and ignore the half a million in fifty-pound notes in a separate bundle in the last bag. That concluded the contents.
   There were no accountancy slips, bank papers or account names, numbers or addresses. It was the most anonymous of fortunes ever to fall into the hands of any finder. Having finished counting and searching the contents of the bags, they now did the most English of things.
   All over the world, anyone else would have been bolting doors, and lifting floorboards to secrete the hoard away. In this household, they had a cup of tea, lit a cigarette, and waited. It was as if they were awaiting instructions. From which source, they had no idea. Perhaps they were waiting for divine guidance. There were very few people in history who had a direct telephone line with God, and none with material instructions, since perhaps Moses was told what to do with the stone tablets.
   Sarah Wilson had filled the kettle and set it on the gas hob. In a few minutes it announced that it was boiling with its doleful wail. It is a noise that serves its function, yet at the same time manages to annoy, and demand immediate attention. She ceremoniously poured a little water into the pot to warm it. She gently swayed the water around, to even the warming. Emptying the contents, the tea spooned into the pot, and freshly boiling water was poured over the tea. In a few minutes they were sipping the refreshing brew, pampering themselves with an extra spoon of sugar each.
   They considered their position, and what they should do about it. Geoffrey repeated the options and the scenarios, with their possible consequences, as he saw them. It was obvious that if the owners of the money came after their property, then there was a possibility, if not a probability, that they would prefer to extract some form of spiteful vengeance. The reward for such an amount, if there was one, and if the money was somehow legitimate, would, he thought, be both substantial and negotiable. Ten per cent would give them half a million nearly. That would mean comfort and security, if not actual wealth, for the rest of their lives. It would certainly be better than unemployment benefit, and a council flat. They even dared to dream of a small yacht, or a world cruise. At least a holiday in the sun every year for sure.
   The bang on the door made them both panic and jump at the same time. At first Geoffrey wanted to send his wife down the stairs to answer the door, while he waited in the kitchen with a lump hammer in hand. Sanity prevailed as they realised that if it was someone who meant no good, a pregnant woman answering the door might not be any incentive to stop at all.
   The strange thing with knocks on doors is that they have personalities of their own. There is the timid tap of the unsure, who probably wants to borrow something; the bold, confident knock of the door-to-door salesman, and the religious sect monger. Then there is the officious rap of the police, debt collectors, and irate neighbours. The second hammering of impatient insistence filled them both with dread.
   Geoffrey crept down the stairs, and called out in a voice that he could not avoid sounding thin, and piping, "Who is it?"
   "Royal Mail, sir," the voice said in a military style clip,
"letter to sign for please."
   Geoff was not in the habit of using the door chain, but was extremely grateful that it was fitted. He was also grateful for the frosted glass in the front door, because he could see the broken image of the postman. More importantly, he recognised the man’s height, build, and grey hair. It was his regular postie.
   The letter was from his family abroad, who always registered their mail, in case it went adrift. He undid the chain, quickly opened the door, looked to see that the postman was indeed for real, and rapidly signed something on the bottom line of the form, which was proffered on a clip board.
   "No, there if you please," he offered the board again, with the pen poised on the required line, next to the right name. He stared daggers at the unfortunate postman, thinking violent and unkind thoughts.
   "Sorry, chief, thanks." He took the letter and shut the door, bolting it and throwing the latch on the Yale. He latched the chain on too, and went upstairs to Sarah.
   "Letter from Mum and Dad."
   "Oh Christ, is that all, I nearly had the baby. What are we going to do with all this lot? It can’t stay here, I will be a nervous wreck by the end of the day."
   He went to the cubby hole and fetched out the step ladders. In the attic, apart from roof insulation, a T.V. aerial, and cobwebs, were the suitcases for going on holiday. They hadn’t been used for nearly four years, and had accumulated old curtains, and blankets, along with other garbage that would ‘come in later.’ He tipped them out onto the rafters, and handed down the cases. There were only just enough to take the money, after he commandeered his old squash bag, to second for the job.
   He hauled them back up into the roof space, one by one, and closed the wooden hatch. He then buried the steps back in the cupboard, so that they looked like they hadn’t been used for a while. He even thought of shaking the vacuum cleaner bag over them for a dusty effect, but thought that was going a little too far.
   Feeling a little safer, they sat to discuss what to do, and still couldn’t make their minds up. Half the problem was that they had never found four and a half million quid on the beach before, and lacked the necessary information for dealing with such matters. The immediate instinct was to cut and run. With a few thousand pounds in his wallet, and a wife and two children in tow, especially with her being pregnant, he figured that he could pass as a tourist, just about anywhere. The point was that to go to the banks, was not a safe thing to do. It was obvious that such an amount of money could not be slipped into a bank account, without at least the tax man being told. The only thing that he could do was to get the money out of the country as soon as possible. He toyed with the idea of going abroad with some of the money, to open an account.
   Leaving his wife with four million plus in the attic, was not a healthy thing to do, for her sake. If anything did happen to her and the children in the two or three days that he would have to be away, he would never forgive himself. No, they were all in together, and safer that way. He decided on Jersey. It was offshore, the currency was Stirling, and lots of people had offshore money there. He was sure that all of it was not as legitimate as the business world officially led the rest of the country to believe, but then he had always been a cynic. He thought of Liechtenstein, but didn’t even know where it is. Switzerland and a numbered account sounded attractive, and so did the Isle of Man.
   Perhaps, after all, it would be better to keep it in bank that he at least knew the name of, and where they spoke English. Jersey, he concluded, was the better gamble. In the circumstances, with his family and luggage, it was also probably the easiest to get to. He only had to phone the local airport to book a flight. The other option was the train to Penzance, and either ferry, or scheduled helicopter flight, direct to the Channel Islands. There were no customs to go through from the mainland, as such, and the Brymon Airways flights were just up the road, literally a short taxi ride away. It was the route out which he thought would attract the least attention. All that remained was to organise the trip. He had to make a few phone calls, to the taxi firm, and the airport. To try to arrange to take the children out of school without attracting too much suspicious attention was the next problem. He thought he could quite successfully invent a lie to pacify the school secretary at least, and their respective teachers could be sold the same line.
   He decided against contacting any of the banks in advance on the island, better do that from a hotel room when they arrived. All in all he thought his wife and children deserved a break. Then he remembered that airlines do not take heavily pregnant women as passengers.
   While he reflected on his situation, he saw all the wrappers which were discarded across the kitchen floor. Thinking it too dangerous to just put them in the bin, in case anybody came to snoop his rubbish, he hid the evidence in the roofspace with the money. That was the least of his worries, and could be dealt with later. Perhaps he would burn it in the garden later that night. The immediate problem was what to do next. He recognised that he was being pestered by two parasites, hurry and indecision, both of which can make a mental wreck of anyone who is prone to worry. What he needed was a plan to stick to, and one which can be carried out in secrecy. If there was a clear run, the he would go for the Channel Islands plan after all.
   The next tap on the door was a much more friendly and appealing rap. It bore no malice at all. When he opened up to see the blue uniform and pointed helmet of a police constable, his depression was instantaneous.