There’s a reason why I am reluctant to give money to a lot of charities.
Quite often when you see them on TV, or in the papers, it’s usually someone very familiar to you, a movie star, or a TV star, a person people would respect, making a pitch for donations.
These people are usually very well paid for their services, with all manner of perks.
So, in reality, for every dollar you give, a large percentage goes into this person’s pocket, another large slice for the administration, and in the end, the people who are supposed to get it, get nothing.
You could argue without them there would be nothing anyway.
On the other hand, a lot of famous people do donate their time, and help raise funds that mostly go to those who need it. I give to those.
What I would like to know is what motivates these people.
Enough pontificating.
Our girl gets to go with her boy to the charity to help, firstly to peel potatoes, then to hand out food to the needy. It’s an experience that brings her to tears.
It doesn’t help that it is the reductions and downsizing in her father’s company that put the people she is serving in their situation.
I called Juliet and then got Cecelia to run interference while I left the hotel. No point in having unwanted guests when I was talking to her.
We met at a café not far from the small hotel the three women were staying at. I was reminded when I saw her approaching on foot, that she was still as attractive as she had been before her troubles, and there could have been something between us if the circumstances were different.
There was no furtiveness about her movements as if she didn’t have a care in the world. And that for a woman who had already had one attempt on her life, was odd. To me at least.
I waited until she had seen me before I ordered coffee and cake.
When she sat, I waited until she was comfortable, then, with just a small hint of annoyance in my tone, said, “For a person whose life might be in danger, you don’t seem to care.”
“Not if they don’t know where we are.”
“Do you believe that? The place where the inheritance documents are going to be signed, a fact everyone seems to know. I was followed here, as far as Pompei, but they will know exactly when I was going. In fact, I was just speaking with another person who was following me, and I brought her with me. She was very interested to know you were in Sorrento.”
The look of smugness disappeared. “Are you mad?”
“No. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. I know where she is, and I also have leverage if her friends turn up. As far as I’m aware she works for investigators hired by the Burkehardt’s to locate the countess. They know about you, though, so jauntily running around town may get you kidnapped or killed, or both.”
“Then why should I worry when you said you were here to protect me.”
“That was before I knew what I know now. Have you got anything to tell me that would be useful to know before the shooting starts.”
There was now fear in place of smugness. If she didn’t think she was a real target, now she did. But the question had to be, was she really the daughter of the count, or someone else. A photo of her in the gardens of the Count’s residence meant very little. The fact the count had told people he had an illegitimate daughter didn’t mean Juliet was that daughter.
People kept telling me she was, but were they trying too hard to push what could be a lie. It bothered me that I hadn’t spent enough time to find the truth myself.
The coffee and cake arrived.
So had a suspicious man who had so far made three circuits of the block, walking a dog. If her was surveillance, he was going to extra mile to make himself fit into the landscape. There were three others walking dogs.
“What could I tell you?”
“Tell me about your mother Vittoria?”
“I have vague memories of her when I was little, then a few more when I was a teenager, and we went to Italy. Like any young girl, I was in awe of the surroundings. Having not seen her for a long time, I was surprised when she turned up on my doorstep. There was no mention of a fortune in the beginning, and I was happy to see her.”
‘Now you’re not so sure?”
“You’re here, and when you arrive, trouble follows. Very bad trouble.”
“I didn’t ask Larry to involve you in any business between him and I. That was on Larry, and not he’s paid the ultimate price. I didn’t kill him, by the way, someone else did that. That’s why I ask. If Vittoria is another of those strange business partners of yours that had some hold over you, best to tell me now, and I’ll deal with it.”
“Do you think you have a legitimate claim on the Count’s estate?”
“Based on the birth certificate, and what I’m told, yes.”
“Birth certificates can be forged, and people tell lies to further their own ends. Has your so-called mother asked you to negotiate a deal in which you will forsake any claim on the estate for a princely sum, say a million euros?”
She didn’t have to. Rule number one in an inheritance scam. Make it real enough so the real heirs can see competition, and then make a demand that’s not too outrageous that they will settle. And quickly before they have time to scrutinise the proof.
A what if had just come into my head. Do a deal with the fake Countess, verify her identity, renege any rights to the estate, and in turn when the fake countess gets the inheritance, get the payout promised. Win-win-win. Who better to verify the countess’s identity than her biggest rival?
“If only that were true, Evan. I’d be rich for the first time in my life. But we both know that will never happen. For the record, I’m not interested in the inheritance. That’s my mother’s issue. She says she was treated badly, but she got a lot of money from the count for my upkeep. I don’t want to be in the middle of this, but what choice do I have?”
I shrugged. She had choices but kept making bad ones.
“Well, just keep a low profile until I come and get the three of you, and we go to the signing. You might want to tell the countess there are three separate parties looking for her.”
“Are you not coming to protect us in person. Or your friend?”
“No. I don’t want to be killed in the crossfire. Stay where you are, we are the only five who know exactly where you are. Don’t tell anyone and you’ll be safe.”
And if she knew the countess staying with them wasn’t the real countess, she did a very good job of hiding it.
Instead of making a grand entrance, arriving in style and being greeted by important dignitaries, we are slinking in via an airplane, late at night. It’s hardly the entrance I’d envisaged. At 9:56 the plane touches down on the runway. Outside the plane, it is dark and gloomy and from what I could see, it had been raining. That could, of course, simply be condensation.
Once on the ground, everyone was frantically gathering together everything from seat pockets and sending pillows and blankets to the floor. A few were turning their mobile phones back on, and checking for a signal, and, perhaps, looking for messages sent to them during the last 12 hours. Or perhaps they were just suffering from mobile phone deprivation.
It took 10 minutes for the plane to arrive at the gate. That’s when everyone moves into overdrive, unbuckling belts, some before the seatbelt sign goes off, and are first out of their seats and into the overhead lockers. Most are not taking care that their luggage may have moved, but fortunately, no bags fall out onto someone’s head. The flight had been relatively turbulent free.
When as many people and bags have squeezed into that impossibly small aisle space, we wait for the door to open, and then the privileged few business and first-class passengers to depart before we can begin to leave. As we are somewhere near the middle of the plane, our wait will not be as long as it usually is. This time we avoided being at the back of the plane. Perhaps that privilege awaits us on the return trip.
Once off the plane, it is a matter of following the signs, some of which are not as clear as they could be. It’s why it took another 30 odd minutes to get through immigration, but that was not necessarily without a few hiccups along the way. We got sidetracked at the fingerprint machines, which seemed to have a problem if your fingers were not straight, not in the center of the glass, and then if it was generally cranky, which ours were, continue to tell you to try again, and again, and again, and again…That took 10 to 15 minutes before we joined an incredibly long queue of other arrivals,
A glance at the time, and suddenly it’s nearly an hour from the moment we left the plane.
And…
That’s when we got to the immigration officer, and it became apparent we were going to have to do the fingerprints yet again. Fortunately this time, it didn’t take as long. Once that done, we collected our bags, cleared customs by putting our bags through a huge x-ray machine, and it was off to find our tour guide.
We found several tour guides with their trip-a-deal flags waiting for us to come out of the arrivals hall. It wasn’t a difficult process in the end. We were in the blue group. Other people we had met on the plane were in the red group or the yellow group. The tour guide found, or as it turned out she found us, it was simply a matter of waiting for the rest of the group, of which there were eventually 28.Gathered together we were told we would be taking the bags to one place and then ourselves to the bus in another. A glance in the direction of the bus park, there were a lot of busses.
Here’s a thought, imagine being told your bus is the white one with blue writing on the side.
Yes, yours is, and 25 others because all of the tourist coaches are the same. An early reminder, so that you do not get lost, or, God forbid, get on the wrong bus, for the three days in Beijing, is to get the last five numbers of the bus registration plate and commit them to memory. It’s important. Failing that, the guide’s name is in the front passenger window.
Also, don’t be alarmed if your baggage goes in one direction, and you go in another. In a rather peculiar set up the bags are taken to the hotel by what the guide called the baggage porter. It is an opportunity to see how baggage handlers treat your luggage; much better than the airlines it appears.
That said, if you’re staying at the Beijing Friendship Hotel, be prepared for a long drive from the airport. It took us nearly an hour, and bear in mind that it was very late on a Sunday night.
Climbing out of the bus after what seemed a convoluted drive through a park with buildings, we arrive at the building that will be our hotel for the next three days. From the outside, it looks quite good, and once inside the foyer, that first impression is good. Lots of space, marble, and glass. If you are not already exhausted by the time you arrive, the next task is to get your room key, find your bags, get to your room, and try to get to be ready the next morning at a reasonable hour.
Sorry, that boat has sailed.
We were lucky, we were told, that our plane arrived on time, and we still arrived at the hotel at 12:52. Imagine if the incoming plane is late.
This was taken the following morning. It didn’t look half as bland late at night.
This is the back entrance to Building No 4 but is quite representative of the whole foyer, made completely of marble and glass. It all looked very impressive under the artificial lights, but not so much in the cold hard light of early morning.
This the foyer of the floor our room was on. Marble with interesting carpet designs. Those first impressions of it being a plush hotel were slowly dissipating as we got nearer and nearer to the room. From the elevator, it was a long, long walk.
So…Did I tell you about the bathroom in our room?
The shower and the toilet both share the same space with no divide and the shower curtain doesn’t reach to the floor. Water pressure is phenomenal. Having a shower floods the whole shower plus toilet area so when you go to the toilet you’re basically underwater.
Don’t leave your book or magazine on the floor or it will end up a watery mess.
And the water pressure is so hard that it could cut you in half. Only a small turn of the tap is required to get that tingling sensation going.
Most people think the life of a ‘problem solver’ is simply staying in the best hotels, and virtually going on an expensive all-expenses paid holiday, with a little work on the side.
They’d be wrong.
No first-class hotels, no living in the lap of luxury, just a hard slog, sometimes without result, sometimes ending up in a hospital, or in detention in a country where you really don’t want to be in detention.
And definitely no sightseeing.
So, in his place, we will take in the sights, like:
The Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, Checkpoint Charlie, Tiergarten and Hitler’s Bunker
Just to name a few.
Of course, there is the Stasi records office where our main character spends time researching various people.
Then, there are the beer halls, like then Hofbräuhaus München Berlin, and Alexanderplatz, accessible via the U-Bahn, and a station that was partially closed off during the division of Berlin, up until 1990.
But, after a week David is getting restless, and it’s time to go home. Fortunately, or otherwise, Susan is coming to join him as she has decided it’s time for them to present him to the world at large, and back into her life.
But as always there’s a problem lurking, and maybe even an unexpected visit from …
Instead of making a grand entrance, arriving in style and being greeted by important dignitaries, we are slinking in via an airplane, late at night. It’s hardly the entrance I’d envisaged. At 9:56 the plane touches down on the runway. Outside the plane, it is dark and gloomy and from what I could see, it had been raining. That could, of course, simply be condensation.
Once on the ground, everyone was frantically gathering together everything from seat pockets and sending pillows and blankets to the floor. A few were turning their mobile phones back on, and checking for a signal, and, perhaps, looking for messages sent to them during the last 12 hours. Or perhaps they were just suffering from mobile phone deprivation.
It took 10 minutes for the plane to arrive at the gate. That’s when everyone moves into overdrive, unbuckling belts, some before the seatbelt sign goes off, and are first out of their seats and into the overhead lockers. Most are not taking care that their luggage may have moved, but fortunately, no bags fall out onto someone’s head. The flight had been relatively turbulent free.
When as many people and bags have squeezed into that impossibly small aisle space, we wait for the door to open, and then the privileged few business and first-class passengers to depart before we can begin to leave. As we are somewhere near the middle of the plane, our wait will not be as long as it usually is. This time we avoided being at the back of the plane. Perhaps that privilege awaits us on the return trip.
Once off the plane, it is a matter of following the signs, some of which are not as clear as they could be. It’s why it took another 30 odd minutes to get through immigration, but that was not necessarily without a few hiccups along the way. We got sidetracked at the fingerprint machines, which seemed to have a problem if your fingers were not straight, not in the center of the glass, and then if it was generally cranky, which ours were, continue to tell you to try again, and again, and again, and again…That took 10 to 15 minutes before we joined an incredibly long queue of other arrivals,
A glance at the time, and suddenly it’s nearly an hour from the moment we left the plane.
And…
That’s when we got to the immigration officer, and it became apparent we were going to have to do the fingerprints yet again. Fortunately this time, it didn’t take as long. Once that done, we collected our bags, cleared customs by putting our bags through a huge x-ray machine, and it was off to find our tour guide.
We found several tour guides with their trip-a-deal flags waiting for us to come out of the arrivals hall. It wasn’t a difficult process in the end. We were in the blue group. Other people we had met on the plane were in the red group or the yellow group. The tour guide found, or as it turned out she found us, it was simply a matter of waiting for the rest of the group, of which there were eventually 28.Gathered together we were told we would be taking the bags to one place and then ourselves to the bus in another. A glance in the direction of the bus park, there were a lot of busses.
Here’s a thought, imagine being told your bus is the white one with blue writing on the side.
Yes, yours is, and 25 others because all of the tourist coaches are the same. An early reminder, so that you do not get lost, or, God forbid, get on the wrong bus, for the three days in Beijing, is to get the last five numbers of the bus registration plate and commit them to memory. It’s important. Failing that, the guide’s name is in the front passenger window.
Also, don’t be alarmed if your baggage goes in one direction, and you go in another. In a rather peculiar set up the bags are taken to the hotel by what the guide called the baggage porter. It is an opportunity to see how baggage handlers treat your luggage; much better than the airlines it appears.
That said, if you’re staying at the Beijing Friendship Hotel, be prepared for a long drive from the airport. It took us nearly an hour, and bear in mind that it was very late on a Sunday night.
Climbing out of the bus after what seemed a convoluted drive through a park with buildings, we arrive at the building that will be our hotel for the next three days. From the outside, it looks quite good, and once inside the foyer, that first impression is good. Lots of space, marble, and glass. If you are not already exhausted by the time you arrive, the next task is to get your room key, find your bags, get to your room, and try to get to be ready the next morning at a reasonable hour.
Sorry, that boat has sailed.
We were lucky, we were told, that our plane arrived on time, and we still arrived at the hotel at 12:52. Imagine if the incoming plane is late.
This was taken the following morning. It didn’t look half as bland late at night.
This is the back entrance to Building No 4 but is quite representative of the whole foyer, made completely of marble and glass. It all looked very impressive under the artificial lights, but not so much in the cold hard light of early morning.
This the foyer of the floor our room was on. Marble with interesting carpet designs. Those first impressions of it being a plush hotel were slowly dissipating as we got nearer and nearer to the room. From the elevator, it was a long, long walk.
So…Did I tell you about the bathroom in our room?
The shower and the toilet both share the same space with no divide and the shower curtain doesn’t reach to the floor. Water pressure is phenomenal. Having a shower floods the whole shower plus toilet area so when you go to the toilet you’re basically underwater.
Don’t leave your book or magazine on the floor or it will end up a watery mess.
And the water pressure is so hard that it could cut you in half. Only a small turn of the tap is required to get that tingling sensation going.
You know how it is when you’re working away, an idea comes to you, but the problem is, it cannot come out of nowhere.
There has to be a previous reference to it so that when the reader gets to that point in the story, they can say, oh, yes, I read about that two chapters back, and that was what it was about…
So, back I go, in my time machine and re-write history.
Just to be clear, I didn’t write myself out of existence, which I often wonder in these shows on TV where you can go back, that they do not alter their own timelines.
Of course, I keep forgetting when we watch these shows we’re supposed to suspend belief for the hour. If we could do that in reality, how many of us would make the same mistake, or create a whole new timeline?
We didn’t have to wait that long to see what our tail did, he simply sped up and drove off, perhaps satisfied he had been made, and knew we were going to ditch him before we got to our eventual destination.
It would be hard for him to guess where we were going, so that meant that he would arrange for someone to pick us up as we came into the city, or after.
After all, he knew what car I was travelling in, and he knew what we looked like. Which is why we stopped briefly in Naples and changed cars and clothes.
Then, by a quirk of fate, we saw him again, parked on the side of the road, near Pompei, waiting. He had been hidden behind several trucks, but at the last minute on of the trucks moved, and I saw the car.
And there he sat, not assuming we would be smart enough to change cars. What was it Rodby said from time to time? Good help is hard to find.
I had no doubt the moment he reported in, that other arrangements were not already underway. If they were smart, they’d know what my destination was, the home of the Burkehardt’s up in the hills that overlooked the Mediterranean, with billion-dollar views, nestled in among the exclusive and very expensive resorts.
Cecelia had booked on and it was where she had been relaxing in what time she had away from surveillance. She was at the hotel when I called, and we arrived there a half hour later.
I’d already forewarned her about my new shadow.
She met us down in the foyer, gave Francesca her ‘don’t mess with me, or else’ scowl, and then took us up to the room. It was amazing, and I would probably never be able to afford to stay in a room, or place, like it if I had to pay for it myself.
Francesca was suitably impressed. “How much had you got on your expense account. I can barely buy a sandwich with mine.”
“Normally we don’t either, but this is a ‘by all means available’ mission.”
She gave me a blank look, and I didn’t have the time or inclination to explain it to her. We would not be seeing her again after this.
“I trust your charges are behaving themselves selves and remaining anonymous,” I asked her, after sitting down with a bottle of wine and three glasses, and we’d all taken a separate chair each.
“No. You didn’t expect them to stay in the room, despite the fact someone is trying to kill them. I’m not their nursemaid. They want to get killed they can.”
I frowned at her. We were supposed to be keeping them alive. I suppose learning they were fakes didn’t help. Vittoria and Juliet weren’t, or at least I hope they weren’t, but the jury was still out on that.
I was going back to see them after I spoke to the Burkehardt matriarch. Or maybe I would talk to Juliet again. I couldn’t believe that everything I did seemed to involve her, and I was hoping the universe wasn’t trying to tell me something.
“Who are these people again,” Francesca asked.
“Didn’t you tell her?” Cecelia looked at me.
“No. Relevance?”
“None,” she looked at Francesca. “A woman called Vittoria who was a maid at the house I’ve been watching for that last day or so and her daughter Juliet are supposed to be keeping a low profile. It appears Juliet might be another direct descendant of the Count’s. I’m surprised your employers didn’t tell you of her?”
“They mentioned the possibility of another heir. They just didn’t know who or where she was. She’s here, you say?”
“Yes. I hope they’re safe, and, no, we’re not telling you where they are. Not until we know your employers, whom I’m assuming are the Burkehardt’s, are not trying to kill her.”
“I assure you that neither am I, and I work for the investigations company, not the Burkehardt’s. I can only take orders from my boss. He was very clear about that.”
“Good. I’d hate to have to shoot you because you lied.”
I could see she meant what she said. I hoped Francesca did too. She seemed to brush that threat aside.
“What about the countess?”
“That’s the bigger question, where is she? We’d like to know so if you have any ideas, please share. For this dynamic to work, you must be willing to share information. It’s not going to be a one-way street.”
“So, you don’t know where the countess is?”
Cecelia looked at me.
“Inquisitive little bugger, isn’t she? Don’t make it so obvious you want to know. Didn’t your boss tell you; that you must be subtle when approaching people like us, people with more experience, and less of a conscience.
Francesca looked at me.
“Don’t think I won’t stop you if you get in the way. You can stay while it is useful to us, but don’t ask questions you know we’re not going to give you answers for.”
“Then I’ll assume you don’t know where she is, other than most likely in Sorrento, waiting for the meeting.”
Most people think the life of a ‘problem solver’ is simply staying in the best hotels, and virtually going on an expensive all-expenses paid holiday, with a little work on the side.
They’d be wrong.
No first-class hotels, no living in the lap of luxury, just a hard slog, sometimes without result, sometimes ending up in a hospital, or in detention in a country where you really don’t want to be in detention.
And definitely no sightseeing.
So, in his place, we will take in the sights, like:
The Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, Checkpoint Charlie, Tiergarten and Hitler’s Bunker
Just to name a few.
Of course, there is the Stasi records office where our main character spends time researching various people.
Then, there are the beer halls, like then Hofbräuhaus München Berlin, and Alexanderplatz, accessible via the U-Bahn, and a station that was partially closed off during the division of Berlin, up until 1990.
But, after a week David is getting restless, and it’s time to go home. Fortunately, or otherwise, Susan is coming to join him as she has decided it’s time for them to present him to the world at large, and back into her life.
But as always there’s a problem lurking, and maybe even an unexpected visit from …
It’s a fact of life that over time people change. Yes, they do keep some of their original characteristics, but a lot of people sometimes wake up, forty years later, and wonder who it is that they are in bed with.
It hasn’t happened to me yet, but the person I married has changed.
We all do.
External influences like workplaces, friends, enemies, attitudes, and even children, all have an influence on who we become. I personally have no idea where the 18-year-old version of me has gone, not that I remember much of him.
So it goes for our hero, David. He has an inkling of who Susan is or was, but so much has changed for her. Her mother is dead, she had been held captive by a madman, drugged and tortured, it would have to affect anyone.
But, then, there are different nuances, so un Susan-like. Little changes he knows she might not partake in, and it is these that start him wondering, what if…
Firstly, she cuts short a planned reunion away in Italy, time for them to reconnect. Yes, she is now head of the family business, yes, she is hanging out with new men in her life, and no, it seems he does not fit into her corporate persona.
Going to volunteer at a charity is not the place to be wearing shoes that are more expensive than the daily food budget. This is the task our boy is given, to take her with him as another volunteer.
Of course, how to break that news to a girl whose old clothes are probably more expensive than his car.
He goes to pick her up and there he discovers just what the work staff think of him. Not the sort of people they expect at Daddy’s company. Emily comes to his rescue.
Then there is convincing her he was not going to be able to take her in $5,000 Gucci dresses and Prada shoes. They were going to Walmart, a different type of shopping spree.
Of course, that’s not without its problems, the staff are members of the school she used to go to and people she tormented and treated badly. People seem to have long memories.
If only life was simpler.
That hurdle negotiated, more by luck than good fortune, they move to the next.
Our boy takes her home to his place, and when you live in a castle, literally, well…
Thrills, Spills, and just a dash of Romance 