The next couple of weeks of our lives were frenetic. We signed the offer to purchase the penthouse the day after Toyota delivered Tony’s Cressida. The developer accepted our offer, as negotiated by Rhonda and then we had to go shopping for furniture. This was a lot more stressful than you’d think. Rhonda had good contacts though and we ended up accepting a quote from one of her recommended interior decorators, Diane Pendleton. She furnished our new home with stylish, modern but timeless pieces. That was one part of the process.
The other thing we decided to do was invest in some wall art. This got tricky. Some of the prices we were shown for pieces we liked were eye watering. None of the artists were dead so to my untrained mind where it comes to art, what they were asking couldn’t be justified. Jessie and I did have different tastes in this department, but we agreed that if we were going to put expensive pieces on our walls we would both have to approve them.
Another of Rhonda’s contacts was an attorney named Dennis Mahoney who’s firm was dealing with the conveyancing of the property on our behalf. He’d been an attorney for forty years so he had a few tricks up his sleeve when it came to setting things up for people. What he did for us was create a Trust that was the legal entity holding title on the penthouse. There was a whole lot of technical stuff in that regard that I tried hard to grasp, but eventually I got a second opinion from one of my former boss Verne Brown’s legal acquaintances and he assured me that everything was above board. The property could never be lost if either Jessie or I experienced any financial crises that might eradicate our respective fortunes. Or if we decided that we couldn’t live together anymore for whatever reason. I retained Dennis as an advisor and attorney for my property investment company that he also set up for me.
Getting ready for the big move in consumed most of our time. Jessie spent alternate nights at my place and hers. Tony’s outlook on life was improving too. He took up fishing, often driving up or down the coast to find the ideal spots to cast his line. He also started going to gym, which really surprised both Jessie and I.
“Do you think he’s seeing somebody?” Jessie asked me one night as we were lying in bed.
“Dunno. Has he said anything about anyone?”
“If he has and I didn’t hear it’s probably because I am so busy with the penthouse stuff.” she said.
“Would it be a terrible thing if he was seeing somebody?” I asked. “I mean, how long has your mother been gone for?”
“It’s been almost two years.” she said and then sat bolt upright. “And you know, she hasn’t even once tried to get in touch with me since our big news story broke. I just don’t know where she might be.”
“You could hire an investigator to track her down, if you wanted.” I said.
“Like a Magnum PI?”
“Well, hopefully not like him but there are agencies who deal with this sort of thing. We used to use them in the bank all the time to track down debtors who had absconded.”
She lay back down, not saying anything, her hands folded on her chest.
“I don’t know if I ever want to see her again, to be honest.”
I didn’t know how to respond. I loved my parents both equally and couldn’t imagine what it must be like to have a bad relationship with either of them. Just the week before I had paid off their mortgage to much protesting but ultimately their delight. My Mom cooked us dinner that night and it warmed my heart to see her and Jessie getting along like a house on fire. They hit it off and it wasn’t long before they were off on shopping trips together.
I kissed her goodnight and said, “I’m sure your heart will tell you what you need to do, Love.”
We took delivery of our BMW’s in the last month of May and we were allowed to park them at The Sentinel, even though we hadn’t officially moved in yet. We had two underground double lock up garages, which was twice the number any of the other flats in the building had. We stood there looking at them gleaming under the fluorescent light the day they arrived. Apart from the colours they were identical, although Jessie had opted for an automatic transmission instead of manual.
“What should we name them?” she asked, leaning in on me, one arm on my shoulder.
“Hmmm… now that’s a perplexing question.” I said. “I’m going to have to think about that.”
“What about Bonnie and Clyde? After all, we robbed the casino of a few million.” she laughed.
“That seems entirely appropriate! High five, Babe!” we both giggled as our palms slapped together so hard it sounded like a small fire cracker had been let off in the echoey basement.
And so it came to pass that our cars were affectionately named after two notorious American criminals. We caught a taxi back to my place and began planning our own move in to The Sentinel.
Transfer was only expected to happen at the end of July, but we were itching to get in there beforehand, so we negotiated an occupation date with the developer for the first week of June. We’d be paying them pro rata rental until our recently created Trust became the official owner of the property.
Diane and Jessie set about moving in all the furnishings, beds and kitchen things we’d bought through the Trust. I set about finding myself an office space where I could establish my property company. Rhonda came to the rescue again and found me a place one street over from The Sentinel. It didn’t have a sea view, but that was what the penthouse was for. I was there do do work, not gaze endlessly at the ocean.
It wasn’t a huge space, but it was big enough for what I had in mind. I had my own private office and there would be an open plan area that could accommodate about five or six desks where I would have employees running the day-to-day business of invoicing tenants, collecting rentals, paying bills and doing all the other things that property tycoons would need to have done. At first it was just me and a solitary desk in the space, but when I looked out at the open plan section from my mahogany desk I could imagine the room buzzing with activity as I set about establishing my tycoondom.
Dennis Mahoney had laughed at me when I came up with my company name: Bandit Investments, so named after the gaming machine that had changed everything in an instant.
“I don’t know if that’s a great choice of name, but it’s certainly amusing.” he said as we clinked whisky glasses in celebration of the formation of the company one Friday night. He had invited me to his gentlemen’s club where we imbibed single malt and played snooker on a full sized billiards table. No women were allowed there and I had to wear a suit, which made me feel like I was back at the bank.
Dennis was an old master of the universe. He knew all sorts of interesting things about business, human nature and mostly about the laws that governed commerce in our country. He could pick out a shyster a mile away, he said to me as he lined up the cue ball with another red ball and dropped it in the corner pocket. He was also a master billiards player it seemed because he was kicking my arse something awful. I’d only ever played on a full size table once before when I was a young teenager and could barely get the ball to travel from one end of the table to the other.
“Daniel, you’ve been given an extraordinary head start in life with your good fortune but I am most pleased to see that you haven’t let it go to your head or done anything exceedingly stupid with the money. Thus far.” he said as he waited for me to make my next embarrassing shot on the billiards table. “Most people your age would be burning through the capital at a rate of knots. I’ve seen it happen with some of my clients’ children. Quite tragic when they extinguish vast inheritances in a matter of months.”
“I come from sensible parents, Sir.”
“Please call me Dennis.” he said, grinning. “Anybody who gifts me easy shots like this next one is not a foe who needs to stand on decorum.” I laughed as he continued to rack up maximum points and clear the table.
“Thanks Dennis. Do you have children?”
“Mary and I had twin boys that we sadly lost shortly after the war. Medical supplies were in short supply then and they were prematurely born, so their chances of surviving were slender at best.”
“I’m very sorry to hear that, Dennis. It must have been devastating for you.” I said.
“It wasn’t easy on us, but who are we to question God’s motives?” He stood up tall as the last ball on the table disappeared into a pocket. He took a big sip of his single malt. “The Lord has blessed me with many things in life, but children weren’t among them.”
I liked Dennis Mahoney a lot. He was old enough to be my grandfather and we were simpatico from the get go. He and his wife Mary lived in a mansion up in the hills surrounding the city. She kept herself busy with charity work and Dennis was the founder and senior partner of his law firm, Mahoney & Co. He was never going to retire, he told me. Things would fall apart if he did. His partners, while learned and skilled lawyers themselves, didn’t have the vision or people skills that were necessary to foster long lasting relationships in business. They were always only after the quick money.
“If you carry on with your plans you will become an even wealthier man than you already are.” he said as we sat down to dinner in the grand dining hall of the club. “But you must never let money become your master. Find the balance between work and play and try to maintain it for as long as you can. You never know when your life is going to end and what good will it do you to put yourself so tightly against the grindstone that you never get to enjoy the fruits of your labour should that last day come sooner than expected.”
This was sage advice, probably undeserved in my case, but I sensed that Dennis had taken a shine to me and his wisdom wanted to hit the mark in at least one young person within his sphere of influence. I might be that one person. I had an important question I wanted to ask him.
“Dennis, what would you say to somebody like me where it comes to matters of the heart? I really love Jessie and want to marry her, but I wonder if it’s too soon to ask, given everything that’s happened to us in such a short space of time. Am I rushing into things too quickly?”
He chuckled and put up his hand to summon the waiter to replenish our drinks.
“Well now, things with the fairer sex are very different today to what they were when Mary and I hitched ourselves to the same wagon. My feeling is that you need to examine the motivations of your heart, as well as the heart of your intended life partner. Do you both want the same things in life? What do you share in common? Will she abandon you for another man if she gets bored with you (which is a trap women seem to be able to fall into easily these days if they are not being constantly engaged by their husbands).”
The waiter brought the fresh whisky glasses, ice cubes clinking cheerfully and placed them on the table.
“My advice would be to take it easy at first, live together for a year and watch what she does, what interests her. Get involved with the things she likes to do. If she’s ever going to be stolen away from you it’s going to become evident within that first year, perhaps beyond it. Love is not an exact science, Daniel. I have had clients divorce after being together for many, many years. You can’t always predict the future, but you can protect yourself against it by taking precautions at the beginning of a relationship that results in nuptials. I’m speaking of legal things here, of course.” He took another big sip of the whisky and smiled.
“But if you love her and you don’t want to lose her, there’s nothing wrong with popping the question, getting an answer and sealing the deal with an ice cube that doesn’t melt. Marriage dates don’t have to be the day after you propose, you know.” He smiled again.
I had the answer I wanted.
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