And Thereby Hangs a Tale (23 page)

Within days, Liam had hired a leading
architect from Barcelona, a highly respected surveyor from Madrid and a
well-connected lawyer in Palma, and began to prepare the necessary documents to
ensure that outline planning permission would be granted by the local council.
They divided the land into 360 individual plots that included roads with broad
pavements, street lighting, electricity, drainage and sewerage, an
eighteen-hole golf course, a shopping centre, a cinema, eleven restaurants and
a sports complex. Every home would have its own swimming pool, while some of
the larger plots would even have their ×en werag a×en weraown tennis courts.
But the feature that made the development unique was that whichever house a customer
purchased, from the top of the mountain all the way down to the coast, they were
guaranteed an uninterrupted view of the ocean.

Liam and Pepe both accepted that because of the
huge amount of work involved with the project, it would be years before they
could consider taking on any other commitments.

Liam had a large-scale model of the site built,
and commissioned a documentary film maker to produce a twenty-minute
promotional video entitled Valldemossa Vision. The Allied Irish Bank clearly bought
into this vision, and released an initial two point three million euros to Liam
as a deposit on the land.

It was another year before Liam was ready to
present his outline planning application to the Consell Insular de Mallorca.
When Liam rose to make his speech to the Valldemossa council, every elected
member was seated in his place. He took them slowly through his master plan,
and when his presentation came to an end, he called for questions.

If only to persuade people they haven't
fallen asleep, politicians always have well-prepared questions to hand.
However, Liam's experts had spent hours anticipating each and every question
they were asked, and others that hadn't even been thought of. When Liam finally
sat down, he was greeted by warm applause from both main political parties.

The governor of the Balearics rose to
congratulate Liam and his team on a splendid and imaginative scheme, while the
Mayor of Valldemossa enthusiastically assured his colleagues that the project
would undoubtedly attract wealthy residents, ensuring increased revenue for the
council's coffers for many years to come.

No one was surprised when, six weeks later, the
Consell Insular de Mallorca granted outline planning permission to Casey, Miro
& Co. for its Valldemossa project, which the mayor described to the press
as bold, imaginative and of civic importance. But Pepe had already warned Liam
there was one more hurdle that had to be negotiated before they could return to
the bank and ask for the remaining twenty point seven million euros of their
advance. It was still necessary for the Supreme Court in Madrid to rubber-stamp
the whole project before the first bulldozer would be allowed on the site, and
the court was well known for rejecting projects at the last moment.

Three different sets of lawyers worked night
and day in Madrid, Barcelona and Palma, and nine months later to everyone's
relief the Supreme Court gave its imprimatur.

The following day Liam flew to Dublin, where
even more lawyers were working on the documentation that would allow him to be
able to draw on a rolling fifty-million-euro loan. Building costs only ever go
in one direction.

Within minutes of the ink drying on the
paper, four of the leading construction companies in Europe were driving their
vehicles on to the site, followed by over a thousand workers who were looking
forward to being employed for the next ten years.

Liam had never taken a great deal of
interest in Majorcan politics, and he made a point of not supporting either
main party when it came to the local elections. He made
it a policy to donate exactly the same amount to the campaign funds of both the
major parties so he could continue to deal with whichever one was in power.

Over the years, it had always been a
closerun thing between the Partido Socialista Obrero Espanol and the Partido
Popular, with power changing hands every few years.

But to everyone's surprise, when the
election result was announced from the town hall steps later that year, the
Green Party had captured three seats and, more important, held the balance of
power, as the other two parties were evenly split with twenty-one seats each.
Liam didn't give the result a great deal of thought, even when the Mallorca Daily
Bulletin informed its readers that the Greens would join a coalition with
whichever party was willing to support their ideological aims. The most
important of which, as had been stated in their manifesto, was not to grant any
future planning permission in Valldemossa.

This suited Liam as it would cut out any
further rivals, making his the last project to be approved by the Supreme Court
in Madrid.

But once the resolution had been passed in council,
with the backing of both main parties, the Greens, encouraged by their success,
immediately announced that any projects currently underway should have their planning
permission rescinded. This time Liam was concerned, because his lawyers warned
him that even if the Supreme Court eventually overruled the council's decision,
his project could be held up for years.

'Every day we're not working will cost us money,'
Liam warned Pepe. He realized that if the Greens were able to get either of the
two main parties to support their proposal, he and Pepe would be bankrupt
within weeks.

When the council met to take a vote on the Greens'
resolution, Liam and his team sat nervously in the public gallery waiting to learn
their fate. Passionate speeches were made from all sides of the chamber, and even
after the last councillor had offered his opinion, no one could be sure how the
numbers would fall.

The chief clerk called for the vote, and for
the first time that evening the chamber fell silent. A few minutes later the
Mayor solemnly announced that the Greens' proposal to rescind all current
planning permissions had been carried by twenty-three votes to twenty-two.

Liam had lost all his few bobs in a few minutes.

Every one of his workers immediately
deserted the site. Unfinished houses were left without doors or windows, cranes
stood unmanned and expensive equipment and materials were left to rust. By the
time Liam recalled his late father's wise advice, it was too late to turn the
clock back.

The company's lawyers recommended an appeal.
Liam reluctantly agreed, although, as they had pointed out to him, even if they
were eventually able to overturn the council's decision, by then years would
have passed and any possible profit would have been swallowed up by interest
payments alone, not to mention lawyers' fees.

The Allied Irish Bank quickly responded to the
news from Valldemossa by placing an immediate stop order on all Liam's
accounts.

They also issued a directive instructing
Casey, Miro & Co, and any of its associates, to repay the outstanding the thirty-seven million-euro
loan at the first possible opportunity, although it must have known that neither
Liam nor Pepe could any longer afford the airfare to Dublin.

Liam informed the bank that he intended to appeal
against the council's decision, but he knew, and so did they, that even if he
won, they still would have lost everything by the time the Supreme Court
reached its verdict.

An appeal date was set for the Supreme Court
of Madrid to sit in judgement on the Valldemossa project, but before then Liam and
Pepe had been forced to sell their homes, as well as what was left of the company's
assets, to pay lawyers' bills on both sides of the Irish Sea.

Liam returned to the Flanagan Arms for the first
time in twenty-three years.

When Liam and Pepe appeared before the Supreme
Court two years later, the senior panel judge expressed considerable sympathy
for Mr Casey and Mr Miro, as they had invested ten years of hard work, as well
as their personal fortunes, in a project that both the Valldemossa council and
the Supreme Court had considered to be bold, imaginative and of civic
importance. However, the court did not have the authority to overturn the decision
of an elected council, even when it was retrospective. Liam bowed his head.

'Nevertheless,' the judge continued, 'this court
does have the authority to award compensation in full to the appellants, who
carried out their business in good faith, and fulfilled every obligation
required of them by the Valldemossa council. With that in mind, this court will
appoint an independent arbitrator to assess the costs Mr Casey and Mr Miro have
incurred, which will include any projected losses.'

As Spaniards were involved, it was another year
before the arbitrator presented his findings to the Supreme Court, which
necessitated a further six months of making some minor adjustments to the costs
so that no one would be in any doubt about how seriously the court had taken their
responsibilities.

The day after the senior judge announced the
court's findings, El Pais suggested in its leader that the size of the award
was a warning to all politicians not to consider making retrospective
legislation in the future.

The Valldemossa Council was ordered to pay 121
million euros in compensation to Mr Liam Casey, Mr Pepe Miro and their associates.

At the local council election held six
months later, the Green Party lost all three of its seats by overwhelming
majorities.

Pepe took over the business in Majorca, while
Liam retired to Cork, where he purchased a castle with a hundred acres of land.

He tells me he has no intention of seeking planning
permission, even for an outhouse.

POSTSCRIPT

Observant readers who have followed the timescale
during which this story took place might feel that even if the Green Party had failed
to overturn Liam and Pepe's planning permission, they would have gone
bankrupt anyway following the sudden downturn in the
world's economy, and without being paid any compensation. But, as I said at the
outset, no one would believe this tale unless they were told that an Irishman
was involved.

'Never judge a book by its cover,'
Arnold's mother always used to tell him.

Despite this piece of sage advice, Arnold
took against the man the moment he set eyes on him. The bank had taught him to
be cautious when it came to dealing with potential customers. You can have nine
successes out of ten and then one failure can ruin your balance sheet, as
Arnold had found to his cost soon after he had joined the bank; he was still
convinced that was why his promotion had been held up for so long.

Arnold Pennyworthy -- he was fed up with
being told by all and sundry, That's an appropriate name for a banker -- had
been deputy manager of the Vauxhall branch of the bank for the past ten years,
but had recently been offered the chance to move to Bury St Edmunds as
branch manager. Bury St Edmunds might have been one of the bank's smaller
branches, but Arnold felt that if he could make a fist of it, he still had one
more promotion left in him. In any case, he couldn't wait to get out of London,
which seemed to him to have been over-run by foreigners who had changed the
whole character of the city.

When Arnold's wife had left him without
giving a reason -- at least, that's what he told his mother -- he had moved into
Arcadia Mansions, a large block of flats which he liked to refer to as
apartments. The rent was extor-tionate, but at least there was a hall porter.

'It gives the right impression whenever
anyone visits me,' Arnold told his mother. Not that he had many visitors since
his wife had walked out on him. Arcadia Mansions also had the advantage of
being within walking distance of the bank, so the extra money he paid out on
rent he clawed back on bus and train fares. The only real disadvantage was that
the Victoria line ran directly below the building, so the only time you could
be guaranteed any peace was between twelve-thirty and five-thirty in the
morning.

The first time Arnold caught sight of his
new neighbour was when they found themselves sharing a lift down to the ground
floor.

Arnold waited for him to speak, but he didn't
even say good morning. Arnold wondered if the man even spoke English. He stood
back to take a closer look at the most recent arrival. The man was a little shorter
than Arnold, around five feet seven inches, solidly built but not overweight,
with a square jaw and what Arnold later described to his mother as soulless
eyes. His skin was dark, but not black, so Arnold couldn't be sure where he was
from. The unkempt beard reminded him of another of his mother's homilies: 'Never
trust a man with a beard. He's probably hiding something.'

Arnold decided to have a word with the
porter. Dennis was the fount of all knowledge when it came to what took place
in Arcadia Mansions and was certain to know all about the man. When the lift
doors opened, Arnold stood back to allow the new resident to get out first. He
waited until the man had left the building before strolling
across to join Dennis at the reception desk.

'What do we know about him?' asked Arnold, nodding
at the man as he disappeared into a black cab.

'Not a lot,' admitted Dennis. 'He's taken a short-term
lease and says he won't be with us for long. But he did warn me that he'd be having
visitors from time to time.'