Trail of Greed: Fighting Fraud and Corruption... A Dangerous Game (13 page)

I called Pierre in the afternoon to see how he was getting on. He was on target and hoped to have some results for us the next day. We discussed the idea of trying to contact some of the people on the list and getting them to email the company with requests for information. We’d go for about twenty and see what happened when twenty emails hit Purdy’s desk on Monday morning.

Pierre, excitable Frenchman that he was, was all for it. I could almost hear him rubbing his hands with glee at the end of the phone. I was a little bit more reluctant but eventually agreed that I would get on the phone that afternoon and see if I could organize something.

Looking at the list I selected twenty names who, by their profiles, seemed to me the type of people who could be persuaded. It took a few hours but, by pretending to be a fellow investor who was a bit concerned, I managed to rustle up fourteen people who agreed to send suitable emails that evening. The only reason my target was reduced to fourteen was because I found that six people either did not have computers or, if they did, they didn’t know how to use emails. I wasn’t going to do a training course over the phone so I kept it to fourteen. I was sure that would be enough to achieve the effect we wanted.

The effect it did achieve turned out to be considerably more dramatic than we had envisaged.

The next day, Tuesday, Mike and Sophie turned up for coffee mid-morning. Sophie was full of praise for the Scottish countryside and Mike was like the proverbial cat who had found a dish of cream.

We were able to sit outside and enjoy the warm morning sun. Sophie was bubbling, full of praise for what she had seen and keen to go hiking off into the mountains as soon as she could get the opportunity.

After a while we had exhausted the tourist guide to the Trossachs and Mike asked how things were on the AIM front. Sophie came back down to earth and listened while I explained to them the results of my examination of the files. They were both as horrified and indignant is I had been.

“Bob, we’ve got to do something about this guy,” said Mike. “There is no way he should be allowed to get away with a scam like that.”

“Sure,” I replied, “But don’t forget we can’t use any of this stuff because it would get Sophie into trouble. Hacking in to their systems is a criminal offence. You don’t want her behind bars, do you?”

I then told them what Pierre and I had agreed. I showed them the list of the fourteen people who were prepared to send emails to AIM and explained our reasoning. Mike liked the idea of stirring things up. Sophie was a little more reticent, wondering what it might lead to. After all, Purdy had already shown he was capable of burglary. How much further was he capable of going?

I was able to rustle up a satisfactory lunch and Pierre arrived just as we were finishing. He had brought Sophie’s laptop over and we set it up.

“Here’s what I’ve found,” he said, as he brought up on screen a list of the investments that had been made by each of the three funds.

“I’ve been able to identify all purchases and sales during the year. It’s what you would expect. This fund has been going in and out of various stocks and bonds, presumably programming their positions to sell automatically when any investment hits a predetermined growth figure. They’ve even dabbled a bit in foreign exchange. The net result of all this can be seen at the bottom.”

He pointed to a figure at the top of his list. “This is the value at the beginning of the year. And this . . .”

He moved the cursor down to the bottom. “. . . is the value at the end of the year. I’ve checked some of these values with records from the internet and they are correct. What it says is that this particular fund increased in value over the year by eight point two per cent, which is close to the industry average.”

I powered up my computer and checked the details of the returns AIM had announced to its investors for the same fund. They had credited their investors at various rates, depending on the infamous “comments” column, at rates of between three point four per cent and five point eight. The weighted average, bearing in mind that not everybody had invested the same amount, was three point nine per cent.

“Mon Dieu,” said Sophie, so shocked that she had slipped back into her mother tongue. “Cela fait plus de deux millions!”

Mike tapped her gently on the shoulder.

“Translation, please.” “Oh, sorry. That makes more than two million pounds.”

“Wow.” We then ran a check on the other two funds. AIM had sold their investors short to the tune of four point eight million pounds.

There were a few moments of silence in the room while we all tried to absorb the enormity of what was going on.

I broke the silence. “This needs a bit of thinking about. This is not just a case of someone cooking the books or fiddling their expenses. This is theft on a massive scale. I suggest we reflect for a couple of days and each of us come up with a proposal as to what we should do about it. And don’t forget we can’t use this information without getting arrested ourselves.”

I got up to pace the room and ease my back which was acting up from so much sitting.

At that point the phone rang. It was Doug, asking if Mike was around. I handed him the receiver. He listened attentively for a while then asked Doug if he was now back in Edinburgh.

“OK.” he said. “Call here tomorrow night and update Bob. I won’t be contactable,” and hung up.

He turned towards us with a thoughtful look. He was starting to look concerned.

“Doug has just informed me that the villa in Spain that our friend Dewar went to for the weekend is registered in the name of a Margaret Buchanan.”

“Who’s she?” we asked. Milking the mystery for effect, he went on. “Doug has come back to Edinburgh. He didn’t get the same flight as Dewar, who flew back on Sunday night, because he didn’t want to risk any chance that Dewar would notice him. He flew back this morning and, anticipating that we would want to know who she was, he went hunting and, lo and behold, Margaret Buchanan is none other than . . .”

Sophie broke in.

“Mrs Dewar’s maiden name.” Mike looked hurt. “How did you guess?” “Female intuition, darling,” she said and gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek.”You’d better get used to it.”

Mike glanced over at me with a look of resignation. Pierre and I shared a laugh at his expense, but he really didn’t seem to mind.

“So this man Dewar is a close buddy of Purdy. They play squash together twice a week and he goes off, presumably regularly, to Spain where he has bought a villa worth several million pounds and registered it in the name of his wife. Sounds like a typical bent French politician,” said Pierre. “And could it be that the money has somehow come from Purdy?”

He left the question hanging in the air – then went on. “Perhaps he knows about Purdy’s girlfriend and is blackmailing him.”

“Or he knows about the scam and is taking a cut,” I added. “One or the other would seem to fit.”

“Right,” said Pierre. “Let’s add that into our reflections and we’ll get together tomorrow and decide on the next steps.”

“Not tomorrow,” said Mike. “I’m afraid we can’t.” He looked at Sophie and took a step towards her. He put a protective arm around her shoulder and announced to us that they were going off for a couple of days – if nobody had any objections.

I pretended to look astonished. Pierre laughed. Sophie blushed and Mike looked combative. I joined in the laughter with Pierre, and Sophie demanded to know what was so funny.

“I’ll tell you when you get back,” I said. “Just make sure you take a camera.”

There was definitely very little brotherly love in the look I got from Mike.

“Are you planning to pop in and see Heather?” I asked innocently.

Mike’s response was to pick up his jacket and say to Sophie, “Come on. It’s time to go before these two old farts really get started.”

The next evening I heard from Doug. He had been continuing to keep an eye on Dewar and had picked up his trail at the squash club where he had known he had his regular court booked with Purdy.

“All I can tell you Bob, is that they had their game and a drink afterwards. I was able to watch them without being able to hear their conversation but there was definitely something fairly serious being discussed. It looked as if Purdy was telling him something important. Dewar was listening most of the time and when they left they gave the impression that they had come to some kind of a decision.”

“Thanks, Doug,” I said. “Can you switch your attention back to Purdy now for a couple of days?”

The Thursday morning sun woke me the next day. I had been fairly late in getting to sleep the previous night with my mind trying to sort out all the news we had learned from the day before.

What we knew for sure was that Purdy was skimming off millions through AIM. That he had a mistress whom he presumably wished to keep secret. That Dewar was clearly a friend of some sort and he had a villa in the south of Spain worth a lot more than he could afford on an MP’s salary and he wanted to keep it quiet because he had registered it in his wife’s name – no paper trail to him.

The question was whether Dewar had got the money from Purdy and whether it was because he was blackmailing him over the mistress or the fraud that he was running at AIM.

It didn’t really matter which. The fundamental question was whether Dewar’s money was coming from Purdy or not.

Then there was the conversation that Doug had observed. I had to consider the fact that, perhaps, Purdy had told Dewar that we were sniffing around AIM. He would have received the emails I had organized and had probably linked them to my question at the conference. Perhaps he had told Dewar of the burglary he had organized to get Alice’s papers.

The scenario seemed perfectly possible but at the moment it was only supposition.

Letham is a small village. It’s really not much more than a hamlet. The main street has houses down one side and stretches up to crossroads at the top. The other side is simply fields, giving a clear view across the Howe to the Lomond Hills about six miles away. There is a school and a post office and about sixty houses. It is quiet and suits me admirably. My cottage, unlike most of the others, has two storeys and is built in large chunks of granite. Half way up the street there is a lane which leads off to the right, past the village bowling green, which sits just behind my garden, and then on up to the farm. My house sits just on the corner.

Almost all the houses are set back from the road, each with its twenty feet of front garden, separated from the road, in most cases, by a low stone wall.

The owners of a good few of the houses have widened their front gates and covered the little bit of garden with gravel and park their cars there. I haven’t. I like the idea of a small piece of cultivation between myself and the road and religiously look after the few rose bushes that make the house much more welcoming. There is little traffic so it is no problem to leave my car in the road. It’s quite safe. One day I’ll get around to building a garage up the lane at the back of the house but that is for the future.

After I had wandered up to the post office to get some milk and exchanged a few words with Mrs McLachlan about the weather I returned home to do what I had asked the others to do – think about the next steps.

I noticed that Pierre had left Sophie’s laptop in the sitting room from yesterday and thought I might as well return it to him. We could have a chat about things while the young ones were probably doing their own planning. I smiled at the thought of Mike being finally hooked. Heather would be pleased.

I took the laptop and went out to the car to go off to Fernie when I suddenly remembered that I had forgotten to lock the back door. The computer was in a solid protective carrying case so I simply threw it onto the back seat and turned back to the house. I had just opened the door when the blast ripped through the air.

My front door flew back, ripped out of my hand, and crashed open against the inside wall. The explosion of hot air threw me into the house after it. I was flung onto the bottom few steps of my staircase. The unexpectedness of it left me in shock for a moment or two. I struggled to my hands and knees and turned round. My car was not a car anymore. It was a burning mess. Flames were consuming the body work furiously and black smoke was billowing up into the sky.

Once I had ascertained that I was, in fact, unhurt I got gingerly to my feet.

“Good God,” I thought “What the hell was that?” I vaguely registered the fact that I had been bloody lucky. The wall, even although it was low, must have helped to deflect the force of the explosion so that I had not been caught in the full blast. But how had it happened?

It didn’t take too long to eliminate the possibility of some kind of accidental electrical fault. I hadn’t even switched on the ignition. All I had done was to open the door and chuck the laptop onto the back seat and slam the door closed.

That left the only possibility. A bomb. The noise of the explosion had brought the neighbours out. Mrs Clark came rushing out, wearing her baking apron, her hands covered in flour. Everybody was clearly shocked. Not wanting to frighten people unnecessarily I let them bandy their theories around to explain how such a strange accident could happen. I wasn’t going to put forward my theory of a bomb, but undoubtedly that was what it had been.

There was no way the car could be saved but Jack, from two houses up, managed to get a hose speedily rigged up so that we could douse the flames as quickly as possible while his wife, Sally, kept on shouting at him not to get too close in case it blew up again. How it could possibly blow up twice was beyond my imagination. After about half an hour the wreck was reduced to a pile of twisted metal emitting the odd hiss as drips of water met molten steel, lost the battle and were immediately converted into a puff of steam which rose up into the air, mixing itself with the black smoke. The stench of burning rubber added to the hellish scene.

I had remained quite calm throughout the whole circus but when the crowd had dispersed and I went back inside to sit down I suddenly realised I was shaking. Delayed shock I thought to myself and sat down with a stiff whisky to calm myself down.