Dick Francis's Gamble - Felix Francis [82]
One of my clients never expected any financial return from such investments, he just reveled in rubbing shoulders with the stars at the first-night functions and taking all his friends to see “his” show in the best seats. “I know I might lose it all,” he would say, “but, if I do, I’ll enjoy every minute while I’m losing it. And, you never know, I might just make a fortune.”
And he had done precisely that the previous year.
At my suggestion, he had backed a small independent film company to make an obscure and irreverent comedy based around the first transportation of convicts from England to Australia in 1787. To everyone’s surprise, not least my client’s, the film had been a huge international hit. At the box office worldwide it had earned back over two hundred times its production cost, as well as receiving an Oscar nomination for its young star who played the title role in Bruce: The First Australian.
But the successes were few and the disasters many.
It took me over two hours just to answer my outstanding e-mails, by which time I could hear movement above and, presently, my mother came downstairs in her dressing gown.
“Hello, dear,” she said. “You’re up early.”
“I’ve been down here over two hours,” I said. “I have work to do.”
“Yes, dear,” she said. “Don’t we all. Now, what would you like for breakfast? I have some bacon and local eggs, and Mr. Ayers, my butcher, has made me some wonderful sausages. How many would you like?”
“Just a coffee and a slice of toast would be lovely,” I said.
It was like King Canute trying to hold back the tide.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said, already placing a frying pan on the stove. “You’ve got to have a proper breakfast. What sort of mother would I be if I didn’t feed you?”
I sighed. Perhaps Claudia and I would go out for a drive at lunchtime.
I took her up a cup of tea while the sausages and bacon were sizzling in the pan.
“Morning, gorgeous,” I said, pulling open the curtains. “How are you feeling today?”
“Still a bit sore,” she said, sitting up. “But better than yesterday.”
“Good,” I said. “Time to get up. Julia Child downstairs is cooking breakfast.”
“Mmm, I can smell it,” she said, laughing. “Now, don’t you expect that every morning when we’re married.”
“What?” I said in mock horror. “No cooked breakfasts! The wedding’s off!”
“We haven’t even fixed a date for it yet,” she said.
“Before or after the hair loss?” I asked seriously.
She thought for a moment. “After it grows back. Give me time to get used to this engagement business first.”
“After it is, then,” I said. I leaned down and kissed her. “Don’t be long or Mr. Ayers’s sausages will get cold.”
She dived back under the covers and put a pillow over her head. “I’m staying here.”
“Hiding won’t help,” I said, laughing, and leaving her alone.
My mother hadn’t lied, the sausages were excellent, but, as always with her meals, they were too big and too numerous, and then there was the mountain of bacon and the scrambled eggs on fried bread, not forgetting the mushrooms and grilled tomatoes on the side.
I felt totally bloated by the time I sat down again at my computer to check through my client files using the firm’s remote-access facility.
Claudia, meanwhile, had managed to extract herself from her bed, coming down to join us in a bathrobe, but she ate just a small bowl of muesli and a little sliced fruit. And had grinned at me as she did so. It really wasn’t fair.
I spent the morning briefly looking through all the files for my fifty or so personal clients, to check on the reminder tags, ensuring that I hadn’t missed reinvesting the proceeds of maturing bonds or such like.
What I really needed to do was to study all the recent stock movements. It was something that I should be doing every