Cat O'Nine Tales: And Other Stories by Jeffrey Archer Read Free Book Online

Cheltenham
and Summer Fields respectively. After all, it is important that they mix with
the sort of people they will be expected to fleece at some time in the future.
And whenever I see them at the opera–Verdi and Puccini, never Wagner or
Weber–they are always seated in their own box.
    So, I hear you
ask, how did such a shrewd and intelligent man end up serving at Her Majesty’s
pleasure? Was he involved in some fracas following a football match between
Arsenal and Fiorentina ? Did he drive over the speed
limit once too often in that Ferrari of his?
    Perhaps he
forgot to pay his poll tax?
    None of the above. He broke an English law with an action
that in the land of his forefathers would be considered no more than an
acceptable part of everyday life.
    Enter Mr.
Dennis Cartwright, who worked for another of Her Majesty’s establishments.
    Mr. Cartwright
was an inspector with the Inland Revenue. He rarely ate out at a restaurant,
and certainly not one as exclusive as Mario’s. Whenever he and his wife Doris
“went Italian,” it was normally Pizza Express. However, he took a great
interest in Mr. Gambotti , and in how he could
possibly maintain such a lifestyle on the amount he was declaring to his local
tax office. After all, the restaurant was showing a profit of a mere £172,000,
on a turnover of just over two million. So, after tax, Mr. Gambotti was only taking home–Dennis carefully checked the figures–just over £100,000.
With a home in Chelsea, three children at private schools and a Ferrari to
maintain, not to mention the yacht moored in Monte Carlo, and heaven knows what
else in Florence, how did he manage it? Mr. Cartwright, a determined man, was
determined to find out.
    The tax
inspector checked all the figures in Mario’s books, and he had to admit they
balanced and, what’s more, Mr. Gambotti always paid
his taxes on time.
    However, Mr.
Cartwright wasn’t in any doubt that Mr. Gambotti had
to be siphoning off large sums of cash, but how?
    He must have
missed something.
    Cartwright
leaped up in the middle of the night and shouted out loud, “No credit cards.” He woke his wife.
    The next
morning, Cartwright went over the books yet again; he was right.
    There were no
credit-card entries. Although all the checks were properly accounted for, and
all the customers’ accounts tallied, when you considered that there were no
credit-card entries, the small amount of cash declared seemed completely out of
proportion to the overall takings.
    Mr. Cartwright
didn’t need to be told that his masters would not allow him to waste much time
dining at Mario’s in order to resolve the mystery of how Mr. Gambotti was salting away such large sums of money. Mr.
Buchanan, his supervisor, reluctantly agreed to allow Dennis an advance of £200
to try to discover what was happening on the inside–every penny was to be
accounted for–and he only agreed to this after Dennis had pointed out that if
he was able to gather enough evidence to put Mr. Gambotti behind bars, imagine just how many other restaurateurs might feel obliged to
start declaring their true incomes.
    Mr. Cartwright
was surprised that it took him a month to book a table at Mario’s, and it was
only after several calls, always made from home, that he finally was able to
secure a reservation. He asked his wife Doris to join him, hoping it would
appear less suspicious than if he was sitting on his own, compiling notes.
    His supervisor
agreed with the ploy, but told Dermis that he would have to cover his wife’s
half of the bill, at his own expense.
    “It never
crossed my mind to do otherwise,” Dennis assured his supervisor.
    During a meal
of Tuscan bean soup and gnocchi–he was hoping to pay more than one visit to
Mario’s–Dennis kept a wary eye on his host as he circled the different tables,
making small talk and attending to his customers’ slightest whims. His wife couldn’t help but notice that Dennis seemed distracted, but she
decided not to