Conman by Richard Asplin Read Free Book Online Page A

in some respects. But it was a closeness that had nothing to do with annual trips to the Seychelles. Nothing to do with ponies, private school or party shoes.
    Dad and I had what you might call a Saturday-afternoon closeness . A movie and a comic closeness. Through everything. Arguments. Hangovers. Casualty wards. Court appearances. Come Saturday afternoon, he was there.
    Movie and a comic. Without fail.
    Explains a lot, I suppose.
     
    “ I’m afraid there isn’t a lot you can do sir. ”
    “Not a lot I can – ? That’s it? That’s your 24-hour help-line’s helpful line? The bank are about to … I mean do you know how serious this is?”
    “ I can put you through to a customer policy care supervisor. ”
    “Isn’t that you?”
    “ Er, yes. I mean I could put you through to … another one. ”
    “Who’ll tell me something different?”
    “ Uhmm, no. ”
    “Right. Look … I just need to know if there’s some chance that, well … that maybe you might pay it this time?”
    “ Sir –”
    “And I-I increase my premiums, y’know, from now on?”
    “ That’s not how your policy works sir , I’m afraid. We do have a new  Emergency 48 Hour Valuables Cover Plan that is along those lines though. Would you like me to put you through to sales sir ?”
    “Well that depends doesn’t it?” I said through gritted teeth. “If your sales department is located within a worm-hole in the spacetime continuum, enabling me to buy this policy three weeks ago when I needed it.”
    “ I’ll put you through to sales, ” she said and either Hank Marvin abruptly turned up at her call centre playing Handel’s Water Music or she’d put me on hold.
    Yes, it had been an unbelievably long shot, I admit. But when you’ve spent half a late-October Thursday morning crouched trembling and dripping in a pool of black gunk behind a water-damaged cardboard Chewbacca while a large, goateed, memorabilia-salesman called Maurice, with Judge Dredd on his lapel badge and spit dribbling down his pyjama top, kicks your shutters with steel-toed motorcycle boots, hollering both your name, how much of a ‘feckin’ faggot’ you are and what his lawyers are going to do with you when they find you, lengthiness of shot often ceases to be of any relevance.
    Hank moving on to a twangy version of Moonlight Sonata, I looked up at the sound of my bell tingling softly. A figure stood framed in the doorway.
    “ Good morning, sales ?” the phone crackled. “ My colleague says you’re concerned about worm-holes? Our Standard Homecare covers all damage to gardens, including lawns and fences. ”
    “I-I’m sorry, what?”
    The figure began to wander up the shop towards me, unpeeling his ratty scarf.
    “ We do have a new Emergency 48 Hour Valuables Cover Plan which we’re telling our customers about. This covers items in your care that you are not the owner of. For example, if you were looking after something for somebody else and it was accidentally – ”
    I hung up.
    “ Mr Cheng? ” I hissed out of the side of my mouth. “ Mr Cheng, pssssst. ”
    Cheng, on his usual morning spot, peering and humming at Robert Redford through Perspex and pursed lips, turned.
    “You rea to may a dea? You tay fye hundreh?”
    “ What?Yes, yes all right, I’ll take the five hundred. Just … just keep an eye on this guy. He was in yesterday. He might make some trouble. ”
    The man got closer. His woollen hat was the same. As was the greasy coat. His shoes, however, were considerably smarter. Brown half brogues. Polished. Leather laces. They didn’t go with the look at all.
    “Truhb?” Cheng said far too loudly and turned to look at the visitor, now at the desk, peeling off his gloves. He had small, surprisingly clean, neat hands.
    “Hello a-again,” I said, flapping nervously about the desk.
    “Indeed. Right, as it were, back at you,” the man said. His voice was different. More clipped. Straight out of a Gieves & Hawkes display case. Maybe he’d