The Inspector Walter Darriteau Murder Mysteries - Books 1-4 by David Carter (best finance books of all time .txt) 📕

The three standing men couldn’t keep their eyes off her, and they were all thinking the same thing. What would father say if I dated a copper? This copper? Karen smiled at them nervously. They disconcerted her; they didn’t smile back, didn’t speak; just stared.

‘Are these your sons?’ asked Walter.

‘They are unless Rose has been keeping things from me.’

‘They look like you.’

‘They should be so lucky.’

Walter nodded at the boys. They didn’t nod back.

Belatedly, Langley thought he’d better introduce them.

‘Lawrie, Lenny and Lewis,’ he muttered.

Three peas in a pod, thought Karen, and that idea made her smile. The guys all imagined she was smiling at them, and them alone.

‘Take a seat,’ said Langley, pointing to the two chairs that had been placed before the desk for that very purpose.

Walter made himself comfortable.

Karen did too, crossed her legs, her long grey skirt riding up a fraction, attracting the attention of see no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil, who stared down at her, as if they were one pig ugly three-headed-being.

‘So, what can I do for you?’ asked Langley, picking up a pen and tapping it on the polished desk.

‘Some years ago,’ said Walter, ‘you lent a considerable amount of money to the builder Gerry Swaythling.’

‘Who says I did?’

‘Do you deny it?’

‘If the coppers ask, we deny everything,’ and he grinned and turned round and smiled at his sons. ‘Isn’t that right, lads?’ They grinned too. Nodded like dogs in the back of a car. Focused back on the girl.

‘What I’d like to know is, was the loan adequately repaid?’

Langley sniffed roughly.

‘I can’t comment on some financial transaction of which I have no knowledge.’

‘Let me fill in the details,’ said Walter. ‘The amount was around 150K.’

Langley blew a rush of air from his puffed out cheeks.

‘Really, Inspector, do you imagine I could afford to lend that kind of money, and years ago at that, you say? I wouldn’t be living here, now would I? I think you must be mixing me up with someone else.’

‘A few days ago Gerry Swaythling’s son, Neil, was gunned down in broad daylight.’

‘I read about that in the paper. Terrible business. How is he?’

‘He’s dead.’

‘Really? I heard he was holed up somewhere.’

‘Where did you hear that?’ asked Karen.

‘Little birdies twitter, little bird, that’s where I hear everything.’

‘You know Gerry Swaythling quite well, don’t you?’ asked Walter.

‘Do I?’

‘Oh yes, you met him as recently as yesterday.’

‘You do your homework, I’ll give you that, Darriteau; own a spy in the Lodge, do you?’

Walter didn’t answer, said, ‘How is the money lending business doing these days?’

‘Don’t do it anymore, you know that, Mister Darriteau, hundred percent legit these days.’

‘Doing what?’ asked Karen.

‘I am sure your boss knows.’

‘Tell me,’ she said, coldly.

‘I don’t have to answer your questions, you know that, but I will, because I’ll humour you, and I have nothing to hide. Lawrie looks after Wells Motors, nice garage on the Greyhound Industrial Estate, you must know it, pop in next time you want a good car, hope to land a Ford franchise next year, make our fortune it will, won’t it boys, if we get it.’

The boys all muttered, ‘Sure thing, dad.’

Langley took a breath and sailed onward. ‘Lenny looks after our property letting business, Well-Lets, we rent out property all over the area, find a tenant or full management, do you a good deal if you want to find somewhere nice to live, or if you have a property you want to rent out. Property letting, that’s the future, people will always need somewhere to live, better than any pension plan, solid as lead. We even have a few of our own hooses these days, buy-to-let jobs, you know how it works, it’s doing well, I’m proud of it, and I’m proud of the boys, all three of them, while Lewis here looks after our finance business, investing some of our hard earned money here and there, could be in anything, wine, stamps, pictures, sculpture, even ostriches, we’ve tried most things. Some pay a big dividend; some give us a good kick up the backside.’

‘But you still lend money?’ said Walter.

‘Can’t do that, Mister Darriteau, can’t get a consumer credit licence, you know how it is.’

‘Why can’t you get a licence?’ asked Karen.

‘Because in my misspent youth I had one or two minor transgressions, that’s why, and the authorities never forget these things, and if you add that to the small fact that I happen to live on a council estate, then there’s your reasons.’

‘Why don’t you move?’ persisted Karen.

Langley laughed. ‘We can’t afford to, and even if we could, we like living here, don’t we boys?’

The three monkeys nodded and the middle one said, ‘That’s right, pa. We like being amongst our own kind, people round here are reliable, straight and honest,’ and they all nodded at that weird notion.

‘What gets my goat,’ said Langley, ‘is these companies that are advertising short-term loans on daytime TV. They are charging more than I ever did! 3680% APR, as clear as day, up there on the screen for all to see, for God’s sake. So how does that work? I’m portrayed as a heinous criminal for providing a public service that people really want, when I used to do it, that is, while they are held up as a paragon of blinking virtue, members of the establishment, you see, robbing the public senseless. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw that interest rate on the TV the other day. How brazen can they be? Something should be done about it. Shouldn’t be allowed, leeches on the backs of the common people, that’s what they are.’

‘Ridiculous!’ said one of the sons, and they all nodded like hungry hyenas, and licked their lips and tut-tutted and re-focussed their eyes on the delicious blonde, as if they could surround her and eat her.

‘Let’s get back to Gerry Swaythling,’ said Walter.

‘If you must.’

‘There’s a young killer walking around out there who has shot dead two