When the Siren Calls (25 page)

Andy stirred beneath his gaze and retorted, “If this is a sales update, I think I’d rather hear it from the Irishman. He’s the one that should be getting the credit for selling, while you’ve been frolicking around music city.”

Jay seemed to welcome the dig, as if it made his point for him, and continued as if addressing some great auditorium.

“None of us are indispensable. But unfortunately, Eamon is unable to be with us this morning. He is fully engaged on closing those apartment sales. I hope we can all agree that this needs to be Eamon’s priority today.” Jay looked around the room, daring anyone to contradict such perfect logic. “Therefore, if I may, I will continue with an update on sales. Alberto and Davide will give individual updates from their areas, as you requested.”

“Jay, can you please get on with it?” said Andy. “We can all see the agenda… for once, and I’ve got a few questions I want to get to,” he added ominously.

“‘There will be ample time for questions and discussions,” said Jay, unruffled. “I suggest that after the coffee break, we continue with director only business, with Gina too of course.”

Jay smiled at Gina, as Andy too was drawn to her face by the mention of her name. She met his eyes with barely concealed appetite, brushing her foot against his under the table as Jay began an itemised update on each agenda item, covering every significant matter. He focused overwhelmingly on the positive and Andy was forced to concede he recognised some substance to Jay’s optimism, which reinforced the evidence he had seen with his own eyes as he toured the development.

“I have one request from the board, if I may,” said Jay, causing suspicion to well up within Andy. “I should like permission to begin taking reservations on phase two membership sales. We are getting many enquiries, and I don’t want to disappoint anyone.”

Andy’s mind processed the request, but he could find no ulterior motive in it. But still he probed. “Since when did you start asking permission on operational matters?”

“It is purely a matter of timing, Andy. Normally I would just make an executive decision and go ahead, but seeing as the directors were meeting, it only seemed respectful to check before giving Eamon authorisation.”

Andy looked around the room, but saw no sign of dissent, so nodded his agreement, unaware of the feel of cold gunmetal against his fingertips.

“Gina, can you please make a note for the minutes,” said Jay, beaming with pleasure and relief, before Andy cut him short.

“This is enormously encouraging, and I’m sure down to fine work by all,” he declared, allowing the room a few cruel seconds of hope before he continued, “but perhaps we can now move on to Alberto?”

Alberto was Jay’s Geometra, a man who performed the combined roles of a surveyor, planner, and estate agent from the safety and influence of Jay’s palm. He rose and gave Jay a nervous glance as he stepped into the spotlight. His clear discomfort bolstered Andy’s confidence in his own position and Andy allowed himself a satisfied, almost predatory, smile as the short, wiry man with a shock of silvergrey hair like a scouring pad, began to speak. He gave a buoyant overview of building progress, as Jay nodded and smiled encouragement. He flicked through slide after slide, with a green tide slowly rolling across the screen to indicate progress, building by building.

“I am pleased to say that our difficulties, particularly with the builders, are now behind us,” he concluded. “All one hundred apartments are close to complete, and will be completed within a month.” He folded his notes precisely in half and made to flee for his seat but Andy held up a hand, firm and flat against the air, to stop him.

“So all the planning permissions and permits are in place?” he asked, raising his eyebrows. “No danger of anyone coming along and trying to close us down, or knock the place down?”

“I am more in consultation with the planning authorities than with my own children,” said Alberto, beads of perspiration dotting his brow.

Andy laughed with hollow dismissal. “Is that yes or no?”

“In Italy things are not so straightforward, Mr. Skinner,” Alberto replied, twisting his hands together in unease. “Palms must be greased and so on. And it is often the way that permissions are withheld, but it is nothing more than a negotiation.”

Andy could have argued the point for hours, but time was limited with too much else to discuss.

“There’s something else I’m curious about,” he said, running his fingers down the columns of figures as Gina leant her body into him as if following the movement of his hand. “The sales prices that we have realised on similar apartments vary enormously. Why is that?”

“It is a complicated matter,” said Alberto, as if this alone was sufficient explanation.

“Well, speak slowly and I will do my best to follow you,” said Andy. “Why do we sell some apartments at less than half the list price?”

Alberto shifted on his feet for several moments before offering the answer. “We sell at one price to the Italians, and a different price to the British.”

“Why exactly?” asked Andy, with cold logic, careful to keep emotion and injustice from his tone.

“It is a very unusual arrangement, I admit, but it is a necessary one, and it is legal, we have been assured of that,” Alberto replied, pushing his needle-like fingers through his hair until Jay intervened.

“The Italians are buying bricks and mortar; the British are buying a lifestyle. Everything is perfectly legitimate, Andy. What the Brits are investing into is their own little dream of a home in Tuscany. And we incur heavy marketing costs to promote that dream. And for all that, they are prepared to pay a premium over what an Italian is prepared to pay. So—”

“How much of a premium?” asked Andy, cutting him off. “And let Alberto answer, if you don’t mind.”

Alberto did not need to check his notes. He dined out in Florence too often on this particular anecdote. “The price we market the property to the UK is never less than twice that we sell to an Italian, sometimes much more.”

“And what, Alberto,” asked Andy, “what happens when the British come to sell, and find their apartment is worth only half what they paid for it?”

“All we are doing is charging what the UK market will bear,” answered Jay in his stead. “No one is forced to buy.”

Andy laughed with derision, having been only too recently berated with a tearful account of high pressure selling by Eamon and his team of arm twisters. “If you say so, Jay, but before Alberto sits down, I have another question. I spoke with one of the owners here yesterday, an English couple, the Barkers, you may know them, Alberto?”

“Yes, I think I do,” responded Alberto.

“The Barkers tell me that some owners on site have paid for kitchens to be fitted, for which they have been waiting over six months. They say that each owner has paid you twenty-five thousand Euros. Twenty-five thousand Euros for a few cupboards and appliances?”

“Only four such owners are in that position, Mr. Skinner,” said Alberto, caressing the razor sharp fold of his paper.

“Only four? Why are there any at all?”

Much to Andy’s chagrin Jay intervened again. “It is a complicated story, Andy, and not at all appropriate for this part of the meeting. The point is that the end-user is paying. You are not subsidising anything.”

“I’ll decide what’s appropriate,” said Andy jerking his thumb towards his own chest. “And that is not how I see it. They are people, clients, and we are cheating them.”

Jay flinched as the accusation echoed about the room. “Ok, Andy, maybe what was done was not properly thought through. I’m sure no wrong was intended.”

Andy sighed, his frustration not so much at Jay’s methods, but that the man genuinely seemed to see no wrong in them.

“Well, maybe this is a good time for Davide to give us a financial update,” he said in concession, unwilling to desert the figures in favour of philosophic discussion.

Jay nodded in apparent relief as Davide stepped forwards, striding into the foreground with the confident air of a man who had rehearsed his presentation carefully.

Before Davide could launch into his bird’s eye view of the land of plenty just over the horizon, Andy shot a pre-emptive missile. “So, right now, how much is owed to owners?”

Davide floundered under his directness. “That information would need time to put together.”

Andy tried to keep his temper. “Davide, what are the numbers?”

“These I do not have exactly today.”

Andy’s temper rose. “What is this, Jay? An accounting presentation with no numbers? This meeting has been scheduled for over a month. Where are the numbers?” He slammed his notepad down in exasperation.

Alberto attempted to continue. “This is not that easy to answer—”

“Well, answer it as best you fucking can.”

Jay shot a glance at Gina and she put her hand to her mouth in a loud and obvious gesture of shock. Andy touched her arm in apology.

“Excuse my language, no need to put that in the minutes.”

Gina somehow managed to recover her composure, and rewarded him with a look of undiluted admiration, as befitted a man of such authority, pushed to his limits.

“Davide, watch my lips,” Andy said, low and measured. “How much do we owe to owners who have bought property here?”

Davide quivered as he eyed Jay’s threatening look, but he was cornered. “Over a million Euros is owed.”

“A million,” said Andy, throwing down his pen, “so that explains why the Barkers are banging on my door like demented bailiffs.”

“The Barkers are in a special situation,” said Jay.

“Fuck all is special about having your home repossessed,” said Andy, standing in fury. “Take fifteen, everyone, I need some fresh air.”

While Jay was on the defensive in the board meeting, Geoff and Rosie Barker were on the offensive in an Internet café in the industrial town of Pontedera. They were huddled conspiratorially around a computer screen as they waited nervously to access their email account, unsure whether Gina would have fulfilled her promises and well aware of the damning financial implications of their helplessness if she had not. Rosie’s hands trembled as she typed in her password with deliberate single-fingered jabs. The Barkers were infrequent computer users but after several unsuccessful attempts, Geoff suggested Rosie might need to be typing in lower case, or upper case, or whatever the other case was to the one she was currently in. Half an hour later, by a process of trial and error, Rosie somehow managed to enter the right sequence of letters.

The Barkers did not send many emails, so they did not receive many, other than junk mail. The mail they were looking for was sitting unopened in the top of their inbox, directly above the one offering Rosie discounted penis-enlargement cream. Rosie jerked the mouse like a joystick till, by as much luck as judgment, the cursor was where she wanted it, shrinking back as the link glowed blue. She looked at Geoff, who nodded, and she clicked the mail open, to find it blank. Their immediate reaction was that Gina had played some cruel joke. But after some thought, Geoff suggested that Rosie click on the paperclip on the mail.

Before them was a long list of email addresses. They scanned the list, recognising a few names. It was two hours later, and only after the help of the patient café owner that they managed to get the email addresses in the attachment into the address field of the email they wished to send. And it was another hour before they were happy with the mail they had composed, and felt ready to send it.

“You are sure we should be doing this, aren’t you?” asked Rosie.

“It’s now or never, dear.”

Rosie girded her loins, moved the cursor to the send button, closed her eyes, and clicked on the mouse. A cyber second later, and a group of some sixty investors at Castello di Capadelli were to learn that they were invited to the first ever meeting of the “UK Capadelli Owners’ Action Group.”

Andy strode back into the room last, almost five minutes after even Jay resumed his seat. He smiled with confidence as he sat down, well aware that his anger had left the ghostlike men and women desperate to pacify him. He changed the point of attack to money wasting, highlighting every extravagance, of which there were many, and proceeding to impress the stupidity of every item of over-expenditure for the next half an hour.

As he began to deride the Armani toiletries, Jay interrupted him with a sigh.

“Andy, this item-by-item nit picking is a poor use of everyone’s time. No one wants to waste money, and I as much as anyone want us to run lean and mean. But we need to focus on the bigger picture.”

Andy raised himself up full of confidence and vindication as he launched his carefully formulated argument.

“Many of the costs you are incurring, Jay, are around intangibles. I am talking about things that do not impact the product that is delivered. Expenditure that does not affect the actual holiday experience on site. And isn’t that the important thing?”

“No, Andy, it is not!” retorted Jay, all of a sudden passionate and vehement. “It’s the intangibles that people value.”

Andy threw a brochure across the table. “Look at that; you could print bank notes on paper that quality. All I can see is cost.”

Jay heaved another heavy breath. “Andy, that is a very fancy watch you are wearing. A Hublex, I believe. The Timemaster model if I’m not mistaken. How much did you pay for that?”