Dan dropped me off at home. His parting words were.
“Take some time to get your life sorted out and then get the hell out of town. Adam Strong might be in Ryker’s but I’m sure that he’ll be trying to discredit you. His frat buddies are not to be messed with. I should know. My brother is one of them but he’s a good guy. He saw the light and is now a Priest down in Southern Jersey, but he still has his ear to the ‘frat network’.”

He stopped me from replying.
“I know that you didn’t supply the critical bit of evidence that persuaded the DA to file charges but he clearly hates your guts. He has plenty of people that will step up to the plate in his absence. With you out of the picture he and his ilk will have to find someone else to target.”

“Thanks Dan. What do you have left to do on the case?”

“Not a lot. My first task is to make sure everything is filed properly for the inevitable appeal and questioning of the validity of the evidence and chain of custody. Then I’m going Fishing, for a week. I own part of a day boat with my brother down near Cape May provided we don’t get any hurricanes in the area. But to be honest, I just want to get away from this stinking city for a while. This past week or so has seemed like it would never end at time. Keep your head down ok? There might be more danger lurking in the shadows.”

Before I could ask Dan a question he drove off.

Once back in my apartment, I took a shower and went to bed but sleep didn’t come easily. My mind was replaying the events of the past eight and a bit hours over and over again. I must have fallen asleep at some point because the next thing I remember was my phone ringing.

Through bleary eyes, I looked at the caller ID. I was expecting to see ‘Dan’ on the display but the number was withheld. I declined the call and closed my eyes again.

A minute or so later the phone bleeped. Someone had left a message.

Reluctantly, I listened to the message. I recognised the voice as belonging to Brad Montgomery. He’d occupied the next desk to mine for the past two years.

“Gordon, the shit has hit the fan here. You might not believe it but Adam Strong was marched out in handcuffs an hour ago. Rumour has it that the COO has gone walkabout and two other execs are downtown with their lawyers. I know that he revelled when you did your walk of shame and he’s been a right pain ever since. Has this something to do with you? What have you gone and done? Whatever it is, I don’t want to know but man… Watch your back. Those people have really, really powerful friends.”

He didn’t leave his name but his Canadian accent was readily identifiable. He was like me, an outsider so we’d naturally gravitated together and had shared a more than a few beers in the past two years.

I looked at the clock. I’d slept well past the time I was supposed to be with my Lawyer. It seemed that his guess was right.

I texted Dan saying that I’d overslept and that I knew about Adam.

His reply arrived as I was washing my face.

“Sending a car for you. Thirty Minutes. Dan.”

I seemed that I was needed.

By the time I’d shaved, dressed and downed a cup of coffee, there was a ‘limo’ waiting for me outside.

---

Dan was waiting for me in his office. He was with someone from the SEC. This person had been listening to my initial grilling by them but had said nothing during the interview.

“Gordon, you know Art Jefferies don’t you?”

“We have met,” I replied trying to be non-committal.

“Art went to college with Adam Strong.”

I groaned inside. It showed in how my body reacted.

“That might have been the case but back then, I wasn’t deemed rich enough or to have been to the right prep schools to be invited to join his frat,” said Art.

“Plus, he’s no friend of mine. I know he cheated at his exams but never had the evidence to back it up. But how else do you get to be ‘summa cum laude’ when your GPA was barely a pass unless you had the inside track eh?”

I started to realise that Art was indeed no friend of Adam.

“I heard that he’s been arrested?”

“Yes. He was arrested just after the closing bell as we planned. Several other people from the Bank and two other Financial Institutions were also arrested at the same time and most of them are singing like Canaries. Adam is keeping to his story that it was all you and that he went along for a joke. We know differently. There is more than enough evidence to show that he was one of the ringleaders.”

Art continued.
“To start with, we are charging him with interstate wire fraud. That’s just a holding charge. From the evidence we obtained from you, we know that a large amount of money has shall we say ‘gone missing’ from the bank. What brought it to a head was the trades you did over the holiday weekend. For some totally unfathomable reason, they shorted your portfolio. When your book went up like that they were neck deep in the quicksand and could not cover their losses. With settlement due the following Friday, they needed a really big diversion to give them time to find the money they need to cover their losses.”

I held up my hand.

“Hold on, why are you telling me this? Aren’t I supposed to be a witness?”

Art grinned.

“Sorry Gordon. I forgot to say. Adam’s boss, Franklin Jansen is singing like a canary. He’s much like you in that he also took copious records of everything. He gave us those yesterday about the same time that ICE, were in the act of detaining you. They were total dynamite. It will be very doubtful if you will be needed at trial. It may well have been him that provided you with the envelopes of information. From what he’s said so far, Adam was blackmailing him over something that happened in Cancun a few years before you transferred over from the London Office. When Adam conspired to get you sacked he saw his chance to get even.”

I looked at Adam.
“Does this mean that I can go home and that the FBI won’t be after me if I do?”

“The FBI Agent responsible will be arrested today so that tells me that the answer is no they won’t but I’ll make sure that I get it in writing as soon as I can. It was her that dug up the evidence to blackmail Mr Jansen.”

My shoulders slumped. I felt as if a great weight had been lifted from my shoulders.

Dan put his arm around my shoulder.

“It is all over Gordon. You are in the clear.”

Art added.

“Mr McLeish, on behalf of the SEC and the US Government, we want to thank you for your help. You can rest assured that Homeland is going to be told in no uncertain terms that you are always welcome to return to this country. We will also make sure that you get that in writing.”

“I’m sorry for giving you the 3rd degree the other day but we had to be sure that what you were saying was on the ball. It…”

“It was you just doing your job?”

“I’m sorry,” said Art.

“There is no need to do that. I’m doing what I’d planned all along. I’m going home and quitting this sordid banking and finance business once and for all.”

I stood up and began to walk out of the office. Then a thought crossed my mind.

“Why the fuck did they short my portfolio? I can’t for the life of me think why anyone would want to do that. My book was up over a hundred and twenty percent of the year before that weekend?”

After a moments hesitation, Art said,
“Perhaps you had better sit down again Gordon? You may not like what I’m about to tell you.”

I returned to my seat while Art leafed through some papers. He pulled one out and handed it to me.

“Do you know that that is?”

I looked at the sheet. It was a copy of a Korean language document with an English translation below.

“I do. It is a report about the CEO of a major Korean Company resigning in disgrace after literally being caught with his trousers down.”

Then I added.
“You know that I can read and speak both Korean and Japanese. That’s why I’ve been so successful over the years. You learn to read between the lines. Business in both countries is all about saving face when things go wrong. A simple translation would lose those nuances and context.”

I looked at the translation and the original text several times. Then I smiled.
“This translation was probably straight from Google. It is all wrong. Well, the literally it is correct but the interpretation is the important thing. There is none in the translation. Anyone relying on this would soon find out their mistake.”

Art smiled.

“Adam or someone he employed put some spyware on your work computer. It was buried very, very deep. We have no idea how long it was there before the holiday weekend. The spyware was so good that it evaded the regular scans made by the bank of all the computers. We now know from evidence found at Adam’s home that they had all your research information run through Google translate. That gave them a pretty good picture of what you were going to do with your trades over the holiday weekend. The problem was that you didn’t do what they expected you to do. Instead you traded in stocks that were not in your recent research. The Korean company’s CEO did resign and the stock dropped as you would expect. That was what Adam was betting on only you played a blinder and did something totally different.”

I laughed. They both looked at me.

“Sorry, I just had a vision of an early sketch from Monty Python. John Cleese is sitting behind a desk with waves lapping all around him and he says, ‘and now for something completely different’. What you said just triggered that memory.”

Art thought for a moment then a broad smile appeared on his face.
“Actually, it is very apt. Add in a bit of ‘The Spanish Inquisition’ and you have pretty well summed up your actions that weekend. Adam and his team could in no way read your mind. You were able to make several inferences that only someone with a deep understanding of the region would know. You went totally off track and returned an exceptionally healthy profit. It is safe to say that no one I’ve spoken to expected the merger of those companies to be announced when it was other than you. Not even the SEC people in Tokyo and Seoul. No other trader in the world saw them coming.”

“So, Adam’s bet on my portfolio was placed well before I made the trade orders on that Friday Evening?”

“It was actually done late on Thursday,” said Art.

I laughed.

“That all starts to make sense now. I only decided to change my dealings late on Friday afternoon when I saw a trading note on the London Bloomberg wire. You saw that copy in the documents I presented to you. If I hadn’t done that, they would have made a killing. The Bloomberg note was based upon a report that came out of Frankfurt that talked about the Korean Company teaming up with the Japanese one to build an Electric Car Battery Plant in Poland. I made a call to a former colleague of mine who went back to Warsaw. He confirmed that both CEO’s had been seen at the proposed site at the same time. Then the companies themselves were reporting that extraordinary board meetings were being held on Sunday and Monday. That was enough to make me change my mind on the trades.”

Then I thought for a moment.

“And the rest as they say is history.”

I stood up and shook both of their hands. Then I walked out of the office and headed for the nearest bar and downed a couple of drinks. I even toasted Adam for his ingenuity but laughed at his eventual foolishness. Feeling an awful lot better with myself, I went home.

---

I called Maureen the following day once she’d taken Luke to pre-school. She came over and together we finished packing my things. A friend of hers was going to come around the next day with a panel van to take what I had left either to her place or into storage for shipment home.

As we packed and cleaned, I told her what had happened. To my surprise, she burst into tears.

I hugged her to comfort her.

“Don’t worry Maureen, it is all over. Adam and his fellow conspirators will get the justice they deserve.”

“How can you be so calm at times like this?”

“Oh, believe me, I was really angry when the Immigration people arrived. But I had to trust my lawyer. He came very highly recommended to me and he did a lot more than I would have expected a normal lawyer to do.”

“But it must have cost you a load of money?”

“Not me. The Bank. Part of my severance deal included them covering my legal fees until I went home. They clearly did not envisage the shit storm that came later. That storm was entirely Adam Strong’s doing. He’s now in the smelly stuff up to his neck.”

Maureen looked at me through tearful eyes.

“You are a strange person Gordon MacLeish. Perhaps that is why I like you so much?”

I chuckled.

“Maureen Jenkins, no one has ever said anything as nice as that to me in a long time.”

I held her tight for quite a while. I was determined not to let her go.

The TV news that evening had some details of the arrests in the case. We saw Adam Strong and some others that I didn’t know all doing their ‘perp walk’ after being arraigned and denied bail. The reporter said that as he owned a private Jet, there was a clear flight risk. That I could believe. I knew that his family had properties in Mexico, Belize and Iceland and probably a few others that Adam had not visited since I moved over from London..

---

I spent a week at Maureen’s finalising my move home. It also gave us plenty of time to talk about our future. At first, she wasn’t too keen on moving to the UK especially as she didn’t have a job to go to.
That all changed when I found out that she’d been training to become a teacher before she became pregnant with Luke.

“Then go to college and finish your training to be a teacher? I’ll look after Luke and I can easily pay for the tuition.”

An expression of pure surprise came over her face.

“Are you sure about that?”

“Yes I am. I’m totally sure. Come home with me, get married and …”

I didn’t get a chance to finish my sentence.

“Married?”

“Why not? It would make getting you a settlement Visa a heck of a lot easier. Being married and finishing your teacher training sounds like a good idea to me…”

“I didn’t think… Oh crap… With everything that has happened, I didn’t give it a thought.”

Then she said,
“The fact is, I didn’t think you were totally serious about me for a while.”

“Maureen… I am deadly serious. As I said before, you didn’t run a mile when I told you about my other side. Plus, I happen to think that we are good together.”

“I… It is hardly the sort of proposal I’d dreamed about as a girl.”

“If you want me to go down on one knee I will but we are both intelligent adults. So how about it eh? Come across the pond with me and try a different life?”

Maureen remained stone faced for several seconds. Then she smiled.
“If you are sure about this?”

I sighed.
“I am deadly serious.

---

Maureen, Luke and I went to see her Parents the following weekend. I had some explaining to do after saying to them that I didn’t have any romantic intentions towards their daughter only a few weeks before. Maureen’s Mother saw how happy her daughter was and overruled her husband.
“She deserves to be happy and I see how happy Gordon has made her. Our Daughter deserves to be happy. If that means moving to the other side of the Atlantic then let it happen.”

We’d already decided to get married as soon as possible. That ‘soon’ turned out to be a week later at a nice place Delaware. Maureen had been to the place for another wedding and liked it. Then we found out that they’d had a late cancellation so we took advantage of it. Together, Maureen and her Mother handled all the arrangements. I had to do was pay for it all. Dan Cooke was my Best Man. It wasn’t that far from Cape May and his fishing boat so it wasn’t hard to get him to be at my side for the day.

Everything was done in such a hurry that I had to rent a tux for the event. Dan and I found what we needed only two hours before the ceremony.

Thanks to Maureen’s Cousin Donna, she had a beautiful wedding dress to wear. The only problem was Luke. No matter what anyone did, he looked like someone had dragged him through a hedge backwards. He didn’t care. All he was interested in was seeing ‘Thomas’. Still he promised to behave himself during the ceremony and at the reception afterwards.

---

On the day of the wedding, a package was delivered to me in my Hotel room. I recognised the writing as well as the name on the wrapper. Somehow, Maureen had found time to take the train to New York and visit the Lingerie Shop that I’d ducked into to escape my FBI Tail.

She’d bought me some underwear and stockings to wear for the wedding. The note that she’d written also said that she would be wearing what I’d bought her at the wedding so she thought it fitting that I should wear some as well.

The more I got to know her, the more I realised that I’d found a gem of a woman.

---

When we arrived back in New York from a brief trip to Denver and the Rockies which included a couple of steam train rides for Luke, the place felt fresher and a whole lot nicer. The ‘Hot and Steamy’ part of the year was over as was my time in the Big Apple. It was still as noisy as ever though.

Five days after returning from Denver, I said goodbye to a tearful Maureen and Luke at JFK whereupon, I flew back to London. I had a few loose ends with respect to my pension contributions and the like, to tie up with the bank in London before I was free to head north and my home.

We’d already submitted the residency visa applications in for Maureen and Luke. It was hard leaving them so soon after we’d gotten married but I had to go home to get my place ready for them.

---

[Twenty Ninth of October. New York]

My phone rang. It was my lawyer, Dan Cooke. I was just finishing Lunch with Maureen.

“Yes Dan?”

“They are? After just two hours?”

“No. We are two blocks away. We’ll be there.”

I hung up the call and said to Maureen.

“The Jury is back.”

She smiled.
“We’d better get a move on then,” she said gripping my hand.

Twenty-six minutes later the Judge entered the courtroom. Adam and his cohorts were waiting to hear the verdict. The place was crammed with the media. Expectations were clearly high. Adam was smirking as usual. Several ‘high-fives’ were exchanged with his friends as they were brought in from the holding cells. It seemed that he thought that he was going to get away with it. I thought otherwise. I’d sat at the back of the court for most of the case and it was clear to me that he was going down for a long stretch.

When asked by the Judge, the foreman of the jury rose and read the verdicts one by one. All sixty counts were of guilty.

Everyone was Guilty. The smirk that had been on Adam Strong’s face disappeared in an instant the first verdict had been read out.

He spoke to his lawyer.
The lawyer shook his head. Adam slumped back in his chair.

The Judge called the court to order.

“I want to thank the Jury for their services. You are dismissed and thank you once again. Sentencing will be in one week. The defendants who have been found guilty will be taken into custody. Court is dismissed.”
He banged his gavel and it was all over.

As Adam was led away he saw me. I got the mother of all glares of hatred. Sadly, I tried but couldn’t stifle a yawn. This set him off and he tried to get to me. The officers guarding him soon had him under control.

I was just glad to see the back of him after all the trouble he had given me but I had to thank him for one thing and that thing was standing right at my side.

I walked out of the court with Maureen on my arm. One huge chapter of my life had just closed.

---

[Two weeks before Christmas at Manchester (UK) Airport]

I looked up at the Arrivals board for what must have been the hundredth time. To my relief the status of the flight from JFK had changed from ‘Arrived’ to ‘Baggage in Hall’. My pulse raced. Not long now I thought to myself.

Despite my optimism, it was nearly half an hour before Maureen appeared pushing a trolley that was loaded with three large suitcases. Luke was sitting on top having a whale of a time directing his Mother where she should push the trolley which like most of their ilk, has a mind of its own.

I resisted running forward and walked towards them. Maureen spotted me and struggled with the trolley which for a moment claimed victory. It spun around and Luke went ‘Wheeeeee’.

I hugged Maureen. Then we briefly kissed. I’d not seen them other than on a laptop screen for more than a month.

“Hello Mrs MacLeish.”

“Hello Mr MacLeish,” he replied.

“Good flight?” I asked as I took over trying to control the trolley.

“Not bad at all. Luke slept most of the way which made a difference.”

Maureen looked tired out but Luke seemed as fresh as a daisy.

“You look shattered?”

She just shrugged her shoulders.

“Let’s get you to my car and then home. You can have a sleep while I keep Luke entertained.”

Maureen tucked her arm in mine and leant her head on my shoulder.

---

Two and a half hours later we arrived at my home not far from Kendal. I always used the term ‘not far’ or ‘close’ or ‘south of’ when describing where I lived. Most people I’ve met had no idea where Cartmel is so being a bit circumspect is always a good idea. I owned a former farmhouse with a large barn at the side. ‘Lucy’ was in the Barn. I’d spent quite a bit of time working on her over the past weeks when I wasn’t back in New York dealing with the visa’s for Maureen and Luke or attending the trial of my now former arch nemesis, Adam Strong. He’d been sentenced to ten years and fined sixteen million dollars. That was just loose change to his family but they’d all done a rapid distancing job from him once he’d been found guilty.

I nudged Maureen. She’d had her eyes closed for the past half hour. She looked knackered and needed a rest.

“Darling, we are here.”

Luke had also fallen asleep when we got stuck in a traffic jam on the M61. The silence as I switched off the engine woke him up.

Maureen was looking around at the yard where I’d parked. All around here were stone buildings.

“Where are we?” she asked sleepily.

“Home my darling. Home.”

I got out and helped her out of my car. I’d already made a note to get a bigger car. A Ford Fiesta might be ok for one person but a family of three plus luggage was stretching it a bit.

“All the old houses are built from stone in this part of the world.”

“Oh!” remarked Maureen.

Then she shivered. There was a chill breeze blowing in off the sea. Morecambe Bay was not that far away. We’d had quite a bit of snow two weeks before but that was all gone now but, there was still some on the top of the peaks in the Lake District to the north and the Pennines to the East.

“Let me unlock the house. It will be much warmer inside.”

By the time I’d unloaded the car and brought their bags inside, Maureen was trying to work out how to use my ancient range. It was one where you lit it in October and kept it going until April. It warmed the whole house.

“There is no off or on switch. It is always on,” I said as I opened the lid to expose a hot plate.

“This is very hot. You just move the pot or kettle around to regulate the temperature.”

“Sorry,” replied Maureen.

I hugged her.

“No need to say sorry. Things will be a little strange at first.”

Then I added,
“I know how you feel. Remember that I was once a stranger in New York?”

“But…”

“But you are feeling out of your comfort zone aren’t you?”

She nodded.

“Sit yourself down and I’ll make us some tea. Then I’ll show you both around.”

By mid-afternoon, both Maureen and Luke were showing signs of jet-lag. I let them rest while I prepared us something to eat. The wind had veered around to the North-East and it was getting colder so I made us some Lamb Stew and put some more wood into the range.

Just after five, Maureen appeared looking quite refreshed.

“That smells good. What is it?”

“Lamb Stew.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever eaten Lamb before.”

I chuckled.

“That is one thing that you will have to get used to. There are more sheep than people in these parts.”

“So, I heard. I heard a load of them bleating a little while ago.”

“Ah, that would be Mick Young. He runs about two hundred head. He’s just bought them down from the fells for the winter.”

“It is so quiet here. I can just hear the trains but otherwise…”

“Very different to New York isn’t it?”

“You told me that it would be but I had no idea.”

“New York never sleeps. This place never wakes up. That’s why I chose it. Not far off halfway between London and Glasgow but very quiet.”

Then I asked,

“Is Luke still asleep?”

“Yes. I looked in on him and he hasn’t moved since I tucked him up.”

“This will be ready in about an hour. I think you should wake him up otherwise he’ll want to play in the middle of the night.”

Maureen approved of my cooking but found it hard to believe that the nearest Fast Food outlet was not just around the corner.

“It looks like I’m going to have to do a lot more work in the kitchen than I’m used to.”

I took hold of her hand and smiled.

“I have a good selection of cook books you know.”

Maureen responded by hitting me on the arm.

---

The following day, I showed them ‘Lucy’.

Luke fell in love with my small industrial Steam Engine that just happened to look like “Thomas” except that it had one less pair of driving wheels.

“Where’s the bit in the middle?” asked Maureen as she pointed at the hole where the boiler should be.

“You mean the Boiler?”
I smiled.
“It is away having some work done on it. Then it can be tested and certified.”

“Sounds expensive?”

“It is but it is all within budget. It will be back after Christmas.”

“Speaking of Christmas…” said Maureen.

“You were thinking that it might be good for your parents to visit?”

“How did you guess?”

“I saw you eyeing up the room next to ours earlier.”

“It is a bedroom isn’t it?”

“It is but as you found out it is a bit of a junk room.”

“Would you mind if I turned it into a 3rd bedroom?”

I smiled and put my arm around her.

“Of course not. This is your home now but there is a lot to do before Christmas isn’t there?”

“Can we go and look for materials tomorrow?”

“Of course, we can go, but remember that we have an appointment at the school at two. We don’t want Luke to miss starting school in January.”

“Sorry. I’d forgotten.”

“Don’t worry. You have had a lot to deal with this past week. Things will soon settle down. As I have said before this place moves at a snails pace. Once you get used to it, you won’t want to go back to the big city in a hurry.”

Maureen looked at Luke who was trying to move the reversing gear on Lucy’s footplate.

“Luke seems happy,” she commented.

“Did you ever have any doubts?”

“Not once you’d told him about Lucy.”

Then I kissed her.

“What was that for?” asked Maureen when we broke up.

“Do I need a reason to kiss my wife?”

“Well no you don’t.”

“So, you won’t mind if I do it again?”

“No, I won’t.”

So, I did it again.

---

Luke started at the local school after Christmas. That gave us some time alone. Time enough for Maureen to see the other me. Once she’d stopped laughing at my frankly pitiful attempt at applying makeup, she said with her hands on her hips…

“Right my girl, I can see that you will also be going back to school. Call that makeup? It is pathetic! Must do better! Nil Points!”

The smile on her face told me that she was enjoying herself and I didn’t mind one little bit.

[The End]