grand.’
Panzer cannot suppress a smile. ‘Listen to you, give or take a few hundred grand.’
‘Forty-one million in sterling, seven million in euro and two million in foreign currencies, mostly US dollars. Of the sterling, only twenty-eight was usable, the rest was coin and new print. I reckon we should be in a position to harvest about thirty to thirty-five million.’
‘Harvest, Ructions? Is that what we do? Harvest bank money?’ Panzer has a vision of a field of green money plants, with fifty-pound notes flapping like leaves in the wind. ‘Still, why not? The O’Hares: money farmers. I like it. You and Eleanor can’t have any contact for at least a couple of years and—’
‘She’s okay with that.’
‘You’ve told her?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you believe her?’
‘Yes.’ You’re still not certain, are you, Panzer? You’d just love to put a bullet in the back of her head and remove even the sniff of a problem, wouldn’t you? No, I take that back; you’d love me to put a bullet in the back of her head for you. Isn’t that the way of it?
‘Heads up,’ Ructions says.
Eleanor Proctor – five feet seven inches, thirty-two years old, curvy, with long auburn hair and a spring in her step – walks out of her home carrying a gym bag.
‘She’s a stunner, amigo, I’ll give you that. How long have you been banging her?’
Eleanor gets into her red Volvo and drives off.
‘Amm, about a year? I’ve been chasing her properly since May 2003, but she played hard to get.’
‘The old Ructions charm didn’t work right away, then?’
‘It took a while, but Ructions always gets his woman.’
Panzer laughs. ‘How did it start?’
‘I set her up.’
‘Why doesn’t that surprise me?’ Panzer says.
‘It was at the Bruce Springsteen concert in the RDS stadium in Dublin,’ Ructions says. ‘She was chatting to her friend, Stacy, outside the venue. I knew who she was, who her husband was. The only reason I was there was because she was there. So, I gave a kid a few quid to snatch her bag. I pretended to give chase and got the bag back. She was very grateful.’
‘Extremely grateful,’ Panzer says.
‘In the end,’ Ructions says.
The Proctors’ garage door opens, and Frank Proctor drives out in a silver Saab.
‘I’ll catch you later,’ Ructions says, getting out of the passenger door.
Panzer lifts the stopwatch on the dashboard, turns the ignition key and leans over to Ructions. ‘Make sure you do. We need to talk this thing through some more.’
Ructions gets into his car and drives off, taking to the back streets to get to the gym before Eleanor.
The gym is usually quiet at eight o’clock in the morning. As Ructions waits for Eleanor to arrive, snippets of his conversation with Panzer rampage through his mind like a terrified elephant in a shopping centre. ‘Look, kid, I’m your greatest fan …’ Yeah, you’re my greatest fan, Panzer – as long as I’m making you cartloads of money. What was it you said? ‘You’re the Magic Man.’ Too fuckin’ right, I’m the Magic Man.
Eleanor’s car enters the car park and pulls up alongside Ructions. On the far side of the car park, in the back of a yellow Volkswagen van, a small freckled man with strands of white hair brushed across his pate to conceal his baldness zooms in his video camera on the couple. ‘Mr James O’Hare is getting out of his car and is walking towards the car of Mrs Eleanor Proctor.’
Ructions gets into Eleanor’s car. They kiss. Eleanor instantly feels the electricity. Ructions offers Eleanor a cigarette. She shakes her head, wipes away a strand of hair from her face. ‘I look a mess,’ she says defensively.
Ructions toys with her silver earrings, then traces a finger along her breast. ‘Actually, you look extremely fuckable.’
‘More fuckable than Sweet Maria?’
‘Infinitely more fuckable.’
Eleanor shakes her head. ‘I want you to get rid of her,’ she says.
‘She’ll be gone soon.’
‘When?’
‘Very soon. She’s already picked up that things are different between us. It’s over bar the sighing and sulking.’
‘It’d better be. I mean it, James. I’m not going to be yours or anybody else’s mistress.’
‘Trust me, El.’
‘I do.’
Eleanor feels a lessening of the tension in her stomach. She nibbles his ear while pulling down his trouser zip. ‘Besides robbing banks, is that all you ever think of?’ she says huskily.
‘In case you haven’t noticed, love, that’s your hand on my joystick.’
‘Is it? Bad hand.’
A car pulls up close to them and a man and woman carrying gym bags get out. Eleanor takes her hand away and Ructions pulls up his zip. ‘Are you okay?’ he asks.
‘Yes, I’m fine.’
‘That doesn’t sound very convincing. What’s wrong? Out with it.’
‘It’s you.’
‘Me?’
‘Yeah, you. James, I’d better not be just a recreational fuck with a bank rota.’
‘Hey, that’s—’
‘Tell the truth. Am I only a way for you to find out what’s happening in the bank?’
Ructions shows genuine surprise and pulls back his head to get a better look at Eleanor. ‘Can we rewind this tape? I must have missed the first act.’
‘You’re avoiding the question.’
Ructions looks at Eleanor. Holy fuck! What do I say? He folds his arms and turns to her. ‘You know what? We should make a clean break now.’
Eleanor reaches across Ructions and opens the car door on his side. ‘Away you go then,’ she says dispassionately.
Away you go then? Ructions had not expected this reaction from Eleanor. He closes the door. ‘Would it be that easy for you?’
‘Easy? It’d be the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But if you want to break up, there’s nothing much left to say.’
Fucking
