‘Thank God you’re here, Maserov!’ Betga whispered when he opened Carla’s front door.
‘Where’s Carla?’
‘She’s gone out.’
‘Gone out? I thought the whole point of me coming here was to talk to her, for both of us to talk to her . . . about settling. She does know I’m coming, doesn’t she?’
‘She knows, she knows. She’s gone for a walk with the sad policeman. He came here unexpectedly and found me. We almost had a bit of a scene.’
‘Was he violent?’
‘No, are you kidding? No, he was more . . . He was very sad, quite aggressively sad.’
‘What a bastard!’
‘Exactly! No man can expect to appear attractive to a woman if he’s responsible for that degree of sadness in a much more pathetic man. He’s got it all figured out. It’s Darwinian. He’s exploiting the one natural advantage he’s got over me.’
‘Abject sadness?’
‘Yep.’
‘Is that why you were so relieved when I got here?’
‘No, it was because I need you to show me some dad tricks.’
‘“Dad tricks”? Where’s Marietta? Isn’t she with Carla?’
‘No, she’s in there,’ said Betga, pointing to the living room.
‘By herself?’ said Maserov, running down the hall to the living room. The little girl was sitting on the coffee table about to tumble off, head first and backwards. Maserov swooped in and picked her up off the table and held her in his arms.
‘Okay, first dad trick. You can’t leave her alone unless she’s in her cot or in a playpen of some kind. She’s too little. The cardinal rule of fatherhood is to never, ever, stop being terrified your child is going to hurt herself. Okay? And there’s only one thing worse than her hurting herself and that’s her hurting herself when you were the one supposed to be taking care of her, protecting her against harm, including harm that you haven’t even thought of, harm that is so unlikely to come to her that its anticipation will expose an imaginative genius in you that you never knew you had. Got it?’
‘Got it!’
‘You need to wake regularly in the middle of the night, night after night, imagining terrible things happening to her, which are all your fault, that haven’t happened yet but that probably will happen unless you think of them first. It’s only if you think of them that you can have any chance of stopping them from happening. That’s the first rule of fatherhood. Jesus, Betga, you’re nowhere near anxious enough for parenthood.’
They heard the sound of Carla’s key in the front door. She walked in alone without the policeman and saw Betga in the living room standing beside Maserov with Marietta in his arms. She smiled wanly at the sight of Maserov holding her daughter, the little girl’s arms around his neck.
‘You see?’ she said to Betga. ‘That’s the way to hold her. How come he can do it?’
‘’Cause he’s never been sent away from his child.’
There was an uncomfortable silence as the three of them realised that was not true.
‘The acting sergeant, he’s gone, has he?’ Betga asked, changing the subject to one he would very soon realise was not going to help him.
‘I know you laugh at him but he’s a very decent man.’
‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ Carla asked Maserov. ‘I’m not going to settle with Torrent Industries but you’re welcome to a cup of tea.’
‘I’m not here to talk to you about settlement.’
‘You’re not?’ Betga asked.
‘No, I actually came here to tell you some news, some good news.’
‘Oh really?’ Carla said with her back to Betga and Maserov as she filled the kettle and Betga mouthed the words, ‘What are you talking about?’
Carla spoke before Maserov had a chance to answer. ‘I must say, it can’t happen very often that the lawyer for the company you’re suing holds your baby daughter better than her own father.’
‘Who happens to be your lawyer,’ Betga added. ‘I’m not beyond learning. He’s had more experience being a father but I plan to be around a lot more now so that Marietta feels more comfortable with me. It won’t be long before she’s comfortable enough with me to let me take her out alone.’
‘Where are you going to take her, the Grosvenor?’ asked Carla.
‘Not yet, although I think she’d like the decor. It’s got quite a surprisingly soothing ambience during the day. No, before that I thought I could take her to the park. But I understand that it will take a little time for her to be comfortable alone with me so, for the time being, I’ll just hang out here with you as well . . . if that’s alright with you.’
‘You’d like to spend more time here, would you . . . to get Marietta more comfortable with you?’
‘Yes, I would. And if that has the unintended benefit of allowing me to spend more time in your company that’s no bad thing.’
‘Okay,’ said Carla, in a tone that implied a sudden good idea. ‘If you want to spend more time around here there might be a way we can make that happen.’
‘Yeah?’ asked Betga.
‘I’ll need you to agree to do something for me.’
‘Sure, you name it. Anything.’
‘Well, you haven’t yet heard what I want.’ Then, surprising Betga, Carla turned to Maserov, who was still gently swaying and holding the now almost sleeping Marietta. ‘Ron, the policeman Betga makes fun of, he’s a very sweet man. I met him through or perhaps I should say because of Betga. When I found out about Betga’s extra-legal contact with the legal recruiter I told him I never wanted to see him again but Betga, being the kind of child-like pain in the arse he is, wouldn’t accept that I meant it. He kept coming back. In the end I went to the local police station and that’s where I met Ron. And, in the state I was in, I probably over-shared. I definitely cried a lot. I told him all about Betga and how I didn’t want to see him again or want him anywhere near me or the baby when she was born. He gave me his card and told me to call him if ever I was afraid or needed him for any reason at all.’
‘They give cards now to acting sergeants,’ Betga interrupted. ‘It’s irresponsibly profligate.’
‘Okay, cut that shit, alright?’ she said with a sudden flash of anger that was never very far from the surface. ‘That’s what I’m talking about. He’s not the most dynamic man in the world but he was there, reliably there . . . if I needed him. And you, for all your intelligence and smart talking, you were a weak prick who let your constant need for a self-esteem top-up, for an ego boost, lead you down the path of instant gratification when we had a chance to build something here. And you did it even knowing what I’d been through, what had been done to me. So don’t you dare laugh at him!’
‘Carla, alright, I take your point but there’s no need to canonise him. It’s pretty clear what he was hanging around for.’
‘Maybe that was true in the beginning, maybe he carried some hope. But I made it pretty clear pretty early that that was never going to happen. And do you know what? He hung around anyway, which is more than you would do. So if you want to hang around now, you’re going to do something for me. I want you to be his life coach.’
‘What?’
‘You heard me. He often needs advice with respect to his career, handling people. He needs confidence, one thing you’ve got too much of. So here’s the deal. You’re going to be his life coach and you’re going to do it for free.’
‘You’ve got to be kidding!’
‘I’m not kidding. You do this properly and you help him, you can start coming around here and learn how to be a father.’
‘Carla, I can try, but I can’t guarantee it will help him. He’s got to want to be helped. I mean . . . I don’t even know if he’d want me to be his life coach. He might find that, frankly, humiliating.’
‘That’s why you’re going to approach him, make the offer out of gratitude for all he’s done for your daughter and for the mother of your daughter.’
‘And if he doesn’t want it?’
‘You’re going to talk him into it.’
‘And if I can’t?’
‘Betga, if you can’t talk him into it that just means you didn’t really try. Now, Mr Maserov, what’s your good news? I could use some.’
Maserov explained how Betga had conned Malcolm Torrent into trialling him as a private investigator without revealing that he, Betga, was simultaneously the lawyer acting for the aggrieved women, a conflict of interest as large as the building in which the con took place.
‘To demonstrate to Malcolm Torrent how good a private investigator he was, Betga concocted another woman, a fictitious plaintiff also suing Torrent Industries for sexual harassment, who he would persuade not to pursue the case. I was to present a Notice of Discontinuance to show that within a couple of weeks he had indeed got rid of the case. Betga hoped this would convince Torrent to take him on as a private investigator, off the books, that is, with no record of him or Torrent Industries employing him.’
‘And?’ asked Betga expectantly.
‘The good news is,’ said Maserov, ‘it worked. You are now hired as a private investigator on the strength of your work for the period it takes to make the real cases disappear.’
‘So he has a financial incentive to make them go on and on and last as long as possible. How is this good news for me?’ Carla asked.
‘Carla, relax. I’m going to help you out financially,’ answered Betga before continuing. ‘So what salary did you negotiate for me?’
‘It’s 75 per cent of mine.’
‘That doesn’t seem fair,’ said Betga.
‘I was fine with it,’ answered Maserov.
‘I still don’t see where any of this is good for me,’ Carla interrupted.
‘You’ve got to take the long view here, Carla, although admittedly Maserov’s negotiating skills on our behalf are disappointing.’
‘No, no, she doesn’t have to take the long view here. I’m here with the short view,’ Maserov interrupted.
‘What does that mean?’ asked Carla.
‘Okay, Malcolm Torrent doesn’t want any record of him or the company paying Betga because he doesn’t have any idea how Betga, as his private investigator, is getting rid of at least that one case. So, at Betga’s suggestion, Mr Torrent pays me a “bonus” that constitutes his payment to Betga. So I’m responsible for this money. Knowing how keen Betga is to atone for his misdeeds and to be offered a second chance, I know that he’s going to want this money to go directly to you.’
Maserov pulled out an envelope full of hundred dollar bills.
‘This is for me? Oh my God, thank you!’
‘Don’t thank me.’
‘I won’t,’ muttered Betga.
‘It’s Betga here you should be thanking.’