My phone dinged and alert for an incoming text. It was from Lillian. It said, 

Hello, Tony, a room has been reserved for you at The Dylan Hotel near Baggot Street, along with breakfast and dinner reservations on the night of your arrival. You will be meeting Lindsay, your companion for the stay. She will be sitting at a nest of chairs and sofas in a glazed nook in reception and will meet you there. This is a five-star hotel, a jacket and tie is required for dinner. Check-in is from three p.m. and Lindsay will be there from four. Enjoy each other. 

X Lillian.

I returned my phone to my pocket and walked into the canteen at work. It was empty, so I checked the smoke shed outside. That was empty too. I checked my watch. It was working.

“What’s wrong, Harris?” Raffles asked as he walked up from his car.

“I’m looking for Smithser,” I said, “have you seen him knocking about?”

He rolled his eyes. “He must be in his office, the ‘do not disturb’ sign is up.”

“He must have a woman in there,” I said with a grin, and he laughed. 

I took the stairs to Peter’s office. Sure enough, there was a sign on his door so I pushed it open. Peter was working at his desk with his head down, so I snapped a picture of him with my phone and he turned around at the sound of the click.

“Oh, Tony,” he said, “what’s the craic?”

“Sorry, I’m looking for Peter Smith, have you seen him today?” I asked.

“Go on, get it all out now,” he said. “You can laugh, but I’m just about finished these contract amendments. Here, take a look,” he continued and handed several typed pages to me.

“I’ll take them down to my desk and read through them,” I said. “We’ll need Cadden to sign off and after that__”

“Let the games begin,” he said, rubbing his hands together gleefully.

“You’re fucking enjoying this, aren’t you?”

“I’m fucking loving it, young Master” he said, “and I think I’m on a promise tonight, too. All because of this wonderful little confection you’ve allowed me to play with.”

Intrigued, I pulled a chair over beside him.

“Tell me,” I said.

“You know I’m not one to kiss and tell, my good man,” he said, “but for you, I’ll make an exception. Just this once.”

“Ooh, is it salacious?”

“We won’t know until later, but if it’s not, I’ll want my fucking money back.”

“Is she a hooker?”

“I refuse to charge anyone for it, Tony, and you shouldn’t either, it’s bad form,” he said.

“Will you fucking tell me?” I almost screamed in curiosity.

“Well, you won’t fucking believe this,” he said. “Last night I was in Searsons with a few of the boys and Jill Adams comes over with her mother. She was asking all about you and about our progress on the project.”

“The nosey cow!” I said.

“Of course I gave you all the credit,” he said.

“As if,” I said, “but go on in any case.”

“Anyway, Destiny, I think that’s the mother’s name, or is it Dani? It’s something like that anyway. By the way she’s a fox, with one of the best pair of tits I’ve seen on a woman in a long time,” he said. “She’s forty two and just ripe for the picking.”

“For fuck’s sake come on, Peter,” I said. “Will you get to the meat of the matter?”

“Ok. Did you say meat?” he shook his head. “So we we’re chatting away and Debbie, that’s her name, not Dani, Debbie tells me that she and Ben are three years into a difficult divorce. Now you know how sympathetic I am towards the unfortunate divorcees of the world, especially the foxy ones.”

“You didn’t …” I said fearfully.

“No, I fucking didn’t! Her daughter was with her,” he said in mock disgust. “Do you think I’m a caveman or something?”

“No, I don’t, most of the time.”

“But I will tonight, young stud, all things being equal,” he said. “Deirdre! that’s her name … I think. It starts with a D; I know that much at least.”

I had a call to return to Ben Adams. He was most likely looking for an update on progress, given that his wife and daughter were hassling Peter at night in the pub. I sat down and pored over Peter’s work. It was top class. He’d covered everything, as far as I could see, so I got my checklist out and spent an hour comparing them. It checked out fully, so I brought it up to James Cadden for his imprimatur. I dropped it on his desk, returned to my office and called Ben.