“And if he’s been doing that for the last five years or so that comes to a very useful thirteen point seven five million pounds, less a bit of tax somewhere.”

I sat back in my chair and looked across at Pierre. “Bob, I’ve told you the money doesn’t really mean much to me. For your information I got about ninety million when I sold the company and not too much went on tax. Most of it has been invested sensibly. I don’t really have to worry. But,” he said, with emphasis, “I do not like being taken for a fool and I don’t like crooks, especially those that prey on the elderly.”

“There’s another thing.”

“What?” “The two guys that Purdy sent over to break up the chat I was having with Alice wanted to have a little meeting.”

“Why?” “Ostensibly to sell their products to a potential investor.”

I then told him about the veiled threat I had received at the end of the meeting.

Pierre’s reaction was immediate. “That does it, then. We need to do something.” “Like what?” I asked. Pierre thought for a moment. “Here’s what I would like to do. We agreed that we’ve both got time on our hands. You can’t work in the garden and play golf all the time. I’m a bit bored. As far as I’m concerned today was confirmation of my suspicions. We need to see how we can expose the bastard.”

I thought this over for a minute. He was right. These kinds of crimes never got investigated properly. One reason was that they were often too difficult to prove. Another was that regulatory authorities seldom had teeth and the police, being more and more short handed and more and more snowed under by paperwork, just didn’t have the time. Government by objectives had gone crazy and playing by the rules was a slow process.

We were a couple of old farts who had time on their hands. Pierre could obviously supply financial backing and I had got to the stage in life where bending a few rules to achieve a morally correct objective was not going to bother me one bit.

I summarised this to Pierre and grinned. He lent over the table and stuck out his hand. I took it and thereby committed myself to a course of action which was going to have some startling consequences.

“Let’s plan the next steps.” We banged around a few ideas for the space of half an hour. As far as Purdy was concerned I was the thorn in his flesh. Pierre was just a client. We agreed to keep it that way. Our connection would be kept secret.

I would talk to Steven as soon as possible and get him digging on the promise that, whatever came out of it, he would get an exclusive.

I would go and see Alice and find out if she knew any other fellow investors. Meanwhile we should bring Mike into the equation.

“He has contacts from his old army days – guys that can do a bit of following or digging and if we can find out anything that proves that Purdy has a lot more money than he should have we’ll have a lever on him.”

We agreed to get Mike over the next morning and get things moving.

Pierre left to go back to the hotel and I turned in, reeking of curry and beer. As I dropped off to sleep I thought of Liz. She would definitely approve of what I was doing.

I called Mike the next morning and he agreed to come over and we’d meet at Fernie Castle for a bar lunch.

After we had related to Mike the events of the conference and he was completely up to date on everything he was more than happy to get involved.

“So you want me to see if I can dig up any dirt on Mr Alan Purdy?”

“Can you?” we asked.

“No problem. I have a couple of guys who would be just right. I knew them in the army. Mac lives up near Perth and does freelance house painting which bores him rigid but he likes the freedom it gives him. I’ll see if he’s free. Can I offer to pay him?”

“I’ll organise that,” said Pierre. “There is also Doug, who used to be an explosives expert, but that’s beside the point. He can do other things. He can’t find work very easily at the moment. He’ll be up for a bit of tax-free cash.”

The plan was launched. I knew what I was going to do, Mike would organize Mac and Doug and Pierre would stay in the background.

“Right little bunch of musketeers, we are,” said Mike, finishing off his beer. “We should call ourselves the Three Musketeers. We need a name. I like names.”

“The Three Musketeers is a bit old-fashioned,” said Pierre. “Well, how about The Bruce Brothers?” I said with a grin. “One of my favourite films.”

We discarded that as being too frivolous and after bandying about a bunch of alternatives – some of them distinctly unusable in female company – we decided we would be APA Consulting (Athos, Porthos and Aramis).

As we were about to leave I mentioned to Pierre that we had an invitation to go through to visit Heather for lunch on Saturday. He was delighted and we decided that he and I would meet Mike on the way so as to arrive together. Our sister could be a bit daunting on occasions and I preferred the idea of presenting a consolidated front.

Mike had to go back home. He had an appointment in Dundee, he said.

“Which will no doubt result in a new photograph in the living room?” I asked mischievously.

“You never know.”

Pierre looked mystified.

I called Alice when I got back home and asked her if I could come over and see her the next day. She promptly suggested that I come for lunch. She would rustle up a salad.

I set off the next morning at ten thirty and drove north at a leisurely pace, over the hills and down into the fertile valley of the Tay. It was sunny and I felt invigorated. I had something to do. My brain was operating again and trying to imagine what we were going to discover.

I have to admit that most of my life had centred around the need to forge a career and look after my family. The idea of having the luxury (the time and the money) to do something to help others – to right a wrong, to punish a wrong doer – in some way or other appealed to me. I had a new purpose.

I skirted the fair city of Perth and drove north. Alice had given me directions to her house once I got to the village. They were simple to follow and I arrived at about a quarter to twelve.

Lunch had been prepared (cold salmon salad) in the little verandah that was tacked onto the back of the cottage. I was offered a sherry. The verandah was neat and tidy and let in lots of light yet protected us from the wind. At this time of year it was an ideal place to sit and chat.

And Alice could chat. In her own home there was none of the nervousness she had displayed when we first met. She explained how she lived, how she busied herself with the affairs of the village. She and her husband had come to live there after he had retired from his production management job with a large American paper-making company. They had been lucky because he had, over the years, accumulated a sizeable number of stock options and they had turned out to be quite valuable when he had cashed them in.

They had had two children – one was living down south (down south meant anywhere on the other side of the English border) and the other had emigrated to Australia.

I let her prattle on through lunch and, when she went through to fix some coffee I thought to myself what a nice little old lady she was, although she was probably only about ten years older than me. That Purdy was stealing from her was, in my book, disgusting.

When she brought back the coffee we turned to the subject of her investments and AIM.

“That man is definitely a crook,” she announced. “I watched him when you were asking about the ‘missing millions’. He’s a crook, there’s no question about it. I can feel it.”

I smiled at this conclusion which was uttered with such conviction, yet based on little more than female intuition as far as I could tell. But over the years I have discovered that female intuition can be a pretty powerful tool.