A book in the Fabulous Fathers series, 1993

“You’ve simply got to face facts, Gavin. The figures don’t look good. Hunter and Son is rapidly becoming a paper company-splendid on the surface, but nothing behind it but debt.”

Gavin Hunter’s dark brows almost met as he frowned angrily. “Hunter and Son has always been good for any amount of credit,” he snapped.

The banker, who was also a friend insofar as Gavin Hunter had any friends, pulled a wry face. “That was then. This is now. The great days of property are over. Interest rates rise as prices fall. Some of your hotels are only just hanging on. Since they’re mortgaged to the hilt, it won’t even help you to sell them.”

“I don’t want to sell,” Gavin snapped. “I want a small loan to keep me going. A mere quarter of a million pounds. In the past you’ve loaned me four times that without blinking.”

“In the past you had excellent collateral to back it up. Look, I’m not sure…What’s the matter?” The banker had realized that Gavin was no longer listening to him. His attention was fixed on the television screen in the corner of the room. “Is that disturbing you? I have it on to catch the news, but I can turn it off.”

“Turn the sound up,” Gavin said hoarsely.

The screen was filled with a photograph of an amiable looking middle-aged man. The banker turned up the sound.

“…died today in a car crash that also killed his wife, Elizabeth. Tony Ackroyd was one of the world’s best-known naturalists, a man who’d been prominent in…”

Gavin was gathering his things together, thrusting them hastily back into his briefcase. “Don’t you want to talk some more?” the banker said.

“Not just now. I have urgent business to attend to.”