Chapter Twenty-Six Boulevard of Broken Dreams
‘Somehow we have to emerge as the heroes of this story,’ I say the next morning as Charlie and I gather early in the shop to try and sort things out. We have yet to work out how to make that happen.
The door opens and Josie walks in. She hangs her head, avoiding eye contact, and I guess she’s wondering where she fits now. I rush up to her and put my arms around her shoulders.
‘It wasn’t your fault, you have to know that,’ I tell her. ‘Now do you want to come back to work? I think we’re going to need you.’
She squeezes me so tightly I’m in danger of popping. I nod at Charlie to join us and we have a big Mercury hug before settling down to the task at hand.
Charlie calls the local papers. They’ve inevitably picked up the story and want to know if we’re involved. They ask whether our customers are safe: Charlie was right — this is an issue that affects us, too. He reassures them that we weren’t involved and says our customers are completely safe. The police are really helpful with this. They let the newspaper have a picture of Lorenzo’s leather manbag, which he left behind in the rush. Fortunately, it contained his passport, so when the papers found out that he wasn’t even called Lorenzo — he was a conman called Larry Maxwell from Wolverhampton — it all added to the frisson and took the attention away from us a little.
Nevertheless, we need to do the right thing. My first job is to call every single person who has booked a trip with Mercury. I tell them Launch has gone bust but we are safe and their holiday is safe. Then Josie gets in touch with Launch customers to find out if there’s anything we can do to help them. We ask the local paper to include a bold paragraph stating that Mercury has offered to help and that if they’ve been affected by Lorenzo, they should call us.
It’s an emotionally draining morning, listening to people telling us how they’d saved up for months to pay for their holiday or how the break was their once-in-a-lifetime chance to visit family overseas. I’ve always known that I’m selling more than simply a few days away but these stories really bring it home. We’re shattered by the end of the day. I invite the guys back to my place for some food and wine. We can’t go out locally in case someone corners us about their trip. After today we all need a break.
I order a takeaway and open the wine. We toast ‘survival’, then all three of us empty our glasses without coming up for air.
‘I suppose this makes us the last man standing,’ I say, filling them up again. ‘So why doesn’t it feel better than this?’
‘It’s like winning a silver medal in the Olympics against a drugs cheat,’ says Josie and she’s right, it does feel like that.
The next day, the local newspaper article is out and spreading across social media. The phone never stops and we work another twelve-hour day. There isn’t much we can do — the money is gone — but we do try to find cheap alternative trips if people want to book them and we help them apply for compensation if they’ve booked by credit card or have travel insurance. Unfortunately for many, Lorenzo encouraged them to just transfer the money and said he’d sort the insurance — which of course he didn’t. In a few instances, we can’t stop ourselves: the story is so sad that we just have to help the customers out ourselves. It might be bad business but I’m hoping that karma will come into play, too. We’re trying really hard to sort out this mess. The poor charity Lorenzo pretended he was supporting (I still can’t get used to the idea that he’s really called Larry. Patty was right, I’m far too gullible) got nothing, so with another few calls, we persuade the local business community to come together and put collection boxes in their shops and reception areas. I think people are starting to understand that we’re not to blame. As the day ends, Charlie and I get an email from the bank asking us to come in tomorrow to discuss the resort financing.
‘Well, at least he can’t say that we’ve too much competition on our hands now,’ I tell Charlie.
I ask Patty to help Josie in the shop while Charlie and I head into town. We’ve got the very last appointment of the day so that we don’t have to close up. Closing the shop, even at four o’clock, would look dreadful right now and I’m still wary of leaving Josie on her own. She’s prone to spontaneous sobbing outbursts despite the number of times we’ve told her she’s not to blame. I doubt Lorenzo/Larry is crying over this. The truly guilty ones never do.
This time, I haven’t even thought about how I look. I’m the competent travel expert who’s sorting out a mess left for customers, not the smooth talker who was here last time. If I had sleeves to roll up, they would be. Charlie’s are and his tie is relaxed as he throws his jacket on the back of his chair while shaking hands with the bank manager.
‘You’ve had quite a time recently,’ starts the manager, holding up the front cover of the Evening News.
‘You can say that again,’ Charlie says. ‘But it goes to show — if the offer looks unbelievable, it probably is. At least we won’t see discounting like that anymore.’
The manager nods and pulls up our most recent bank statement.
‘It’s a good job really,’ he says. ‘You were getting pretty close to the edge, weren’t you? It’s a shame he didn’t go bust earlier.’
I’m quite shocked but keep quiet. To me his going bust has meant lots of customers lost out. Yes, of course I’m glad he’s gone but I’d rather people hadn’t suffered on his way out.
‘Certainly, there’d be fewer innocent victims if he had,’ says Charlie, obviously biting his tongue. ‘Still we’ve survived and we’re relatively unscathed.’
The manager stops scrolling through the statements and looks directly at us, his hands folded in front of him. ‘I’m afraid there’s no easy way of saying this.’
I sit upright, not sure what he’s going to say.
‘The business loan to finance the new resort expansion was secured against the core business as you know. The terms always required that the loan would be reviewed directly before drawdown to ensure the collateral was still a sufficient guarantee.’
I’m following it, just.
‘With the downturn in deposits and now this collapse of a competitor, the bank does not have enough confidence in the independent travel sector to approve the release of funds.’
What exactly is he saying?
‘The competitor didn’t collapse,’ argues Charlie. ‘He defrauded customers and ran off with their money. It had nothing to do with us.’
The bank manager closes the file on his desk to show unequivocally that the conversation is over.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘If the bank over the road went bust, we’d experience a run on funds, and you’ve yet to prove you can recover. We cannot lend you the money for the resort.’