Dave Hart Omnibus by David Charters

Author:David Charters
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781908739551
Publisher: Elliott & Thompson

THE THIRD INSTALMENT OF

DAVE HART’S ADVENTURES IS

AVAILABLE NOW

THE EGO

HAS LANDED

by David Charters

from Elliott & Thompson

I’M DEAD.

I know I must be dead because I’m walking slowly up a long staircase in bare feet, wearing an old-fashioned nightgown, and I’m surrounded by puffy white clouds. Sitting or standing in the clouds are groups of beautiful young women, all dressed in long white gowns, all singing heavenly arias. I recognise Ilyana from Kiev, and Breathless Beth, and Fluffy and Thumper from the Pussycat Club, and there’s a stunning redhead from Warsaw whose name I’ve forgotten. Choruses of heavenly hookers, all serenading me as I ascend the final steps to a pair of huge iron gates, and standing in front of them a very ancient man with a long beard, who is staring at a book on a lectern.

‘Name?’ He has a deep, gravelly voice, commanding and stern, the sort of voice that makes me worry in case he somehow knows my guilty secrets. All of them.

‘H – Hart. Dave Hart.’ My mouth is dry and it’s an effort to get the words out. But at least I get a reaction as he looks up from the book.

‘Dave Hart? Are you kidding? You’re a fucking investment banker. Get out of here, you wanker!’

And suddenly a great wind is blasting through the railings of the gates and I’m tumbling, falling head over heels back down the stairs, and the girls have stopped singing and are all pointing at me and laughing, and I want to scream, need to scream, desperate to scream…

‘Aaaaaaargh!’

I open my eyes. I’m lying in bed in a small room with white painted walls.

An institutional room. The bed is narrow and uncomfortable and is surrounded by medical equipment with wires running under the covers and dials and flashing lights. I know I’m in hospital, but as I scream the door of my room bursts open and a policewoman runs in followed by a nurse.

A policewoman? In a hospital? Oh, for fuck’s sake. Now it’s coming back to me. I rest my head back on the pillow and try not to laugh.

I’m an investment banker. And not just any investment banker. I’m Dave Hart. I run the investment banking operations of the Erste Frankfurter Grossbank – ‘Grossbank’ to its friends – which I’ve turned from Sleepy Hollow into one of the most happening places in the City of London in a little over twelve months.

And most of my friends are investment bankers too. I still can’t recall exactly what I’m doing in hospital, but instinct takes over and I look at the policewoman and the nurse and grin.

My voice is croaky and it’s an effort to speak. ‘Don’t tell me – Dan Harriman sent you.’ Dan runs European equities at Hardman Stoney. He’s what passes in investment banking circles for one of my closest friends – which is to say that he’s always there when he needs you. But now it’s my turn and he’s done me a favour.

‘All right, get your kit off.

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