RJ Book 10 Taking Care of Business Read online

  The Richard Jackson Saga

  Book 10: Taking Care of Business

  By Ed Nelson

  Dedication

  This is dedicated to my wife Carol for her support and help as my first reader and editor.

  Also, the Bellefontaine High School Class of 1962 just because.

  Quotation

  “That’s the way it happened, give or take a lie or two.”

  James Garner as Wyatt Earp describing the gunfight at the OK Corral in the movie Sunset.

  Copyright © 2021

  E. E. Nelson

  All rights reserved

  Eastern Shore Publishing

  2331 Del Webb Blvd. W.

  Sun City Center, FL 33573

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage retrieval systems without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  The Richard Jackson Saga

  Dedication

  Quotation

  Copyright © 2021

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 1

  After the Holidays I flew back to England to start my new term at Oxford. The first thing waiting for me at the mail table sitting in The Meadows entrance was a stack of telegrams.

  Every one of them was from my brothers and sister. Each telegram reminded me that I was seventeen years old. During my birthday celebrations, I made the mistake of saying I was eighteen.

  Why I made that mistake I don’t know, but my wonderful siblings weren’t going to let me forget it. Something about not being as perfect as I thought I was.

  Maybe I was getting forgetful at my advanced age, Who knew? I might forget to buy them Christmas presents next year.

  Speaking of Christmas, when arriving at The Meadows it was Christmas all over again. Nothing big, but Grand Mum had knitted me a sweater.

  It was dark blue with the Oxford logo in grey. The logo was offset on my left side. It was really neat looking.

  I had bought her a one hundred pound gift certificate from Harrods. I know I should have picked out a real gift, but I had no idea what to get a lady of her age.

  She seemed very happy with it. To her, she would be getting her shopping for free!

  I also had Mr. Hammond purchase cufflinks for the male staff and a broach for the females. I gave him a matching tie clasp and cuff links from Tiffany’s in New York.

  Having staff all over the world was very convenient for running errands.

  The staff chipped in and gave me a new set of riding clothes. I thought that strange as I didn’t have a horse in England. That is until I was handed a card from Mum and Dad.

  A riding horse was waiting for me at a local stable. They had purchased it and it would be kept there as we couldn’t justify supporting a stable at The Meadows.

  I was glad to see that while money was no object the family was still mindful of spending.

  My first class at Oxford was part of a business course. I had given up on a formal program leading to a specific degree. Instead, I was taking those courses that would help me in general and sounded interesting.

  This business course was part of the MBA program. I thought I would have an easy A, but that I would learn a few things along the way.

  I had a rude surprise about the easy A.

  The Don introduced himself and then told us the course requirements. Besides the normal reading requirements, there was a live business case study.

  The course was run over two terms so we would have six months to complete the case study. We had to start a business and make a profit. Our grades would depend on the gross profit made.

  We would start with funds of 50 pounds each. If by the end of the second term it had made 500 pounds it would be a C, 1000 pounds for a B, and 2500 pounds for an A.

  That seemed easy enough to me. We had a choice of going it alone or combining it with other students. If we combined it would scale up, for two people 100 pounds, but 1000 pounds for a C, 2000 pounds for a B, etc. Three people would have 150 pounds and would need 1500 pounds for a C.

  I thought it would be easier for me to go alone.

  It turned out I had no choice in going it alone. After the Don explained the terms he continued.

  “We have a special case in class, Sir Richard Jackson. For any that may not be aware Sir Richard is very wealthy.”

  “As such this assignment would be nothing for him, I’m proposing a challenge especially for him to level the grading curve in the class.”

  Cricky he's set me up, I have to accept whatever is coming or I will be blamed for a bad grading curve in the class.

  “Sir Richards's challenge is that he will start with 10,000 pounds. To get a C it will take 100,000 pounds, a B 250,000 pounds, and an A will be 1,000,000 pounds.”

  Oh well, I can use Jackson Enterprises as support, not that big of a deal.

  “He must do this from scratch without using any of his current company resources.”

  Arrgh, can I drop this course? No, he has me cornered, if nothing else my pride won’t let me do it.

  “What say you, Sir Richard?”

  I can accept, accept under protest, refuse the challenge, or drop the course.

  “I accept.”

  “Capital, I wish your sister Mary was in this course. I would love to see what she could do.”

  “You seem to know a lot about my family.”

  “It’s called business intelligence. I research the backgrounds of all my students. You will have to learn to do the same in the business world.”

  Someone in the back of the room asked about my sister, is she rich?

  “Miss Mary Jackson is worth a million in her own right and from what I under
stand is about to receive a royal patent to purvey clothes to Her Majesty.”

  “Hey Rick, is anyone shagging your sister?”

  I didn’t think I could move that fast. Several men in the crowd pulled me off the guy before I could do him harm.

  “Sir Richard, please sit down. If you are going to do violence do it outside of the lecture hall. I should have mentioned that his sister Mary is six years old.”

  That set up an uproar in the room. Half the class wanted to help me kill the jerk, the other half wanting to know how she did it.

  The jerk wasn’t completely stupid, he left the room and dropped the class. For all I know, he fled the country, as I never saw him again.

  After the room settled down the Don added one more thing.

  “Some of you will have a letter from me in your mailbox. As I told you intelligence is important. I know some of you are under extreme financial difficulty and I’m sending you fifty pounds for your business.”

  “I’m like any other businessman and want to make a profit. I expect my money back with ten percent interest from your first profits. That won’t count against your grade count.”

  “If you lose all your money then I will be out mine, just as in the real world. I’m making an unsecured loan. For all the years I have been doing this I’ve ended up in the black every year.”

  After that, there was a long question and answer period. While that was going on I thought about what I would do. To raise that amount of money in a six-month run would be difficult.

  The only way I saw to accomplish that was to invent something and license it out. I would have to give this some serious thought.

  My losing my temper over Mary had one positive effect. Normally at the end of the class, I would have been inundated by the girls who wanted to know the rich guy and possibly marry him, and guys wanting to be a friend of the rich guy.

  They all left me alone. This was good and bad, good as I didn’t want false attention, bad because it prevented me from having real friends. This problem had plagued me since my first movie.

  One neat thing happened. While I was in class a message was left for me. The restoration of the Ferrari I had won from that Arabian jerk of a prince was complete. I could pick it up in London at any time.

  Instead, I called and asked for a price to have it delivered to The Meadows. It seemed reasonable so I agreed to the amount and it was due on Wednesday.

  While I was at home at Christmas some old business had come up. The new R&D center for Jackson Personal Products had been scheduled to open last October.

  This was delayed by new requirements put in place by the State of California. If they kept doing this we would have to give serious thought to moving operations out of the state.

  The new opening date was in late January so I had to sneak a trip back to the States for the ribbon cutting. At the same time, I would try to corner Mum on what she was doing in Morocco during the war.

  I had tried to corner her at Christmas but she always seemed to drift away. One thing I noticed that Dad was never present when she would even use the word Morocco.

  I had to find out, inquiring minds you know.

  Another thing that I was behind on was doing voice overs for the documentary about the new container business. I just wouldn’t have time to get it done while in the US.

  I made a mental note to contact Mr. Monroe and see if it could be done at Pinewood Studios. That was another thing I had to give a definitive answer about the two movie scripts they had sent me.

  I was inclined to do them as they fit the criteria I had given them. They both seemed like fun comedies.

  Then I had to get up to London sometime and review the purposed flying uniforms for the new division of the Queen’s Messengers. I hoped they would be practical.

  My list of fun things to do was growing: I had to do was take delivery of a Ferrari, and at the same time arrange for pictures with a pretty girl on the hood. I was hoping to get Nina from Switzerland some weekend. Perhaps she would like to be the ‘hood ornament.’

  Then I had to fly to the States for a ribbon-cutting, and, do voice-overs for my documentary, oh, yes, sign up to appear in two movies.

  I almost forgot. I also had to select a uniform for the Queen’s Messengers.

  Then I had to keep up with my classwork, and I suppose I should check with the Queen to see if she needed any dogs robbed.

  Oh yes, and invent something that would make a lot of money in the short run. All in all, it sounded like an easy term coming up at Oxford. Well, easy as compared to running for my life from the KGB and the Stasi.

  Being a logical person, I took care of the important issue first and called Nina to see when she could come over for the pictures with my new Ferrari. She was busy catching up with things this weekend but the next would be grand. I would fly over to pick her up on Friday and get her home on Sunday.

  Even though it was dinner time in the UK, it was still work hours in California so I put in a call to Mr. Monroe. He wasn’t available so I left a message for him to call me at his convenience.

  Mustn’t upset the girlfriend's Dad.

  All this and it is just past dinner on Monday.

  Grand Mum and I had tea and coffee after dinner. She told me that she was having dinner with John on Friday. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out who John was.

  I must have had a puzzled look because she said, John Norfolk, the Duke of Suttonham,

  Egads and little fish hooks, my Grand Mum going on a date, with a Duke! I was at a loss for words. I mean they were both adults, but Grand Mum’s weren’t supposed to go chasing after men at her age. At least I didn’t think so.

  “That’s nice. Where is he taking you?”

  “We are having dinner with the Royal family at Windsor.”

  Things became a little clearer, Queen Mum Mary might have a hand in this.

  “Is he picking you up?”

  “Oh no, I’m picking him up, it’s on the way.”

  What a modern Grand Mum I have, who would have thought.

  “It will be a long drive back.”

  “I know, that’s why we would like to borrow your suite in London.”

  “Certainly.”

  I need some brain floss, the pictures I’m getting are not normal.

  Again my face must have given me away.

  “Richard what nasty thoughts you have. Mr. Hamilton is driving us and staying and we are being accompanied by Pamela and her new boyfriend.”

  As the Alka Seltzer ad says, ‘Oh what a relief it is.’

  “Good to know.”

  “I’ll ‘good to know’ you, you nasty boy. Women of my age don’t bed men on the first date; it usually takes about three.”

  Oh my God, let me out of here.

  Grand Mum started laughing like a loon.

  “Oh, Richard, the look on your face was priceless. We don’t act like that at all.”

  “You frightened me. I’m just not used to thinking of you as a woman. You are my Grand Mum.”

  “That’s all right Richard my lad, by and by, we don’t count the dates. It’s by the number of presents.”

  I fled to my room coffee untouched. Routed horse and foot. I thought Mum was a holy terror, but now I knew where she got it from. If it passed down through the female line, the world would come to an end when Mary grew up.

  Well, maybe not an end, but the place of females in the world would change. I tried to go to sleep but it evaded me as I thought of Mary changing the world.

  When I decided it could be a good thing I was able to drift off.

  Tuesday had me up early and running, I had increased my run to ten miles a day. East Germany was still fresh on my mind.

  As I ran I thought about my economics class project. I could object and have it changed but I did agree to it. Besides, it sounded like a fun challenge. The question was, what could I invent, patent, and license out in a short timeframe?
I didn’t come to any conclusions.

  After cleaning up and breakfast, thankfully missing Grand Mum, I went to the library to type a paper that would be due by the end of term. My typing had greatly improved. So much that I would clash and occasionally stick the keys.

  While easy to do on the old mechanical typewriters it was hard to accomplish on the new electrics. That’s when it dawned on me, why did we have these long levers with the letters on them.

  It made sense with the original typewriters, but the new electrics could work in different ways. I would have to think about this.

  I also decided against attending the economics class. The other students would be all over me for the wrong reasons, fame, and fortune. I could avoid this by skipping most of the classes.

  The Don was one of those who stuck closely to his notes, so I could just keep up with those. If I had any questions I could schedule an appointment.

  One problem solved, now I hoped the rest of the day went as well.

  Chapter 2

  Driving into Oxford for my first class of the day. I thought about the typewriter idea I had yesterday. If I eliminated keys, how would the letters be struck?

  I was still thinking about it after I parked my Aston Martin in the garage and was walking to class. I passed a toy shop on my way. In the window was a toy typewriter.

  It was made by Marx a large toy company. What struck me was that it was supposed to be a fully functioning typewriter but it had no keys.

  There was a dial on top which had to be turned into position for each letter by hand then the head depressed –well, slapped, to print the letter.

  It would be tedious to type a letter, to say the least, but it could be done. Now if there was a way to motorize the operation it would be a great improvement over the current keys.

  I was on to something, I would have to think about how I could get an electric signal sent by touching a letter on the keyboard and translating it to mechanical action.

  My lecture was okay, but I didn’t feel like I learned anything, just confirmed what I already knew. While a certain amount of this was helpful I would hate for every class to be like this. I needed new information.