It suited Dom to have me around. I was a relic from another age, the ‘Old Man’ with my fedora, thick silverly hair and courtly manners. I was content just to sit as the milky tide of glaucoma washed over my eyeballs and the light was extinguished forever.
Every generation has amnesia imagining the past as a series of evocative stills. Fossilised moments that had neither a past nor a future. I was that. The young’uns liked to drop by and have a chat with the Old Man. To keep him company. The last of his line. His descendants all tragically killed, or so the story went. I didn’t bother correcting them. I was the end of a line, but not the line and my descendants were, for the most part, alive and well. I hadn’t seen them for years. Not since I was implicated in a murder. I had bought their silence by dividing up my share of the loot. They could have given it back, of course, but as I had correctly guessed they had declined, reasoning: ‘it is of no use to him anymore and ‘what is done is done’. Beside, the insurance had made them ‘whole again’, although as the deceased (much) younger widow had wailed ‘no amount of money could make up for the death of my dear, dear husband.’
The widow was a first-rate actress, and a first-rate crook who unfortunately was a third-rate stepmother. The dead man’s daughter had got suspicious and had raised the alarm. The husband had lumbered in mid-robbery breathing hard. I had ducked his clumsy punch and I struck out wildly hitting him in the chest. It should have left nothing more than a bruise, but unfortunately, I had smacked his pacemaker disabling the device. He died from sudden cardiac arrest. I made for my island getaway with just enough to cover a modest retirement.
The murder had disturbed me over the years. It was supposed to be a victimless crime. A clean insurance job. Nobody hurt except for a husband’s broken heart as the wife made off with her share of the loot. In my case, though, I had literally broken his heart. I had been distracted by the music which was blaring throughout the house and didn’t hear him approach. A guy that big should have been audible a mile away.
I breathed in deeply and let the sea breeze calm my mind. Dom had changed the old timey jazz for a different soundtrack. The guitar’s opening chords sounded familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. I recognised Dom’s footsteps together with other unfamiliar footsteps.
‘Burt, this is Layla. She’s made me an offer on the cafe, a very generous offer, but it comes with a condition.’
‘Oh yeah?’ I said hearing the hopeful note in his voice.
‘You come with the cafe. Nothing changes. You stay where you are. She called you an ornament, a jewel,’ he chuckled.
Dom had been good to me over the years, but a stroke had left him partially paralysed down one side and he dragged his right foot when he walked. He had finally accepted his doctor’s advice to retire. The offer intrigued me. Besides, I had nowhere to go, and I enjoyed the occasional company and my status as the ‘Old Man’.
‘She says you knew her old man. That you were good friends with his wife.’
‘Hi Burt.’ Her hand’s closed over mine. Her fingers were strong and competent, made lean from years of exacting work. A craftsman’s hands.
‘I have been looking for you for a long time … to thank you.’
‘Oh yeah?’
‘You inspired me to become a jewellery maker.’ The fingers tightened momentarily. I tried to withdraw my hands, but she held onto them. To an observer it would have looked like an affectionate reunion. The music had become loud and distracting.
‘What did you say your name was again?’
‘Like the song,’ she said lightly, ‘It was dad’s favourite band, and this was his favourite song.’
It suddenly clicked. This track was playing on the day of the theft.
‘Layla by Derek and the Dominoes,’ I said slowly.
‘Correct.’
‘What are you going to do, now that you ‘ve found me?’
She paused, and I could feel her appraising me.
‘I haven’t decided whether you are better as a diamond in the rough or as my Koh-i-Noor’, she said referring to the great Indian diamond stolen by the British and cut up. The reference was something that only a jewel thief and a jewellery maker would understand, and it chilled me to the bone. In the dying moments of that song the band’s lead singer spoke for us both:
Layla
You’ve got me on my knees
Layla
I’m begging, darling, please
Layla …
© Tropical Writers Inc 2025