Paphos People

HELL HATH NO FURY!

The village of Corfe Dean was a one street village in the Cotswold Hills. The big house at the end of the village was modern but beautiful, six bedrooms and like a palace occupied by Lloyd Hobson and his wife Betty.
Because of its position Lloyd changed the name of the house to ‘Far Corfe’ Betty didn’t share Lloyds crude sense of humour but the lifestyle they had made up for everything, a Range Rover for him, Mercedes for her. Lloyd was a scrap metal dealer but his ‘real earner’ was in gold! Betty had many pieces of fine jewellery which of course was officially listed as ‘stock in hand valued at thirty thousand pounds’ as assets in the business accounts.

All was well with them until the day that Betty returned home unexpectedly to see a shiny red mini cooper in the driveway. Angry that she couldn’t park her Mercedes in its usual place fuming she shot into the house. There was nobody around but noises came from upstairs. Stealthily she crept up the lavishly carpeted staircase.
“Ooh Lloyd do that again, Oh Oh Oh Yeeesss, Yeeesss” Opening the bathroom door she saw Lloyd with a big busty blonde, bent double in the jacussi while he rodgered her soundly from behind. Standing still for a moment, which seemed like hours, Betty let rip.
“What the hell are you doing?” realising at once that the question was unnecessary.
Lloyd separated from the still panting blonde, and the gravity of the situation literally overcame him!
“Betty – it’s not what it seems” then realising that it was exactly what it seems he was about to carry on....
“Shut up Lloyd and you” indicating the blonde “GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!!”
“I’ll get my clothes” she mumbled.
“GET OUT NOW, FORGET YOUR CLOTHES, JUST GET OUT”
Betty grabbed the loofah and swung it at the blonde who sped down the stairs naked, pursued by Betty beating her when she could reach. Blondie ran out of the still open door jumped into her car and drove off in a cloud of dust and small stones.
“I hope she gets stopped for speeding” growled Betty as she threw the loofah down the drive after the now fading mini.
Back indoors, Lloyd had put on his bathrobe.
“Sorry Babe” he started
“What – sorry you got caught you mean, how many others are there?”
“None Babe today was the first......”
“Lloyd stop calling me Babe, in fact just go”
“But Babe......”Lloyd began - only to be physically pushed away.
“I mean it Lloyd go - I need to be on my own”

He moved into the bedroom pulled on a pair of Jeans and a jumper and went out of the door, into the Range Rover and drove off running over the totally innocent loofah as he went.

Betty stood alone in the bedroom she was raging and took a deep breath to help her calm down. What to do next? First pick up the slag’s clothes which were spread all over the room. She tried not to think of her and Lloyd tearing at each other until they were both naked, then screwing on the bed - her bed. As she picked up the bra she looked at the label 42DD and thought of her own 36B cup. She tore the expensive garments to shreds, then going downstairs into the garden she went to the incinerator put the bundle of rags in and threw a lighted match after them. That made her feel better.
She thought about what to do. She phoned Jayne her sister and asked if she could stay with her for a while. Packing her clothes and all her Jewellery off she went to Jayne’s flat. They had a heart to heart talk and a ‘Girlie’ night, with a takeaway and a couple of bottles of Prosecco. After dinner they plotted Betty’s revenge on Lloyd.

******************

Lloyd received the papers filing for divorce the following week and in the same post a letter from Betty informing him that she was taking a small flat in town and he was to pay the rent directly to the landlord.
She also said that she would come to the house and remove the remainder of her clothes and belongings on Thursday and would prefer it if he wasn’t there.
Lloyd picked up his mobile and texted just one word ‘Okay’.

So on Thursday evening Lloyd returned home to a house devoid of Betty’s clothing and bits and pieces. He had the locks changed the next day.

After work he went to the pub where he drowned his sorrows, so much so that the landlord took his car keys off him and brought him home.
“I’ll make sure you are in safely before I go”
“Have a drink before you leave mate”
“I don’t think so Lloyd” he said then sniffing the air asked “Have you been cooking fish?”
The next few weeks for Lloyd were fuelled with alcohol and falling asleep on the settee. There was a noticeable smell like fish in the house and Lloyd called a builder friend to get his opinion. Straight away he said
“That’s damp that is, have you any history of rising damp or a leaking roof?”
Despite numerous ‘fresh air blocks’ and deodorisers the smell got worse, and Lloyd got more and more worried.
Calling in a surveying company to make an inspection, the news was bad. In their opinion there was a significant water penetration problem in the concrete construction, otherwise known as ‘concrete cancer’ which in turn was causing problems with the timber joists in the building, hence the ‘fishy’ smell.
“It’ll be a major job on a house this size maybe over a million, the investigation survey alone would be tens of thousands of pounds. It’s probably cheaper to knock it down and start again”.
The words rang in his ears.

Lloyd sat down with a bottle of whisky trying to work out a solution. By the time he had finished the bottle, he had it worked out. He would offer Betty his half of the house for a nominal sum, say a pound, in return for her gold jewellery which was still technically his property being a company asset.
That would get him off the hook with the un-saleable house, get the jewellery back in his control and more importantly land Betty with a massive problem. Serves her right!

**********************

Flashback to Betty and Jayne’s ‘Girlie night’
“What do you want from him?”Jayne asked Betty
“Everything, I want the house, the jewellery and the Merc and to watch him squirm and beg - the nasty man!” was Betty’s vitriolic reply.
“Right this is what we’ll do” said Jayne
“First we go and see Manny the jeweller and get all the pieces copied in silver and then gold plated”. To spend thirty thousand making copies of one and a half million pounds worth of gold was a bargain.
“Next we go to the house alone, pack all your belongings but we’ll leave a slow burning ‘present’ for him, because sure as hell he will have the locks changed as soon as you are gone.”
So they did just that, once Betty’s belongings were packed and safely in the car, they got the stepladder and set about leaving Lloyd’s ‘present’.
“It’ll take a few weeks to start filtering through, putting us well in the clear. Then we’ll wait and see what happens!”

Some weeks later it was no surprise when Lloyd’s letter dropped on the mat, eagerly they tore it open.
‘Dearest Betty, I know that I cannot turn the clock back but I am truly sorry. I don’t want a long drawn out messy divorce so what I propose is this:
I sell you my half of the house for one pound to keep it legal,
You return the gold, which is an asset of the company anyway I will give you a receipt for thirty thousand pounds worth of Jewellery to balance the books.
You can keep the Mercedes.
It’s as simple as that. If you agree then I will get the lawyers to draw up the necessary paperwork and receipts.
I am not a bad man and I hope that this makes up for my behaviour if only a little bit.
Love Lloyd.’

So a week later they all met at the lawyer’s office. It was very civil and polite.
Firstly the contract for the sale of the house was signed by both parties and Betty paid Lloyd one pound, all in pennies. The Title Deeds were in Betty’s hands. The jewellery, all packed in a large box was presented to Lloyd.
“Is it all there?” he said.
“Of course it is all the thirty thousand pounds worth.” She winked at him as she picked up the receipt.
The car was outside and Lloyd gave her the spare keys.

They thanked the solicitor, everybody shook hands and they left.
Outside on the pavement Lloyd showed his true colours
“You cow! I wish you well with that rotten worthless house. Oh by the way I’ve had a clearance company in today to strip everything out of it everything, right down to the curtain poles!!!!”
“Be sure to empty all the prawns out of them before you use them again” Betty said with an ironic laugh!