The betrayal of Giles C

Giles Clarke leaned back in his executive leather-effect desk chair and puffed on his Castella Classic. For the man who thinks that little bit bigger, he muttered bitterly to himself. He fiddled, distracted, with a framed photograph - himself and Sir Allen Stanford, taken in Antigua. Sir Allen with an arm round his shoulder, a warm evening on the veranda, a delicious dinner of ruby-encrusted lobsters, a violinist playing "Just The Two Of Us", and Sir Allen's favourite song, "What's She Gonna Look Like With A Chimney On Her?" Their song. A single stem rose. A perfect evening.

Until the FBI had arrived - turned out the violin player had been a plant. The rose was plastic. Even the lobster was in with the Securities and Exchange Commission. How could he have known? He had done all the due diligence he could. Giles sighed. His one chance to really be something, make something of himself, like the way he had built the off licence up from nothing to be the biggest retailer of super strength cider in the North-West Bristol M5 corridor.

And now reduced to this, a Gulliver tied down to the little people of English county cricket. He surveyed the man in front of him.

"Why do you disrespect me this way, Mr Regan?" he said.

The man shifted uncomfortably on the low stool in front of the desk. Giles knew it was important to establish status in these situations, let these reactionary old fools from the shires know who was boss. But this one. This worm that turned. A worm from Yorkshire, trying to slither its way into the world of money and power and brand-directive blue-sky consulting documents. His world.

"Sir, I meant no disrespect," said the Yorkshire man. "Modi, the evil one. He glamoured me, sir. Deceived me with promises - of riches, talk of franchises, even a flushing toilet at Headingley."

"And you went to meet with him," said Giles. "You walked into the snake's lair. Or is it a den? A nest? Whatever. You went to meet with the very man who seeks to destroy us all. The man whose every waking moment is dedicated to thinking of new ways to defile our game, to dancing on the grave of poor Sir Alec Bedser in a cheerleader's outfit while Harsha Bhogle shouts out the names of sponsors, to turning our beloved county grounds into shopping malls."

An assistant stepped forward to whisper discreetly in Giles' ear.

"Fair point, the shopping malls thing was actually one of my ideas," he said. "But the point stands. Mr Modi is very dangerous: he understands nothing but making money. And worst of all, he is actually good at it."