Archive of Our Own ^beta

But as the words are leaving his lips, a noise comes from behind

They were in a conference room of the Apple Corps building on Savile Row. Allen Klein was once again pitching his services to The Beatles. Rumor had it that managing The Beatles had long been his goal, so of the four Beatles, Paul mostly looked at him with a jaundiced eye.

John, George, and Ringo seemed to be eating up everything the man was saying. He promised that he would comb through their books just like he did for the Rolling Stones and find where money was being wasted and get it back for them. He also promised to get them to the heights of which they had never seen before.

Considering what Beatlemania was like, Paul was finding that very hard to believe.

He knew that there would always be screaming girls, but in reality, just like the lads, the girls had grown up and certainly they wouldn’t be as insane as they had been in the early 60s.

Paul was just really finding everything this man was saying very hard to believe. Unfortunately, the other three were falling for everything he was saying.

“So, tell me,” Paul started to ask, pushing away the contract that sat in front of him, “How did you find the discrepancies in the Stones financial records?”

“Well,” Allen began, “I started going through all their numbers and noticed they were paying out of pocket for items that were to be the responsibility of the record company. They were paying literally hundreds of thousands of dollars that should have been in their pockets.”

John nodded, “Good looking out.”

“How much did it actually amount to?” George asked.

“Well,” Klein began proudly, “I was able to negotiate a record deal on behalf of the Rolling Stones for $1.25 million. The largest contract ever between a band and a record company.” He beamed. “I can do the same thing for you boys.”

John, George, and Ringo all smiled. It all sounded pretty good to them.

But Paul was at odds with them. “I’m not sure,” he voiced. “I hate to say it Allen, but I’ve been hearing some things that are making me a little wary.”

John turned to him with an outright look of disgust on his face. “Right. You’re been hearing things,” he scoffed. “Let me guess. Those things you’re hearing are making you lean more toward your father-in-law, Lee. Am I right?”

Paul shrugged. “I just think we should give it some thought.”

“What’s there to think about, Paul?” Ringo asked. “This guy can save us a lot of money and negotiate a better contract for us. Get us out from under the thumb of EMI. Don’t we all want that?”

Paul nodded vehemently. “Of course I want that. I think we’re getting screwed by them. Of course we’re making a lot of money, but they’re taking too big of a piece of the pie. We’re the ones who do all the work.” He stood from his chair and threw the contract across the table. “I’m just not sure if this is the right way to go.”

“Why?” George wanted to know.

Paul paused. He looked at all his bandmates and then focused on Klein.

“I didn’t want to bring this up, but I’ve been hearing things.” He blushed a bright red.

“What have you been hearing?” John wanted to know. He moved closer to Paul so that they were almost nose-to-nose. “Tell me, Paul. What exactly are your reservations for signing with a man who will actually give us what we’re worth and what we worked so hard for?”

Paul looked down at his feet. “I’ve just been hearing things.”

“Like what?” George asked, making Paul’s head shoot up in his direction.

Before he answered, he looked over at Klein who just seemed to be watching the four Beatles have their discussion, wearing a smirk on his face.

Paul moved gracefully like a panther until he was standing in front of Klein.

“I hear that while he negotiated that contract for the Stones, he was able to skim almost 40% off the top in addition to his commission.”

Klein didn’t move and he didn’t drop his smirk.

“I earn a lot for what I do for my bands,” he told Paul.

“Really? And exactly how much do you think you’ll be able to squirrel away from us?”

Looking Paul in the eye, Klein said, “You’re the biggest band in the world, McCartney. You’re worth a fortune. To you and to me.”

Paul scoffed. He turned to the other Beatles. “Are you listening to this? He’s in it for what we can give him.”

“Aren’t they all?” John asked.

“Sure they are. But usually the decisions are left up to us. This guy is gonna run us ragged just to line his pockets,” Paul told his bandmates incredulously. “I can’t do that again. He wants us on tour. Those tours were murder on us. Is that what you lot want?”

Before the other Beatles could answer, Klein started arguing with Paul. “Now wait a minute. I never said I wanted to put you out on tour.”

“Yes, you did!” Paul thundered. “It’s in the contract you expect us to sign.”

John, George, and Ringo picked their contracts back up and began going through them again.

“You want to put us out onstage again?” George asked incredulously. “The last tour was a complete clusterfuck. They protested against us. We almost died. I’m not doing that again.”

John got to the part with the dates. “You want us to tour all summer around the world? Are you mad?”

Ringo chimed in, “Some of those dates were the worst times of our lives. And I’m certainly not going to Manila or being held hostage in Japan again.”

Allen addressed the three Beatles that were most receptive to his overtures. His face turned twenty different shades of red. “You will sign this right now. Not only that, you will do what I say. And I don’t want to hear any arguments about it. You’ve been without a manager for how long now? I’m offering to take over your management and elevate you to new heights, plus save you financially. If you think you can’t handle it…”

Paul saw red. Never in his life could he ever remember being so angry. He wasn’t even this angry when John beat up Bob Wooler at his 21st birthday party. He was so positively livid that he was looking for a way to shut Klein up. There was no way this man was telling him and his bandmates what they could and couldn’t do. With all their success, they more than earned a little say so in their own destinies.

Klein wasn’t paying attention to Paul, who had made his way to the decorative bookshelves that adorned the room. He looked around at the various items on display and picked up a heavy clay pot with flowers.

Without much thought, Paul picked it up, went back toward Klein, approaching him from behind, and swung the hefty vase at his head.

Suddenly, Klein’s speech broke off. He was laid out on the floor. A patch of blood pooled underneath his head.

John, George, and Ringo rushed over to where Paul was and they all stood around in a circle looking at the man lying on the ground unmoving.

The three of them looked at Paul, who still had the bulky clay vase in his hands.

“What did you do?” John asked, his eyes as wide as saucers.

“I had enough of him, John. He wasn’t going to let us go.” Paul shrugged. “You heard him. He wasn’t taking no for an answer.”

They all looked down at the unmoving man again.

“We should check for a pulse,” Ringo said, remembering his former paramedic training. He bent down and felt for his carotid and then, just to double check, he monitored his wrist, as well. He looked up at the other three and shook his head. “He’s gone.”

John turned away and covered his face with his hands. “What the hell do we do now?”

Paul placed the unmarked heavy vase back on the shelf from which it had come.

George just stared at the body. “I agree with Paul that he wasn’t letting us go. He probably deserved it.”

John turned back to the other Beatles. “What the hell were you thinking, Paul?"

Paul poked John in the chest. “I was thinking about us. Do you really want to have some kind of dictator telling us what to do?”

“Besides you?” John asked with a quirked eyebrow.

“I do it to make the music better. He was doing it to take advantage of us,” Paul reasoned.

John gathered Paul into his arms. “Paul… Paulie… What in god’s name were you thinking? You just killed him.” John pulled him in tighter. “What the hell are we gonna do with him?”

George and Ringo moved closer and joined hands.

“We get rid of him,” George said with a shrug.

Ringo let go of George’s hand and went to the door of the conference room. He opened the it and peeked out. Almost everyone was gone and the few people remaining were getting ready to leave. Everyone knew The Beatles kept their own hours and no one really needed to be there to help them out.

Suddenly, John asked, “Are George and Geoff in the studio?”

“No,” answered Paul. “They knew we were having a meeting and were not to be disturbed. As far as I know, once the rest of the office staff leaves, we’re the only ones here.”

“We need to come up with a plan,” John said. “No one can know that we’ve had anything to do with this. This stays between us. Always.” Paul, George, and Ringo all nodded their assent.

They sat down in the executive chairs that surrounded the conference table. In front of them were multiple sheaves of paper that made them look as if they were busy with business discussions, which completely helped with their ruse. Luckily, Klein’s body was on the other side of the room away from the door.

“So what do we do?” Ringo was the first to ask.

At that moment, Debbie the receptionist, poked her head in.

“Sorry to disturb, lads. Everyone’s popping out. If there’s anything that I need to take care of in the morning, just leave it on my desk.” She looked around quickly. “Did Klein leave already?”

“He had another meeting,” Paul lied smoothly.

Debbie smiled. “It’s really late, so I’ll see you lads tomorrow.” Then she walked out, shutting the door behind her.

“Well, that crisis was averted,” George said sarcastically. “Now what do we do?”

John stroked his chin. “What if we cut him up?”

Paul scoffed. “Are you having a laugh? What exactly are we gonna cut him up with?”

“Don’t see any chainsaws or axes around,” Ringo said.

“Thanks for stating the obvious, Ritchie,” Paul said sarcastically.

“Plus chainsaws are too loud, you berk.”

Suddenly Paul could see what they needed to do. “We can bring a car around to the back door.”

“It is super dark out in the alley,” George added.

“Let’s load him up in garbage bags,” John offered. “It’s gonna take all of us to do it.”

Everyone was silent for a while.

Eventually, John turned to Paul and asked, “What the hell were you thinking, Paul?”

Paul sat silently and thought for awhile. After a long pause, Paul said, “He was going to ruin us, John.” Paul chewed at his thumbnail. “I never got a chance to tell all of you this, but he’s being investigated for fraud. I even heard that he stole from the Stones. It wasn’t going to be long before he ended up in prison. I didn’t want to be associated with him and you guys were all ready to sign on the dotted line. You did, in fact. And I couldn’t. I couldn’t let him ruin everything that we worked so hard to build.”

“So you killed him?!” John yelled.

“For fuck’s sake, keep your voice down,” Paul whisper-shouted.

“Okay, okay, okay…” George interrupted. “What’s done is done.”

Suddenly, the phone rang.

The four Beatles looked at each other.

“Who even knows we’re here?” John asked.

“Didn’t you tell Mick we were meeting with Klein tonight?” Ringo asked.

Paul picked up the phone. “‘ello.”

“Who’s this?” the voice on the other end of the line asked.

“Who the fuck is this?”

“McCartney? Is that you?” the voice asked. “It’s Mick. Is John there?”

“All four of us are here. Do you want to be on speakerphone?”

“Fuck, yeah,” Mick said, his voice dripping with rage.

Paul hit the button for the speaker phone and soon they could all be heard.

“Mick, is that you?” “What’s up, Jagger?” “Long time no hear!”

Mick ignored their greetings. “Oi! Did I hear that you’re meeting with that Klein piece of shit?”

The Beatles got real quiet and turned to look at the body currently taking up residence on the floor.

Paul, ever the diplomatic one, said, “We had something scheduled with him, yeah. Why?”

“Stay the fuck away from him! We just had someone else go over our books and it seems he bilked us for over $245,000 just last month.”

Mick’s pronouncement was met with silence.

Then Paul, addressing his bandmates, said very quietly so Mick wouldn’t hear, “See? I told you.”

“We were just talking the whole thing over,” John said. “And we’re not sure what way to go.”

“If you ask me,” Mick said through the speaker, “Someone ought to take care of him for good, the lying conman prick.”

“Is he really that bad?” George asked.

“I’ll tell you lot, I’m finding out that we’re not the only group he’s swindled. You let him get ahold of you, and I swear you’ll regret it. And you’ll be poorer for it.”

“Why are you calling to tell us this?” Paul asked.

“Rumor has it that since Brian passed, you’ve been looking for someone to manage you besides you, Paul. I’m just trying to give you a heads up.”

The four Beatles looked at each other.

“Paul didn’t even want to sign with him,” George told Mick.

“Good lad, that one,” Mick agreed. “Don’t do it. You’ll be better off without him.”

As the conversation was coming to an end, Mick said, “I hope I caught you before you signed anything. Believe me when I tell you he’ll be the ruin of you all. We think we’re going to sue.”

“Thanks for the heads up, Mick,” John said. “See you at the Bag O’Nails?”

“See you there. And we’ll celebrate never having to deal with Allen Klein again!” Then he hung up.

The four bandmates sat and looked at each other for a long while.

“Well, I definitely feel better after that call from Mick,” Paul said.

“Better about us not letting him steal our money or better about finding a way to get rid of the body?” John asked caustically.

Ringo looked down at Klein lying on the floor. “So what’s the plan again?”

“Wrap him in garbage bags,” George said. “Who has the biggest car?”

Everyone looked around at each other shrugging.

Finally, Paul offered, “It I put the back seat down in my Mini Cooper, I can make room.”

John clapped his hands together. “Great! It’s settled!”

“Oh no, it’s not! I’m not riding in a car with a dead man. You’re coming with,” Paul insisted.

Ringo stood up and poked at the body with his toe. “Then what do we do?”

Once again, all four bandmates looked at each other.

“Uh… is there a construction site we can dump him at?” Paul asked.

John rolled his eyes. “Yeah, that would never lead to us.”

“Well, what about Tittenhurst? You’re doing construction up there.”

“Yet another place that would lead him directly to us, Paul. Think,” John said, poking him on the forehead. “That’s almost as bad as putting him under your dome at Cavendish.”

“What if we throw him in the Thames?” George offered.

“We’d need to weigh him down,” Ringo said.

Paul yawned. “What time is it?”

George looked at his watch. “It’s almost midnight.” George suddenly got quiet. “If we use those gloves the cleaning staff wear and use their garbage bags, we can put him in Paul’s car and take him to that forested area upstream and dump him in the water there. Weigh him down with branches.”

“Why, Georgie… Who ever knew you had such a devious mind,” John said gleefully, rubbing his hands together. “I think we have a plan, lads. Paul, you go bring your car ‘round back. We’ll get the gloves and garbage bags.” John turned to leave the room. “And, Paul, come back in. We’re gonna need your help to get the rest of this done.”

Paul stood and looked at where Klein lay on the floor. “What do we do about the blood?”

While Paul looked down at the corpse, the others stood with their hands on their hips weighing what to do about the mess on the carpet.

“What about wine?” Ritchie suggested. “I hate to say it, but we’re a bit of a bunch of slobs. What if we just spill wine all over where the stain is? I don’t think anyone will think anything else of it. They’ll just get the carpet cleaned," he shrugged.

“Yeah, yeah,” John enthused. “Maybe even leave a half empty bottle laying on the ground beside it. You’re a genius, Ritch.” John clapped him on the arm. “Now let’s get moving and get this over with.”

They didn’t make it to Bag O’Nails that night.

~oOo~

After Paul moved his car to the back door in the alley, he joined his bandmates in the conference room.

It took the better part of an hour to wrap Klein in the garbage bags. All of them were careful to keep their cleaning gloves on so as not to leave any fingerprints. Not that their fingerprints on Klein would be such an anomaly; they did have a meeting scheduled with him, after all.

When the body was in the bags, all four of them stood around and looked at heir handiwork.

“It’s gonna take all of us to lift him,” John reasoned. “He’s a big boy.”

Paul pointed at John. “You and I will grab his shoulders. Ritchie and George can grab his legs.”

In a scene reminiscent of the Marx Brothers, the four Beatles finally got their hands on Klein and slowly and carefully moved him down the short hall to the back exit where Paul had parked his car.

After a little bit of wrestling to get the body into Paul’s vehicle, he slammed down the hatchback, shutting the body inside.

“Alright then,” Paul started instructing. “John comes with me…”

“Why do I have to come with you?” John protested.

“Because I’m not riding alone with a bloody dead body, what’s why!” Paul shouted.

“Keep your voice down,” Ringo warned quietly.

“Right. Sorry.” Paul rubbed at his eyes. “George, you and Ritchie follow us. We’ll go to that forested area near the water and dump him there.”

“This better work,” John stated.

“Just keep your gloves on,” George reminded them all.

“Did anyone remember to spill the wine?” Ringo asked.

All four looked at each other, utterly flummoxed.

“Your idea, mate,” John told him, “You take care of the wine.”

Ritchie grumbled, but headed back into the conference room. He found an open bottle of red that they hadn’t quite gotten to yet. He went over to the bloodstain on the floor. For as hard as Paul had hit Klein, there wasn’t all that much blood. So Ringo did the only thing he could: he dumped the whole bottle all over the stain and then left the empty bottle lying on the ground near it. He hated leaving such a mess for the crew to clean up, but desperate times called for desperate measures. And this was definitely in the realm of desperate.

When Ringo joined them back at Paul’s car, he reported, “Operation Wino complete.”

For a moment, they all stood and looked at each other.

“Are we really doing this?” Paul asked.

“You’re the one that bashed his head in,” John told him.

“Are you really gonna tell me that you wanted to give in to his threats?”

“I was ready to sign with him. I did, even,” George said, “But after that call from Mick, I was ready to tear everything up. It’s not like we don’t pay enough in taxes. I’m not about to let some half-assed conman tosser take the rest of my money.”

“I believed, Mick, too. Especially if he was talking about taking legal action against him,” Ringo chimed in. “We could be doing the rock ’n roll world a favor.”

John, who had been silent during this exchange, finally said, “C’mon, Macca. Let’s you, me, Ritchie, and Geo take out the trash.”

Ritchie and George walked around to the front of the building where their car was. Paul and John pulled to the end of the alley, waiting to see George’s headlights, then he pulled out onto the road.

John turned in his seat and kept waiting for the package to move somehow.

“What are you doing?” Paul asked him after noticing for the fifth time that John was staring at their passenger.

“Making sure he doesn’t move.” Paul rolled his eyes. “You sure did a number on him, Paulie.”

When Paul didn’t answer, John reached over and took his hand. “I’ve never seen you that angry.”

Paul shrugged. “I couldn’t help it. All I saw was red. And I couldn’t let him do that to us. You heard what Mick said.”

“It’s a good job he called us when he did.” John thought for a moment. “I’m pretty sure we’re not gonna see him at the Bag O’Nails tonight,” he said with a laugh.

Paul shot him a glance. “I’m sure we’ve got more important things to worry about right now.”

John glanced into the back of the car again. “Yeah,” was his only response.

After about a half an hour of driving in silence, John let go of Paul’s hand and pointed, saying, “That’s the turn off there.” He quickly looked around the empty streets to make sure they weren’t being followed other than by Ringo and George.

“After you make the turn, kill the lights,” John told him.

“How am I supposed to see?” Paul asked incredulously.

“It’s a full moon, you tosser,” John pointing out the windscreen at the bright moon above them. “Plus, it’s an easy path to follow.”

Paul made the turn and turned off his lights. In his rearview mirror, he saw George do the same. They pulled along a bank, got out and looked into the water. The swift moving river caused a bunch of branches to create a piling along the bank. It almost seemed a natural place for their body dump.

John, Paul, George, and Ringo maneuvered Klein’s body out of Paul’s Mini Cooper. They dropped the body to the ground then rolled it down into the water’s edge where the pilings were. Luckily, it fell in such a way that some of the branches covered up the lump in the garbage bag.

The four of them stood and watched as the flow of the river lodged the body further into the pilings.

“Now what?” Ringo asked.

After several more minutes of silence, Paul made a decision.

“Let’s go to Cavendish. I don’t want to be alone.”

John put an arm around his shoulders. “We can do that, Paulie.”

Silence descended again.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here,” George said as he threw pebbles into the water. “It’s over with now. After that call from Mick, we’re lucky we still have our money intact.”

For a few seconds longer, the four of them stood looking at the lump covered in garbage bags that was the body they disposed of.

George and Ringo climbed into George’s car while Paul and John got into Paul’s Mini Cooper. Before they entered the car, Paul folded the back seat up into its proper place.

Before putting the keys in the ignition, he turned to John. “What do we do now, John? I kill…”

John leaned in and shut him up with a tender kiss to his lips. “Shhh, Macca, shhh. You didn’t do anything we didn’t all want to do.” John kissed his nose, his cheeks, his eyelids, his forehead. “It will all be ok.”

“What do we do with these gloves?” Paul asked, holding his rubberized hands up.

“We’ll burn them in your fireplace. As soon as we get home.” John kissed his lips again. “Lead the way, Paulie.”

In the bright moonlight, the path out of the copse of trees was easy to see. Once they hit the roadway, he cautiously looked to his right and left and then turned on his headlights and turned toward home. He looked in his rearview mirror to make sure that George and Ringo were following him.

~oOo~

As Paul dangled his house keys as he approached the front door in the early morning, John asked, “Where’s Miss Linda this morning?”

“She had to go to America. Heather’s with her. Something to do with her family.” Paul lowered his head to his chest and shook it. “I just can’t remember.”

John put a hand on Paul’s shoulder. “It’s been a long night, Paul. You’re not supposed to remember everything.”

Paul turned to John. “What about Yoko?”

John shrugged. “I told her I didn’t want her at the meeting with Klein.”

“You didn’t want her at the meeting with Klein,” Paul said blankly, disbelievingly.

John scoffed. “I can do things on me own, Paulie.”

“Since when?” George asked, walking up to join them.

John ignored his question. “Don’t you have a wife to call?”

“I told her this would be an all night thing. After Pepper, she’s kinda used to it,” George told him.

“Mo, too,” Ringo chimed in. “She knew we had a meeting and we’d be working all night. Told her I’d probably drop by here for a kip.”

Paul shrugged. “Well, that’s us all taken care of, then.”

He unlocked and pushed open the door. Martha and Eddie came tiredly padding to the front door to greet their owner and visitors.

Paul knelt down and gave them snuggles. “I’m sorry, my sweethearts. Our meeting ran late.”

“And a bit wet,” John mumbled. Paul shot him a look.

“Come on, Macca. Let’s light the fire and dispose of these gloves once and for all.

Luckily, Rose, Paul’s housekeeper, kept embers burning in the fireplace. She left a note saying that she stayed until 2am, but then had to return home. She would see him in the afternoon. Paul stoked the embers and added more wood until there was a nice fire going.

“Alright, lads. All the gloves go in the fire,” John instructed.

Everyone peeled their gloves off and threw them into the flames. It took a while for the rubber to catch and melt, but eventually they burned along with the firewood.

“Sun’s coming up,” Ringo observed, looking out the large window that overlooked the garden.

“It’s been a long night,” John said. “I think we definitely deserve a lie-in.”

“Yes, getting rid of dead bodies is hard work,” George said sardonically.

The other three whipped their heads around at him.

“Am I wrong?” he asked.

Paul sunk down on the couch nearest the fireplace and buried his face in his hands. “What the hell did I do?” He looked up at his bandmates. “I fucking killed someone.”

John sat down beside him. “No one knows but us. And we’ll keep it that way.”

“Jesus Christ, John. It’s murder, what I did.”

“And we covered it up. We’re as guilty as you, Paul.”

Ringo sat on Paul’s other side. “We’re all in this together, mate.”

George knelt down in front of Paul. “You may have done the deed, but we all disposed of him. Nothing’s gonna change that. Through thick and thin, we’re all in this together.”

John put his hand out in front of Paul. Ringo added his on top. Then George added his.

“Come on, Paulie, All for one and one for all.”

Paul laughed slightly. “So we’re the bloody musketeers now?”

“We are in this.”

Paul added his hand on top of everyone else’s. “All for one, and one for all.”

John put an arm around Paul again. “Let’s get you to bed.”

Paul looked John in the eye. “I can’t go alone. I won’t.”

“I’ll be right there with you, Macca.”

Paul shook his head. “I want more than that.”

John looked at him quizzically. “What more do you want?”

Paul looked at John with tears in his eyes. “I want everyone.”

At that, John’s eyes practically bugged out of his head. “Everyone?”

“My bed’s big enough,” Paul reasoned.

When John, George, and Ringo didn’t say anything, Paul looked at each of them and said, “I just can’t be alone with this tonight. Please don’t make me.”

Everyone was silent, so Paul continued, “I just see my hands picking up that vase and I see me swinging it and I see him go down. And then he didn’t move. I thought for sure he would jump up and attack me or something for doing something so outrageous… but he didn’t move.” Then Paul started crying. “He just didn’t move… he didn’t move… he didn’t move…”

John pulled him into a hug on one side, Ringo held him on the other, and George held both of his hands.

“We’ll stay with you, Paulie,” John told him, kissing his cheek. “We’ll stay with you. You’re not alone.”

~oOo~

They all trooped up to Paul’s bedroom and stood there looking at the bed. Before anyone could say anything, Paul crawled into the middle of the bed. He laid on his back, fully dressed, with his arms crossed over his chest.

John, George, and Ringo all looked at each other without saying a word.

Paul broke the silence by saying, “I still can’t believe I did that.” Tears fell from the corners of his eyes. That was all that was needed to get everyone to move.

John grabbed Paul’s feet and worked his shoes off, throwing them to the floor. George and Ringo stepped out of their shoes, too, then George carefully crawled onto the bed and laid on Paul’s left, curling around him. Ringo joined George wrapping himself around Geo’s body and reaching for Paul’s hand. John took up the space on Paul’s right, wrapping an arm around his waist and leaning his head on Paul’s shoulder.

“We’re here for you, Paulie,” John said, kissing his cheek again. “Whatever you need.”

“What about you guys?” Paul asked. “You wrapped him up. We all put him in the car. We all dumped him. Don’t you guys feel anything?”

“Of course we do,” George said. “But if I’m honest, I feel more at peace knowing that that negative energy is out of our lives.”

“It wasn’t like really wrapping up a man, anyway,” Ringo explained. “The more we worked on it, the more it seemed as if we were working with a mannequin. It almost didn’t seem real.”

“Well, it felt real when we picked him up,” Paul countered. “And it felt real when I hit him.”

“Paulie,” John whispered, kissing his cheek yet again. “It’s gonna be okay.”



~oOo~

Daybreak came and went with all four Beatles still lying in Paul’s bed comforting him. The tears had mostly stopped, but occasionally one would slip unbidden from the corner of his eye. Usually John was the one to catch it and tell him he would be okay.

Eventually, George was the first to move. “Paul, you want tea and toast, mate? Maybe you need something in your stomach. Help you a bit.”

“‘Ta, mate. That’d be lovely,” Paul told him without looking at him.

George rolled over to Ringo who was also wide awake with his arm still resting around George’s waist and reaching out toward Paul.

“Come on, Rings. Let’s go get some brekky going.”

Ringo raised his head. “You gonna be alright for a few minutes, Paulie?”

Paul silently nodded.

“I’ve got him,” said John, tightening his grip around Paul’s waist and pulling him closer.

After George and Ringo headed out of the bedroom, John cupped Paul’s face and caressed his cheekbone. “What do you want to do, Paulie?”

Tears spilled from the corners of Paul’s eyes. “I want to turn myself in.”

John kissed his cheek. “You know you can’t do that, son.”

Paul turned his head to look at John. The first movement he made since he laid down the night before. “What do you think I should do?”

“Nothing. Do whatever it takes to forget about it. You heard what Mick said. The man was a great big tosser conman.” John lowered his eyes, not able to look at Paul in that moment. “I’m sorry I tried to bring him in. He just seemed so sure of everything. And then the plans he had for us…”

“Like non-stop touring?”

“Yeah, I didn’t expect that bit.” John looked in Paul’s eyes again. “Can you forgive me?”

Paul scoffed. “Can you forgive me?”

“Already done, son,” John told him, kissing the tip of his nose.

Paul swiped the tears from his eyes. “What do we do now?”

John thought for a moment. “When does Linda get back?”

“Two more days she’s gone.”

“Right. Yoko and I are at Ritchie's apartment, so we’d be pretty cramped there. You should stay with George and Pattie. They’ve got the room.”

“I don’t want to leave my house.”

“Then move them in here. You can’t be alone right now, Paul. And all we’ve got is each other. I think George has a calming effect on you and you need that right now.”

“Can’t you stay?” Paul pleaded with his big puppy dog eyes.

“I would love nothing more than to stay here with you. But based on when we stayed with you for a few weeks, I don’t really think you want Yoko here. Especially with what we’re dealing with right now,” John reasoned.

“No, I don’t want her here,” Paul told him emphatically.

John shook his head. “That witchy woman has a sixth sense. She’d figure us all out in a moment.”

“What are you gonna do about being with her at home?”

“Lie. Like a rug.”

“I thought you didn’t have secrets from each other.”

“This is a secret between you, me, Geo, and Ritchie. The only people that matter. It’s Beatle business. She has absolutely nothing to do with Beatle business.”

Paul looked at the hard, cold glint in John’s eyes and he believed him. It was only the four of them that needed to know about what was going on and the only people they needed to trust.

“Alright,” Paul agreed. “I’ll ask George.”

“Ask me what?” George asked as he entered the bedroom with a tray of toast service, followed closely by Ringo with a complete tray of tea service including cups, saucers, pot of tea, milk, and sugar.

John and Paul sat up and leaned on the headboard.

“I was going to ask if you and Pattie wanted to stay here a few days. Linda is gone for two more days and John doesn’t think I should be alone. And I don’t want to impose by bringing Martha and Eddie to your house.” Paul gave George the puppy dog eyes. “What do you think?”

Before George could give an answer, Paul continued. “See, John and Yoko are at Ritchie’s apartment, so there’s no room for me there. John and Yoko staying here wasn’t an ideal situation and Ritchie has his kids. I thought maybe you and Pattie might not mind being here with me until Linda comes back in a couple days. We can even use my geodesic dome out back, if you want, for meditation.”

George’s eyes lit up a little at that idea. “I can ask Pattie. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind. But Paul, you’ve got to keep it together, man.”

Paul started chewing on a nail. “I am trying,” he said, looking down at his lap. Then he looked up at George. “Why aren’t you freaking out about this more?”

George shrugged. “I think the transcendental meditation has been helping me a lot. Plus, ask Ritchie. I was pretty freaked out in the car last night. Right, Ritch?”

“We both were,” Ringo affirmed. “And I know those feelings aren’t going to just disappear, but we owe it to ourselves to hold it together. Rely on each other. Just as we always have since we’ve been mates.”

Ringo was making too much sense for Paul. Plus, Paul was the one who struck the fatal blow. He thought he had a right to be freaked out about this. But he also understood the need to keep up appearances as well.

“I will try my best. Especially in front of all the wives. I promise.” Paul raised his hand in the Boy Scout salute.

George nodded. “I’ll go give Pattie a ring, shall I? See if she can come and bring some things from home for me. I’m sure we’ll be fine for a couple of days here. ‘Ta, mate.”

“Brekky first, Geo. And you’ve got the toast,” Ringo told him.

George moved to put the tray of food on the bed then said, “I’ll be right back in a few.”

Ringo put down the tea, as well, then climbed carefully back on the bed with John and Paul. “Let’s eat, gents.”

~oOo~

That night, Paul was all alone in his big bed. John and Ringo had gone home to their wives while George and Pattie were in a guest room across from Paul’s bedroom. Paul asked George to stay as close to him as possible without giving anything away to Pattie. Luckily, Martha and Eddie were curled up on the bed with Paul, happy to have their owner’s undivided attention.

After getting no sleep at all the previous night, Paul had to admit to himself that he was exhausted. He thought about having a few drinks before bed, but the idea of that terrified him. He was afraid of being drunk or stoned around Pattie and saying the wrong thing. George had also passed up on his normal extracurricular activities of drink and pot. They were all sober, having even forgoing wine with dinner.

Post dinner saw the three of them head out to Paul’s glass geodesic dome where they all meditated for an hour. At George’s instigation, Paul tried concentrating extra hard while meditating to calm his mind. So far it seemed to be working. He wasn’t as serene as George appeared to be, but he wasn’t the giant bundle of nerves he had been since hitting Klein.

Suddenly, at 3:24 in the morning, Paul sat bolt upright in bed, his throat aching from crying out with George standing beside his bed, a hand on Paul’s shoulder. George was shaking him.

“Paul! Mate, are you alright?”

Paul looked up at George then noticed Pattie standing in the open doorway.

“What happened?” he asked, blinking up at George in the moonlit room.

“You were yelling in your sleep. I think you had a bad dream. Are you alright?”

Paul looked at Pattie. “Sorry, Pattie, love. Did I wake you up, too?”

“No,” Pattie answered, shaking her head. “George was moving around a lot, really restless. You yelling out just made him wake up, too.”

George looked at Pattie questioningly. “I was? I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I have to ask, though. Did something happen at the studio last night to make you both so out of sorts?”

George and Paul looked at each other.

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Paul shrugged. “We had a meeting that ran late and we put in a lot of hard work last night. Didn’t we, George?”

“We did. I even told you that, love,” George told Pattie.

“I know you did,” Pattie admitted. “But you both seem a bit jumpier than you were earlier.”

“I think we both just need some much needed rest,” Paul told her. Then he looked around the room. “Where are Martha and Eddie?”

“You scared them away, mate. They were both pawing at the door to get out of here when I opened it. They took off downstairs.”

Paul shook his head. “Poor little buggers.”

“I’m sure they’ll forgive you,” Pattie smiled. “I’m also sure you’ll feel better once Linda gets back, too.”

“I’m sure you’re right. Thanks for agreeing to keep me company while she’s gone. I truly appreciate it.”

“That’s what mates are for, mate,” George told Paul, patting him on the shoulder one last time. “Get some sleep. This time with the door open. We’ll keep ours open, too. Just in case.”

“Thanks, Geo. You’re a good friend."

George walked over to join Pattie in the doorway. “Good night again. See you in the morning.”

Paul looked at his clock.

“Later in the morning,” George amended.

“I’ll try to keep it down this time,” Paul joked.

When George and Pattie returned to their room, Paul laid back down and stared at his ceiling. There would be no more sleep for him tonight. He idly wondered if John and Ringo were sleeping.

~oOo~

At Ringo’s apartment on Montagu Square where John and Yoko were staying while their house was being readied, John looked at the bedside clock for what seemed like the millionth time. It was getting closer to four by the minute. Yoko stirred beside him.

“Are you still not sleeping?” she asked John.

John shook his head. “Too much on me mind.”

“The meeting with Klein?” Yoko asked.

John’s head snapped around to her. “Why would you ask that?”

“You’ve been talking about him for awhile, but you haven’t said a word about how the meeting went. So I’m assuming it didn’t go as planned,” she answered.

Resettling his head on the pillow, John mumbled, “He may not be our guy after all.” Then he turned over putting his back to Yoko before she could ask him any more questions.

~oOo~

Over in Brookfields, Ringo’s two boys were awakened by their father shouting. Thinking their parents were fighting, the boys huddled in their room together until they heard their mother shouting, “Ritchie! Wake up!”

“Mummy, what’s wrong with daddy?” a little voice asked from the bedroom doorway.

Ringo shouted out again, this time waking himself. Maureen had both her hands on his arm trying to shake him awake. “What’s happening?” he asked.

“It’s alright, Zak and Jason. Daddy was just having a bad dream,” Maureen told the boys. “You know how when you have a bad dream and then you wake up and the bad dream goes away?” When both wide-eyed boys nodded, Maureen smiled at them and continued, “Well, that’s what happened to daddy. He just had a bad dream. But he’s awake now and the bad dream went away. Right, babe?” she asked, turning to Ringo.

Ringo looked at his bedside clock. It was just after 3:30. “Yeah, hon. That’s all it was. Just a bad dream.”

“Can we sleep in here with you and daddy and help keep his bad dreams away, mummy?” Zak asked.

“Of course you can, sweethearts. Come climb in.” Maureen lifted up the blankets. Both boys clambered up into the bed and settled between Ringo and Maureen.

Zak put his little hand on Ringo’s arm. “It’s alright, daddy. We’ll keep your bad dreams away,” he told him.

“I know you will,” Ringo smiled at his oldest son. “Everyone back to sleep.”

Everyone in the big bed closed their eyes, but after a few minutes, Ringo opened his again and lay there alternately staring at the ceiling and watching the hands on his clock as they moved around the dial.

~oOo~

The next morning at Cavendish, Pattie got up early to go to a photoshoot she was doing that day. That left Paul and George sitting in the kitchen at ten o’clock idly clinking their spoons in their tea cups.

“I thought you said you were alright with it,” Paul said suddenly.

George shrugged. “I never said I was alright with it. I said I was handling it better than you.”

After a moment, Paul said, “We should check on John and Ritch. What do you want to bet they didn’t sleep well, either?”

As if in answer to Paul’s inquiry, the phone started ringing. Paul went over and answered it. “‘ello. McCartney residence.”

There was silence.

“Hello? Is anyone there?”

“I didn’t sleep a wink,” came a small voice.

“John?”

“I just laid there and stared at the ceiling or watched the clock tick. I watched it turn light outside and watched the sun rise. Around 3:30, almost four o’clock, Yoko asked me how the meeting went.”

“What’d you say?”

“That he may not be our guy after all. What could I say?”

“Why don’t you come over? George and I were having tea. Maybe bring Ritchie, too. See how he’s doing.”

“How are you doing?”

Paul sighed. “I screamed the house awake at 3:24 on the dot.”

“And George?”

“Restless. Kept Pattie awake.”

“What’d you tell her?”

“Just that we had a meeting that ran late and we put in a lot of work in the studio.”

John was silent for a few moments, then said, “I’m sorry, Paulie.”

“John Lennon apologizing? For what?”

“I thought you were exaggerating a bit with your reaction. Now we’re all feeling it. Bet Ritchie didn’t sleep, either.”

“I’ll call him and have him pick you up.”

“See you soon.” Then John hung up.

Paul turned back to George. “Well, it seems as if John didn’t sleep again last night. We have to check on Ritch.”

George got up from the table. “I’ll call him. I told him I’d check on him when we got up and moving around today.”

“Okay, I’m gonna go for a shower. Maybe we can all take Martha and Eddie for a walk once everyone is here.”

“You want us all to walk the dogs?”

“Okay. Maybe not the four of us,” Paul conceded. “I just don’t want to be alone. I want people around me.”

“I get it, Paul. I do.” George nodded. “Especially after last night. I’ll walk the dogs with you.”

“Thanks, George. Call Ringo. I’ll be down in a few.”

Paul left the kitchen to go shower and change, hoping he could wash off some of the fear he was still feeling from his nightmare.

~oOo~

Ringo answered his phone on the second ring.

“Were you waiting for me to call, Ritch?”

“I was, actually, yeah.” He paused for a moment. “I’m getting worried, Geo.”

“Go pick up John at your apartment and come over to Cavendish. We can all talk about it then.”

~oOo~

Almost two hours later, the four bandmates were sitting in Paul’s living room. They were all sober and wild-eyed.

Paul spoke first. “So, no one got any sleep last night?”

“I did for a bit,” Ringo admitted, “Until I woke up everyone yelling in my sleep.”

“You, too?” Paul asked.

“Paul woke us up screaming,” George told them.

“Well, Pattie said you were restless all night, so you didn’t sleep, either,” Paul accused.

“I didn’t sleep a wink,” John said. “Stared at the ceiling, out the window, at the clock… Never really closed my eyes, I don’t think.”

“What should we do?” George asked.

“Paul wants us to turn ourselves in,” John told them, pointing to the other end of the couch.

Ringo shook his head. “We can’t do that. We’ll ruin our lives and so many other lives. Think of everyone we’ll hurt.”

“I agree with Rings,” George said. “Though I have an idea. Why don’t we go out to the dome and meditate for a while and maybe we’ll be able to figure out what we should do.”

The other three nodded, so they all headed out together.

When they were all seated in the lotus position, George instructed them to “concentrate on coming up with a solution to the problem.”

Paul looked worried, so John took his hand and kissed the back of it. “It’ll be alright, Macca. I promise.”

“You can’t promise me that,” Paul said with a sad smile.

“I can and I do. I. Promise.” John was emphatic.

“Thank you, love,” Paul told him, kissing the back of John’s hand in exchange.

In turn, Ringo grabbed George’s hand and threaded their fingers together. “Take us where we need to be, Geo.”

Everyone closed their eyes and George took them on a guided tour through the initial meditation process, then silence reigned as they each thought about what had happened and what to do next to protect themselves.

After an hour, George said, “Okay. What has everyone come up with?”

“I think we need to keep our mouths shut,” John said immediately. “The only people we can trust with this are ourselves. We know what happened. Only we can protect us.” He turned to Paul. “You with me, Paulie?”

Paul frowned momentarily then said, “I’m with you. I think keeping it to ourselves is the only way to protect us and the people we care about.”

George and Ringo nodded and Ringo said, “I agree. I spent my meditation time thinking about it and I think that’s the only thing that makes sense.” He paused. “I also thought about what Mick said on the phone. I don’t want to say that guy probably had it coming, but…”

“That guy had it coming,” John finished for him.

“I really think it was only a matter of time,” Ringo said sadly. “Now what do we do about sleeping? I can’t be awake for another day, lads.”

“Whatever we do, we can’t drink or take anything,” Paul said.

John’s head snapped around. “I don’t think that’s a good idea at all. I was planning on getting blind drunk and passing out, meself.”

Paul shook his head. “We can’t do that, Johnny.”

“We bloody well can!”

Paul shook his head more emphatically. “We absolutely bloody well cannot! All that stuff does is loosen up our tongues. You want to start wagging your tongue about this to anyone who will listen? See how fast Scotland Yard shows up after that and let me know how it goes for you.”

George looked around at everyone. “I think Paul is absolutely right. If we start drinking or smoking something, we might let it slip to someone and then the real trouble starts.”

“What if you all stayed here? We’re working on an album, you all stayed here when we did Pepper, why can’t you again?” Paul offered. “I bet if we’re all in the same house, we can get some sleep. And if we can’t, at least we can be here for each other. What do you think, lads?”

“Maybe we can even have a few drinks,” John suggested. “Nothing too heavy.”

“That’s not really what I was going for here, John.”

“I know, Paul, but just think about it. We could have some wine with dinner and get some sleep. Doesn’t that seem like a good idea?”

Paul thought for a minute. “Well, I don’t know…”

John could sense that Paul was softening a little bit. “Come on, Paul. Just a couple of glasses. Mellow us out a little bit. No smoking anything other than ciggies. No pills, no acid. Like I said before, nothing too heavy.”

“Maybe. Wine with dinner sounds kind of nice,” Paul nodded. “But nothing too heavy. I really don’t think any of us could handle anything like that.”

“That’s all I’m saying. Just a little something to make us a little soft, you know what I mean. I think we’d all benefit from it a little bit,” John reasoned.

“If it’s just going to be the four of us, I think we’ll be okay with a little bit of drink,” George told them. “What about you, Rings? What do you think?”

“If a bit of wine will put me down for a good kip, then I’m all for it. When do we start?” Ringo wanted to know.

Paul looked at his watch. “It’s not even two in the afternoon. I think it’s a bit early to be starting. Plus you all need to get things from home, don’t you?”

“Well, actually…” Ringo started.

“I brought my overnight case with me,” John admitted. “I left it in Ritchie’s car. I didn’t want to just assume we’d be staying here.”

Paul genuinely laughed a little. “You didn’t want to assume you’d be staying here? Really? That’s what you’re going with?”

John blushed a bit. “Well, I didn’t.”

Turning to Ringo, Paul asked him, “I’m guessing you brought stuff with you, as well?”

“I did. I absolutely assumed we’d end up staying here,” he told Paul with a smile.

“‘Ta, mate. You know you’re welcome any time.” Paul smiled back at him. “Let’s get out of here and go to the music room or something. Maybe we can get a bit of work done or something until dinner time.”

The other three shrugged, figuring that a busy Paul was a Paul who wasn’t worrying about their current situation.

~oOo~

They spent time going through some songs in the music room, but they mostly just ended up jamming a bit. Then, since no one was in the mood to cook, they ordered some takeaway that Pattie was nice enough to pick up on her way back to the house. She had already been told by George that the group planned to work through most of the night and the next few days, so she conveniently dropped off the food before leaving to go out with some girlfriends.

The biggest change was that, as the food was passed around, the wine began to flow.

“Ah!” John proclaimed, smacking his lips delightedly. “It’s about time we had something good to drink.”

Paul swished the wine around his mouth before swallowing gratefully. “I have to admit that I think this may have been a grand idea.”

“Grand? Really, Paul?” Ringo asked with a small smile.

“Let me have a few glasses and it may be elevated to the grandest of ideas,” Paul told him with a wink.

Ringo looked at George and raised his eyebrows and his glass.

“It is the grandest idea,” George agreed, raising his glass in an unreciprocated toast and taking a heavy pull of the liquid.

They all sat back in their seats and looked around at each other cautiously.

Finally, John laughed and said, “Relax, lads. It’s just us.”

The tension broke when everyone laughed and relaxed just a touch.

After they had gone through a few bottles, they got a lot more relaxed and with the relaxation came looser tongues.

Then John turned somber. “I’m sorry, Paul. I should have believed you when you said you didn’t trust him. I’m sorry to all of you that we had to go through that.”

“It wasn’t your fault, Johnny,” Paul told him, reaching out to grab his hand.

“It was,” John nodded emphatically. “He approached me and I brought him in to the rest of you. It was my fault that he was circling us like a bloody shark.”

“I think he would have found his way in some other way if he didn’t approach you,” George said. “He seemed slimy enough that he would have found his way in through some other avenue.”

“Yeah, you didn’t do anything wrong, John,” Ringo assured him. “You did what you thought was the best direction for the group. We all get it.”

“Do you?” John wanted to know. “Because that’s all I was doing. What I thought was the best move for all of us.” He looked at Paul and then, dropping Paul’s hand, drove his own two fists together. “I can’t believe I got fuckin’ rooked!”

“It’s really okay, John,” Ringo said cheerily. “Paul took care of it.” He smiled.

“You know,” John started, “I just can’t stop thinking about the look of surprise on Klein’s face when that vase made contact with his head.” Then he giggled.

“How heavy was that thing, Paul?” George asked. “Because the way you swung it looked like it weighed next to nothing.”

“Yeah!” Ringo joined in. “Just a giant THWACK! And down he went!” He giggled, too.

Paul even laughed for a moment. “I gotta say: it felt pretty good to do that.” Then he turned introspective. “You know, I felt even better about it once we heard from Mick, too.” He whispered, “Fucker deserved it.”

“Yeah, he did,” George agreed, beaming. “And you got him good. For all of us.” He hoisted his wineglass into the air. “To Paul!”

“To Paul!” John and Ringo echoed, laughing. They clinked glasses. But Paul didn’t join in. He sat huddled in his seat.

“What’s wrong, Paulie?” John asked. “You saved us, but you don’t seem happy about it.”

“I’m not,” Paul replied miserably. “Don’t you guys get it?” He whispered, “I killed a man. And then all four of us covered it up. We’re murderers. The lot of us.”

That brought the celebratory mood crashing down.

“I don’t think we’re all murderers,” George said.

Paul nodded. “You’re right we all aren’t. Just me. I’m the murderer. But you all are accomplices. And we’ll all end up in jail when the authorities find out.”

“The authorities won’t find out,” John assured him.

“Are you one hundred per cent sure? Are you certain they’re not gonna find that body and connect him to us? Because I’m pretty sure they’re gonna say that we were the last people he had a meeting with,” Paul ranted. “And we’re all guilty. All of us are guilty. There’s no way around that. Because we all did it. We all did it,” he concluded, shaking his head. Paul covered his face with his hands and wept.

John was at his side immediately. “Hey, Paul. It’s okay. I won’t let them take you. You’re not going to jail. You’re not going anywhere. No of us are.”

“You can’t make me that promise, John.”

“Well, I can do everything I can to try.”

Paul smiled weakly. “Thank you for that.” He wiped the tears from his eyes. “I’m exhausted,” he announced. “I”m going to bed. I had enough wine. And it did seem like a grand idea. But now I’m just feeling worse than before.” He stood up and headed upstairs. “Good night everyone. You don’t all have to join me.”

“I will. I’ll be up shortly,” John offered.

Paul nodded vaguely and continued up the stairs to his bedroom.

John turned back to George and Ringo. “Paul needs me. He needs all of us right now. We need to be there for him. I’m gonna do that by holding him and not letting go. All night if I have to. You guys try and get some sleep. You don’t have to join us.” Then John followed Paul upstairs.

“What do you want to do, Ritchie?” George asked.

“I know what I don’t want to do. I don’t want to go to prison. You don’t think Paul’s right, do you?” Ringo asked.

“I think Paul’s freaked out and rightfully so. We just have to keep our heads down and work on our album. And not let on to anyone that we know anything. As far as we’re concerned, we met with him, he left, and we had a meeting among us to talk about Klein. And that’s all that happened. And then Mick called us to tell us what he knows about Klein. End of story.”

“What did we do then?” Ringo wanted to know.

George thought about it for a moment. “We’ll have to discuss that with John and Paul. But no matter what we decide, we all stick to that story.”

“What do we do now, then?”

George put an arm around Ringo’s shoulders. “We try and get some sleep, too. Because what we’re doing right now isn’t healthy. Let’s go to bed. And no hogging the covers.”

Together they went up to one of Paul’s guest rooms.

~oOo~

Sleep actually happened during the night, along with a few nightmares. But the combination of exhaustion and wine made everyone ready for sleep to take them away for a few hours. Paul only called out in his sleep twice — with John wrapping him up and quieting him — and the others only snapped awake a couple times.

In the morning, they all showed up in the kitchen in various stages of wakefulness. Ringo appeared to be the least awake, sitting and “resting his eyes” at the table.

“How did you sleep, Paul?” George asked. “I thought I heard you call out, but wasn’t sure.”

“I did yell a couple times, but John was right there with me. He took care of me. Didn’t you, Johnny?” Paul rubbed his hand up and down John’s arm as he sat beside him.

“I tried,” John answered. “Felt a little out of it myself, having woken up a few times meself. I have to say, though, it was an easier night than what I had at Montagu.”

George nodded in understanding. “Me, too. Snapped awake a couple times, but overall got some sleep.”

“Can’t say the same for your partner, apparently,” John said, pointing at the closed-eyed Ringo.

“He slept some,” George said, waving him away. “He just wants some more. He woke up a couple times, too. Didn’t you, Rings?” George elbowed him.

Ringo’s eyes snapped open. “Yeah, sure. Whatever you lot want is fine with me. I’ll eat whatever.”

His three bandmates chuckled. Something they hadn’t done in what felt like forever by this point.

“You want to go back to bed, Ritchie?” John asked.

“No, no. I’m good.” Ringo closed his eyes again. “Just gonna keep resting me eyes until we get some brekky.”

“Tea and toast sound good to everyone?” Paul asked, getting up and walking across the kitchen to start cooking.

“Whatever you lot want is fine with me,” a sleepy Ringo repeated.

As Paul was passing the phone, it suddenly started to ring. He quickly spun around and stared at it, then looked worriedly at his bandmates.

George immediately thought about the conversation he and Ringo had had the night before that they didn’t get to fill John and Paul in on yet. “Whoever it is, say you’ll call them back,” he said hurriedly. “Ritchie and I came up with what to say.”

“Well, what do I say?” Paul wanted to know.

“We have to discuss it!” George hissed.

By now, the phone had rung four times.

John hurried over to Paul. “Call them back. Whoever it is, call them back.”

After looking at John fearfully for a moment, Paul reached for the phone. “Hello. Number seven Cavendish. Can I help you?” Visibly, his body sagged. “Hello, love. Just working with the lads. We had a late session here last night.”

“Linda?” John asked. When Paul nodded, he returned to the table. “So, you two came up with what we need to say to keep our story straight, eh?”

George nodded. “We just have to say that we met with Klein. After he left, we had a meeting with just us to talk about him. That’s when Mick called to tell us what he knows about Klein. Then that’s it.”

John raised his eyebrows. “Then what?” he asked, hands splayed in front of him.

“We have to figure that out with you and Paul,” George shrugged.

Then they heard Paul say into the phone, “I don’t think we’re gonna go with him. I don’t know what we’re gonna do, though. We need to discuss it some more. I’ll let you know, though.” He said his goodbyes and hung up the phone. “Linda will be back tomorrow afternoon,” he told them as he sat back down. “What are we doing, now?”

John gestured with his thumb toward George and Ringo. “These two think we just have to say that we met with Klein, he left, we talked amongst ourselves about what to do. Then Mick called us and filled us in.”

“Oookay… then what?” Paul wanted to know.

“We come up with that part together,” George told him.

“Well, I think we have to call his office, don’t we?” Paul suggested. “We’ll want to talk to him to tell him we’re not going to hire him, right?” He looked around at his bandmates. “Tell me if I’m thinking wrong here, lads. It’s been two days. I think John needs to call for him.”

The other three bandmates thought about it a bit.

George finally nodded. “I agree. I think John needs to call for him. At least leave a message of some sort.”

“If that’s what’s gotta happen, that’s what we’ve got to do,” Ringo agreed.

They all turned to John.

“Alright. I’ll call for him. What do I say?” John wanted to know.

“Say that we’ve talked about it and we’re going a different direction,” Paul suggested.

“What direction are we going in?” John asked.

“One thing at a time, mate,” Paul said with a wink. “We can talk about that later.”

John nodded and rubbed his hands together. "Alright, then. Let’s make a call.”

John went over to the phone. He took out his wallet, removed Klein’s business card, then started dialing. After a few moments, he said, “Hello, yes. This is John Lennon. Is Allen Klein in, please?” A pause. “He’s hasn’t been? Well, when he makes it in, tell him thank you, but we’ve decided against using his services.” Another pause. “No, I don’t really want to talk to him again. And you can tell him that.” Another pause. “Well, thank him for his time.” Then he hung up. He looked at his bandmates. “How was that?”

“You weren’t enough of an arsehole, but I think you made your point,” George told him flatly.

“‘Ta, mate,” John said as he sat back down. “Now what do we do?”

“Just get through the day, I think,” Paul said. “I mean, we have to try to move on, don’t we?”

“Well, look who’s come around almost a full one-eighty,” John said.

“I have not. I just did some thinking and I think we need to stick together. And sticking together means acting normal. Acting normal means moving on. So, we move on.” At everyone else’s upraised eyebrows, Paul added, “Until we come up with something better.”

“Well, Macca called it. Act normal,” John declared. “Some need to work on it more than others.” he squeezed Paul’s shoulder and Paul just nodded.

They would be normal. So they went through the day working a bit in Paul’s music room, meditating in the dome, and having dinner together, tonight without wine.

That night, John wrapped himself around Paul while they slept and Ringo and George held hands. Luckily, being so close to each other kept the majority of nightmares at bay. There was no crying out or shouting of any kind, just sudden waking up, which, compared to the visions of the past couple nights was a welcome reprieve.

The next day after breakfast, it was decided that everyone should go to their own homes, since Linda would be arriving from America.

“Will you be alright, Macca?” John asked at the door, on his way to join Ringo in his car.

Paul thought for a moment, then nodded. “I’ll be alright, Johnny. We’ll see you at the studio tomorrow, yeah?”

John kissed him on the cheek. “If you need me for anything, I’m just a phone call away. You know that, right?”

Paul nodded again. “I know.” He took John’s hands in his own. “I’ll be alright. Linda will be here soon. She’ll keep me on the straight and narrow.”

“Until tomorrow, then.” John gave him another quick peck on the cheek, then left to join Ringo in his car.

A few hours later, a car pulled up to the gate and Paul was relieved to look out and see Linda’s face in one of the windows. Heather was there beside her, making faces at the fans gathered outside.

When the car made it inside, Paul went out the front door to greet them.

“The lovely Linda! How was your trip, love?” he opened the door and offered Linda his hand.

Gripping Paul’s fingers in one hand and holding onto Heather with the other, heavily pregnant Linda climbed out of the car slowly.

“Paul!” Heather exclaimed, letting go of Linda and jumping into Paul’s arms. He flinched slightly. He knew the adoption wasn’t complete yet, but he couldn’t wait until the day when she would call him “dad.”

“It was a pretty quiet trip,” Linda told him. She turned and directed the driver to put the bags outside the front door where they would then get them into the house. “How was work?” she asked Paul.

“Um… a little less productive than we hoped, but mostly alright,” Paul said with a shrug. “It’s okay. We’re getting it done, though.”

“How did your meeting with Klein go?” Linda wanted to know. “Are the boys still convinced that he’s the direction they want to go?”

“Well, maybe not now,” Paul admitted.

Linda whipped her head around to peer at him. “What happened?” Paul swallowed past the large lump in his throat. “I thought they were all dead-set on hiring him.”

Paul let go of a breath he wasn’t even aware he had been holding. “We, um, we got a call from Mick. He had some news for us that wasn’t very good.”

“Oh yeah? What did he have to say?”

“He said that Klein had stolen from them. A lot of money. And they weren’t happy with him. They might even sue.”

“That’s not good,” Linda said, stating the obvious.

“Yeah. Lucky for us, he called before we signed anything. We had a meeting and decided he’s not the one for us.”

“Will they agree to go with my father, then?”

“I’m not sure. We did’t get that far. Everyone was a bit freaked out about the information Mick gave us. That’s really all we discussed.” When Linda gave him a skeptical look, Paul added, “But I’ll bring up Lee again. I promise.”

“Okay. Good. Maybe you can convince them to do the right thing this time.”

“They thought they were doing the right thing last time.”

“Even John?”

“Especially John. He thought he was doing the right thing by us.” Linda gave him another skeptical look. “That’s all any of us have wanted to do. The right thing by everyone else.”

“Well, I’ll remember that the next time you complain that John moved a bed into the studio for Yoko.”

Paul rolled his eyes. “Please, Lin. Not now. it’s been a really tough week.”

“Alright, my love,” Linda acquiesced, kissing Paul quickly. “Let’s just move past Klein in his entirety.”

“That,” Paul told her with a kiss, “Is the best idea you’ve ever had.”

Linda just laughed lightly and grabbed Paul’s hand, pulling him toward the front door and calling to Heather to get into the house instead of playing in the yard with the dogs.

The rest of the day and evening was pretty quiet. Both of them just caught each other up on the days they had spent apart. Paul’s answers to Linda’s questions remained fairly short and direct throughout her questions. He seemed a lot more intent on hearing about her trip than he was to share information about what The Beatles had accomplished while she had been gone.

But at night, Paul couldn’t dodge the images that flashed in his dream-fevered brain.

“Paul. Paul!” Linda was shaking him awake as she called to him. “Wake up! Paul! Are you alright?”

Paul’s eyes shot open. He was soaked with sweat and shaking slightly. “I’m okay. I’m okay. I’m okay,” he repeated until Linda grabbed him and turned him over.

There was the sound of the door opening, followed be a small voice. “Mommy? What’s wrong?”

“It’s alright, Heather. Paul was just having a bad dream. Weren’t you, hun?” Linda turned back to face Paul.

“Yeah,” he whispered and then cleared his throat. “Yeah. It was nothing. Just a bad dream.” He pulled his hands down his face. “It was just a bad dream. I’m okay. Everyone go back to sleep now.”

“Go back to bed, Heather. Everything is okay,” Linda told her daughter. When Heather had left and pulled the door shut, Linda turned her attention back to Paul. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked as she rubbed his arm.

Paul turned away from her and faced the window. “Yeah, I’m okay. It was just a bad dream.”

“Anything you want to talk about?”

“No,” he told her coldly. “I don’t want to talk about it at all. I just want to go back to sleep and forget about it.”

But even as he said the words, he knew there was no way he’d be getting any more sleep that night.

~oOo~

For weeks it went on.

They were taking a break from working on the album, so they were spending a lot of time at home with their significant others. And it wasn’t working out for any of them.

Nightly, Paul would wake Linda and even Heather, who was down the hall, with his shouting. Every time it happened, Linda was there to wrap her arms around him and assure him that everything was okay and nothing was going to happen to him, which seemed to be one of his biggest fears. Also, every time Linda wrapped him up, he would think to himself, This wouldn’t be happening if John were here with me. There were also a few times when Linda caught Paul just staring at himself in the mirror as if the image in front of him was something he had never seen before. She also caught him crying by himself in the shower a few times.

Almost every night, George and Ringo would spend time on the phone psyching each other up for another night of almost-sleep in their beds with their respective wives. Throughout the night, each of them would keep their partners up with non-stop tossing and turning. When their wives would ask them why they were having such trouble sleeping, they would tell them that it was all the stress of finishing this current album, the worry of the documentary that the film crew had shot back in January, and the fact that they still had no manager to speak of.

John, who was normally open with Yoko about everything, was having a hard time keeping his mouth shut. He would get in moods where he didn’t think he could keep it in anymore and would open his mouth to tell Yoko everything that had happened that night in May between them and Allen Klein. But then, just as abruptly, he would clamp his mouth shut and try to move on to something else. The thing that made it so hard were the looks that Yoko would shoot his way. She knew something was up, but she couldn’t put her finger on it. She was also suspicious of his sudden abhorrence of drink and drugs, which would normally be staples in their diets, and his inability to sleep at night. But she left John to his own devices and didn’t say anything. She was sure he would breakdown and tell her eventually.

It was the second week in July when they finally got back together in the studio. Though everyone had been talking on the phone with each other almost daily, they hadn’t been face-to-face since they had all stayed at Paul’s before Linda returned from America. They all looked like they had seen better days. Each of them appeared as if they had aged about ten years and they all wore sunken and sallow expressions on their faces that set-off the dark circles underneath their eyes. Plus, they were kind of short and snappy with each other.

“Morning, lads,” John greeted them when he walked into the studio. He gave everyone a quick once-over. “Not sleeping well, are we?”

“From the looks of it, neither are you, John,” Ringo pointed out.

“Aye, I imagine you’re right,” John nodded.

“No Yoko today?” Paul asked, when he noticed that John’s shadow wasn’t behind him.

“Not today,” he said with a shake of his head. “I told her we had Beatle business to discuss and no one else was welcome.”

“Do we?” George asked. When the other three looked over at him in askance, he rolled his eyes and stated, “Have Beatle business to discuss.”

“Aye, we do,” John said with a quick head nod. “Do we want to discuss it here or go to a conference room?”

Everyone turned to look into the control room where the ever-present George Martin sat preparing for the day’s recording session.

“Let’s go to another room,” Paul suggested. “It’s not that I don’t trust them, but… I don’t trust them. Anyone can flip a switch in there at any moment and listen to what we’re saying.”

With a smirk, John said, “You sound a bit paranoid there, Paulie.”

Paul shot him a withering glare.

John put his hands up in surrender. “I’m just saying.”

“Well, don’t just say,” Paul snapped at him.

George deflated a bit beside them. “C’mon, lads. Let’s go somewhere else and have this conversation, eh?” He turned to each of his bandmates in succession. “What do you say, Ritchie? John? Paul?”

“Yeah, let’s go,” Paul agreed.

“After you, Paulie,” John offered, sweeping his hand toward the door.

The four of them trooped out the door, up the stairs, down the corridor, and towards a conference room. In the hallway, they came across Debbie.

“Morning, lads,” she said with a smile. When she noticed them headed into the conference room, she told them, “If you’re having a meeting in there, try not to spill any wine this time.” The Beatles all stopped and stared at her. “The cleaners had a hell of a time getting all that up when you knocked over that bottle of wine in May. It’s alright, though. They eventually got it all out.” She was still smiling, not giving any indication that she thought something was up. More like they were all sharing some kind of joke.

With an audible swallow, Paul said, “We’ll do our best, love.”

“You all have a good day,” she said before continuing down the hall to the reception area.

Once inside the conference room, they all took spots around the table. Paul was closest to the scene of the crime, so he merely stared at the carpet, looking at a spot that seemed just a touch lighter than the rest of the floor.

“So what do we do now, lads?” John asked, calling their ad hoc committee to order.

“What do you mean, John?” George wanted to know.

“Well, it seems to me that no matter what else is happening, we need to get ourselves new management. Does anyone have any ideas or is Paul father-in-law the only other option?”

At the mention of his name, Paul’s head snapped up and he turned to John. “I can’t do this anymore,” he told them. “I can’t sleep. I’m crying out in my sleep and waking my whole house. Linda even caught me crying in the shower. I couldn’t even tell her what was wrong when she asked.”

“What’s with you, Paul?” John asked coldly. “One minute you’re okay, then you’re crying, then you’re telling us we all need to act normal, then you’re having nightmares again…”

Paul cut him off before he could say anything more about the cyclical feelings Paul was having. “You cannot seriously tell me that you’re sleeping okay at night. The answer is written all over your face,” he accused. He looked around the table at everyone. “It’s all over all our faces. We not only have sorry-looking complexions, we all look like we’ve aged. We’re in our twenties, for Christ’s sake.” He shook his head.

“What the hell do you want us to do now, Paul?” John asked him.

“What I wanted to do from the beginning,” Paul stated. “I want us to turn ourselves in.”

“We can’t do that. Think of all the lives we’ll ruin if we do that,” George pointed out.

Paul turned on him. “We’re ruining ourselves right now! Don’t you get that?”

“What if we called in an anonymous tip,” Ringo offered. “You know… the police always have those tip lines. What if we called the police from a telephone booth and told them we saw a body.”

“Now how in the world can we do that? All of our voices are recognizable,” John said.

Each of his bandmates thought about that for a few moments, then nodded. John was right. If there was anyone in this world who had recognizable voices, it was the four of them. Their voices had been ringing out from records, radios, televisions, and interviews for more than six years now, clear as a bell.

“We need to do something. I can’t do this anymore,” Paul repeated. “I don’t even feel like myself. I look in the mirror and I don’t recognize the person looking back at me. It’s bloody well killing me.” He covered his face with his hands and started to cry. After a minute of silence passed punctuated only by the sound of Paul’s tears, he pulled his hands away from his face and asked plaintively, “Can’t we just go talk to the police? Maybe put in a missing persons report or something?”

“Don’t you think someone at his firm did that already? Or even his family? It’s been over two months,” John pointed out.

“You’re the one with your nose always in the newspaper. Didn’t an article about him appear anywhere?” Paul asked.

“You’re always nosing in the paper, too. Didn’t you see anything?” John countered.

Paul looked down at his hands. “I’ve been avoiding the newspapers and all the news on the radio and on the telly, haven’t I,” he confessed. “I was afraid there might be a report in one of them that I couldn’t bear to see or hear.”

“Lads, we need to do something,” Ringo interjected. “I think I’m with Paul on this. We can’t maintain what we’ve been doing.”

John let that sink in for a few moments. Then he turned to the only member who hadn’t voiced an opinion on the subject since Paul had started crying. “What do you think, Geo? You were the one arguing for us not to tell anyone earlier. Have you changed your mind?”

George was looking down at the table, deep in thought. “I hate to say this, John, but I think we might have to, you know? I think Paul may be right. This whole situation is making us unrecognizable to ourselves. I know I toss and turn all night.” He looked to Ringo on his left. “Ritchie and I have been propping each other up with pep talks before bed almost every single night and it’s not working. I’m still restless.”

Ringo nodded in agreement.

John took everything his bandmates said under advisement. After spending a few minutes thinking about it all, he finally said, “Okay. We’ll do it Paul’s way. We’ll go see the authorities. Together. But what are we going to tell them?” When no one answered him, he asked, “No one has any idea of what to say to the cops?”

“I just keep thinking that we should tell them that there was an accident of some sort,” Paul offered.

“What kind of accident? Why did we wait two months to report it? Where’s the body? And why did we dispose of it?” John asked in rapid-fire succession. “That may have worked back in May, but it’s certainly not going to work now.”

Paul started to cry again. “I just don’t know, Johnny.” He rested his head on his arms that were folded on the table in front of him.

This time, John didn’t yell or have a snide remark to aim at him. Instead, he started running his fingers through Paul’s hair. “Shhh. It’s alright, Paulie. It’s alright. We’ll figure something out.” He looked at George and Ringo. “Any ideas?”

“What if we told them that we’re worried because someone’s been calling looking for him and we haven’t seen him since our meeting that night in May?” Ringo suggested. “We could even ask the receptionist if anyone actually has called for him. Maybe someone has and we just don’t know it.” He shrugged.

“You know, we’re forgetting one very important thing,” George said. When no one told him to continue, he added, “We’re The Beatles. If we just go in with some vague idea of what we want to do — maybe just saying we’re there about him — we can just let them fill in the missing pieces without saying too much. I think like most people they would be tripping over each other to help us.”

“Really? You think they’re gonna want to help us after we disrupted the whole city by playing on the rooftop?” John asked disbelievingly.

“Well, if you’ve got a better idea, I’m sure we’d all love to hear it,” George countered.

He was right, of course. John didn’t have any bright ideas regarding how they should go about this. What he did have was the instinct to protect them all, especially Paul. But how could he protect them all if they were now planning on going to the police?

“I really don’t,” John admitted. “But maybe what we need to do is just go to the police and see what happens. Maybe we can even convince them it was a mistake.”

“When do we go?” Ringo asked.

John shrugged. “No better time than the present, I’d imagine. C’mon. Let’s get this over with.” He turned to Paul. “No matter what happens, we are with you. You will not go down for this alone.”

Paul gave him a weak smile. “All for one, one for all, then, eh?”

John ruffled his hair. “Exactly.”

They all stood up from their seats. John placed a protective arm around Paul’s waist, pulling him in close. He murmured into his ear, trying to reassure Paul that everything would be okay.

~oOo~

When The Beatles walked in to the police department, all heads turned. This was not the type of behavior that was expected of people who had long been on the list of criminals wanted for drug possession. Yet here they were, marching into the precinct in their little duck row, lead by John Lennon.

When they were all standing in front of the front desk, John addressed the officer. “Hello. I’m John Lennon. This is Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr. I believe we need a police inspector to help us out. Is there anyone we can talk to?”

The officer blinked rapidly at first, then wiped his eyes, not quite believing what — or who — he was seeing. The Beatles were all stood in front of him, asking for assistance. “One moment, please,” he told John. He picked up the phone on his desk. “This is Grady from the front desk. I need Inspector Miller up front as soon as possible.” He listened for a moment. “Well, tell him to get up here immediately.” He whisper-shouted into the phone, “Because I’ve got the bloody Beatles standing in front of me asking for him! That’s why!” After another moment, he replaced the receiver and addressed the group in front of him. “Gentlemen, it will be just a moment.”

The band stood waiting for awhile before a middle-aged man approached them with his hand extended. “Gentlemen,” he greeted them warmly. “I’m Inspector Miller. I had been planning to come and see you. I’m sorry we have to meet under such grim circumstances.”

That made them all stop cold.

John looked frantically at his bandmates. “And what circumstances would those be?” he wanted to know.

Inspector Miller’s face colored slightly. “I don’t think this is something we need to discuss in the vestibule. Come with me to one of our interrogation rooms and get comfortable. We can talk there.”

John shot a glance at Paul.

Paul swallowed loudly past the large lump in his throat and he immediately hunched his shoulders, like a man who had been caught redhanded.

John put a protective arm around Paul’s shoulders and moved him forward, with George and Ringo bringing up the rear. They all had a defeated look in their eyes, keeping their heads down and following the Inspector, like inmates marching to the gallows.

Inspector Miller ushered them into a private interrogation room far from the main floor of the police station. “Please have a seat in here, gentlemen. Let me grab some files and I’ll be right in.”

Feeling like there was nowhere else they could go and nothing they could do, the bandmates all sat there silently, looking down at their shoes, utterly defeated.

When Inspector Miller returned, it was to find The Beatles quiet and anxious.

“Inspector Miller…” Paul began.

“Excuse me, Mr. McCartney,” Inspector Miller said, raising his hand with a notebook in it. “But I’d like to go over a few things with all of you first and then, if it’s warranted, I can take statements, if that’s alright with you.”

Paul nodded and looked back down at his hands perched on the table. He glanced over at John, George, and Ringo. They were all avoiding looking at the inspector, too.

“We seem to have found someone that may be associated with you,” Inspector Miller began.

John lifted his head. “Found someone? What do you mean?”

“There was a man who was reported missing. An American businessman named Allen Klein who had some dealings here in Britain. He was supposed to return to America a few days after meeting with you. Let me ask this: did you, in fact, have a meeting with this man?” At that, the inspector turned around a picture he had been holding and showed it to The Beatles.

All four looked up at the picture being presented to them. They all nodded.

John, who had been the spokesman for the group so far, added, “We met with him in early May. In fact, that’s…”

“Please hold all comments for the moment, Mr. Lennon,” the inspector directed. He paused for a moment. “Now, I normally wouldn’t give out details about a case, but because you’re… well, you know… I think I can be a little forthcoming with some specifics.” He flipped around another picture. “We found a body matching this man’s description. It appeared to have been dumped in the Thames near a wooded area.” The picture showed what looked like a bunch of garbage bags stuck in a bunch of tree branches.

“How did you find it?” Paul asked.

Inspector Miller lifted an eyebrow at Paul. “About two weeks ago, a man walking his dog through the woods found him. His dog got free of his leash and went straight to the body. Being alarmed at what his dog had found, he immediately returned home and called us.”

The group all looked around at each other, clearly in shock.

John cleared his throat. “What happened to him?”

“That we know a little bit about. It seems to be blunt force trauma. He was hit in the head, rather hard. It was quite a shot. Right to the temple. He was dead on impact,” the inspector informed them.

“What would do something like that?” George asked.

“There were no instruments found at the site and there was nothing on the body to give any indication as to what he was hit with. At this point, we’re surmising that it could be anything. There’s really no way of telling.” The inspector showed them another picture, this one closer up where you could tell it was a body in the bags. “Plus, the body was waterlogged, making it even harder to tell.”

“How did you know he had anything to do with us?” John asked.

Inspector Miller raised his eyebrows. “Well, that was an easy one. Apparently, the only thing the deceased could talk about was becoming your new manager. His secretary informed us that he had contracts drawn up in each of your names to be signed giving him rights of representation for The Beatles. You were one of the only things on his calendar.”

“Just us?” Paul asked around another lump in his throat. “If he was found two weeks ago, why haven’t you come to talk to us yet?”

“We’ve been running down leads, Mr. McCartney.”

“What leads?”

“Have you heard of Floyd McAllister?” When everyone shook their heads, Inspector Miller continued. “He’s an associate of the Kray Twins. I assume you’ve heard of them.”

“Who hasn’t? I think we used to drink in one of their clubs,” John volunteered.

“Well, McAllister has been taking care of some of their interests while they’ve been behind bars. He was particularly involved in the gambling aspect of their empire. He was using an American businessman to help wash their money. It turned out that the businessman was stealing from them. And that businessman turned out to be Allen Klein.”

At that, the group all raised their eyebrows and looked at each other, shock etched into their faces. Surely Klein hadn’t been involved with mobsters, had he?

“Klein wasn’t really doing business with mobsters, was he?” John voiced the question all of them wanted an answer to.

“We’ve been following leads and investigating the allegations, but at this point, what I can say is that it appears to be true. Klein was involved with these characters up to his eyeballs. And he wasn’t playing fair, by the looks of it.” Inspector Miller looked at his guests. “So they took care of him. By ‘they’ I mean Floyd McAllister and we are investigating him.”

The group all looked around at each other.

“How did this happen?” Ringo asked, incredulous.

“We are working under the assumption that there was an argument that turned violent. Klein ended up getting hit alongside the head and he went down.” He looked over all The Beatles. “There’s no concrete proof of that, though. So I was going to come to you for an interview to see if Mr. Klein said anything to you about McAllister or the Krays.” When the group all shook their heads, Miller asked again, “Anything at all? Truly, whatever you may have to tell us could be helpful.”

The Beatles all looked gobsmacked.

“All he ever talked about was getting a better contract with our record company and claiming some royalties that he thought were due to us,” John told the inspector. He looked to his bandmates. “He never said anything to any of you, did he?”

“Not a word,” George said, shaking his head more fervently.

Ringo and Paul muttered “no” and continued to lightly shake their heads.

“What do we do now?” John asked, looking up at the inspector.

“I don’t mean to sound flippant, but I would suggest getting another manager,” Inspector Miller told them. He picked up the pictures he had shown them and placed on the table. “Gentlemen. I really didn’t believe that Mr. Klein had imparted any information about his business dealings to you, but due diligence is necessary. I’m sure you understand. Thank you for your time. I’ll send someone to take you out.” With that, he left the room.

After what seemed like a lifetime, Paul let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. “What was that?” he asked.

John looked around quickly to make sure there was no one else in the vicinity. “That was a lucky break.”

“What do we do now?” George asked.

“You heard the man,” Ringo started. “We get a new manager.”

There was a knock at the door, followed by a head poking inside. “Hello, gentlemen. I’m here to escort you out.” The door swung open in invitation.

The group stood and trooped through the door and out into the daylight.

They all slept peacefully that night.