Chapter 42: Digging a hole to bury Bates

**** Join my Patreon for 30 or so Advance Chapters and my other stories ( currently 3) . Link is Below. Remove space after http https:// www.patreon.com/c/Virtuosso777?redirect=true Discord link Drop some stones , review , comments if you like it so far. *** After finishing their lunch—Arthur still mentally ranking the roast beef above anything he'd eaten that month—he and Ferguson got into the car and made their way over to Manchester United's Carrington training base. It was a sunny afternoon, the kind that made you squint and regret not wearing sunglasses. But Arthur had bigger things on his mind than the weather. Today wasn't about meetings, contracts, or actually doing anything useful. No, this was theatre. A performance. A carefully staged bit of nonsense designed to fool exactly one man: Jeremy Bates. Arthur knew that if he strolled into Carrington with Ferguson at his side, it would cause a stir. And sure enough, the moment their car rolled past the gates, the reporters who had been loitering outside like pigeons at a bakery suddenly snapped to life. They charged like a herd of caffeine-fueled interns, waving microphones and recorders as if someone had just declared free season tickets for life. One of them nearly tripped over a traffic cone in his enthusiasm. Arthur barely got the door open before he was smothered by a wall of cameras and microphones. "Mr. Arthur, is it true that you're here to finalize Tevez's transfer to Manchester United?" "Sir Alex! Is Arthur here on official business? Have you finally agreed on the fee?" "Sir Alex, can you confirm the exact amount United has offered for Tevez?" "Arthur, Leeds United have already sold most of their key players this window, but haven't signed anyone notable. Are you planning to survive the Premier League with free agents and hope?" "Sir Alex, Chelsea just signed another superstar yesterday. What do you think about their transfer activity?" The two men kept walking, trying their best not to burst into laughter. Ferguson answered a few questions with his usual grandfatherly grin, nodding like he was pretending to hear someone at a family reunion. But then came the Chelsea question. A younger journalist, probably thinking he'd asked something clever, shouted: "Sir Alex! What's your view on Chelsea's signings this summer?" Ferguson stopped in his tracks, looked directly at the lad, and deadpanned, "What's my view? I see them. With my eyes." The crowd snorted. Arthur bit his lip to keep from laughing. Ferguson shook his head and muttered something about stupid questions as they pushed forward. Arthur, for his part, answered the Tevez-related questions with all the charm of a man who had just been told the vending machine was out of chocolate. He smiled politely, nodded, and replied, "Oh, I'm just here to visit, nothing official. Came to learn, observe, maybe pick up some ideas." It was the sort of answer that sounded reasonable and yet meant absolutely nothing. The reporters scribbled it down anyway, most of them rolling their eyes. They knew he was lying. He knew they knew. But that wasn't the point. What mattered was that someone else would read those headlines soon: Arthur visits Manchester United. Ferguson silent on Tevez. Negotiations underway? Arthur was counting on Bates seeing every word. After a few more generic replies and enough camera flashes to trigger an airport security alarm, Arthur and Ferguson finally made it inside. Security at the gate politely but firmly held the press back, leaving them muttering and packing up their gear like grumpy fishermen who hadn't caught anything. As soon as they stepped out of sight, Arthur turned to Ferguson and grinned. "Well," he said, "that should speed things up." Ferguson chuckled. "So that was the whole point of this circus?" "Of course," Arthur replied. "You think I flew all the way here just for the steak?" In truth, he had enjoyed the steak. But that wasn't the point. The point was optics. A simple image—Arthur walking side-by-side with Ferguson—would do more damage than a hundred emails or phone calls. Bates would see those photos and panic. He'd assume Manchester United were making serious moves. He'd double his efforts to finalize a loan. He'd push harder to sell his players. He'd rush. And that's when Arthur would strike. The genius of it, in Arthur's view, was that he hadn't done anything at all. No deal was being made. No contract signed. Just a very public lunch and an afternoon stroll in front of the cameras. "Let the headlines work for me," Arthur muttered, half to himself. He imagined Bates, squinting at his computer screen, chewing on a pen cap, already calculating how many players he'd need to sell to beat United's non-existent bid. The irony made Arthur's day. "By the time he gets the money," Arthur said, "Tevez will already be gone. Not to him, obviously. But that's not the fun part. The fun part is he won't find out until he thinks he's won." Ferguson, who had been in football long enough to appreciate a good bit of mischief, gave Arthur a sideways look. "You ever think about going into politics?" Arthur smirked. "One circus at a time." Inside the training centre, the two of them were soon sipping tea and watching youth players go through drills. Nothing important was discussed. That wasn't needed. Arthur had already achieved what he came for. The cameras had caught what they needed to catch, and Bates would get the message. In fact, Arthur imagined the scene quite vividly: Bates rushing into a boardroom, waving his phone around, shouting at his assistant to call the bank and finalize the loan now. Somewhere in the background, a fax machine would jam. A coffee mug would be knocked over. Chaos. And all because Arthur ate lunch and walked through a gate. It wasn't the most conventional football move. But for Arthur, it was just another day at work. *** That afternoon, Arthur sat across from Manchester United's executives at Carrington, sipping lukewarm coffee and pretending to care about the wallpaper. It was time for the real business. The meeting room was nothing fancy—just clean walls, a long table, and a few senior United officials who looked like they'd rather be golfing. Ferguson, of course, sat in the corner like an old king watching over his court. Tevez wasn't present. He wasn't even invited. That was part of the plan. Arthur got straight to the point. "Twenty million, plus Piqué," he said. One of the executives immediately cleared his throat and tried to look offended, like Arthur had just asked for their company car too. "That's still a bit steep," the man said, cautiously. Arthur shrugged. "You're getting Tevez and a free smokescreen in the press for two months. What more do you want? Lunch?" Ferguson smiled quietly. Eventually, to grease the wheels and make sure United played along with the full scheme—including keeping the whole deal under wraps—Arthur knocked a cheeky two million off the price. Final terms: €20 million plus Gerard Piqué, with everything kept secret. No press release. No registration. Not even a whisper. Oh, and Tevez? He was made to sign a confidentiality agreement too. Arthur made sure of that before anything was finalized. Tevez didn't seem thrilled, but then again, he was never thrilled. He signed anyway. The money was good, and Ferguson promised him a starring role at Old Trafford—eventually. Arthur didn't care how excited or confused anyone was. His only focus was making sure one person didn't find out: Jeremy Bates. Once the papers were signed and the deal locked in the vault, Arthur stood up, nodded politely, and left the room looking like he'd just been told his dog ran away. The gloomy expression was deliberate. By the time he walked out of Carrington at around 5 p.m., he looked like a man who'd just lost a family heirloom. Of course, the reporters were still there—journalism's version of mosquitoes. Most of them froze when they saw his face. Only a few brave souls dared to approach, awkwardly jogging up with recorders in hand. "Mr. Arthur, is the deal off?" "Did the negotiations fall through?" "Was Manchester United unwilling to meet your price?" Arthur waved them off like a tired schoolteacher. "No comment. Long day. I'm exhausted." And with that, he slipped into his car, leaving a trail of flashing cameras and furrowed brows behind him. The next morning, Arthur's face was back on the front page of every sports newspaper in England. "Only 3 Days In, Leeds United May Sell Another Key Player!" "He Went In Smiling, Came Out Miserable—Is Arthur Losing the Tevez Battle?" "Tevez Transfer to United Hits a Wall, Other Clubs Still in Play" "Leeds Star's Future in Doubt as Manchester United Pull Back" "Is Arthur Struggling to Hold the Fort at Leeds?" Leeds United fans went berserk. For the second day in a row, angry supporters gathered outside the club headquarters. This time, they brought signs. Some of them were even spelled correctly. "WHERE IS THE PLAN, ARTHUR?" "SELLING EVERYONE, BUYING NO ONE!" "TEVEZ IS NOT FOR SALE—UNLESS IT'S FOR A REAL PRICE!" "THIS ISN'T FOOTBALL MANAGER!" Security had to be increased just to keep the front gate visible. People were shouting, chanting, even singing sarcastic songs about Arthur. One man in a Leeds shirt loudly offered to sell his cat if it helped buy back McKenna. Inside the club, Arthur was, as usual, not available for comment. He was somewhere far away, letting the media burn and the fans stew. Because none of it mattered. What mattered was how one man was taking the news. Over in West Bromwich, Jeremy Bates was finishing his breakfast—black coffee, two slices of dry toast, and a smug grin. He flicked through the latest copy of The Times, nodding to himself as he read the headlines about Arthur's supposedly failed Manchester trip. "See?" he muttered aloud. "Knew it. That greedy little git is waiting to milk every last penny." From his perspective, everything was going exactly as expected. Arthur wouldn't sell Tevez easily, not with half of Europe sniffing around. That gave Bates more time. More time to raise money. More time to sell his own players. And most importantly, more time to get that infernal loan from the bank. He leaned back in his chair, sipping coffee with the satisfaction of a man who thought he was winning a chess game. But then, as he reached the bottom of the article, reality reared its ugly head. The bank still hadn't confirmed the loan. Worse, their reply yesterday had been downright rude: "At least one month for processing. Do not expect early disbursement." Bates stared at the email again on his phone, as if hoping it would magically change. He groaned, his previously confident expression crumbling into a frown. "One month?! What the hell are they even doing? Building the money from scratch?" His entire plan depended on getting that cash fast. Without it, he couldn't trigger Tevez's buyout clause. And if he couldn't do that soon, someone else might snatch the player. Of course, he didn't know Tevez was already sold. He paced around his office like a man trying to think his way out of a traffic jam. "If I wait a month, Arthur might sell him to Chelsea. Or Arsenal. Or—God forbid—Everton!" In a fit of anxiety, he marched up the stairs to his second-floor study, mumbling to himself about lazy bankers and slow internet. He opened his laptop and began typing a new email to Leeds United. It wouldn't be a final offer. Just a polite nudge. A way to stay in the game. Keep Arthur engaged. Stall for time. Because in Bates' mind, the transfer was still up for grabs. And Arthur? Arthur was already three moves ahead, waiting for Bates to bring all his chips to the table—just to pull the rug out from under him. Again. *** Arthur, who had left Manchester under the cover of night like a man trying to avoid an awkward family dinner, had already touched down in Zagreb, the capital of Croatia, by the early morning. His plan for the new season's signings was simple: if the player lived somewhere far away—say, in South America or Africa—he'd just send club staff to handle the paperwork and handshakes. But if the player was already in Europe? Arthur was doing it himself. Not out of necessity, really, but because he'd come up with a brilliant plan while watching the Champions League final in Istanbul: why not turn the summer transfer window into a European vacation? So now, instead of sitting in his Leeds office getting yelled at by fans and pestered by the media, Arthur was hopping from country to country, signing players, scouting youth teams, and pretending to care about local landmarks. Everything else—press, angry supporters, conspiracy theories about selling half the squad—he left to poor Allen, who was now the unofficial lightning rod of Leeds United. By mid-morning, Arthur was already out walking the streets of Zagreb with a coffee in one hand and absolutely no clue where he was going. He wasn't there to sightsee, but since he was in the neighborhood, he figured he might as well act like a cultured manager who cared about history, or art, or...whatever they had here. He stared at statues, took pictures of buildings he'd never identify later, and nodded at pigeons like a man with a plan. After lunch, he made his way to Dinamo Zagreb, right on schedule. There was no drama to the visit—Modrić's transfer had already been wrapped up earlier in the summer. Today was just paperwork, greetings, and pretending everything hadn't already been agreed over fax two weeks ago. He signed the final documents in record time, politely shook hands with everyone who needed a handshake, and then casually asked the staff if he could take a look at their youth training setup. It wasn't that he expected to find another Modrić hiding behind a bush, but hey, what if there was? You never know with teenagers—one day they're tripping over their own feet, the next they're getting £60 million moves to the Premier League. Dinamo Zagreb were more than happy to show him around. They even sent their sporting director to personally escort him like a proud parent on open house day. Arthur also had a short chat with Luka Modrić himself, who was still playing for Dinamo at the time but already knew he'd be heading to Leeds soon. The conversation was polite and awkward. Modrić seemed surprised that this young guy in a plain t-shirt and sneakers was actually the owner and coach of the club he'd just signed for. "You're... the boss?" Modrić asked, politely confused. Arthur nodded. "Yep." There was a short silence. "Well, I didn't expect you to come all the way here," Modrić added. Arthur grinned. "Neither did I." Modrić was clearly flattered, and Arthur took mental note of that. Show up, shake hands, smile—it didn't take much to make a young player feel important. After that, Arthur spent about 30 minutes watching the youth team train. He stood quietly on the sideline like a man scouting talent but was mostly just using his instincts (and a bit of intuition) to try and spot anyone with potential. Unfortunately, the results were underwhelming. No one stood out. A few players tripped over their own shoelaces. One forgot which position he was playing. It was... a little depressing. Arthur turned to the sporting director. "Anyone good hiding somewhere else?" The director just laughed. "This is what we've got today." "Right," Arthur said. "Lovely." With that, he nodded politely, thanked everyone for their time, and left the training ground. Another country, another youth team, and another blank page in his scouting notebook. Back at the hotel, Arthur was looking forward to a quiet evening. Maybe a nap. Maybe a Croatian dessert. Maybe absolutely nothing at all. But the moment he stepped into his hotel room and dropped his bag, his phone started ringing. It was Allen. Arthur stared at the screen like it had just insulted his mother. He sighed, rubbed his face, and answered. "This better not be about another protest," he said. Allen's voice came through, slightly panicked, slightly breathless. "You're going to want to sit down."