Читать книгу Coming for Money - F.W. vom Scheidt - Страница 10

5

In February, in the city, winter lopped off the afternoon at its knees.

Within our offices, the intensity of the fluorescent light neither wavered nor dimmed. You would only notice the change outside in snapshots when you looked up between telephone calls or looked off your computer screen. First the deepening mid-afternoon shadows shouldered along the canyons between the office towers. Then it was black outside the windows, without further increment, as if the blackness spilled down from the sky.

Often you could hear the end of the day in the rising volume of vehicle horns barking in rush-hour before you took notice of the gloom, punctuated by streetlights, pierced by headlights and checkered by distant shoals of lit up high-rise windows.

Soothed by the cliffs of familiar darkness outside my windows, I sat patiently in my office, my apprehension easing as I listened to voices disappearing into the elevators, the expanding emptiness of the office leaving me insulated from interruption or reproach. I flipped through a wad of yellow computer slips confirming the day’s string of bond trades. My eyes retraced packs of numbers and decimal points that dissolved within my concentration without registering any meaningful information. I brushed the bundle aside.

My confrontation with Kyle came back on me like heartburn. I hated it, how it had gone. I hated how Kyle had withdrawn his support this past year and made me a target because I had elevated my commitment to my personal life above my commitment to the firm. I had tried to make caring about someone the most important thing in my life, certain that it would make me invincible; and, instead, it had left me on the outside of potent office alliances, compromised and vulnerable. It left me feeling as if I had been betrayed by something I could not see or touch.

Listlessly, I slumped in my chair, leafing through a two-month-old copy of Forbes magazine to keep my hands busy while I waited for it to be time to make the call.

Often, when I was about to call to the other side of the world, I imagined the sun rolling freshly through the streets of a foreign city; the recipient of my call rising from slumber, preparing for the day in morning rituals similar to my own, travelling to work along hectic streets banked by gaudy advertising.

Memories of my last trip to Singapore broke my clouded thoughts: cleanly swept streets and lush parks planted with palms and broad-leafed tropical plants; gleaming office towers looking out over the green sea and verdant islands of Indonesia; on the streets, heat and steamy humidity doubling the weight of the air in your lungs; and then the chill of the air conditioning, bringing welcome relief as it soaked slowly back into your shirt when you got off the elevator heading for someone’s office.

I clicked my mouse, and brought my database of names and addresses up onto the screen, not trusting myself to dial the twelve digits from memory.

My call to Bank of South Asia was answered on the second ring by a woman chirping heavily accented English.

I asked for Stanley Man by his full Mandarin name, properly placing the family name first.

“Man Sek-Lung, please.”

“Who is calling, please?”

“Paris Smith. Addison, Beaufort and Shulman. Toronto. Canada.”

“One moment, please.”

There was a pause unusual to the frenetic pace of Asian business.

“Hello. Mr. Smith, are you still there? I’m giving you a forwarding number for Mr. Man.”

“What do you mean, a forwarding number?”

“Please contact Mr. Man at the following number.”

She slowly announced a number that I realized, as I double-checked it against my computer screen, was Stanley’s home telephone number. I re-dialled quickly, nervously.

The telephone was not answered until the fifth ring.

“Stanley?”

“Yes.”

“Paris Smith. What’s up? You taking the day off?”

“Not quite, I’m afraid.”

“What do you mean?”

“The bank and I parted company Friday night, Paris. Actually, I was called in and let go.”

“Stanley. Shit. Were you expecting anything?”

“I suppose it’s been in the wind the last couple months. But I thought the timing would be a lot different.”

“You come out of it okay?”

“Better than I thought. They could have gone with a severance package as low as three months’ salary. I was hoping for six. They gave me twelve. And I’ve been keeping a few options open in Singapore and Hong Kong, and one in Beijing. So I’m in great shape.”

“Glad to hear that. But who takes over the file for Bangkok Commercial Bank to run with our deal now?”

“Well, Paris, that’s the part that’s not in great shape.”

“What do you mean?”

“In short … there is no deal.”

“Don’t tell me that.”

“I’ve got nothing else to tell you. The deal is dead.”

“And don’t tell me that either.”

“Paris, that deal is deader than my job. That’s the whole reason I got the axe.”

“I don’t understand. You and I designed that credit line to guarantee some very high fees to BSA. It’ll probably be the richest deal BSA does this year.”

“Except there is no deal. It’s off. The deal is dead.”

“The deal can’t be dead. You can’t cancel a done deal. There’s six and a half pounds of contracts.”

“And that’s the problem.”

“What?”

“There are no more contracts, Paris.”

“What do you mean? You can’t just cancel out all those contracts or throw them away. We’d sue BSA for breach. Hell, we wouldn’t even have to sue. We’d just have to go through the motions so that the story spreads around. Nobody would ever get into bed with BSA again. And somebody else would step up to marry us at the altar as soon as it got out how rich the deal was. Hell, for that much profit we’d probably hear from Credit Lyonnais or Barclays or JP Morgan Chase.”

“That’s just it. BSA won’t be in breach of contract, and they won’t be walking away from the contracts.”

“What then?”

“They sold the contracts.”

“Sold them?”

“They had to.”

“How? How can you sell a contract? And who did you sell it to?”

“I’m not exactly sure how. But I know why. And I know who.”

“Well, then, who?”

“Amsterdam Bank.”

“Amsterdam Bank? No fucking way either of us would ever deal with them. We put this whole bond deal together to screw Amsterdam Bank. How could they even get into the game, how could they even get into the ball park, let alone get into the deal?”

“You want the short version, Paris? Or do you want the long details?”

“Give me the short version.”

“Amsterdam Bank sent someone in to BSA. They let it be known that they own the controlling share of half a dozen insurance companies across the Pacific Rim. And between them, all of these insurance companies hold one awful shit-load of Bank of South Asia stock in the Hong Kong, Singapore, and Australian stock markets.”

“And?”

“And they threatened to start dumping all of the stock unless they become a partner in the deal.”

“And BSA caved in to that?”

“Hey, BSA took a couple of big hits in China and Vietnam and a few other places that over the last two years that have left it overexposed and under-capitalized. If those Amsterdam Bank insurance companies start dumping the stock, the share price will dive. As soon as the share price caves in, BSA’s equity shrinks and it can’t meet reserve requirements. Then the Bank of International Settlements steps in. Rumours trickle out into the capital markets. BSA is fucked. They can start turning the branches into hamburger stores.”

“Amsterdam can’t do it. They’d never get away with it.”

“There’s nothing to stop them. Think about it. It’s not like dealing with a single company in a single stock market like London or New York where everyone lives in almighty fear of the regulators. It’s a handful of different companies and half a dozen different stock markets. They’re not afraid of anything except losing a couple of dollars worth of profit on their stocks. Which they’ll just swap for shares in other bank stocks anyway.”

“There’s still probably some part of it that’s against the law somewhere.”

“And you and me, and everybody else in this business, know that when you’re dealing with this much money on anything there is no law.”

“For money? Amsterdam?”

“Of course not. You know they wanted to set an example. Stamp out this problem before it got started. Stamp out anyone else from ever thinking about trying again.”

“Fuck.”

“Amsterdam couldn’t touch Bangkok Commercial for pulling the bonds out from under their feet. So they clobbered you guys.”

“Who did Amsterdam Bank send in to see you guys.”

“I don’t know. I never saw or heard anything. I got it from the chairman and he had two of the directors with him. And they wouldn’t answer anything for me.”

“Why didn’t they keep you around rather than let you loose with the information?”

“They wanted to. That’s what the whole meeting was about. They wanted me to keep running with the deal. They wanted me to work with Amsterdam Bank. But I refused. So they fired me. The year’s severance is being paid in instalments, to keep a lid on me, but you and I both know there’s really not much I can do to hurt either BSA or Amsterdam Bank other than one or two embarrassing stories that they can make go away pretty easily.”

“If you refused out of loyalty, I appreciate it.”

“Well, partially out of loyalty to you and your firm. Mostly because, sooner or later, everything I do for the rest of my career in this business will come down to my reputation for keeping my word.”

“Thanks for that much anyway.”

“Sorry, Paris.”

“Will anybody at BSA give me more details?”

“They’ll have to. Or their attorneys will have to. Try Albert Quan, the chairman. You’ve met him before. Worst he can do is refuse to talk to you.”

“I guess so. Can I stay in touch with you at this number for a while or are you out to Hong Kong?”

“No, I’ll be here. They made sure I didn’t take anything out of my office. But I wiped my office computer clean into a couple of downloads, so they’ll be missing a few of the private memos we shot back and forth to each other. And I’ve already got all of the documentation for the deal on the computer here at the house. There’s a few internal memos on the Amsterdam angle, but nothing that will really stand up under light of day. I can always go through the files and see if I can find anything that might help.”

“Thanks.”

“Least I can do.”

We stuffed a few personal comments into the conversation to bring it to a rapid close, equally eager to cease feigning momentum that was no longer there, equally eager to flee the hovering stigma of personal failure. Then we hung up sharply.

Acid crept up my esophagus. I forced it back down in a smarting swallow. I drilled my eyes around my empty office. I was at first anxious, then confused as to why I was not more furious.

It was backwards.

My rage should have been absolute, my grip on it like my grip on a lethal weapon.

Instead, the more my rage compelled me to return to the ruthless facts from Singapore, the more I choked on my shame of failure.

There was no reassuring heat from the familiar surge of adrenaline that flowed invariably from a business crisis.

Instead, I had a sense of all of my other feelings going cold and watery. My vigour and confidence cowering. My hope hiding.

It left me with an aberrant sensation of being present in the passing moments, while also of living outside myself, of being detached and looking down on myself.

I crooked my toes compulsively within my shoes, searching for the solidity of the floor, my urge to flee so intense I sensed it would take no more than an uneven breath to send me into the corridor.

Was this what it was like for Judith? This absence of everything familiar?

Was this what made her do it?

I tried to move, pushing myself forward while keeping the brakes on so that I did not lurch or stumble.

To the door, to the corridor, to the elevator, to the street. I touched as little as possible with my fingers. I kept my eyes on my toes to prevent myself tripping. I arrived outside on the deserted flats of concrete in the dark cold air without any recollection of the stages of my passage, only a series of blurred images, like paint slopped on walls, sliding down.

I leaned into the chilled air for support.

Fever flared in the cavities of my brain, as if my blood was being scalded; it roared at my temples, straining to escape my skull.

Words bubbled up my throat and then flew off my lips like flushed birds before I could speak them.

I felt lost in my skin.

I craned my neck, looking up to the surrounding office towers, trying to see through the concrete and steel to the reassurance of lives continuing to be lived in those offices, but could only feel the immense weight of the money, indifferent to my plight. I was forced to peer farther out to the distant constellations in the night sky to situate myself so I would not be flung out by the dizzying rotation of the earth I felt coming up through the concrete beneath my shoes.

Bringing my eyes back to street level, one light beckoned: at the top of the block, a franchised coffee shop that stayed open twenty-four hours to pick up trade from the late-shift cabbies and office cleaning crews omnipresent throughout the mid-town and financial district during the night.

I shivered, tugged my coat tighter at my throat, pulled in a string of burly breaths in an attempt to settle my jumpy breathing, and headed up the block in a long looping jay-walk.

I was exhausted beyond any familiar limit. Feeling as if my emotions had been beaten with sticks. I began to picture myself arriving home, going from the front door straight to the couch in the fewest possible steps and dropping fully clothed, deadly tired, into sleep.

I knew I was facing a terrible night and that it would be worse in the morning.

I knew, in my life, there was now something irreparably wrong.

I knew I had been waiting for it to happen.

The pool of light leaking from the shop out onto the dark street reminded me of shallow water. I waded into it, watchful of deep spots. I pushed through the door, entering into the brightness and the smell of coffee and doughnut grease. The place was empty. A skinny black girl in a moss-green T-shirt presided over the counter, reading a spread newspaper to the accompaniment of a reggae radio station, her hips shifting with the beat.

Without looking up, she asked, “You want coffee?”

I sat at a stool. “Yeah. Please.”

She straightened from the counter and turned to the stewing carafes behind her. “Here or to go? Regular?”

“Here,” I told her. “Regular’s fine. Thanks.”

Clicking; clinking; and she slid the mug onto the counter in front of me.

I took a sip.

To stay away from my memories of Monday morning, vaguely stirred into the sweet creamy taste, I asked her, “Is your accent from Jamaica?”

“No,” she answered. “Trinidad.”

“You’re a long way from home.”

“Long way from home. And cold as hell.” She grinned. “Don’t you know.”

I replied with a nod and a tight smile, wanting her to know that I was grateful for her recognition of me.

“What ’bout you? You’re surely no taxi man dressed like that. You one of them super stock market men?”

“Yeah,” I admitted, “I guess I am.”

“Then what you doin’ down here at midnight? You not make enough millions today?”

I shrugged. “Just a hard night.”

“That happens,” she said. “Sometimes, man, the night comes hard.”

I had to nod.

Don’t you know.