Читать книгу The Money Makers - Harry Bingham - Страница 19

Matthew emerged on to the floor of the deserted trading room. Except for the red digital wall-clocks and the flicker of screens, the room was in darkness. Matthew turned on an Anglepoise lamp over his desk. He liked the dark and the hour of silence before the cleaners arrived at five am. He fetched a cup of black coffee and got to work.

In the five weeks since he had really got started, Matthew had his routine well developed. By the time Luigi came in with fresh coffee at seven, Matthew would have prepared five neat piles of painstakingly referenced and highlighted bundles of research. At first the piles had been a welcome luxury. They had since become little short of essential: the Saint Matthew Gospel, as Luigi put it.

The fictional lira which marked Matthew’s progress with Luigi had nudged up to nearly one dollar. In practice, Matthew knew, Luigi would vote in favour of Madison’s offering him a full-time job to start once he had completed his degree. But that wouldn’t do. He had three years to make a million, and he wasn’t going to spend one of them studying economics. Matthew needed a job and he needed it now.

Later that day, Matthew was to have an interview with Brian McAllister. The son of a Glaswegian truck driver, McAllister ruled the trading floor with quiet voice and omniscient eye. By reputation, he knew each trader’s market better than they did themselves. He was willing, as most traders were, to take large risks in search of profit. Less commonly, he was also willing to refrain from risk whenever he judged the conditions were wrong. Many people had made bigger profits than Brian McAllister, but none had made smaller losses.

McAllister’s judgement would decide Matthew’s fate, and there was no court of appeal.

Just after nine, Luigi came by his desk. ‘Matteo, where does ze lira stand today?’

Matthew pretended to check his screen. ‘Hey, Luigi, what d’you know? The lira equals one dollar exactly.’

‘And how is the Italian deficit, please?’

Matthew touched some buttons on his keyboard. A new screen flashed up. ‘Well, look at that. Rupert Murdoch’s just bought the Italian government for a zillion dollars and the deficit’s been eliminated.’

Luigi grinned. ‘Seriously, Matteo, Big Mac will ask me why you suddenly work, when before you were the most goddamn lazy prick I have ever seen. How do we know which one we’re buying?’

‘My dad died six weeks ago,’ said Matthew, who had said nothing about it earlier. ‘About five weeks ago, I realised I needed to look after myself now. So I did.’

Luigi nodded seriously. His trader’s eyes scanned Matthew’s face, looking for the truth behind his words. ‘I’m sorry, Matteo, I didn’t know.’

Luigi walked off to find Big Mac, as McAllister was known behind his back, never to his face.

Luigi’s conversation lasted perhaps five minutes. Given the number of demands on McAllister’s time, that counted as a long interview. Matthew drummed nervously on his desk and felt inside his jacket pocket to reassure himself that a certain document was still there. Luigi returned, and one by one Anders, Cristina, and Jean-François went to speak with McAllister. Matthew believed they would support him. Each of them had said to him privately that his support over the last weeks had really given them an edge in the free-for-all of the market. Their trading profits still depended on their daily judgements, but Matthew had helped them and they were grateful.

Jean-François came back. He patted Matthew on the back. ‘Allez,’ he said, and gave a wink of support.

Matthew walked over to McAllister’s office. McAllister had taken advantage of the thirty second gap between Jean-François’s departure and Matthew’s arrival to take a call from his counterpart in the Paris office. The phone call blared from a speaker on McAllister’s desk. The subject of the conversation appeared to be how the French bond markets would react to a European summit being held the following day.

McAllister saw Matthew come in and signed him to sit. Privacy was unheard of on the trading floor. Conversations were yelled across the room. Phone calls were recorded. Pierre d’Avignon, on the phone to McAllister, wouldn’t raise an eyebrow if he knew that somebody else had just come in to sit in on his call. D’Avignon asked McAllister a question, something to do with the European summit.

‘An interesting question,’ said McAllister, in his strong Scots accent. ‘I’ll get our analyst here to do some research on that point and we’ll get back to you tomorrow.’

‘OK, but it needs to be tomorrow first thing, before the markets open.’

‘Aye. First thing tomorrow.’

‘And put one of your best guys on this, eh, Brian?’ said d’Avignon. ‘We’ve got five hundred million dollars’ worth of bonds on our books at the moment, and we don’t want to make a mess.’

‘Don’t worry. You’ll have the best.’

D’Avignon hung up. McAllister looked at Matthew.

‘Got that?’

‘You want me to do the research?’

McAllister nodded.

‘Yes. No problem,’ croaked Matthew. He knew virtually nothing about the European summit which d’Avignon was on about, but if he screwed up, he could wave his job goodbye. His mouth turned dry.

‘Good. We’ll talk about your job after your conversation with d’Avignon tomorrow morning.’

Matthew was dismissed, but he continued to hold McAllister’s gaze. The Scotsman’s eyes were pale blue and piercing. It was like gazing into the eyes of God.

‘Thank you,’ said Matthew. ‘There’s just one thing I’d like to ask you.’ He paused. McAllister said nothing, waiting. God, he was intimidating. ‘I don’t want to finish my degree. The last few weeks have made me realise that I love trading. I don’t believe that completing my degree will make me a better trader. I want to work hard and I want to start now. I like Madison and I’d like to work here if I possibly can.’

Matthew paused to review the effect of his words, but McAllister’s face was as empty as granite. Matthew decided he might as well play his only trump card and drew a letter from his pocket. He gave it to the Scotsman.

‘I’ve been offered a job by Coburg’s. I don’t want to work there. I want to work here. I know as well as you do that Madison is going to wipe the floor with Coburg’s, and I want to be part of that. But above all I want to trade and I want to start now. And if that means I need to start at a second-rate firm, then I will.’

McAllister barely glanced at the photocopied letter in front of him. Matthew had pinched the letter from Zack’s flat the evening Josie smashed his coffee table. Except for a couple of initials and the name of the department, he’d hardly needed to alter it. ‘Dear Mr Gradley, We are pleased to be able to offer you a job as Assistant Manager in our Global Markets Department. We are keen that you should start with us directly, and I would ask you to confirm your start date with us as soon as possible.’ The letter continued with banalities. Matthew had photocopied the doctored original, then inspected it under a magnifying glass. He was confident that the changes were virtually undetectable.

McAllister tapped the letter lightly with his finger to indicate that Matthew should take it back.

‘Don’t write off Coburg’s,’ he said softly. ‘They’ve been around for more than two hundred years, twice as long as we have. We’ll be doing well to last that long ourselves.’

The interview was over.