by Bob Purssell
At three o’clock, as people filed into the conference room for the final meeting on our bid, even though Mrs. W had counseled me against it, I looked for the black-haired man in the gray pinstripe suit. I didn’t see him.
With nothing much to do, I sat where I could see the conference room door. At five after four, that door flew open and peopled streamed out. Rushing to a computer, a blond-haired man and a woman began typing. I surmised they were making the final modifications to our bid before transmitting it to the lawyers representing the firm that was in play.[26]
Mrs. W, calm and collected, spoke to Mr. Conover. When they finished, she motioned to me. Jumping to my feet, I rushed over to her.
“Barb, I need you to do an errand for me. Let’s go to the office I’m using.”
Like a puppy, I trailed behind my master. Mrs. W closed the door behind me.
“I want you to take this briefcase to the lawyers representing the company we’re bidding on. At precisely fifteen of five, enter the lobby. That will give you enough time to get to their offices. Give the briefcase to Mister Wildenstein before five o’clock.”
I nodded that I understood the instructions.
Mrs. W looked me in the eyes. “Barb, this is very important. You cannot fail.”
Tense, nervous, I gulped, before saying, “I’ll get the briefcase to Mister Wildenstein before five.”
“Good girl. Now, on your way.”
* * *
As I briskly walked the four blocks, I dreaded every “Do Not Walk” sign. Would it jam, delaying me precious minutes. I gripped the briefcase tightly lest some careless passerby knock it out of my hands. Of course, my imagination was running wild. Added to my fear of failure was the possibility the competition might have a gang of muggers waiting to intercept me and steal the precious briefcase. As I walked, my head was on a swivel, trying to determine if anyone was following me.
At twenty-five of five, I arrived at my destination. With both hands on the briefcase, I positioned myself next to the revolving doors that led to the lobby. My back to the building, my feet spread, I was ready for anything.
A limo pulled up and a man and a woman hastily got out. Was this the competition? They disappeared inside the building. The hands on my watch moved with glacial slowness. After many glances, it read eighteen of five.
* * *
As I rode the elevator up to the eleventh floor, I did not relax my grip on the briefcase. Whatever happened, I was going to complete my mission. At the door to the law firm, I took a deep breath. I had made it with eight minutes to spare.
As I stepped through the door, the receptionist asked, “How may I help you?”
Gulping, I replied, “I have a-a delivery for Mister Wildenstein.”
With a smile, she replied, “He’s expecting you, second door on the right.”
A jovial, heavily overweight man, Mr. Wildenstein said, “Your Mrs. Wingdale called; said you were bringing over the bid.”
The news that I had been carrying the bid caused my hands to tremble. Carefully, I handed over the briefcase; the desk clock read 4:57.
“You look frazzled. Have a seat while I look this over,” suggested Mr. Wildenstein, as he opened the briefcase and then inserted our DVD into his computer. As he reviewed our bid, the man offhandedly said, “If you were older, I’d offer you a drink. Try the cream cheese and lox in my fridge; they’re still fresh.”
More rattled by the news I had been carrying our firm’s bid, I asked, “Can I have a receipt?”
That took Mr. Wildenstein by surprise. With a smile, he replied, “Your boss said you were a sharp cookie. Of course you can have a receipt.”
With that, Mr. Wildenstein scribbled on a pad, tore off the piece of paper and handed it to me, saying, “Try the lox.”
After carefully putting the receipt in my bag, with a shaking hand I opened the small refrigerator and tried the lox. He was right; it was fresh.
After talking to the personable Mr. Wildenstein, my nerves finally settled, and I left. In the lobby I called Mrs. W and told her, “I delivered the bid to Mister Wildenstein at four fifty-seven.”
Apparently surprised, Mrs. W responded, “Oh, he told you.” Then recovering, she added, “Good work. I know you have questions. When the time is right, I’ll explain everything. For now, tell no one that you delivered our bid.”
Although my curiosity was already gnawing at me, I told Mrs. W, “I won’t say a word.”
* * *
That weekend Mrs. W stayed in New York as the firm’s contact executive. This meant she had to be available on an hour’s notice to meet with the management of the company that we were trying to acquire. However, Mrs. W told me she wasn’t keen on hanging around the hotel waiting for a call that might never come. She wanted to work other deals, and Friday night, that meant a client dinner.
The client must have been important because Mrs. W was behaving like me before a date, all nervous and jittery. As she left, she told me, “Unless the call comes from the lawyers who are representing us, take a message, block the call. Do not give them my number.”
“What about Mister Conover?”
“No!” she all but screamed. “Of all people, especially not him.”
I nodded that I understood her strange, atypical request, and Mrs. W started toward the door but stopped. Turning toward me, she gave me a hug and said, “Barbara, we’re almost there. We can do this,” and then left before I could ask what we were trying to do.
After ordering my meal from room service, I stayed in my hotel room and did some of my assigned reading for college. By ten thirty, I had logged three routine calls. Then my cell indicated I was receiving a fourth call. I answered, “Miss O’Leary, Mrs. Wingdale’s assistant. How may I assist you?”
“This is Conover. Get me Wingdale.”
Caught between the rock and the hard place, knowing Conover’s fearsome reputation, I replied, “Sir, Mrs. Wingdale has gone to bed. She asked not to be disturbed. Can I take a message?”
“No, you cannot. Now get me Wingdale, O’Leary.”
“Sir, Mrs. Wingdale wasn’t feeling well. She gave me explicit instructions not to be disturbed.” That caused Conover to pause. Knowing he wouldn’t let a mere assistant block him, I offered, “I’m supposed to see if Mrs. Wingdale needs anything at eleven. When I see her, I could tell her you called?”
Conover thought about my offer and then said, “You do that, O’Leary. I’ll give you my number. Tell her it’s damned important.”
After ending the call with Conover, I called Mrs. W and explained the situation. As she replied, “Good work,” I could hear music and laughter in the background. She added, “I’ll call him. What did he want?”
“He wouldn’t say. I told him you had gone to bed early. I made it sound like you were sick or not feeling well. Also don’t call him before eleven.”
“Very good, Barbara, I can handle it from here.”
* * *
I looked upon my deceiving Conover as part of a game. He was always bullying people—not me, other employees—and now he had gotten his, so I didn’t feel sorry for him.
I didn’t know what Mrs. W was doing, but I figured it was just part of how successful people made a lot of money.
I liked the cloak-and-dagger component; it had an element of danger. The fact that I had so easily manipulated Mr. Conover was unsettling. Either way, it was too convenient to be the initiator or too easy to be a victim. As far as ethics were concerned, I never made the connection.
* * *
Saturday, Mrs. W worked at the lawyers representing our firm. She had me do some typing, and when I wasn’t doing that, I did some more of my college reading. A little after four thirty, as we were packing our stuff, a junior lawyer from the firm representing ours walked into the office being used by Mrs. W. He told her that the senior executives from
the company she was negotiating to acquire wanted to meet at 5:00 PM.
At five, wondering what I should do, I trailed Mrs. W to a conference room, where our senior lawyer introduced her to three men and a woman. One of the men explained, “My clients have some questions about your bid.”
As the six adults stepped inside the conference room, Mrs. W told me, “Stick around; I may need you to run an errand.” With its door closed, I waited outside the conference room wondering what was going on. Within five minutes, the junior attorney delivered some requested item. As he walked out of the conference room, a voice said, “It’s hot in here; leave the door open.” From then on, I overheard, but only partially understood, everything said during the meeting.
Immediately, the conversation focused on who would run the company if our bid was accepted. I listened as the company’s president and the CEO spoke with Mrs. W about personnel issues. During the conversation, careers were changed and, in four cases, terminated.
One of the men asked Mrs. W, “What about the Denver facility?”
“We’ll close it in December so we can get the write-off this year.”
“That’s a hell of a Christmas present,” observed the CEO.
Her voice cold, Mrs. W responded, “I’m not Santa Claus.”
On the way back to the hotel, I asked, “Do you think we’re winning?”
“It’s hard to tell,” replied Mrs. W. “It depends on the power structure within the company, how scared management is of the shareholders and how greedy the executives are.”
Her analysis took me aback. When I did not say anything, Mrs. W told me, “It’s all about fear and greed, kiddo. Don’t let anyone fool you.”
* * *
Sunday, while we were having breakfast, Mrs. W said, “Screw this. I’m going nuts. Let’s take a walk. They can get me on my cell if they need to.”
We went to Central Park and walked about on a beautiful summer day. In the warm air, we watched families picnic and guys play volleyball. All the while, joggers ran by us, occasionally stopping to measure their heart rates.
Screwing up my courage, I asked, “What will happen to the people?”
“Which people?”
“The people who work for the company.”
“Can I answer the question you’re really asking?”
Not knowing what Mrs. W meant, I replied, “Sure.”
“I buy distressed merchandise, some of which is good, the rest junk. Some of the junk, if I’m lucky, I can sell; the rest I just get rid of. That’s the first part of what I do.”
She paused; when I nodded, she continued, “The second thing I do is get someone to fix up what isn’t junk. When it’s repaired, I sell it.”
“The Denver facility is junk?”
“In every way, shape, and form,” responded Mrs. W. “If I were to propose we keep that-that abomination, my partners should can my ass before the sun sets.”
“And the company … without the junk, I mean?”
“If the new management team plays their cards right, we can bring it public with a market capitalization of five point six.”
Doing the math, I replied, “That means we make three point seven billion dollars in profit?”
“You’re ignoring the borrowing costs and the investments that we have to make. The number you’re talking about is really two point one billion.”
Again doing the math in my head, I responded, “That’s 100 percent.”
“On the amount bid,” corrected Mrs. W. “The return on the amount our firm is investing is well over 150 percent in eighteen months, two years at the outside.”
Astounded, I replied, “Worst case, you’re talking about 75 percent a year return.”
With a smile, Mrs. W replied, “That’s one of the reasons I do this kind of work.”
Stunned by the amount of money the firm would make, I forgot about the question I had initially asked.
Mrs. W had not. She rhetorically asked, “Is what I do socially beneficial?” I listened carefully to her answer.
“Yes, I truly believe what my, what our, firm does is socially beneficial. We do what the management, the owners, the workers should have done, but wouldn’t. If they’d been on the ball, the company we’re buying out wouldn’t be in play. Because all those guys blew it, we are involved; doing what needs to be done, making the company viable.”
* * *
At four-thirty Sunday afternoon, Mrs. W got a call on her cell phone. When she had finished talking, she told me, “They’re making the announcement at six this evening.”
“Did we win?”
“Don’t know yet. Their CEO wants to announce the decision to the public before he tells us.”
With the markets closed, I did not understand the CEO’s motivation. Confused, I asked, “Why?”
With a shrug, Mrs. W said, “Who knows. Hey, until he makes the announcement, it’s his company. He can do it any way he likes.”
A large group had gathered in our lawyers’ office. A minute before 6:00 PM, somebody said, “Quiet everyone.”
Mrs. W grabbed my hand and squeezed. The tension in the room was electric.
All eyes and ears focused on the TV monitor. After thanking just about everyone who had ever lived in the Western Hemisphere, the CEO, trying to be dramatic, asked, “What can you buy these days for two point four billion dollars?”
Disappointed, I let out a sigh; we had been out bid by three hundred million. I glanced at Mrs. W. To my surprise, she had a smile on her face.
Continuing, the CEO was able to say, “Well if your name is Jessica,” before the room exploded with cheering. Startled, I looked up and saw Mrs. W hugging the head lawyer. A middle-aged man sprayed us with champagne. A woman standing next to me was so happy she had tears streaming down her cheeks.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mr. Conover leave the room. I looked at Mrs. W, who smiled and nodded. I might have asked why Conover had left, but swept up in all the excitement, I drank champagne from a paper cup instead. After about ten minutes, the uproar began calming down. When I looked at my champagne-stained blouse, somebody said, “Honey, we’ll buy you a new one.” Someone else yelled, “Make that five new ones,” and a whole group of people started laughing.
The party went on until twenty of seven, when Mrs. W went around the room shaking hands, thanking all who had worked on our bid. Somebody joked, “Are you throwing us out on our collective asses?”
“In a collective sort of way,” replied Mrs. W.
* * *
By eight-thirty, having showered and changed my clothes, I knocked on the door to Mrs. W’s hotel room. Like me, she too had changed. Unlike me, her casual blazer, sweater and slacks outfit probably cost over two thousand dollars. After telling me I looked nice, Mrs. W said, “I’m guessing you have questions you want to ask me.”
“Yes, I thought we were going to bid only two point one billion.”
“I can best answer your question by introducing you to someone.” Turning her head and looking back into her room, Mrs. W called out, “David.”
Out of Mrs. W’s bathroom stepped a black-haired man in a grey pinstriped suit. Without my asking, he turned so his back was facing me. He was definitely the man I had seen in the lobby.
As I shook David’s hand, not comprehending what was going on, all I could say was, “I-I don’t get it.”
“Before we get to that, Barbara, let me give David his check.” Handing the man an envelope, Mrs. W said, “Thank you for an excellent performance.”
Looking inside the envelope, a beaming David replied, “Thank you, Mrs. Wingdale.”
“Remember our agreement. The final payment is contingent on you keeping your silence.”
Responding in the hoarse voice of the stereotypical Italian gangster, David said, “Signora, as a man of respect I no tella an
yone.”
As the door closed, now alone with Mrs. W, I blurted out, “Who was, I mean, who is David?”
“An aspiring actor. Do you think he did a good job?”
Getting it, I exclaimed, “You tricked me!”
“Not you, our VP, or more correctly, our former VP.”
“But-but why me?”
“Because you are not a sneaky, devious person like me.” Then sounding like a bailiff, Mrs. W said, “You can be trusted to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth as God gave you the power to understand that truth.”
Reflecting on what had happened, I said, “You arranged for me to be in the lobby, for David to sit next to me, for me to tell what I heard.”
“Yes to the first two parts. I was relying on you for the third part.”
“And you had me carry the bid?”
With a grin, Mrs. W answered, “I consider all these machinations my directorial debut.”
“But what did Mister Conover do?”
“That part of the story I’ll keep to myself for a while.” Then after a pause, Mrs. W said, “I would ask one more thing of you.”
“Sure,” I replied.
“Keep all this under your hat. I’m working on something for you. I think you’ll like it.”
* * *
A week later, just before I left for college, Mrs. W threw a going-away party for me. With my friends and parents sitting around a picnic table, during dessert, she stood saying, “Let me have your attention.”
When the guests quieted, Mrs. W handed me an envelope as she said, “This is a little something to help you with your education.” When I hesitated, she told me, “Go ahead; open it.”
It was a $100,000 check from the firm’s scholarship fund.
* * *
Editor’s Note: Apparently, Mrs. W never disclosed to Barbara what transgression Mr. Conover had made that required his elimination. Maybe he was attempting to betray the firm; maybe she was finishing off a rival. Whatever the reason for the intrigue, it is now lost.
