Closed doors are always the first hint of trouble around the bend.
* * *
At 7:30 A.M. I marched past Katy Anders. She was leading three visitors across SKC’s lobby. The suits carried briefcases and wore grim expressions. I recognized several SKC employees trailing behind them—the staff lawyers and human-resource types that come equipped with nose tethers.
The group was trudging toward a conference room. Their bearing was heavy, their morgue faces drained of energy. And I wondered whether the Morgan Stanley deal had cratered. But Anders was the wrong person to participate in those discussions.
She busied herself with the outsiders and ignored me. A woman from human resources caught my eye and flashed a wan, humorless smile. “Welcome back,” she said, which struck me as weird, uncomfortable. I knew her face but couldn’t remember her name.
“Thanks.” I pressed on.
It took me twenty-five minutes to reach Zola, Chloe, and my workstation. On the way over, stockbrokers buzzed with excitement. They wanted to talk. Not that I had any inside knowledge about our deal with Morgan Stanley. I offered a fresh take, however, on the same old questions that had been posed a million times since the deal was announced on Wednesday.
Scully looked left, and he looked right. He whispered, his voice uncharacteristically low, “Morgan Stanley’s a boiler room. My clients won’t go.”
“Yes they will.” Casper pushed aside his fingernail clippers.
Scully, who’s a big hitter on the floor, was not accustomed to the pushback. “Who pissed in your Cheerios, bright boy?”
“I’ll make this easy for you,” snorted Casper. “You answer the phone ‘Morgan Fucking Stanley.’ Nobody gets hurt, and you take home a fifty percent retention bonus.”
“Nothing wrong with that deal,” I observed.
“It’s about time we got paid around here,” Casper said.
In a room full of stockbrokers, everybody has an angle. Especially when it comes to money. Financial advisers claim to be resolute in their convictions, adamant until a better idea comes along. In practice, the vast majority of us change our minds the way pigeons change directions—straying and cooing from one leader to the next as we move inexorably toward the dough.
Patty Gershon, my nemesis on the floor, stopped me before I reached my team. Her revenues were second only to mine. But frankly, she did a better job keeping her finger on the pulse of SKC. “Thanks for coming in, Grove.”
New day. Same joke as yesterday and the day before and … You get the point.
“Any idea who Anders is meeting?”
“Lawyers from Morrison Foerster,” Gershon reported.
“Well, that’s emphatic.” Her recon surprised me.
“Jane told me.”
The explanation sounded reasonable. Gershon was a magnet for every woman in the office with something on her mind, including Anders’s administrative assistant, Jane.
“MoFo’s bad news,” I observed, referring to the law firm.
Morrison Foerster prides itself on the nickname. A line on its website reads big, gray, and in your face: “This is MoFo.” It’s an image, I think, that hard-boiled litigators embrace during court battles.
It was Gershon’s turn to be surprised. “What’s the big deal?”
“We only use them when there’s a problem.”
“Which is what?”
“Who knows? I’ve been keeping a low profile in Charleston.”
“What do you think about the deal?”
“I’m still gathering facts.”
“Better hurry up.” Gershon picked up her phone. “Anders is leaning on me to sign the paperwork. And my team is scheduled to meet with Morgan Stanley on Monday.”
Back at our workstations, Zola high-fived me hello. She was on the phone, already locked into a client conversation. Chloe, our sales assistant, pulled off her oversized headset, vintage World War II, and asked, “Did you bring me a present, Dad?”
We played this game whenever I returned from trips. Usually, I made some wise-ass remark. But this time, I handed her a tin of Charleston benne wafers. They’re sweet, sesame with a milklike buttery flavor. I can eat them by the handful.
“I was kidding.” Chloe turned crimson.
“I’m hoping you’ll share.”
“Depends how much I like them.”
“Hey, do you have my paperwork?” Our phones were lighting up, but we let the calls go into voice mail. Wall Street could wait another few minutes.
“The Morgan Stanley stuff—Anders has yours.”
“What about Zola?”
“She has hers,” Chloe confirmed. “She refused to turn it in until you got back.”
“It’d be nice to have mine.”
“Anders wants you to stop by anyway.”
“Did she say why?”
“Oh my God, these are good,” Chloe exhaled, grabbing another benne wafer. With that she offered some to me, and we began sucking them down, using sign language to urge Zola to follow our lead.
Old-time Charlestonians believe benne wafers bring good luck. But it’s like I said before: in my business, nothing good happens on Friday afternoon. And by the time the day was over, Wall Street’s voodoo had more than trumped the positive juju from our cookies.
* * *
“It is what it is.”
I hate that expression, the inherent fatalism, the callous marching orders to deal with a decision that sucks. Those five words mean somebody got hosed. Today, that somebody had been me.
Outside Anders’s office, the beat-down over, I decided she could screw herself. She had outpointed me and eliminated all my options. I couldn’t even complain to the client, which is the one thing every broker does in these situations.
Seething, taken aback, I turned philosophical. I decided there’s no such thing as halftime in the rat race. The contest grinds on, day in, day out, forever unraveling with no rules and no end in sight. And because there’s no clear way to win, I wondered if we all lose.
The meeting with Anders had lasted all of fifteen minutes. It began the usual way. “Chloe said you want to see me.”
“Do me a favor and close the door.”
Uh-oh.
My thoughts jumped to the Palmetto Foundation. My decision to join had been eating me for any number of reasons. First, there was Biscuit Hughes. From abso-fucking-lutely nowhere, he walked into Palmer’s office and linked our charity to an adult superstore.
Ordinarily, I would have thought him nuts. But there was something about the big attorney, something that made me trust him. From the start, he passed my smell test. And later, he withstood further scrutiny when Annie and I Googled him. Biscuit was onto something.
Then there was the modest traffic to the Catholic Fund’s websites. Father Ricardo’s story was not hanging together. And when I closed the door to Anders’s office, my misgivings gained momentum. Patriot Act. Fines and jail time. I could be going away.
Wall Street runs from trouble. Firms do everything to protect themselves rather than their people. The brass at SKC would throw me, or any stockbroker, under the bus without a second thought.
Which meant I wasn’t about to confess my misgivings to Anders. I tried a little misdirection instead. “Is this about Morgan Stanley?”
“Everything’s about Morgan Stanley.” She paused and confronted me head-on, obliterating my strategy. “Did you join the board at the Palmetto Foundation?”
“I had no choice.”
Anders shook her head in dismay. I saw trouble in her eyes. There was something deeper than disagreement between two colleagues. Something more profound and, I would add, something more unsettling.
“That’s too bad.”
“Do you have paperwork for me?” I asked, retreating to the big deal.
“It’s all here.” Anders handed me a large manila envelope with a computer-generated label bearing my name.
“I understand several teams are meeting with Morgan Stanley next week.”
“You aren’t. Not yet anyway.”
“What’s that mean?”
Anders leaned forward, her usual pose for the big show of cleavage and trust-me body language. Not today. She was attacking. “A bunch of your clients already have accounts at Morgan Stanley.”
“Every broker on the floor has the same problem.”
“But you cover our chairman.”
“So.”
“We’re moving his account to a team over there.”
“Excuse me.” Percy Phillips was not my biggest client, not by a long stretch. But no stockbroker wants to lose the CEO’s account.
“You heard me.”
The scummy reality—firms can reassign clients anytime they want, even though brokers are paid to develop new relationships. I was growing angrier by the minute. I could feel my forehead throbbing.
There are bragging rights when you cover the CEO of your employer. He’s the king of the chessboard, the piece every player will protect no matter the cost. I was being sacrificed and had no idea why.
“It’s part of the deal.” Her words were crisp and cold. But she brushed her upper lip with a hooked forefinger, the nervous tic I had noticed before.
“That’s fucked up. Revenues are the same, whether Percy works with me or somebody else.”
Anders shrugged. “My hands are tied.”
“He agreed to this?”
“Don’t go running to him.” She leveled her stare like a 12-gauge.
“And if I do?”
“Insubordination. Our lawyers say it’s grounds for termination.”
“Is that why you met with MoFo this morning?”
“That’s none of your business.” Anders blinked and averted her eyes. The flicker lasted less than a second. But I knew. I was right. This was one of those times when I would have paid to be wrong.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
“Our deal with Morgan Stanley is a big win. You should be thrilled about the payday.”
“You’re taking my client. I’m not feeling the love.”
“This conversation is exactly why I don’t want you talking to their management.”
“Gershon’s team is meeting with Morgan Stanley on Monday.”
“Patty is none of your business.”
“And you’re holding back.”
I was bullshit. Ready to blow a gasket. Awareness was the only thing that saved me. Awareness of myself on the brink. Of management’s nonsense. Of MoFo’s involvement. I began to speak in controlled bursts, my words softer and softer, a steady, seething soliloquy that forced Anders to pay attention. “We all have a few clients who keep money with Morgan Stanley. If they didn’t, we probably wouldn’t want them as clients.”
“Let me say something.”
“Don’t interrupt.”
She backed off.
“Other brokers are meeting Morgan Stanley. I’m not. You’re pushing people for their paperwork. But you’re not pushing me, which is pretty fucking strange because our team generates more revenues than anybody else on the floor.”
Anders started to speak.
“Don’t interrupt.” I stared her into silence. “And now you’re telling me Percy’s account is a deal point. It doesn’t square with the facts, Katy, and I’m wondering what’s happening behind the scenes. Are you taking any other clients?”
“Everything is on the table.”
“Does this have something to do with the Palmetto Foundation?”
“Not at all. I love when subordinates ignore my instructions.” Anders sounded hard, the sarcasm sharp. But her eyes glowed like a cornered rodent’s.
“Why don’t you level with me and save the money you’re spending on MoFo?”
“I think we’re finished.”
Anders stood and folded her arms across her chest. The posture, about as subtle as Times Square, said: “Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.”
“This thing with Percy,” I told her while leaving, “it’s not right. I don’t understand your game. But we both know it’s not right.”
“It is what it is.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
OSSINING, NEW YORK
Westchester is nothing if not affluent. Big houses. Big taxes. The county is a place where the usual suspects of wealth—doctors, lawyers, financiers—pay for a view. Though, arguably, the best vistas belong to state employees: the guards stationed atop lookout towers at the Sing Sing Correctional Facility in Ossining.
The prison overlooks the Hudson, a wide stretch where riverbanks are steep and trees shoulder each other for slivers of sun. But for all the feral beauty of unruly thickets, the area is best known for jailhouse colloquialisms like “up the river,” “the last mile,” and “the big house.”
Fifteen minutes east of Sing Sing, around the fjordlike bends, reform is spiritual rather than correctional. The Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers, blessed with a separate zip code, make their world headquarters in a fortresslike campus. Massive buildings are hewn from great beams and rough-cut stone. And were it not for the Asian motif, at least one pagoda roof, the structures would resemble their razor-wired neighbor on the Hudson.
It was Tuesday when Father Ricardo had visited the Palmetto Foundation. Afterward, I Googled the Catholic Fund, the Manila Society for Children at Risk, and Maryknoll every possible chance. That was between calls to the office, clients, and everyone else. Over the phone, Father Tom Ford agreed to meet me. A Maryknoll priest, he pushed papers for their administration.
Ossining is cycle heaven. Ordinarily, I would have thrown a bike on top of my Audi and banged out twenty-five miles after wrapping up business. That Friday afternoon, however, I was in no mood to ride. I was too preoccupied with Katy Anders, the impending merger with Morgan Stanley, and the CEO’s account that had been snatched from me.
Anders was behaving like an alien. Her job was to make nice and deliver brokers, who could generate fees and commissions to our new owner. She should have been puckering those glossy red lips, all swollen from collagen and other adventures in self-love science. She should have been kissing me square on the patoot. Because that’s what overhead line items do on Wall Street.
Anders was hiding something, that flicker of her eyes. Driving up to Ossining, I brooded about my boss. What she knew. What I didn’t. I ground through the Palmetto Foundation, my promise to wire $40 million within a week, and the sparse traffic to the Catholic Fund’s websites.
Its Internet pages looked legit. In fact, they resembled Maryknoll’s three separate websites: one for priests, one for nuns, and one for laypeople. There are three separate Maryknoll operations. But they maintain strong operating bonds and share their focus on the overseas mission activity of the Catholic Church in the United States. The Catholic Fund websites employed the same color palettes and type fonts as their Maryknoll brethren. Even the photos had the same look and feel.
The Donate buttons really piqued my curiosity. They were located in the upper-right-hand corner of most Maryknoll pages. Underneath were the words: “86½ cents of every dollar donated goes directly to our work.”
The Catholic Fund’s websites, even the ones targeting smaller cities like Spokane, included the same gold button. Not similar. The same. The graphics and shading were ditto déjà vu. Only the numbers were different. The Catholic Fund claimed that ninety-three cents out of every dollar donation went to its work.
When I finally reached Ossining, I parked my car and all my preoccupations at Maryknoll’s headquarters. I headed inside and shook hands with Father Ford. His modest office was neither spartan nor over the top. He acted like a man in a hurry, short and twitchy. I soon learned he was prone to repeating himself, as though his inner thoughts were echoing out of his mouth. He proceeded right to business.
“How can I help?”
“I’m trying to get some information, Father.”
“What kind?”
“Things you might not say over the phone.”
�
�I might not say them in person.” The reverend’s demeanor was guarded. Priest or not, I could see he was like any other bureaucrat. Careful.
“I may have a problem, Father. A serious problem revolving around sixty-five million dollars. One that will attract the authorities, if my fears are justified. The thing is, I don’t know if there’s really an issue. And I need information about a member of your order to understand what’s going on.”
He leaned forward, engrossed. “Who’s the priest?”
“Father Frederick Ricardo.”
“Nope. Don’t know him. Never heard of him. Sorry I can’t help.”
The speed of his staccato repetitions surprised me. “How can you be so sure?”
“Five fifty. We have about five hundred fifty priests. I know most, but nope I don’t know Father Ricardo.”
“Do you mind checking your records, just in case?”
Father Ford turned to the computer. His fingers danced over the keyboard. He blinked several times in a frenetic-little-man way, anxious to wrap up and return to his other duties. He removed his rimless glasses, fogged the lenses with his breath, and wiped them clean. “Nope, nope. There’s no Father Ricardo.”
“Dark skin. Curly hair.”
“That could be any of our missionaries.”
“Father Ricardo said this would happen.”
“What would happen?” Father Ford opened and closed his hands repeatedly.
“Maryknoll would disavow his existence.”
“Don’t know him. We’re not in the lying business. Nope, nope, that wouldn’t do.”
“Father, I don’t mean to suggest you’re lying. Father Ricardo said his job is sensitive. That his mission could embarrass Maryknoll, not to mention the Catholic Church.”
“This isn’t Missionaries Impossible.”
“What if I get you a photo?”
“What if whatever.” Father Ford spoke like a machine gun, sharp little bursts. “You can get me all the pictures you want. We don’t have a Father Ricardo, and we don’t employ shady Catholic missionaries. Won’t do it. Never have. Never will.”
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