One Trillion Dollars

by Andreas Eschbach

  John crossed his arms. “Famine, I would say.”

  “That, or genetic engineering.”

  “Genetic engineering?” He blinked confused. “You always said that was of no interest to us.”

  “It is since last Friday. Since then it is the most interesting area of all.” McCaine grinned maliciously. “In genetic engineering you can create plant varieties which are much more productive and at the same time more resistant to disease, pests, and other negative environmental influences than any normal breeding could produce.” He raised a finger. “And above all, you can patent the particular genetic code. This means that no one but us can produce that plant, and no one can afford not to buy our seeds because the production pressure makes them so desirable. Doesn’t that sound like a favorable position for us?”

  John nodded. “More than that.”

  “It gets even better. The market for seeds is already controlled by a few producers…”

  “Which we will buy,” John said, grinning.

  “Of course, but the interesting thing is that today’s method of cultivation brings forth strains that are hybrid — sterile crossings of closely related species. To put it simply, the business is to sell seeds that produce great grain or vegetables, which in turn cannot produce seeds.”

  “That means you cannot go independent by producing your own seeds, but are forced to buy new seeds from us for each new crop.” John was impressed.

  “A property that you can put into genetically engineered seeds,” McCaine nodded. “And this means total control — if we get it right.”

  John fell into his chair, locked his fingers together behind his head and looked at McCaine, obviously impressed. “That’s ingenious. Governments will have to do as we say for fear of not getting seeds from us.”

  “Although we will never threaten them openly with this.”

  “Of course not. When do we start?”

  “I already have. Unfortunately, the stock prices of the genetic engineering companies are exorbitant. We will be forced to get rid of a few companies. And we will have to be prepared to arouse ill feelings. That means we should keep all our media companies to help dampen this some.”

  “Ill feelings? Who can argue against us creating better seeds?”

  “Genetic engineers are scarce, and many work for medical research. We will have to stop a few projects to get the required people.” McCaine rubbed his nose. “I’m considering stopping AIDS research.”

  Ursula looked at John form across the opulently decked table. He returned from London clearly excited. Had mentioned something about an ingenious plan that would help fulfill the prophecy and seemed as euphoric as someone on drugs.

  “Do you even like living here?” she asked him as the excitement in their conversation leveled off some and no waiters were present.

  He was working on his dessert. “Why? The place is great, isn’t it? Like a fairy tale.”

  “Like a fairy tale, right. I took a look around here today.”

  “Don’t tell me that one day was enough. I’m disappointed.”

  She sighed. “Have you looked at it yet? Have you seen every room?”

  “Have I seen every room?” He looked up and shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know.”

  “John, I found rooms where the doorknobs had dust on them. There are dozens of rooms that have nothing in them, they are totally empty.”

  He did not get it. She felt like shaking him. “Dust on the door knobs?” he said and looked confused. “That’s dreadful What do I pay all these people for?”

  “You pay them to keep a castle that is far too large for you,” Ursula said grimly.

  John licked his spoon pleasurably. “Do you know where I really liked it?” he asked as he gestured with it. “In my house in Portecéto. We should really go there one day. It is so beautiful there — it’s in the south — Italy. And it’s not too big … just right.”

  “Then why don’t you live there if you like it so much?”

  He looked at her like she was a dummy. “Because this is where the headquarters are. And because, if you want to know exactly, the Italian house is not up to my standards.”

  “Not up to your standards? I understand. And who determines what is or is not up to your standards?”

  John lifted his glass and looked at the golden-yellow wine in it. “Look, I’m the wealthiest man in the world. People have to see that. It is psychologically important to impress people.”

  “Why is that important? By now every schoolchild knows you are the world’s richest man. There’s no need to prove it. And besides, who sees you here? The nearest road is three kilometers away.”

  He looked at her patiently. “The prime minister was here, for example. Not Blair, but the other one, Major. He was impressed, believe me. And that was important.” He sighed. “This is all McCaine’s plan. I had to get used to it too at first. Hey, I’m a shoemaker’s son from New Jersey. Do you think I grew up with a silver spoon in my mouth?”

  She had to laugh when she saw the funny face he made. And maybe, she thought, she was looking at things far too grimly. She thought about her own childhood in East Germany and how they had talked at table about getting hold of something and who could get it and how. They lacked many things back then and it had been important to improvise. After the borders were opened their life improved steadily, but to be thrown into a world with abundance was at times a bit overwhelming for them all.

  McCaine and John indulged themselves by going down to the cafeteria only when they were hosting guests. But otherwise they had gone back to their habit of having their food served in the conference room.

  “Did you know that money really doesn’t grow on its own?” John asked as they ate.

  McCaine looked at him while he chewed. “How do you mean?”

  “People always say, ‘Put your money in the bank to earn interest.’ But when you do that the interest is really from other people who had to work for it.” In broad terms John outlined what he had learnt on Panglawan, without going into details or telling him about the shock he had felt at this discovery — it was just too embarrassing that these relationships had never been clear to him. To John it was as if he had still believed in Santa Claus and just recently discovered that the gifts were really from his parents.

  “Correct,” McCaine agreed. “To invest money is to lend out money. And he who borrows it must know how to pay the interest for it.”

  “And why do we keep telling people that then? I took a look at a brochure for our bank. It says the same crap: ‘Let your money work for you.’”

  “We tell them that because people believe in fairy tales. And as long as they believe in them they won’t ask for the truth. Simple. Money, in reality, is nothing but a means to settle two things that are important for the coexistence of people. First, who must do what, and second, who gets what. When two people interact with one another, it is always about how you get the other person to do what you want him to do. What you want from the other person is very primitive: give it to me! Give me a piece of your spoils. Give me sex. Give me a part of what you have. That’s how people are, and because money is our invention it mirrors our nature. And what else?” McCaine made a wide gesture with the fork. “But all this sounds very ugly, you have to admit. Believe me, people much prefer fairy tales.”

  Gradually, Ursula started to recognize a few of the household personnel. The name of the waiter who set the breakfast table was Lance. He had pale and sickly looking skin and chewed his fingernails. He talked little, in fact hardly spoke at all. Francesca was one of the chambermaids in their wing. She was a young woman who barely dared to look into her eyes and always seemed sad, but she did her job well. And the chauffeur with the hairy hands who took her into town to shop whenever she wanted was Innis. When she was in the car with him it was a good idea either to talk to him or raise the partition because otherwise he would whistle horribly.

  John had given her a gold credit card with her name on it. It
had a credit limit that would last most people for a lifetime, never mind a month. But Ursula used it as sparingly as she could. For the most part she just window-shopped, watched the people, looked at all the things she could have bought, and tried to forget the presence of the two broad-shouldered men that followed her every step she took, at a respectable distance, of course. Once, a drunkard came at her and acted rude in a dialect she could barely understand, except that he wanted money from her. As if from nowhere the two bodyguards appeared, one on the left and the other on the right, and — well — they “removed” the nuisance quickly and effectively. After this incident she was so deep in thought that she could not concentrate on the perfumes, dresses, and jewelry, and so she just went home.

  During one of those shopping sprees, she was looking through one of the largest bookstores in town and found a large illustrated book about the Middle Ages. It had a nice image of Jakob Fugger the Rich by Albrecht Dürer. She bought the book and cut out the picture of the man dressed simply in black with a stern, alert expression on his face. She took it to a shop to have it framed and later hung it up in their bedroom in plain sight.

  “Are you starting a gallery of my ancestors?” John asked her.

  Ursula shook her head. “It’s just as a reminder.”

  “A reminder? of what? Jakob?”

  “That he was a lifelong manipulator dedicated to getting others to do what he wanted.”

  John stared at her and there was a spark of anger when he understood. “Curious way to spoil a nice evening,” he murmured and turned away.

  John had a large number of files brought to him from bookkeeping and studied them thoroughly. He worked out what was linked to what and didn’t think twice about ordering the man in charge to come see him and give him a few explanations about what was going on. When he was alone he pulled out the economics books that he kept under lock and key in his desk, and only when something was impossible for him to understand would he go to McCaine to get answers.

  The first time he simply busted into McCaine’s office with the question: “Since when do we own stocks of arms manufacturers?”

  “What?” Grumpily, McCaine looked up from his work. “Oh, that. That’s nothing of significance. Parked money, nothing more.”

  John waved the paper around. “Those are billions. It’s a manufacturer of small-arms ammunition, anti-tank ammo and all sorts of explosives.”

  “We know of an impending large-scale order form one of the Arabian countries. We will take the profits on those stocks.” McCaine lifted his hands as if he wanted to surrender. “We’ll do all that through a front-man and then put the profits into genetic engineering stocks. We have to move carefully, otherwise we’ll drive the prices up unnecessarily.”

  John blinked, confused, barely able to discern the connections. “Oh,” he said and as he saw that McCaine was concentrating on his paperwork again, he left the office.

  But the next day he once again found something that confused him and approached McCaine with it.

  “Do you have a moment?” he asked kindly.

  McCaine was sitting at his computer monitor, staring at an ocean of numbers. He obviously had trouble tearing his eyes away from them. “Discovered something else?” he asked tersely, his mind elsewhere.

  “Yes, you could say that.” John looked down at the paper he was holding. “According to this statement, we paid over three hundred million pounds to a company called Callum Consulting just last year alone.” John looked up in confusion. “What the hell sort of company is that?”

  “A consulting firm,” McCaine said reluctantly. “The name says it all.”

  “A consulting company?” John echoed. “Why do we need that? At that price? That is … that is almost a billion dollars!?”

  McCaine sighed loudly. He turned away from the monitor and got up. It was a quick and threatening kind of motion, like a boxer coming out of his corner for the first round. “These people did good work for us. They are all over the world and are the best you can get for money. And they are exactly the sort of people that I need for our plan, because it’s starting to get to be too much for me. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, but please, Malcolm! One billion dollars for consulting fees? That’s crazy!”

  McCaine stood there, looking like a boxer in a bad mood. “John,” he said slowly, his lower jaw jutted out, “I think it is time for me to get something straight here. My day has twenty-four hours, and I can only be in one place at any particular time. I work day and night, while you, if I dare say so, cruise the southern seas, screw the most beautiful women in the world and play cops and robbers with your bodyguards, which, by the way, is something I will ask you never to do again. You have no idea what danger you exposed yourself and our whole plan to. I won’t complain about anything else. It was my idea, and since you’re the heir you enjoy certain privileges that I don’t want to argue with. But, the world empire we want to create does not come into being with cruises and sex orgies. Someone had to do the work, someone who is capable of doing it. The people from Callum Consulting can do it. They are my eyes and ears, my hands and mouths, all over the world. They do what is necessary and work as hard as is necessary. We may pay them a large sum of money, yes, but they are worth every penny.”

  John stared holes into the paper he was holding and was sure his ears went as red as tomatoes. His pulse was racing. He hadn’t had a tongue-lashing like this since he was in school. “It’s okay already,” he mumbled. “It was only a question. I only want to understand …” he stopped and looked up. “If they are so good wouldn’t it better to buy them?”

  McCaine dropped his shoulders and even smiled. “Certain companies can’t be bought, John, not even by us.”

  “Really?” John wondered.

  “Besides, I made good use of the time you were together with Miss DeBeers, distracting attention away from me. What you see here is just the tip of the iceberg. There would be no point in buying the company. You don’t buy a whole cow when you only want a glass of milk.”

  “Hmm,” John said, still unsure. “Well, it was only a question.”

  “Ask away, but only if you can accept the answers.”

  John did not know how to respond to that so he simply nodded and left. He stopped by the door on his way out, turned around, and said: “By the way, I didn’t fuck DeBeers.”

  McCaine looked at John disparagingly. “I don’t know what to say to that.”

  He was on his knee in front of Ursula when she said, “I can’t do that, John, I can’t marry you.”

  He looked at her and felt like he had just been hit by a twenty-two thousand pound sandbag. “What?” he croaked.

  Her eyes glistened from the tears that formed. “I can’t, John.”

  “But … why not?” He had made such an effort, really. He had arranged for a special dinner, chosen the menu, and hired a string quartet dressed in historic costumes to play romantic music. Everything leading up to this moment was to be perfect. And he had chosen a ring. He had a whole bouquet of roses — he’d personally picked out the most beautiful ones. Now, he understood nothing any more. “Don’t you love me?”

  “Yes, of course, and that’s what makes it so difficult,” she told him. “Come on, get back up.”

  He stayed on his knee. “Don’t you like the ring?” he asked stupidly.

  “Nonsense, the ring is gorgeous.”

  “Then tell me why not.”

  She shoved her chair away and sat down on the floor beside him. They sat on the rug beside the table and cried together.

  “I love you John. Since the first time I touched you it was as if I’ve always known you. As if your heart and my heart were beating together as one, as if I had lost you and found you again. But,” she said with a cracking voice, “the thought of marrying you makes me queasy.”

  He looked at her with a confused expression. He wanted to run away and at the same time wanted her to never let him go. “But why?”

  “Because
, if I marry you then I would also have to say yes to the life that you live. I would have to share it, and that is something I dread, John, really.”

  “You dread being rich?”

  “I dread living a life that is neither yours nor mine. I spent days wandering through this palace, and I saw nothing that is you, nowhere. You’re here, yet nothing seems to have anything to do with you. Your personnel live here but you are only a guest.”

  He felt his throat tighten. His world was cracking and within those cracks lurked a bottomless abyss. “Do you want to live somewhere else?” he asked with a numb tongue; deep down inside he knew there was nothing to be saved, that it was all falling apart. “I don’t mind buying a … house in the city or out in the countryside … wherever you want …”

  “It’s not that, John. I want to share your life with you, but you have no life to share. You let a man who has been dead for five hundred years determine the meaning of your life. Your chief executive tells you where and how you should live. You even let an interior designer talk you into having a show bedroom, my God!”

  “All that’s going to change,” he said. His own voice sounded weak and helpless. “It will change, I swear it.”

  “Don’t swear anything, John,” she said with a sad voice.

  He looked up and glanced around the room. They were alone. The musicians must have snuck out without him noticing it. The waiters had withdrawn tactfully. The dining room was empty, bleak, dead. “What will you do now?” he asked her.

  She said nothing. He looked up at her, saw the look on her face and knew.

  McCaine stared at him for a while without saying a word. He only nodded every once in a while and seemed to be thinking what he could say and do. “I’m very sorry for you, John,” he finally said. “She really gave me the impression that she was the right woman for you. At least as far as I can be the judge of that, of course. I’m not exactly an expert in matters of love.”