desk while I was in Brazil. I also mentioned Eduardo's insistence that I tell him and only him if I received any more messages for Beldecos.
Isabel listened closely to every word.
"So what do you think?" I asked her when I had finished.
"I don't know what to think."
"Well, is something going on?"
"From what you've said, yes, there must be. But I still can't believe Ricardo is involved. It's not like him."
"Francisco Aragao is his brother-in-law."
"That's true. But Ricardo goes to great lengths not to deal with him. It's a policy I have no trouble with. Francisco has a bad reputation in Brazil. My father told me he's rumored to be dealing with the narco-traffickers. Dekker has always steered well clear of him."
"In public, yes. But couldn't Ricardo have set up an account at Dekker Trust in secret?"
Isabel looked doubtful. "It would certainly be possible for him to do that easily enough. But I still don't believe he would. It would be against the way he does business. I know it soimds ridiculous, but Ricardo has his own set of rules, and he never breaks them."
"What about Eduardo?"
Isabel thought for a moment. "That's more likely. Eduardo doesn't believe in any rules."
"And he's responsible for Dekker Trust, isn't he?"
"True. It would be easy for him to set something up. There's just one thing not quite right with that, though."
"What's that?"
"He and Luciana don't get along at all."
"Hm," I said." But this could be a strictly business arrangement. I can imagine Eduardo getting over his dislike of someone for money."
''Maybe/' said Isabel. "But he'd know his brother wouldn't approve."
"If he ever found out." Our beers were empty. "Another?" I asked.
Isabel nodded distractedly. She was deep in thought over what I had said.
I procured two more Budvars from the bar and returned. "So what should I do?" I asked as I took my seat. "I haven't told Eduardo. Jamie says I should just forget the whole thing."
"Difficult," said Isabel. "I think Jamie's right that you shouldn't tell Eduardo. There's too big a chance he's involved, and then you might get yourself into a dangerous situation."
"You mean if he knew I suspected him of money laimdering?" I was concerned I had got myself into that position already.
"Yes. But I think I would speak to Ricardo."
"Wouldn't he just tell his brother?" I protested.
"He might. But I'd trust him on this. I don't think he's involved, and I think he'd want to know."
Trust Ricardo? I wasn't quite ready to do that.
"What about going to the authorities?" I suggested.
Isabel inhaled through her teeth. "Now, that's something Ricardo would never forgive. If you spoke to them without speaking to him first, he'd feel betrayed. And he'd be right. No, I think you should talk to him."
"Hm."
"What will you do?" Isabel asked.
"I'll think about it," I said. And I would. But I was pretty sure now that the wisest thing would be to keep quiet, at least for the time being.
My fears about Martin Beldecos's death and my own stabbing seemed more grounded. But I didn't want to discuss them with Isabel. She might think it all a bit
melodramatic, and while I could live with looking silly in front of Jamie, I didn't want to appear paranoid in front of her.
But I did want to ask her about the man whom I was increasingly thinking of as my predecessor.
"What was Martin Beldecos like?"
"He was nice enough," said Isabel. "He was quiet, almost shy. Very dedicated to his work."
"He was American, wasn't he?"
"That's right. From Miami. He had worked for one of the branches of the big U.S. banks there, which deal with Latin American private clients."
"And do you know what he actually did?"
"Not precisely. I think technically he was employed by Dekker Trust. He spent half his time here and half his time in the Caymans. He was working on some project for Eduardo, which he tried to keep confidential, but it obviously had something to do with Dekker Trust. He asked us all about clients of ours who had accounts there." Isabel paused. "It's terrible what happened to him. He was only thirty."
"Any family?" I asked.
"Parents. And a brother and a sister, I think. They're all in Miami. He wasn't married or anything." She looked at me sharply. "And the same thing nearly happened to you."
1 nodded. Now she knew what I was thinking.
13
"I've left the School of Russian Studies."
A piece of overdone pork hovered on my fork. I shoved it in my mouth and chewed. And chewed. My mother was not a good cook.
"Really, dear?" she said, raising her eyebrows.
"Good God! When was this?" thundered my father.
"About a month ago."
The obvious question for most families would have been "why didn't you tell us sooner?" But not in our family. I had long since stopped discussing anything important with them, and they had stopped expecting it.
We were sitting in the small, square dining room in the flint cottage that my parents had bought in Norfolk after my father had retired. Even though it was the end of April, it was cold. When the wind came from the north or east, it was always cold; there wasn't much between the cottage and the North Pole. Both my mother and I were wearing thick jerseys, and my father an old sports jacket.
I had inserted this remark into a pause in the conversation. Although it wasn't really a conversation, more a monologue as my father droned through his staple top-
ics: Europe, old friends from the City, Lady Thatcher (always with the ''Lady''), and cricket. The subjects hadn't changed nnuch since my youth, although he had substituted Europe for the unions as his principal object of hatred. He would eat and talk at the same time, his large florid face bulging as he chewed. These conversations required no participation at all from my mother and me. I sometimes wondered whether they occurred when there was just the two of them. I concluded something much more depressing. Days, months, years of meals eaten in silence.
"So, what are you going to do?" my father demanded.
This was the bit I wasn't looking forward to. I finally managed to swallow the lump of pork, and felt it force its way painfully down my throat.
"I'm going to work for a company called Dekker Ward," I said.
"Dekker Ward! Not the stockbroker?" My father put down his fork and broke into a huge grin. "Well done, my boy! Well done!" And then, much to my embarrassment, he leaned over and shook my hand.
"Know them well. Old Lord Kerton was a pal of mine. Must be near retirement age by now. They specialized in Plantations, I think. Now, there was plenty of money to be made there if you could get the timing right. Oh, yes. Plenty of money."
"I think the old Lord Kerton died. Father." He liked to be called Father. "It's his son, Andrew, who's chairman now."
My father tucked into his burnt pig with renewed gusto. I had made his day. "Don't remember a son. Probably still at school when I knew him. Sorry to hear about old Gerald, though." He took a gulp of the tap water in the glass in front of him. "Well, old man! Whatever made you finally do it?"
"Money, Father. I needed the money."
"Well, you should make plenty of that. The City's rolling in it these days. A smart young man like you will make a fortune. Let me get a bottle of wine. We need to celebrate."
My mother had been watching me all this time, wearing a slight frown. "Why?" she mouthed.
"I'm broke," I mouthed back. She nodded. She understood that. When we had lived in Surrey, we had lurched from having plenty of money to having very little. For a while I had thought it was my fault. I had gone to a local grammar school that had become independent. I had enjoyed it. The teachers were excellent, the rugby team won more than it lost, I made some good, like-minded friends, and it got me into Oxford. But somehow I was made to feel guilty t
hat I was there. It had to do with the fees. The termly demands for payment were met by frowns and barbed comments from my father. I was never quite sure why; he was a stockbroker, like many of the other boys' fathers, fees should not have been a problem. I'm pretty sure now that my father's distress was a result of inept stock market speculation, but at the time he left me in no doubt that the family's money worries were because of me.
He returned with a bottle of Argentine red. Very appropriate. He prattled on, talking a lot about the old colonial stocks in which Dekker Ward used to ply their trade.
After several minutes I decided to correct him mildly. "Actually, Father, they concentrate a lot on Latin America now. And they're thinking of doing business in Russia. That's why they want me."
"Oh, I see. Jolly good."
My father talked on, about the deals he'd done, the people he knew, and he trotted out some aphorisms
such as "Sell in May and go away/' and "Never trust a man whose tie is lighter than the color of his shirt." I studied the surface of the dining table, where the imprint of my school homework could still just be picked out. "Oct 197" and " = 5x + 3" were the most prominent
marks.
After coffee, I asked my mother if I could look at her latest paintings. She smiled and led me to her studio. We left my father behind with the washing up.
The studio was a large room that took up half the length of the cottage. It had big window^s that provided plenty of natural light. But to walk in there was like walking into a hurricane.
Five years ago her pictures had been open landscapes of the Norfolk shoreline, in an Impressionist style. Since then they had become steadily darker, wilder, swirls of cloud enveloping lonely figures on beaches that never ended. Individually they were highly unsettling. When surrounded by dozens of them at once the effect was dowiuight frightening. The nearest thing I had felt to it was walking through the Edvard Munch exhibition at the National Gallery several years before.
My mother's painting worried me. It was probably brilliant, but it had taken over her life.
"Have you tried any more galleries. Mum?" I asked.
"I've told you, dear, none of the galleries around here will touch them."
"How about London?"
"Oh, don't be ridiculous. They wouldn't be interested in this."
I wasn't so sure. I suspected that someone somewhere would jump at her work. But these pictures were for herself, not other people.
We were looking at a particularly haimting painting
of the blackened shell of a wreck being slowly sucked down into the sand flats off Brancaster beach.
"I'm sorry you're giving up Russian literature, Nick," she said.
"I'm not. I'll still read. And once I've made some money, I'm sure I'll go back to it in some form."
"Hmm. Just promise me one thing."
"What's that?"
"Don't marry a banker."
I couldn't answer. The sadness of it wrenched my gut. I glanced at her profile. She had a broad, intelligent face, beneath thick hair only now beginning to go gray. She was still attractive; she'd been striking in the wedding photograph that had been in the sitting room for as long as I could remember. They must have been in love when they married, although I could only remember sniping in my childhood that changed to major rows in adolescence. Since I had left home, this had lapsed into silence.
My father gave me a lift to King's Lynn station. Just as I was getting out of the car, he called after me, "Oh, Nick?"
"Yes?"
"If you hear any good tips, don't forget to let your old man know, eh?"
He winked.
I smiled quickly and slammed the car door shut. It was with a huge sense of relief that I felt the train lurch away from the platform.
As the fens dashed past the grimy train windows, I thought of the City as my father saw it. Limch, drink, talk, helping out old pals, getting on to a good thing. It was a long way from the efficient activity of the Dekker machine, high up in its gleaming tower, whisking billions around the world. But there were some shared as-
sumptions. In both the deal was all. You helped out your friends and screwed your enemies to get the best deal. And then you felt clever about it.
A heavy shower scurried across the fen, splattering the train window with angry raindrops. I slumped back into my seat, not feeling very clever at all.
14
It was a slow cycle into work on Monday. The weather was still foul, and my heart wasn't in it. By the time I made it up to the fortieth floor, still dripping, the meeting was already well under way.
As if on a signal from my arrival, Ricardo cleared his throat. "I'm sure you all read the article in last week's IFR," he began. "The contents of the article itself doesn't concern me. It was obviously rubbish, and a gross insult to Martin and his family. What does concern me was that one of us spoke to a journalist, and gave him information that was highly detrimental to the firm. This person has been fired."
There was a murmur from the gathering. Everyone looked around at everyone else to see who was missing. Quickly, the murmurs took shape. Dave. Dave! Why had he done it? What had he said?
"This person will not only not work for Dekker again, but he will also not work in the bond markets," Ricardo continued in a clear voice. "He has breached the confidentiality agreement you all signed as part of your contract when you joined Dekker Ward. As a result he has lost all of his interest in the employee trusts. He has been warned not to talk to the press any further.
THE MARKET MAKER 153 i
The market will be told that he made large trading losses and that he covered them up. I expect all of you j to back this up if asked/'
We were all silent. Dave was a popular member of the team. The mood of the room felt finely balanced be- '. tween sadness at his dismissal and shock that he had betrayed the rest of us. j
''Some of you may think this treatment is harsh. But j we're all a team here. If you're not with us, you're against us. There are many people out there who don't I like Dekker and what it has achieved. Together we can win. But if any one of us betrays the others, as this man : has, then we're all vulnerable. I will not allow that to happen."
Ricardo glanced around the room. His eyes, which were usually so cool, were angry now. But even his anger drew us in. We were all angry. |
As the meeting broke up, we exchanged glances. ' Many eyes rested on the empty desk where Dave had worked. Alberto, the sixty-year-old "coffee boy," was * putting his belongings into a couple of boxes. Under I Ricardo's stem gaze, we returned to our desks and picked up phones, but over the course of the morning i the room buzzed with speculation.
And so did the outside world. Word had already ] gone around the market that Dave was one of that most i dangerous of animals, a trader who not orUy made losses but lied about them. The rumor echoed back into the Dekker trading room, where to my surprise, it was confirmed. Even Jamie told Chris Frewer it was true.
"Why did you do that?" I asked him, shocked, j "Couldn't you just say you don't know why he left? " ;
Jamie sighed. "In these situations you have to follow the party line. Ricardo will be watching. This is a test of ;
loyalty for all of us. And he's right. We'll only succeed if we stick together."
I listened in mounting disgust to what was happening around me. The initial shock and sadness at the loss of a friend was already changing, as Dave's character was rewritten. Just as the Dekker machine could persuade itself that a lousy bond issue was the investment opportunity of the year, so they came to believe that Dave was an incompetent fraud. They did it with determination and purpose, and without looking each other in the eye.
I watched stunned. I had no idea whether Dave was a good or bad trader, but I knew that he was not what these people were portraying.
The man leaning against the bar, lifting his second pint of bitter to his lips seemed very different from the boy I had known at Oxford. First he was a man. He had a grown-up suit a
nd briefcase, but then so had Jamie and I, and that didn't mean anything. But he also had a receding hairline poorly hidden with wisps of blond hair, a wife and baby, and a way of talking that made him sound closer to forty than twenty.
Stephen Troughton had studied PPE with us. He had always been precocious, capable of discussing knowl-edgeably mortgage rates, house prices, and unit trusts, when the rest of us would have nothing to do with such bourgeois concerns. He had talked his way into the City with no difficulty, and had been one of the lucky few that Bloomfield Weiss had plucked from British universities. He had taken to Bloomfield Weiss like a duck to water, and had done very well. Even though he was the same age as Jamie and me, he looked thirty-five at least, and used this to his advantage. Stephen Troughton had gone far.
Jamie saw him once or twice a year for a drink, to "catch up/' I had tagged along this time, even though I hadn't seen Stephen since Oxford. We were in an old pub in a mews in Knightsbridge.
I was beginning to realize that "catching up" meant comparing careers. I watched them at it.
"Did you hear about that big Brady trade we did last week?" asked Jamie at the first opportunity.
Stephen laughed. "Oh, that, yes. We were just dipping our toe in the water."
"Got a bit wet, didn't you?"
"A little, but we can take it. We're the biggest trading house in the world. That kind of loss just gets hidden in one day's profits."
"Oh, yeah?"
"Oh, yes," said Stephen. He lowered his voice, as though he were about to impart something of great importance. "You'd better watch yourselves, Jamie. Bloom-field Weiss is serious about the emerging markets. And when we get serious about a market we tend to make our nnark. Don't get me wrong, Dekker is a clever little firm, but when a market matures, then it's only natural that the big boys will take over."
Stephen said this in a tone full of fake reasonableness designed to irritate Jamie. It succeeded. He rose to the bait. "And there's that big Mexican mandate that you lost," he said. "That must have been a bit of a blow."
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