At the Sharpe End

by Ashton, Hugh

“Congratulations, I suppose you want me to say,” said Sharpe. “Do you get the fabulous coffee maker?”

  “To the victor belong the spoils, you mean? No, that’s all his to take back. It’s all very hush-hush, of course.” He was obviously bursting to tell Sharpe all about this piece of gossip, but Sharpe was damned if he was going to feed Jon his lines. He got up and moved away from the table.

  “Don’t worry, I’m glued to your every word,” he said ironically. “Just getting a little more tonic in here.”

  When he returned, Jon was still obviously determined to tell all. “It was Al Kowalski that did for Tim Barclay, you know.”

  “But Al Kowalski is dead, isn’t he?”

  “That’s exactly where the problem lay. You see, Ishihara had been relying on Al for all kinds of special services. You know, those little things, like turning over your flat, that only Al could do, and he wasn’t exactly too thrilled when Al’s head turned up in the service lift of the headquarters of one of the larger Japanese electronics makers. Household name, too. And it was a company that had pissed me off big-time a year or so back over a trade deal back in the States, so I had great fun giving the orders to put the head there once they’d pulled it out of the station coin locker.” He smiled unpleasantly.

  “There was nothing on the news about it, was there?”

  “Of course not, you great prannock. You don’t think that a major brand with half a dozen appliances in your living room is going to broadcast the fact that its headquarters security is so leaky that any bugger can sneak in and leave miscellaneous body parts around the place, do you?”

  “I see,” replied Sharpe.

  “And Ishihara put two and two together, knowing, because Barclay had told him, that you’d been round to see us, and he concluded that it was something to do with us not doing our job properly.” He took a pull at his beer. “And he’d had his knife into Tim for years. I think they were both trying to play the insider trading game on the stock market, and it was a falling out between thieves. So it gave him great pleasure to drop a word in the ears of the Japanese Financial Services Agency, who talked to the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who in turn held very delicate discussions with His Excellency the British Ambassador, with the happy result that Major Tim Barclay is now on his way home. Or rather, he will be in a few weeks. He’s going to be out of that little hidey-hole of his soon, anyway, and he’s just waiting out his time. ‘Indefinite compassionate leave’, they’re calling it. And in the meantime, yours truly has effectively taken over the shop. Impressed?”

  “Uh-huh,” replied Sharpe in as neutral a tone as he could manage.

  “So,” Jon went on. “I offered you a job with us earlier without really being able to make good on the offer. Now it really is possible for me to offer you a job. No questions asked by anyone else. Coming on board?”

  Sharpe shook his head. “No, thanks.”

  “Busy?” Jon asked. “Can I ask what’s taking up your time these days?”

  “Financial houses. The usual consultancy sort of thing.”

  “What about Katsuyama, then? Any idea where he might be? Or where the Katsuyama gadget’s hiding itself these days? His wife’s not talking to me as much as she used to.”

  “No and no, why should I?” Sharpe lied easily. Why on earth should Tomiko have anything to do with Jon, and where did she meet him in the first place? he asked himself.

  “Keep thinking about it. If you find out, you’ve got my number, and my door’s always open to you. Same goes if you change your mind about the job offer.”

  Something wasn’t ringing quite right in Sharpe’s ears. It wasn’t just the gin, which remained at a near-toxic level in his drink, despite his having replaced three large blocks of ice with the equivalent volume of tonic water.

  “You’re sure about all this?”

  Jon calmly took a drink of beer and stared at Sharpe impassively.

  “Well, I can’t say that you’ve exactly shaken my faith in human nature as regards Major Tim Barclay. But it seems slightly strange to me. I really can’t believe all that about Ishihara.”

  “It’s a weird business that we’re in.”

  “And I really don’t like the idea of you shopping him to the authorities. Sounds like you’re stirring up the shit just to get yourself promoted.”

  “We’re all trying to get ahead, aren’t we?” Sharpe heard the Estuary English sound of aggressive ambition, which worked on him like fingernails down a blackboard.

  “Speak for yourself. I don’t like what you’re up to, though. Look, it’s nothing personal,” he lied, “but I have to be getting back. Your bill, I believe.” He stalked out of the pub, ignoring Jon’s protests.

  Following a sudden impulse, Sharpe stopped at a mobile phone store on his way home and changed his phone for a new model, refusing the shop’s offer to transfer the old number. It was going to be a nuisance for all his existing contacts to deal with the new number, but at least he could block any further attempts by Jon to reach him that way. Maybe Jon was on the side of the angels, and Tim Barclay was indeed a crooked little wheeler-dealer, but from where he was, they appeared to be different faces of the same coin. He would ask Mieko if they could change the apartment’s phone number. Of course it wouldn’t stop Jon from calling round at the flat in person, but somehow Sharpe thought that even Jon, whose attitude towards criticism seemed to resemble that of a duck’s back to water, wouldn’t want to do that.

  -o-

  The next day, Kim showed up at the M&M Trading office. “Nice,” he commented, obviously impressed by Meema’s trading station and its three enormous computer screens, and amused by the kitchen that by now had found its way into the same room.

  “Do you have backups for the data feeds?” he asked.

  Sharpe was slightly taken aback by this unexpected question. Kim had seemed ignorant of the details of financial technology when the whole business had been explained to him earlier.

  “We do, but why do you ask?”

  “I just wanted to make sure. Since you mentioned this plan, I thought I should find out a little more about what it was all about and how it worked, since I’m trusting you to make money for me with it. It seems that one of the main things you must make sure of in this business is that you are always on line and in touch with the world. Am I right?”

  “Yes, you’re right, of course.” But Sharpe felt that it would be unusual for someone outside the business to seize on this as an important point.

  “How are things going?”

  Sharpe explained that they were still testing and verifying the system.

  “So when are you going to stop spending my money and start making some real money for me?” Kim sounded stern.

  “In a few days—” began Sharpe apologetically, but Kim slapped him on the back and chuckled.

  “My little joke,” he said. “I believe you’re still using the money I gave you, and in any case, I can see you’re working hard to get things finished. I’m sure you’ll be ready soon.”

  “A question for you, Mr Kim?” Sharpe asked, when they were alone in the room. The other nodded. “Where is Dr Katsuyama right now?”

  “Still in Hanoi. Why?”

  “It’s possible that we might need his expertise at some time in the future if his program goes wrong or doesn’t work quite the way we think it should.”

  “Unlikely, I would guess. Your friend Vishal seems competent enough to fix any problems like that. In any case, I am glad that he’s in Hanoi. I have the utmost respect for him and his work, but I don’t want him anywhere near my daughter for a while.”

  Sharpe remembered the bruises on Tomiko Katsuyama’s arm, and what Mieko had told him about her relationship with her father. Katsuyama’s flight to Hanoi made some more sense now. “Vishal is highly competent,” he agreed, “but he’s not in the same league as your son-in-law.”

  “Well, if you ever find yourself really in need of him, let me know. Maybe I can do something about
it.” Kim took his leave of M&M Trading, making polite farewells to everyone, and inviting them all round to his club whenever they felt like visiting. “As my guests, of course,” he added. “But don’t expect the elevator to be fixed any time soon. We keep it that way to discourage anyone from just dropping in.”

  -o-

  This was the day that the market data feeds were to be turned on, and Vishal was on the telephone to three vendors at once as soon as Kim left. After about ten minutes of excited conversation, he turned to Sharpe.

  “We are being almost ready to go.” He launched a couple of programs on his own workstation, and watched excitedly as numbers flashed in front of his eyes. They meant little or nothing to Sharpe, except that something was happening, but Vishal seemed excited and satisfied.

  “Time to fire up Katsuyama’s gadget,” he remarked to Sharpe, who went through the business of starting it, connected to the real-time data feeds for the first time.

  “OK, Meema, select three currency pairs based on the New York prices,” said Sharpe.

  She selected the three pairs covering the euro, dollar and yen, and the four partners of M&M Trading watched the lines of the prices predicted three minutes in the future creep across the screen, followed three minutes later by the actual prices, which tracked the predictions with almost perfect fidelity.

  Meema burst into helpless giggles, and threw her arms around each of them in turn, kissing them, but without the passion that had marked her earlier move on Sharpe. It was still unlike Meema, Sharpe thought – usually she was physically undemonstrative, even towards Vishal, in public at least. “I can do it!” she exclaimed. “I know exactly how to do it! I want to start right now!”

  “Not now, Meema,” warned Sharpe. “Let’s do a little more checking with the play money. Start on the real thing in a few days, or even the next week.”

  She pouted slightly, but Vishal backed Sharpe up on this. Somewhat sulkily, she agreed to do as they said, and continued to scan the screens. After ten minutes she reported, “It’s working well, I’m making millions, this is magic – hey!”

  “What is it, Meema?”

  “Look at that! Something strange is going on, and it’s not working our way.” She checked the news ticker on another screen. “Oh, the spot price of Middle Eastern crude oil’s just changed. That must be what’s doing it.”

  And indeed, the Katsuyama prediction no longer seemed to correspond so closely to the trace of the real rate.

  “If that had been real money, Meema,” Sharpe asked her, “How much money would we have lost just then?”

  “Not a lot,” she admitted. “I was going to place a buy ten seconds before the news came through. If I’d done that, we’d have been in a bit of trouble.”

  “You are wanting me to applaud?” asked Vishal, a little sarcastically.

  “No,” shot back Meema. “Just be thankful that I have some common sense when it comes to these things.”

  “Whatever,” said Sharpe. “I think we have to look at this whole thing for another day or so, Meema, before we start putting real money into there.”

  Both Vishal and Meema nodded in agreement. “It’s slightly different in real time,” said Meema. “I can feel the pressure in a way that I couldn’t when it was just a simulation. Look.” She held out both hands in front of her. They were trembling slightly.

  “But even now you are not playing with real money,” Vishal pointed out. “If your nerves are shaking like this now, what are they going to be like when the real thing is arriving?”

  Meema considered. “I’ll manage,” she said. “If things get too tough, I’ll just log off the system and cook a korma or a dopiaza or something to calm myself down.”

  -o-

  Privately, Sharpe was worried about his role in all of this. Although Meema had spent some time telling the rest of them about her tactics and strategies, she was so far in advance of them in the matter of trading that it was difficult to see how anyone could ever follow even the basics of what she had been doing. In the same way, Vishal was so far ahead of everyone else in the computer and IT aspects of the firm that he had made himself irreplaceable, and Mieko had such a firm grasp of the legal issues and the administrative work of the firm that it was difficult to see how the firm could survive without her. Truth to tell, Sharpe admitted to himself, he was the fifth wheel on the wagon (or to be more accurate, a fourth wheel on a tricycle). He said as much to Mieko one night as they were going home.

  “That’s not true,” she corrected him. “You’re the only person who understands what everyone else is doing, even if you’re not at the same level as the rest of us in our specialist areas. Vishal hasn’t a clue what I’m up to, I don’t know what he’s doing at all with all his computers and cables, and Meema’s lost the rest of us in her hedging and short-selling and options. You may not understand it all perfectly, but you know enough to be useful, at least.”

  It was faint praise, but it made him feel better.

  “And there’s another thing,” she added. “Haven’t you noticed that when there’s a decision to be made, we’re all waiting for you to say yes or no before we go ahead? You’re the leader. So let’s have no more of this ‘I’m useless’ rubbish. Time to come to bed.” And that, thought Sharpe, was that.

  -oOo-

  Chapter 10: Tokyo

  The big day had arrived. Sharpe and Mieko, Vishal and Meema had all contributed something to the initial holdings that were to be invested, and had agreed that the start of the week made a good time to start the trading process.

  Meema had explained the concept of extended leverage to them, whereby they could trade many times the value of their actual assets, but Vishal had tried to veto the idea of this.

  “We’re going to be certain winners,” he had pointed out. “Why be greedy and draw attention to ourselves by making stupidly large deals?” Sharpe had agreed in theory, but pointed out that the market typically expected leveraged trading. Meema had wanted to play with different trading strategies using leverage, and Mieko, who, in common with most Japanese, seemed to dislike the idea of debt on principle, agreed with Vishal’s views. In the end, they all arrived at a compromise whereby they agreed to use only moderate amounts of leverage for the trading, and that if Meema felt the need to risk large amounts of borrowed money, she was to consult the others.

  On the day, Meema claimed that she was nervous, and didn’t want anyone to be watching her when she made her first real trades on the system. All the same, Mieko, Sharpe and Vishal all found an excuse to wander separately into her trading room before she started, and make encouraging noises in her direction, accompanied by (at least in Mieko’s case) a hug and a kiss.

  The three non-traders then proceeded to invade Meema’s trading room en masse, much to her visible annoyance. She shooed them all out, and after making fussy and unnecessary last-minute adjustments to Meema’s computer, chair and desk, they tiptoed out of the room, and left her alone, closing the door softly behind them.

  “I feel it’s like looking after a racehorse before a race, or a ballerina or a concert pianist or something before a performance,” said Sharpe.

  “Or like a tightrope walker in a circus,” said Mieko.

  “Of course in the brokerages, it’s usually only one or two traders who carry the whole floor. The rest of them just do as well as they would by sticking pins into a board blindfolded,” remarked Sharpe.

  “Or even a damn’ sight worse,” commented Vishal dryly. “Meema’s got no-one else on the floor or at the next desk to cover for her if things go wrong. It’s no wonder she’s feeling the pressure.”

  “I’m making tea,” said Mieko. “Will you two get away from that door? I’m sure Meema knows you’re there and it’s making her nervous.” Obediently, the two men moved away from the door where they had been trying to listen surreptitiously to the goings-on within the room, and made their way sheepishly into the small kitchen area where Mieko was boiling water.

  “Too
bloody hot,” complained Sharpe, taking a sip of his tea, and burning his tongue.

  “Well, make your own bloody tea, then!” Mieko screamed at him. “I’m going out,” and flounced out of the room, shutting the door behind her with a bang.

  Sharpe lifted his eyebrows. “What the hell did I say?” he asked Vishal, who only shrugged his shoulders in response. They drank their tea in near-silence, trying not to notice any noises coming from the other rooms, and studiously avoiding each other’s eyes.

  After half an hour of eternity, Meema opened the door, seemingly exhausted, but grinning widely.

  “I’ve done it!” she exclaimed proudly. “I hardly needed to use any leverage on it at all. Almost all of it was done with our own money.”

  “How much?” asked Sharpe.

  “Five hundred thousand US dollars. Plus change. Pure profit.” She threw her arms around Vishal and kissed him with real passion, kissed Sharpe with somewhat less passion (he was relieved to notice), and looked around. “Where’s Mieko?” she asked.

  “Here,” came Mieko’s voice from behind her. “You’re right,” she said to Sharpe. “The tea was too hot.” One of the reasons why Sharpe and she always seemed to get on so well was because even though both of them tended to flare up for no good reason, neither of them seemed able to bear a grudge for very long.

  Meema threw her arms around Mieko and kissed her.

  “Vishal, I think your sister’s going to get better,” said Sharpe to Vishal, shaking his hand.

  “I hope so, man,” replied Vishal. There were tears in his eyes. “Thank you, Meema.” He put his arms round her.

  “And thank you too, Kenneth,” said Meema. “You didn’t have to include us in this business, you know.”

  “That’s true,” said Vishal. “Thank you, Kenneth-san.” Sharpe looked down at his shoes, unable to reply.

  “How easy was it for you to do that?” Mieko asked, obviously in awe of the unbelievable amount of money that had been made so fast.

  “The actual trading was easy. Katsuyama’s predictions were spot-on, every time. What’s difficult is keeping cool. I wanted to take off my clothes and run around the room screaming every time I made a successful trade. I think I understand those lunatic traders a little better, now that I’ve done it myself.”