Bloodmoney

20

The trading room at Alphabet Capital was a hedgerow of computer screens, two and sometimes three to a desk. It wasn’t a tidy office. Nobody on the floor wore a tie, one man was dressed in shorts and sandals, and several of the men had ponytails longer than Sophie Marx’s. It didn’t matter what you looked like, evidently, so long as you made money. There were a lot of Asian faces on the trading floor, many Indians and some Pakistanis, it appeared. That was a worry now.

Marx arrived at nine-thirty dressed in a blue suit and a white blouse, much too sensible an outfit for the trading floor. Perkins’s secretary, whose name was Mona, walked her over to see the director of Human Resources. He found her a desk at the far end of the floor where the analysts sat. It had just one computer screen. The morning was spent in tutorials on the Bloomberg Terminal.

Perkins sent out a system-wide message in midmorning asking everyone to gather on the trading floor. He emerged from his office in shirtsleeves, head bowed. It was obvious to everyone that something bad had happened.

Perkins said he had just received a call from the U.S. consulate in Karachi. Howard Egan, their missing colleague, was dead. He had fallen during a trek in the mountains near Karachi, and the Pakistanis had finally discovered his body. He read the police statement. He said that Egan’s remains would be returned to the States, where the family would hold a memorial service. He was about to head back into his office, somber business done, but he stopped and turned toward the dozens of employees, most of whom had known the deceased only slightly, if at all.

“Howard Egan was a decent man; much too nice for our business. He loved his work. He was a risk-taker, always. In this case, he took a bigger risk than he could handle.”

He paused for a time, looking at the floor, as if he were going to say more. But the words didn’t come, and he turned abruptly and retreated to his Bloomberg screens.

They stood there for a moment, trying to take in the news. Someone in the back said, “Hear, hear,” as if Perkins had given a toast rather than a eulogy. People slowly dispersed back to their desks to begin once more the roar of trading, which didn’t take a break for anyone.

Shortly after his little speech, Perkins called Sophie Marx in the HR training room and invited her to lunch. He proposed to meet her at a restaurant called L’Oranger in St. James’s Street at one. That sounded reasonably discreet, so she said yes.

She felt mildly guilty about having a good time in London when her colleagues were in danger, so she emailed Gertz telling him that everything was going according to plan and that she hoped to have some answers for him soon. Gertz responded promptly. She wondered why he was still up; it was nearly three a.m. in Los Angeles. He told her to go someplace where she wouldn’t be overheard, so he could call her cell phone.

“Perkins likes you.” That was the first thing he said. She wasn’t sure from his tone whether he was pleased about it. She asked how he knew that so quickly, and he explained that Perkins had messaged his agency contact, Anthony Cronin, and that Cronin had told him.

“We have a delicate relationship with this guy,” Gertz continued. “I’m glad he’s opening the door, but be careful. This is a china shop. You touch the stuff and you’re going to break some of it. And then you’re screwed. We’re all screwed. So walk softly. Be professional. And don’t take too much frigging time. I need something to give to Headquarters soon, or we’re all going to be sitting on the crapper full-time.”

“How much time do I have?”

“A week, two weeks at the outside.”

“That may not be enough. This is complicated. And if I find a lead, I’m going to need to follow it. Don’t you think?”

“Sure, sure. Just get it done in two weeks. I’ve told Cyril Hoffman that you’re working on this. You, personally. You know what that means?”

“That it’s my ass.”

“Precisely.” He told her to have fun in London, and not to run up too big a bill at the Dorchester. Apparently Perkins had confided that to Anthony Cronin, as well.

The restaurant was deep in Clubland, at the corner of St. James’s and Pall Mall. Marx took a taxi, hoping to get there first, but when she arrived, she saw Perkins’s car idling outside. He was nestled against the banquette, reading the latest trading report as he did habitually, wherever he was. The entirety of the fund’s life seemed to be summarized by those numbers: What positions it had taken that morning, which ones it had sold. He put the market manifest aside when she sat down. She pointed to it and asked him why he found it so riveting.

“Trading is a narrative,” he said. “You can describe it on this piece of paper, but it’s more like a book. One part of the story is connected to all the rest. Right now we think the European Central Bank is going to start tightening again at the next meeting, which means Eurozone interest rates will go up. So we’re buying euros and selling European equities. As the euro gets stronger against the dollar, oil prices will go up a bit, so we’re buying oils. But if the dollar is off, that’s good for U.S. exporters, so we’re increasing our position in some large-cap U.S. equities, too.”

As he talked, he pointed to the trades that morning that had been driven by the “narrative,” as he’d put it. She tried to follow along, and occasionally nodded as if she understood what he was talking about. But most of the markings on the sheet just looked like very big numbers and she didn’t follow the trading logic, up or down.

“Let’s go back to the start,” she said. “How do you know the European Central Bank will start tightening at its next meeting?”

He smiled sheepishly, and she thought at first that she had asked a dumb question. But it wasn’t.

“That’s the secret sauce,” he said. “I can’t explain that. It’s how we make our money. When you know things, the bets aren’t so risky. Otherwise, it’s just a casino. If I wanted to gamble, I could do that in Las Vegas, without hiring all these people.”

They ordered lunch, and it was delicious, of course. This man only seemed to eat good food and drink the best wines. In this case, it meant pumpkin soup with cognac, served with chicken livers on toast, followed by a navarin of lamb. She waved off the sommelier, but Perkins said that it would be criminal to have the lamb without a glass of Margaux, so she relented.

Sophie had first-day questions about Alphabet, and he answered them genially. He told her that perhaps a half dozen of his employees were of Pakistani origin, including several in the IT department, and one in accounting. He promised to get their names and pull their files. And he explained Howard Egan’s routine: He had made his travel arrangements through Perkins’s secretary, Mona, and he drew on his own operating account when he was traveling; it was one of several accounts Alphabet maintained at Federation des Banques Suisses, but had its own routing number and depository arrangements. Normally, Egan and a private banker at FBS named Felix Stern were the only people with access to these records, but Perkins said he would try to get them, too.

She listened attentively, and took some notes in a wire-bound pad she had brought in her purse. As he talked, she recalled another conversation, several weeks before, when she had first heard the name Thomas Perkins. She had been sitting in Gertz’s office in Studio City, listening in on one of his phone calls. Perkins had asked, “What about the system?” but Gertz had blown him off. She had wondered about that at the time.

“I have a question,” she said. “What’s ‘the system’?”

There was a little flutter of one of his eyelids. He tried to cover with a smile and another tug on his Margaux.

“What are you talking about? I don’t know about any system. What system?”

“That’s what my boss said when you asked him about ‘the system.’ ‘Mr. Jones,’ that was the name my boss was using. You remember: He called you to say that Howard Egan was missing. Toward the end of the conversation, you asked him, ‘What about the system?’ And he said he didn’t know what you were talking about, just like you said a minute ago. So, being a curious girl, I want to know: What’s this system that nobody seems to know about?”

He shook his head. “How on earth did you overhear that conversation?”

“I was listening on the extension. Don’t be angry. My boss wanted me to hear the call. I think he knew we were going to be friends.”

Perkins had drained his wine and was starting in on his mineral water. He was trying very hard to act normal.

“I can’t talk about it, Sophie. I’m sorry, but it’s not my secret to share.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that if you don’t know about it already, then there’s a reason. And it’s not my business to go blabbing about it. Surely you understand that. This is your world, your rules. I’m a bystander.”

“Will you check with Anthony Cronin?” she asked.

“I certainly will.” The easy smile had returned, not just a million-dollar smile, but a thousand times brighter. “You can count on it.”

Perkins proposed that they walk back to the office. It was a fine summer afternoon, with little flecks of cottony cloud padding the blue sky. He seemed to want to tell her about himself, to explain who he was and how he had gotten to this pinnacle: He had been a professor of economics long ago at MIT, he said, teaching students about efficient markets and portfolio theory. He had been a prodigy, in academic terms: the youngest among his peers to get a doctorate, the youngest to get a tenured teaching job, the youngest man, as one of his friends needled him, ever to turn thirty. All he had ever wanted was to be a professor, but once he achieved that goal, he found to his surprise that it bored him.

He stopped Sophie on the sidewalk and took her arm; he seemed especially to want her to understand why his life had turned toward business, and how the money had begun to shower down on him.

“My academic friends all thought it was a betrayal, going to Wall Street. There weren’t any hedge funds back then; people disapproved of making money. But I thought to myself: Why is it better to lecture about the financial system as a professor than to be part of it? That was when I first thought about starting a fund of my own. It wasn’t that I wanted to be rich. I just wanted to be an active person in the world, not a passive one.”

He seemed to want validation, to need approval from this woman who had risked her life in faraway places.

“I was insecure, the way professors are,” he continued. “I didn’t know if I was tough enough to make it in the real world. That bugged me.”

“So are you? Tough enough, I mean.”

He flinched. The question wounded him.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Of course you are. You’re a natural. That’s obvious, even to me. You make it look easy.”

They were passing Jermyn Street and were nearly to the Ritz Hotel. They were walking the richest square mile on the planet, and he wanted her to understand.

“It’s not easy. What you are seeing is an illusion. Markets are not a gentle ride, they are a hurricane. They can destroy you. They almost destroyed me a couple of years ago.”

She laughed. She thought he was joking.

“You? You’re the golden boy. That’s what everyone says. You’re the one who came through the bad years without getting whacked. You’re the Pacman. You eat everyone and everything.”

“That’s all crap. I was nearly destroyed. My creditors were lining up all the way to Trafalgar Square. I survived that, but barely. And I could be wrecked tomorrow. Looks are deceiving, my dear. All that glitters may be gold, but that doesn’t mean it’s yours for keeps. You have to make arrangements, visit the pawnshop. You need to have friends. You are forced to play the game.”

“Everyone does that, right? Behind every great fortune, there’s a crime, as somebody said.”

“It was Balzac, and it’s true. And do you know what? It makes you vulnerable.”

“Sorry, Tom, but I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

He took her arm again.

“When I was on the edge in 2008, I cheated. It was the only way to stay afloat. And the people who knew what I’d done had a handle on me after that. I was not a free man.”

“Who were they?”

“None of your business. Well, that isn’t exactly true. It is your business. But I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You don’t sound very happy, for a multibillionaire.”

The look on his face confirmed her intuition.

“I’m trapped,” he said. “I know that sounds crazy, but if I could escape this world, I would do it in a minute. But I can’t, so I try to collect the things that money can buy, to help me forget about the things it can’t.”

Sophie wasn’t sure what he was talking about, and now, having said so much, he stopped talking. He was quiet the rest of the way back, almost taciturn. His step didn’t seem quite so light and carefree. Sophie felt sorry for him, though she couldn’t say why.

Perkins went into his office when they got back and began making phone calls. Sophie had another Bloomberg tutorial scheduled for three o’clock. When she got back to her desk at five o’clock, there was a one-sentence message from Jeff Gertz: We need to talk.

She took the elevator down to Curzon Street and walked north until she found a private spot. It was a small park off Mount Street that was enclosed by grand brick apartments. She took an empty bench and called Gertz. He was angry, you could hear the effort in his voice as he tried to control himself.

“Where are you?” he began. “And don’t say London. What street?”

She gave him the address of the leafy park and said it was off Audley Street, behind a public library. The phone went dead, and she knew instantly that Gertz was there, in the city, must have been there since she arrived, shadowing her. As she waited, she watched the squirrels dance across the tree branches, so nimble, so certain where they were going, limb to limb. Lucky squirrels, that they could do it on instinct and didn’t have a consciousness that could visualize the idea of falling.

In less than five minutes, the familiar form entered the park; the lean body, almost gaunt; the lupine face, hard-cheeked, softened with the goatee. He was dressed in one of his California outfits: black shirt, black trousers, as if he were going to Dan Tana’s to meet his Hollywood friends. Gertz scanned the park and the surrounding buildings for surveillance and then took a seat next to Sophie Marx on the wooden bench.

“Well, madam, you really did it this time. You really shot the pooch.” He was shaking his head.

“Hi, Jeff. Good to see you, too. What the hell are you talking about?”

“I kept telling you to be careful, not to go sticking your pinky into whatever looked tasty. But you were too smart for that. You had to ask Mr. Lucky to tell you everything, and in the first twenty-four hours, too. And now you’ve put him and me and the whole goddamned enterprise at risk, and yourself, too, by the way. You really are a piece of work, Sophie.”

He stood up, as if he couldn’t contain his consternation sitting down, walked a few paces and then came back to his seat on the bench. She watched, waiting for him to calm down.

“What on earth are you talking about, Jeff? Obviously you’re furious at me, but I don’t know why. What have I done?”

“Give me a break. That sweetie-pie stuff may work with Perkins, but he doesn’t lie for a living, and I do. You deliberately compromised me by asking Perkins about a confidential comment that he made to me on the phone two weeks ago. And don’t pretend that you don’t know what I’m talking about. I know that you pumped the guy for that information today at your fancy bullshit lunch.”

“You mean when I asked Perkins about ‘the system’?”

“Of course that’s what I mean. I can’t believe that you would do that. That is lame-ass judgment. That would normally be a CEI. You know what that is? A career-ending incident.”

“Slow down.” Her mind was jumping backward and forward in time as she tried to understand her boss’s rage.

“So Perkins called Anthony Cronin already? And Cronin called you? That was fast. You people don’t waste any time.”

“Jesus, girl, how dumb are you? I am Anthony Cronin. I have been Perkins’s case officer for the last few years.”

“Oh.” She felt manipulated, but more than that, she felt stupid.

“So here’s what we’re going to do, now that you have pushed your way into the part of the china shop marked do not enter. I am going to explain ‘the system’ to you. And then you are going to help me keep it going. Because if you don’t, your job will end, effective immediately, and I will do everything I can to make it impossible for you to work anywhere else for a long frigging time. Are we clear?”

“Yes, we’re clear.”

He smiled, for the first time since his cyclone had blown into the park. His teeth were so white and sharp they seemed to sparkle in the summer sun. He had her now: She was in his loop again, and he was relieved.

“That’s better.”

“For you, maybe. What’s the system?”

“The system in question is actually quite simple. For it is based on the clearest precept of human life-the golden rule of reciprocity-which is, ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ That means Thomas Perkins helps us. And we, in turn, help Thomas Perkins.”

“How do we help him?”

“We give him the coin of the realm, my dear, which is information. We know things that move markets. We tell him. He makes money. Some for him, and some for us, thank you very much.”

“What do we do with our share?”

“We spend it. If you hadn’t noticed, we have agents all over the world who are paying people large stipends: Bribes, to be blunt. Where do you think the money comes from-given that we don’t exist? Well, I’ll tell you: We make money the old-fashioned way. We earn it. Thomas Perkins provides the structure. We provide the information. Put them together and you have a money machine.”

“That’s the system?”

“Yup. And starting this minute, you are a part of it.”

Marx surveyed the tidy park. The grass under her feet was emerald-green. Within a half-mile radius was perhaps a trillion dollars of wealth, in constant invisible motion.

“Can I ask a question?”

“No. The part where you ask questions is over. Now it’s the part where you follow orders.”

“I’m going to ask the question anyway, Jeff. Is this legal, what we’re doing?”

He put his arm on her shoulder, not roughly, but in a way that was meant to reassure.

“Yes. The Hit Parade was created under the National Security Act. It has powers and authorities to do things that other organizations are not permitted to do. That’s what allows us to operate. By other rules, we may be illegal, but we have our own rules. Does that help?”

“Not really, Jeff. You managed to say yes and no at the same time.”

“Well, then, you got it right. That’s where we live.”