Money to Burn

51

ERIC VOLKE ENTERED THE GLASS SKYSCRAPER VIA THE BOWELS OF THE parking garage through a door marked DELIVERIES. Saxton Silvers’ main entrance on Seventh Avenue was still blocked by hordes of reporters, cameramen, photographers, confused employees, desperate clients, and the just plain curious. Volke wasn’t sure why, but he was thinking of men-boys-like Michael Cantella’s grandfather at the age of nineteen or twenty, storming the beach on D-Day, watching their friends die, carnage all around. Climbing out of his limo and sneaking up the rear service elevator, he felt like a complete coward.

The bankruptcy lawyers had filed a Chapter 11 petition-the largest in U.S. history-at nine A.M. The CEO was dealing with the firm’s partners and major stockholders. It wasn’t specifically in Volke’s job description to address the employees, but they were owed at least that much. He went from floor to floor, meeting with large groups of dazed traders, managers, and others who slowly came to realize that they were wasting their time listening to management and should have been typing a résumé. A few were loyal to the end. One of the traders gave him a bronze plaque that had rested atop her desk for six years, a quote from Act II, Scene II of Julius Caesar that Eric had referenced in one of his many inspiring speeches: “Cowards die many times before their death; the valiant never taste of death but once.”

“Hang in there,” was the more common refrain, though many looked at Volke with dagger eyes, as if to say, I’d like to hang you.

Volke’s last stop was the foreign-exchange traders on the third floor. The open work area was half-empty. Apparently his hollow message had already trickled down from the equity floor above, and many had decided that it wasn’t worth waiting for. Scores of desks had been cleaned out, personal items boxed up and hauled away, row after row of darkened trading screens left behind. Empty coffee cups rested on tables. Suit jackets hung on the ends of cubicles. A platter of bagels and doughnuts was virtually untouched; few employees had the stomach to eat. An open bottle of tequila sat atop a file cabinet, some having found gallowslike solace there. Pairs of traders exchanged sad smiles of resignation and shook their heads in disbelief. One cluster perused a copy of the bankruptcy court papers, astounded by the sheer heft.

“Good morning,” said Volke.

“What’s so good about it?” someone fired back.

An uneasy silence came over the loose gathering, and it stretched all the way across the floor. Some moved closer to listen in. Others stayed where they were, refusing to give up their desk chair, defying the cold reality that it was no longer theirs.

Volke took a step back, glancing out the third-story window at the crowded street below, where double-parked news trucks and cameramen jockeyed for position outside the building’s front entrance. Saxton Silvers employees, trying to escape with their belongings and at least some of their dignity, had to push through a media gauntlet where everyone from CNN to Internet bloggers begged for “just thirty seconds” of interview time. A young guy wearing a green Saxton Silvers T-shirt carried a sign that read WHARTON MBA, TWINS ON THE WAY: WILL WORK FOR ANYONE.

“It’s a very tough day in our history,” said Volke, beginning the way he’d begun each of the dreaded morning talks. But the words halted.

Scanning the room, he avoided making eye contact with any single individual, and his gaze came to rest on some Legos atop a trader’s desk. Someone had decorated his workspace with a toy tower of colored plastic bricks-just like the ones that study teams built on the first day of classes at Harvard Business School. It was a Day One collaborative ritual that Volke knew well, and seeing that playful reminder of his alma mater brought back a flash of memories. The thrill of the acceptance letter. The horror of the first “cold call” in the lecture hall. The “up-yours” letter he could have mailed to the first-year accounting professor who’d told him he wasn’t going to cut it. Volke didn’t fancy himself a historian, but he had lived through “New Yorkonomics,” having arrived on Wall Street when the city was suffering from the exodus of manufacturing to cheaper places. He witnessed a spectacular resurgence fueled by innovations in financial services-everything from junk bonds and leveraged buyouts to mortgage-backed securities and hedge funds. It was all a product of the remarkable concentration of smart people in New York City, each learning from the other how to get rich. Saxton Silvers was once a shining example of success, and it was painful to end up as the poster child of “how not to do it.”

He ditched his prepared words and took an entirely different tack.

“There was a time when the kings of Wall Street were not the commercial banks,” he said, “but entities far less regulated. They controlled ungodly sums of wealth, and the more they controlled, the more investors fed them. The average American still lived off the sweat of his brow, but the rich sure got richer. The Wall Street creed was to make money. Big money. Fast money. Rules were bent. Ethics were relative. Laws were swallowed by loopholes. It was all okay; Adam Smith told us so. It all came crashing down, of course. The stock market suddenly lost almost fifty percent of its value, and banks simply stopped making loans.”

He paused, his gaze sweeping across a sea of perplexed faces.

“That was 1907,” he said. “I guess we didn’t learn much.”

He drew a deep breath, then let it out. “The doors will lock at five o’clock. I’m sorry,” he said, eyes lowered, “especially for you young people. I’m very, very sorry.”

Suddenly a bagel flew across the room and nailed him squarely in the chest.

“Fly home in your helicopter and fuck yourself sideways,” someone shouted. “You and Michael Cantella both.”

A security guard went to the president’s side, but no one else moved. No one said a word. The indignity of silence simply hung there.

Volke brushed the crumbs and traces of cream cheese from his Hermès tie, then turned and left the room.

Ivy Layton rose from the couch as Volke returned to his office on the executive floor.

“Thanks a ton for telling me to go with the 1907 mea culpa speech,” he said as he tossed his stained necktie onto the chair. “Went over like a mink coat at a PETA convention.”

“Maybe the apology didn’t come across as genuine,” said Ivy.

“Maybe I don’t have anything to apologize for,” he said.

Ivy didn’t go there. All across Wall Street, it was someone else’s fault.

Volpe went to his closet and found another tie. He spoke with his back to Ivy, using his reflection in the window as he knotted a perfect double Windsor.

“You can’t hide here forever,” he said. “The bankruptcy team will be inventorying my office in about four hours.”

“I know. It’s been a long time since I’ve spent more than one night in any one place anyway.”

He turned to face her, straightening the knot. “Any longer than that and I’d have some explaining to do to Mrs. Volke.”

“I understand. I’ll go. But I need your help.”

“What now?”

“I have nowhere else to turn,” she said. “No one else has the power to bring down Kyle McVee.”

“Don’t you watch FNN? He’s already kicked my ass.”

“I want you to tell the FBI that it’s him, not Michael, who’s killing the firm.”

“I already have. It’s falling on deaf ears. I know you’ve been away, but now more than ever, Wall Street is like the Wild West, no sheriff in town. Players like McVee do as they please.”

“Then you have to make the FBI understand what kind of man Kyle McVee is. Make them realize that he’s capable of murder.”

“How am I supposed to do that?”

Ivy paused, then forced out the words. “I want you to tell the FBI about me.”

“Tell them you’re alive?”

“Yes. And why I disappeared.”

He stopped and looked at her. “Have you lost your mind? I can’t do that.”

“Why not?” she asked.

“For starters, I helped fake your death. That’s a felony.”

Helped was almost an understatement. Eric had arranged for payoffs to the Bahamian medical examiner and DNA expert who had linked Ivy’s name to the decomposed “remains” found in the belly of the tiger shark.

“I was just watching television,” she said. “A warrant has been issued to arrest Michael for the murder of Chuck Bell.”

“That’s not my fault. In fact, I protected Michael. The FBI was very interested in knowing what he said to me in our phone conversation before Bell was shot, and quite honestly, Michael’s words could have been used against him.”

“What did he say?”

“Something to the effect that he was going to put a stop to Bell ‘one way or another.’”

“I’m sure Michael didn’t mean kill him.”

“I know he didn’t. That’s why I kept that conversation between us.”

“One of us has to tell the FBI what’s really going on.”

He went to her, his expression deadly serious. “That was not our deal,” he said. “I helped you disappear with the understanding that you would never come back, no matter what.”

“Things have changed, Eric. I tried running, and I’m out of options. If you won’t go to the FBI, I will.”

He stepped away, running his hand through his hair. But he didn’t push back the way she had expected.

“You’re right,” he said. “The only way to derail Kyle McVee is to make the FBI understand that, in his twisted mind, bringing down Saxton Silvers is secondary to finding you.”

“Everything is secondary to finding me. I should have told the FBI that four years ago.”

“The FBI couldn’t protect you then. And they won’t be able to protect you now.”

“I’m not worried about me. I’m worried about Michael and my mother.”

He took her hand and squeezed it. “They’ll be fine. I promise.”

“You got their backs?”

He nodded. “McVee will never find them. I don’t care what it costs. I may have lost my shirt in Saxton Silvers, but thankfully, money will never be an issue for me. I’ve still got WhiteSands.”

Eric was talking about the investment management firm he’d founded in the 1980s, before his rise to power within Saxton Silvers. Some said it was the proverbial tail wagging the dog, with over a trillion dollars in assets under management, yet 49 percent owned by Saxton Silvers. Eric, individually, was still a major shareholder.

“Thank you, Eric.”

He nodded. “I don’t regret the way I helped you four years ago. And, of course, we all want to help Michael. You just have to figure out a way to do it without throwing me under the bus.”

She knew he was right. She gave him a quick hug, then stepped away.

“Good luck, Ivy. And for the last time: good-bye.”