The Codex

55

Mike Graff settled in the wing chair by the fire, folding his neat legs one across the other, an alert, pleasant expression on his face. It amazed Skiba how, in spite of everything, Graff managed to keep that crisp B-school aura of self-confidence. Graff could be paddling Charon’s own boat down the River Styx toward the very gates of hell, and he’d still be sporting that fresh-faced look, persuading his fellow passengers that heaven was just around the corner.

“What can I do for you, Mike?” Skiba asked pleasantly.

“What’s with the stock these past two days? It’s gone up ten percent.”

Skiba shook his head. The house was on fire while Graff was in the kitchen complaining about cold coffee. “Just be glad that we survived the piece in the Journal about Phloxatane.”

“All the more reason to worry why our stock is going up.”

“Look, Mike—”

“Lewis, you didn’t tell Fenner last week about the Codex, did you?”

“I did.”

“Christ. You know what a scumbag that guy is. We’re in enough trouble as it is without adding insider trading to our bill of fare.”

Skiba looked at the man. He really should have gotten rid of Graff before. Graff had so compromised them both that now dismissal was out of the question. What did it matter? It was over — for Graff, for the company, and especially for him. He wanted to scream at the irrelevancy of it. A bottomless gulf had opened below him — they were in free fall — and Graff still didn’t know it.

“He was going to downgrade Lampe to a sell. I had to, Mike. Fenner’s no fool. He won’t breathe a word of it. Would he risk throwing his life away for a few hundred thousand on the side?”

“Are you kidding? He’d knock his own grandmother down to snatch a penny off the sidewalk.”

“It’s not Fenner, it’s short sellers closing out their positions.”

“That doesn’t explain more than thirty percent of it.”

“Contrarians. Odd-lotters. Widows and orphans. Mike, enough. Enough. Don’t you realize what’s happening? It’s over. We’re finished. Lampe is finished.”

Graff looked at him, astonished. “What are you talking about? We’ll weather this. Once we get the Codex, Lewis, it’ll be clear sailing.”

Skiba felt his blood run thick and cold at the mention of the Codex. “You really think the Codex will solve our problems?” He spoke quietly.

“Why not? Am I missing something here? Has something changed?”

Skiba shook his head. What did it matter? What did anything matter?

“Lewis, this defeatism is unlike you. Where’s your famous fight?”

Skiba was tired, so very tired. This argument was useless. It was over and done with. There was no more point in talking. All they could do now was wait: wait for the end. They were powerless.

“When we unveil the Codex,” Graff went on, “Lampe stock will go through the roof. Nothing succeeds like success. The shareholders will forgive us, and it’ll take all the wind out of the sails of that Dudley Do-Right chairman of the SEC. That’s why I’m concerned about insider trading. If someone said something about the Codex to someone who told his mother-in-law who phoned her nephew in Dubuque — that charge would stick. It’s like tax evasion, it’s what they nail everyone on. Look at what happened to Martha—”

“Mike?”

“What?”

“Get the fuck out.”

Skiba turned out the lights, shut down the phones, and waited for darkness to come. On his desk were only three things: the little plastic pill bottle, the sixty-year-old Macallan, and a clean shot glass.

Time to take the big swim.