The Marketmaker

23

I was woken by the sound of glass shattering and wood splintering. I sat up in bed, and tried to get my bearings. There was loud banging from the sitting room. I threw myself out of bed, and lurched through the door, still wearing only my underpants.

There were three of them, big, hard men dressed in T-shirts and jeans. I threw myself at the nearest one, sending him crashing into a bookshelf.

‘Get him!’

Strong hands pulled at my arms. I clung on to the man underneath me, trying to force my arm round his throat. He bucked and kicked. The two others broke my grip free, and hauled me to my feet. The man I had jumped on, staggered upright and kicked me hard in the balls. I cried out, and felt sick. Then there was a blow to my back that just missed my kidney, and a knee came smashing up into my face. My cheek stung and I tasted blood, but it was my groin that still hurt most. I tried to double up but they wouldn’t let me. Then something hard hit me on the side of the head and it all went black.

‘Ambulance! Quick!’

The crackle of a police radio. Someone kneeling down next to me. ‘He’s breathing. Hit on the head. Check the bedroom!’

I lay there, playing dead. I didn’t have the energy to move, even to open my eyes. My body hurt all over. There was the continued sound of movement around me, the gentle weight of a blanket laid over my semi-naked body and then the wail of a siren. Strong arms lifted me on to a stretcher. I felt cold air against my face. I opened my eyes.

I was in the street outside my flat. Although it was night, there seemed to be lights everywhere, orange from the street lamps, flashing blue from the ambulance.

A man dressed in bright green overalls leaned over me. ‘Hang on. You’ll be all right, son.’

They slotted me into the back of the ambulance. The pain screamed throughout my body. I was enormously tired. Everything went black again.

My second visit to hospital was briefer than my first. I was let out late the next morning with instructions to come back if my headache got worse. There was a sore spot on my skull, but my head felt fuzzy rather than in pain. I had bruises all over me; one in my back and one in my thigh really hurt.

I took the taxi home with trepidation. The flat was a mess. They had stolen a couple of things, some gold cuff-links my parents had given me for my eighteenth birthday, and the video recorder. And my Apple Mac.

Oh, shit! There was three years’ worth of unfinished thesis on that. I fell into the sofa and stared at the space on the desk where it had sat. Now, think. It can’t be that bad. Under the desk were three cardboard boxes. My notes. Please God, let me have kept the rough printouts!

I rushed to the boxes and tore them open. My notes were all there and drafts of three of the chapters. But the rest? All gone. I put my head in my hands. It would take months just to re-create what I had written.

I sat on the floor, surrounded by the debris of the attack. Books were everywhere, drawers were opened. My body hurt, my head was befuddled. I had no job. I had months of boring rewriting ahead of me. And Isabel was either dead or shut up in some flea-pit thousands of miles away.

The phone rang. I crawled over to the patch of floor where it lay, and picked it up.

‘Hallo.’

‘Nick?’

I felt cold. I recognized the deep voice. It was Eduardo.

‘Yes?’

‘How are you getting on?’

‘You know damn well how I’m getting on. You just had me beaten up and my flat wrecked!’

‘You’ve been attacked? Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that.’ Eduardo made no attempt to hide the mockery in his voice. ‘There was a very unfortunate piece in the Brazilian press yesterday. Very unfortunate. Now, remember, I’m watching you. And I want you to keep quiet, do you understand me?’

‘Fuck you!’ I shouted, and slammed down the phone.

Tidying up took me a long time. I was dispirited, stiff and slow. I was interrupted by a police constable, who came round to take details of what was missing. I told him. I also told him about Eduardo’s phone call. Why the hell not? I doubted very much that they would be able to find any evidence to link him to the attack, but it might make his life a bit difficult. The constable treated me a bit like a paranoid ex-employee, which of course I was, but he promised to look into it further.

I finally finished clearing up and rang Russell Church, the head of my old department at the School of Russian Studies.

‘Nick, how are you? I was just about to phone you to thank you.’

‘Oh, really?’ What the hell was he talking about?

‘Yes. For the Dekker Ward sponsorship.’

My heart sank. Bloody hell! ‘What sponsorship?’

‘I’ve just been on the phone with a man called Ross. He says that Dekker Ward would like to provide substantial commercial sponsorship to SRS. They’ll start with a trial period of a year, and then see how it goes from there.’

‘In return for what?’

‘Well, they will want access to some of our people and our contacts. They say they’re planning to do more business in Russia. But they’re willing to pay good commercial rates for any consulting work they commission. It’s perfect. It’s just the sort of external funding we need! Well done.’

‘Actually, I knew nothing about it.’

‘Oh. I rather assumed you were responsible. You must have made a good impression at any rate. So, how are things going there?’

‘Well, they’re not.’ I tried not to let my voice sound sulky, but I couldn’t help it. ‘I’ve left. You said I should give you a call if I decided the City wasn’t for me.’

Russell was full of enthusiasm. ‘Well, now we might be able to find something for you here. We haven’t thrashed out the details of the sponsorship deal yet but perhaps you could take up some sort of liaison role.’

I stopped him. ‘Wait a second, Russell. I’m not sure that would work. Dekker and I didn’t see eye to eye when I left.’

‘Oh.’

‘What would be useful for me is if we could carry on our conversation about openings at other universities. And I’d like to use you as a referee, if I may.’

It clicked. Russell’s voice became more cautious. ‘OK. Let’s have a chat.’

‘Tomorrow?’

‘All right. Say eleven? See you then.’

I was nervous as I knocked on Russell’s half-opened door; as nervous as I had been the first time I met him for that interview five years before.

‘Come in.’

I could see that Russell had spoken to Dekker as soon as I entered. Neat, with thinning grey hair, he usually greeted me with a beam. This time he rose awkwardly from his desk and shook my hand, not meeting my eyes.

‘Oh, hallo, Nick. Have a seat.’

It was almost as though he wasn’t expecting me. I perched on the small chair crammed against his desk. I recognized much of the debris that cluttered it. Most of it was under the School of Russian Studies headed memo paper. Admin. Piles of it. There was not a single page of Cyrillic script to be seen.

He removed his glasses, and wiped them, frowning. ‘Now, what was it you wanted to talk about?’

‘I need a job. I wondered if you knew of anything?’

‘I haven’t heard of much since you left here. I think the post at Sheffield might still be open. There’s a chance something might come up soon at the University of Surrey. Apart from that, not much.’

This was my mentor, almost my friend over the last five years. The man who had gone out on a limb for me, despite my lack of formal qualifications in Russian. He could do better than that.

I had to know. ‘You will be able to provide me with a reference, won’t you?’

A reference from Russell was crucial. He was well respected in the academic community in the UK. Worldwide, for that matter. Without a good one, I had no chance of getting a job.

The glasses came off again for another polish.

‘That might be difficult,’ said Russell. ‘I can provide you with something, of course. But it will be difficult for me to make it enthusiastic.’

‘Why? What’s wrong? What have they said to you?’

‘Mr Ross at Dekker Ward explained to me the circumstances under which you left their firm.’

‘Which Mr Ross?’

Russell hesitated. ‘I think he said it was Eduardo Ross. I’m not sure.’

‘Oh, yes. And what did he say?’

Russell shifted in his chair. ‘He told me that you had been caught bribing the authorities in Brazil over a transaction there, that this had become public knowledge, and that they’d had to let you go.’

‘That’s bullshit!’

‘I’ve seen the newspaper article, Nick.’ He pulled out a photocopy of the article from Bocci’s newspaper.

‘But Dekker Ward planted that. I can show you another article that says the opposite!’

‘Ross told me you had gone to the press behind their backs as well.’ Russell’s demeanour had changed. He was leaning forward, his jaw jutting out, ready for confrontation.

‘But don’t you want to hear my side of the story?’

‘OK. Fire away.’

So I tried to explain. It was difficult without going into too much detail, but I thought I did a pretty good job of it. But Russell wasn’t listening. He didn’t hear; he didn’t want to hear.

When I had finished, he tapped his pencil on his desk. ‘Basically, Nick, it’s your word against Dekker’s, and the Rio press.’ He tapped the Bocci article in front of him. ‘And at this moment Dekker Ward are crucial to this institution’s future. I can’t afford to doubt them.’

I’d had enough. ‘Russell! You’re being bought!’

‘That’s an absurd accusation!’

‘No, it’s not. If I had come to you from a faceless City institution and said I wanted to go back into academia you wouldn’t have asked any questions. It’s only because these people are promising to pay you money that you’re listening.’

‘I can’t give you a reference in good faith when I know you’ve been involved in bribing government officials.’

‘You know no such thing. All you have is Eduardo Ross’s word, that’s all. This sponsorship comes with strings, and the first string is to ditch me. Your first commercial sponsorship deal, and within a day you’re letting it compromise your independence!’

Russell held up his hands. ‘Now, calm down, Nick. Let’s talk about this Surrey post, shall we?’

‘Forget it!’ I said, and stormed out.

I pedalled back to Primrose Hill in record time, ignoring the pain in my aching back and leg. Russell’s reaction was all too predictable but nonetheless severely disappointing. Since he had become head of the department three years ago, he had made commercial sponsorship the central plank of his strategy for preserving the funding base of the department. Until now, he’d had little concrete success. His position internally within the School was not yet secure. And he was ambitious. So why give it all up for some promising Russian lecturer who still hadn’t got his Ph.D. under his belt?

Because that would have been the right thing to do. Because he was my friend and supporter. Because the School of Russian Studies wasn’t Dekker Ward.

Bastard!

So why had Dekker done it? Was I really that important to them that they wanted to shell out a million or two to keep me out of work? I supposed it was an intelligent move on some level. The School of Russian Studies did have good contacts and knowledge of Russia that Ricardo could tap. And, of course, all Russell had at the moment was promises. Dekker would have plenty of opportunity to back out before they actually put up hard cash.

I stopped at the pub just round the corner from my flat, and bought a pint and a ham sandwich. I thought practicalities. It would be very hard to get a job teaching Russian in a university now. And I probably couldn’t get another job in the City even if I wanted it. I still had six months or so to go on my Ph.D., not including the three or four months it would take just to get me back to where I’d left it. I should probably get my head down and finish that. I had three thousand pounds in my bank account, mostly the residue from the money Ricardo had lent me for clothes. I would try to live on that.

The mortgage payments on my flat were once again going to be impossible to meet. There was still no chance of selling it for more than the amount of the loan. I would have to let it and try to find somewhere cheap to live. Very cheap. Like a squat or something. I looked at the ham sandwich in front of me. I wouldn’t be able to eat out like this in future.

And what future? I looked towards it with an almost total lack of interest. If Isabel were around, or even if I knew she were alive, things would be different. But the uncertainty surrounding her disappearance weighed on me, dragging me down into a sort of pessimistic apathy. I was losing the ability to believe in her survival and, without that, the future looked unbearably grey.

I went back to the flat. It was almost tidy now. Workmen had put up a temporary door where the french windows had been. They would install something more permanent in the afternoon. Luckily the insurance covered that.

I paced through the four small rooms: kitchen, sitting room, bathroom and bedroom. It would be a shame to leave. When Joanna had first bought it, the flat had seemed extravagant, and then it had become a millstone. But there were all those bookshelves that I had spent hours, no, days putting up, shelves that ingeniously held two thousand books. There was the tiny garden: I knew every plant, every weed.

Suddenly, unexpectedly, a rush of anger swept through me. I was losing my flat because of Dekker. I had screwed up my career because of them. They had arranged to have me beaten up. Who the hell did these people think they were? Couldn’t I do something to stop them? Or at least something to hurt them? I wanted revenge, and I wanted it right then.

But what? Exposing Ricardo’s manipulation of Bocci had hurt them, but not enough. They would recover soon. I wanted to do something that would cause them permanent harm.

But what could I do? One unemployed investment banker with two months’ experience. I’d have loved to have been able to blow this money-laundering thing up in their faces. But it would require an extensive international investigation to uncover more, and it didn’t look like the DEA were about to start one, at least not into Dekker itself. I believed Dave when he talked about the indifference of the authorities.

I hated the feeling of powerlessness. There had to be something I could do.

My brooding was interrupted by the phone.

‘Nick? It’s Kate. I heard the terrible news. I was just phoning to see how you were.’

‘Which terrible news?’

I caught the hesitation on the other end of the phone. ‘Well, both things, I suppose. Isabel. And then you losing your job. It must be awful.’

‘It is. And I’ve been broken into and beaten up.’

‘Oh, God! When?’

‘The night before last.’

‘Were you badly hurt?’

‘I was knocked out. My head still hurts. And my back. And leg,’ I said, moving my stiff leg into a more comfortable position.

‘What are you doing now?’

‘Thinking about renting out the flat.’

‘Can’t you get another job?’

‘No. Dekker Ward have suddenly decided to sponsor the School of Russian Studies. My continued unemployment is the condition.’

‘Oh, no! Where are you going to live?’

‘I don’t know. I’ll find a squat somewhere. Camden’s a good area for that sort of thing, I believe.’ I could tell my voice must sound weary, low.

Kate was silent for a moment. Then she said, ‘Well, stop moping. Pack a suitcase and come round here now. You can stay with us until you find the squat of your dreams. You need people around, even if it is only me and Oliver.’

Suddenly there was nothing I wanted more than to do what Kate suggested.

‘OK,’ I said. ‘I’ll see you this evening.’

I took my bike, weighed down with saddlebags, on to the train, and arrived at the station at eight o’clock. It was on the edge of an old market town thirty miles from London, which had lost the battle to avoid becoming a dormitory community. Jamie and Kate’s house was three miles from the station, on the outskirts of the village of Bodenham.

It was still light as I rode along the narrow lanes. Chestnut trees were everywhere, bedecked with white candles. It wasn’t quiet, the birds were making a racket, and farm machinery was returning to base for the evening. I plunged down a steep hill into Bodenham and swerved left at the bottom by the duck pond, narrowly avoiding a mallard strutting importantly across the road. Even here cyclists didn’t get proper respect.

Their house was at the end of a straight half-mile stretch of lane. I didn’t hear the car until a loud horn sounded a couple of feet behind me and almost sent me out of my seat. I turned to see Jamie’s Jaguar XJS whispering along in my slipstream. He tried to overtake, but I slowed to walking pace and weaved across the road in front of him. Some people just don’t grow up.

They lived in Dockenbush Farm, an old farmhouse that was still surrounded by working buildings used by a neighbouring farmer. It had half an acre of garden, an appealing mess of unkempt roses and shrubs. On one side was a small orchard with a purple and green carpet of uncut grass and bluebells. A confused yellow rose scrambled across the front of the house, and I had to duck as I walked in at the front door to avoid a heavy branch of thorns and flowers.

‘I must tie that back,’ said Jamie. ‘Although at least it keeps out lanky gits like you.’

‘I’ll do it,’ I said. ‘In fact, I might give the whole place a good haircut.’

They had moved in two years before, just after Jamie had joined Dekker. The house had seemed to me absurdly large for the two of them plus small child, especially since I was used to seeing them in a cramped one-bedroomed flat in Chiswick. It reminded me a little of the house Jamie had grown up in, which I had seen on my first couple of visits to his family before his father had been forced to sell it. That was no coincidence, of course. I also suspected that it was no coincidence that Ricardo, too, had a nice house in the country.

Kate came through and stepped up on her bare toes to give me a kiss. ‘Hallo. Supper’s almost ready. It’s only stew, I’m afraid.’

The large old kitchen was warmed by an Aga, and pleasingly cluttered with toys and iron pots and pans. The stew was delicious. We downed a bottle of Chilean red between the three of us and talked and laughed. Then, over a spread of French cheeses, Jamie touched on the subject we had all been avoiding. ‘Ricardo talked about you this morning.’

‘Oh, yes?’

‘Yes. He gave us a little speech. He told us why you’d left. He said that he didn’t mind people disagreeing with the Dekker ethos, and that he had given you a chance to resign, which you hadn’t taken. He wouldn’t tolerate any member of the team betraying the rest of us. He said you’d never work again, not in the City, nor in a university.’

‘Jamie! Didn’t you say anything?’ Kate protested.

Jamie shrugged.

‘He couldn’t,’ I said. ‘Ricardo isn’t that sort of person.’ Then I asked Jamie, ‘What do the others think?’

Jamie sighed. ‘It’s impossible to tell. Everyone’s a bit down after Isabel. And this Mexican deal is becoming a real problem. They know I’m a good friend of yours, so they wouldn’t talk to me about it anyway. But I suspect they’ll keep quiet. The message from Ricardo is clear. Stick with me and I’ll look after you. Leave and you’re in trouble.’

Kate looked at Jamie with concern. Jamie avoided her glance, and studied the debris of cheese and crumbs on his plate.

‘I thought it was a bit extreme sponsoring the School of Russian Studies just to keep me out of a job,’ I said.

‘It was. And that’s why it was effective. It’s a warning to the rest of us of how far Ricardo will go to punish people whom he thinks have betrayed him. But also it’s a good idea. We’ll need information and contacts to get into Russia. Your old place can provide us with useful introductions.’

‘And beating me up? Wrecking my flat? Did Ricardo tell everyone about that too?’

‘I doubt he even knows. That has all the marks of Eduardo.’

‘Jamie, you’ve got to get out of there!’ said Kate. ‘Especially after what they did to Nick. You should leave before it’s too late.’

Jamie sighed. ‘It is too late. Especially now. Ricardo will be watching me for signs of disloyalty.’

‘Screw him!’ said Kate. ‘Just leave.’

‘It’s not that easy,’ said Jamie. ‘This house needs to be paid for. I’ll need two years’ good bonuses to make a dent in the mortgage. And if I leave, what will I do then? Ricardo isn’t a good man to have as an enemy. The Latin American market is small: everyone knows everyone else.’

‘You could work for Bloomfield Weiss,’ said Kate. ‘They’d have you like a shot.’

‘Yeah, and if they lose their war with Dekker, which it looks like they will, they won’t need me any more and I’ll be out on the street.’

‘Oh, Jamie!’ growled Kate in frustration. She threw down her napkin and left the table.

The two of us sat in awkward silence. Finally Jamie broke it. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said.

‘Don’t worry about it. I’m free to screw up my own career. There’s no need for you to screw yours up in solidarity. You’ve got Kate to look after, and Oliver.’ And your ambition, I thought. That was the real problem, and both Jamie and I knew it. He was doing well at Dekker, and if he kept his head down he could be making millions in a few years’ time. That was something he desperately wanted to do.

But he was an old friend of mine. I didn’t want him to give up his ambitions on my account.

I helped Jamie wash up, and went to bed. I didn’t see any more of Kate that evening.

I spoke to her the next day. Jamie had gone to work, and she had taken Oliver to school. The weather was glorious, sunny with a gentle breeze. We sat in the back garden drinking mugs of coffee.

‘Did you know your godson has a girlfriend?’ Kate said.

‘Really? He’s a bit young, isn’t he?’

‘I think they’re quite keen on the opposite sex at this age, and then they go off them when they get older.’

‘What’s her name?’

‘Jessica.’

‘Is she pretty?’

‘You’ll have to ask Oliver. She looks a bit dumpy to me. But she plays rockets with him, so I don’t think he minds. He asked me if she could come round to play. He was terribly shy about it. It was quite sweet.’

‘Well, I look forward to a formal introduction.’

We lapsed into silence, sipping our coffee. Something disturbed the rooks in a nearby copse, and they rose in a complaining black swirl, before eventually settling down again.

‘Do you think they’ll find her?’ Kate asked.

‘Isabel?’

‘Yes.’

I thought for a moment. ‘Yes, I do. I have to believe that they will.’

‘She seemed very nice.’

‘She is.’

‘But I hate women with figures like that. They look good in anything.’

I smiled. I remembered how she looked, how she felt, her scent, her voice. She had to be alive. She just had to be.

Kate reached across and squeezed my hand.

‘I’m sorry about last night,’ she said. ‘It’s just that Jamie drives me mad. His life seems to have been taken over by Dekker. I sometimes feel like he’s sold his soul to Ricardo.’

‘I know what you mean. Ricardo likes to control the people who work for him. He lets them go about things their own way, but he makes sure their interests are tied up completely with his. But I can understand Jamie’s point of view. He needs to pay for all this.’

‘No, he doesn’t!’ said Kate with surprising forcefulness. ‘We don’t actually need all this. Of course it’s very nice, but we could quite happily live in a small flat in Chiswick. And that stuff about providing for me is crap, too. I had a perfectly good job in a City law firm. I could earn a decent salary again. Of course I want to spend the time with Oliver while he’s young, but I don’t have to.’

I was quiet. I didn’t want to get involved in an argument between Kate and Jamie. Especially when I thought one of them was right and the other wrong.

‘Do you know, he was angry with me for letting you stay here?’ she said.

I shook my head.

‘He said it would look bad at the office. I told him not to be so absurd.’

‘I don’t want to stay if—’

‘You stay,’ said Kate firmly, her eyes blazing. I was surprised. Kate was normally calm, unflappable. I had never seen her so worked up as in the last twelve hours.

The shock must have shown in my face. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said, with a slight smile. ‘Jamie wants you here too. I think he realized he was being stupid.’

She took a sip of her coffee, and stared out towards the hill behind the garden. ‘He’s changing, you know.’

I didn’t answer at first. I didn’t want to talk too deeply about Jamie with Kate. But, then, she clearly needed to talk to someone about him. So I stepped delicately into the minefield.

‘Is he?’

Kate shot me a glance. She sensed my reluctance to talk, but went on regardless. ‘You remember him at university. He never took anything too seriously. He was always fun, he was always kind, he was always, well, affectionate. And afterwards, too. He was great when my father died.’

I remembered when Kate’s father had been killed in a car crash. She had been devastated. Jamie had done all that could be expected of a husband, and done it very well. He seemed to know exactly when to cheer her up, and when to let her be alone.

‘He’s always been a good friend to me,’ I said. ‘He got me the job at Dekker, didn’t he? I know that didn’t work out too well, but he stuck his neck out for me.’

‘Yes, he did.’ Kate smiled briefly, but she still wore a frown. ‘But what about Oliver? When he was born, Jamie was wonderful. And now he hardly ever sees him.’

‘He doesn’t have any choice, Kate. I’ve been inside Dekker. You have to work hard, ridiculously hard. Jamie spends no more time there than anyone else. In fact he probably spends less.’

‘But why does he have to work there in the first place? After all it’s done to you. After all it’s doing to him.’

There was a note of anguish in Kate’s voice. I knew the answer. I had played rugby with Jamie. He was one of the most competitive people I had ever come across. And he never gave up. If he had decided to make his fortune at Dekker, there was nothing that Kate or I could do to change his mind.

‘You know,’ she said, ‘I really admire what you did.’

‘What? You mean resigning?’

She nodded, looking straight ahead, her coffee mug half an inch from her lips.

‘I had to. I didn’t have any choice.’

‘That’s what I mean.’

She turned to me and smiled her warm friendly smile. The sun shone off her short brown hair. She was wearing a white T-shirt and a long cotton skirt, light summer clothes that gently rested on the soft roundness of her body.

Jamie didn’t deserve her.

So I stayed with Kate and Jamie. I spent a couple of days sorting out my flat. This involved talking to letting agents, getting a plumber in to fix the boiler, tidying up, packing, and hiring a van for a morning to move my stuff, eighty per cent of which was books. The agents were optimistic that they would find a tenant at a rent that would almost cover the mortgage.

I began work again on my thesis. I had thought that resurrecting the missing chapters would be desperately tedious, but actually it wasn’t. I could remember quite well what I had written, and although I needed to dig around in my notes a lot, even that I enjoyed. And the thesis was taking better shape second time round. But I hadn’t made adequate notes of all the references I needed. For these I would have to spend a couple of days at the School of Russian Studies’ library in London. Most of the rest I could do from Dockenbush Farm.

It was a very pleasant place to work, especially in May. There was a guest room at the top of the house. I fixed up a table and chair in front of the window, which supported the brand new Apple Mac I had bought in anticipation of insurance money. The view was over the top of the apple trees to a couple of fields of young barley and a low wooded hill beyond. It was idyllic. I worked a full day, eight till eight, with an hour off for lunch with Kate and Oliver. I was able to throw myself into Pushkin’s world and forget my own. Ricardo, Eduardo and Dekker were still there, but they seemed a long way away.

The only reminder was Jamie, who brought with him the smell of Dekker as he returned each evening. It soon wore off: he didn’t want to talk about it; neither did Kate nor I. The atmosphere in the house had improved since their argument on my arrival. We had fun in the evenings: we stayed up late drinking and talking. It felt almost like a holiday.

I phoned the police station in Kentish Town to see how they were getting on in solving Crime Number 1521634/E. I wasn’t surprised to hear that they had got nowhere. None of the stolen goods had turned up. They had interviewed Eduardo, who had denied all knowledge of the burglary, and they had been unable to find any connection between him and it, apart from my suspicions.

I thought intermittently about Isabel, rather than constantly. I felt guilty about this, although I realized it was probably a good thing. Because when I did think of her, I felt anxious, guilty, worried, uncertain, angry. We had spent so few days truly together, and it had been so far away. I kept on asking myself whether the relationship would have worked, and I kept on telling myself it would. Very well. And then I got angry that I’d been prevented from finding out.

I phoned Luís to see if there was any news. He was pleased to hear from me. He said he had introduced KBN, a large Dutch bank with good Brazilian connections, to Humberto Alves, and suggested they talk about favela financing. It would take a couple of months to resurrect the deal, but Humberto was confident something would come out of it. I was glad Ricardo hadn’t been enraged for nothing.

‘No news of Isabel?’ I asked.

There was a heavy silence. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Nothing.’

‘Have the police found anything yet?’

‘No.’ He paused. I let the silence hang there. ‘She’s still alive, you know. They haven’t found a body yet. If she was dead, they would have found her. I know she’s alive. I can feel it.’

‘I hope you’re right,’ I said. And I had to believe he was.

One evening, in my second week at Dockenbush Farm, Dekker intruded. Jamie was tense when he returned home, and this time the tension didn’t leave after the first glass of wine. It was time for our taboo to be broken.

‘What’s up?’ asked Kate.

‘Things aren’t good at work.’

‘What is it?’

Jamie glanced at me. ‘Nick’ll probably love this. I think we’ve got big problems. The market’s been in free-fall all last week, and it looks like it’s continuing this week.’

‘What happened?’ I asked. I had deliberately stopped reading the Latin American news in the papers.

‘Mexico is up shit creek. Banks are going bust all over the place, the government has a huge debt-refinancing burden to deal with this year, and everyone’s scared.’

‘And Dekker is still long that two billion Mexican deal they led last month?’

‘Yes, that, and a lot more besides. Mexico is off twenty points and Ricardo keeps buying more. You see, his theory is that the US bailed out Mexico in nineteen ninety-five, and they’ll do it again. As far as he’s concerned, it’s a great opportunity to buy into a panic at the bottom. He’s got extra funding from Chalmet, you know, the Swiss bank that owns twenty-nine per cent of us. We have enough Mexican paper to fill the entire Canary Wharf tower.’

‘Exactly how much is that?’

Jamie winced. ‘We’re long four billion of Mexico, and two billion of other stuff.’

‘Jesus! What happened? Is Ricardo losing his nerve?’

‘Ricardo isn’t. The US Congress is. Have you heard of the Pinnock Bill?’

‘No.’

‘It’s a new piece of legislation that will require Congress to approve any emergency-aid package above a certain size. It’s specifically designed to prevent the US government bailing out Mexico again.’

‘Will it get through? Won’t the President veto it?’

‘Maybe, maybe not. There are deals within deals to be done on this one. Let’s just say that it has made Mexico’s situation more uncertain. Some of the Bradys are down in the thirties.’

Whew! I remembered they were trading in the sixties and seventies a month before. ‘So, no bonus this year?’

Jamie sighed. ‘It’s worse than that. Our capital was one and a half billion dollars at the beginning of this year. At today’s prices our losses are bigger than that now. Technically we’re insolvent. Of course, all the losses are unrealized. And no one outside the group knows about it, not even Lord Kerton. There’s still a chance that the market can bail us out. But until then, we’re relying on money from Chalmet and creative accounting.’

Jamie was right. I was pleased. But I did my best not to show it. He was worried. He didn’t want Dekker to disappear before he had received his first truly fat bonus.

But when I sat down to work the next morning, I found I couldn’t concentrate. The notes that had so absorbed me yesterday now lay spread out on the desk in front of me. My eyes were drawn to the window, and the apple trees below.

So Dekker were in deep shit? Great! My only regret was that I hadn’t put them there. I did feel slightly sorry for Jamie and some of the others who stood to lose their bonuses after all the work they had put in to get them. But Jamie was lucky enough to have Kate. What did he want with all that money?

Dekker would probably wriggle out somehow. Prices of Mexican bonds would bounce. Who knows, maybe Dekker would end up making a fortune instead of losing it? But right now they were weak, vulnerable. If I wanted my revenge, now was the time.

And I did want revenge. Ricardo and his brother had destroyed my career, stolen my thesis, beaten me up and forced me out of my flat, all with apparent impunity. The arrogance of it rankled. I couldn’t let them get away with it. What had Ricardo said? ‘If you’re not with me, you’re against me.’ Well, I was against him all right.

But what could I do?

I remembered Kate suggesting Jamie should get a job at Bloomfield Weiss. That would annoy Ricardo a little, true. But he wouldn’t much care if I joined them. Not that they’d have me, with my experience in finance stretching to less than two months.

Wait a moment. I’d got it. It seemed absurd at first, but the more I thought about it the more sense it made. I pushed Pushkin to one side, and scribbled thoughts down on a clean sheet of paper, smiling broadly to myself.

I would need some luck. But, if I pulled this off, Dekker was finished. And I would be responsible.