Timothy's game

Two

Late in May, Timothy Cone comes off a case that’s a real doozy. Cone’s an investigator for Haldering amp; Co., an outfit on John Street that provides “financial intelligence” for corporate and individual clients.

Early in May, a venture capital partnership hired Haldering to look into something called Ozam Biotechnology, Inc. Ozam had been advertising in the business media with big headlines: NEW ISSUE! Shares of Ozam available at ten bucks.

The legal and accounting departments of Haldering amp; Co. couldn’t find any record of Ozam anywhere. It apparently had no bank accounts, wasn’t chartered by the State of New York, nor was it registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

So Timothy Cone went to work. He soon found there were two other eyes doing the same thing: a guy from the SEC and a woman from the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.

The three finally discover that Ozam just doesn’t exist. It is an out-and-out stock swindle dreamed up by a con man named Porfirio Le Blanc. How much loot he took in on those fraudulent ads they never do determine, but it must have been hefty because when Porfirio flies the coop, he flies first-class to Bolivia.

No one is interested in trying to extradite the rascal; just getting him out of the country is enough. So the Immigration and Naturalization Service is told to put Senor Le Blanc on the “watch list,” and Timothy Cone returns to his cubbyhole office to write out his report.

When he tosses it onto the desk of Samantha Whatley, who bosses the five Haldering amp; Co. investigators, he slumps in the doorway while she reads it.

“You’re a lousy speller,” she tells him. Then she shakes her head in disbelief. “Can you believe this? A guy takes out ads in newspapers, and people send him money. Fan-tastic.”

“It’s happened before,” Cone says, shrugging. “Years ago there was an ex-carny pitchman working the Midwest. He bought ads in small-town newspapers. All the ad said was: ‘Last chance to send in your dollar,’ with a P.O. Box number in Chicago. He was doing okay until the postal guys caught up with him.”

“Barnum was right,” Sam says. “Well, here’s a new one for you.”

She holds out a file folder, and Cone shuffles forward to take it.

“What is it?” he asks. “Some guy selling the Brooklyn Bridge?”

“No,” Sam says, “this is heavy stuff. The client is Pistol and Burns. You know them?”

“The investment bankers? Sure, I know them. Very old. Very conservative. What’s their problem?”

“They think they may have a leak in their Mergers and Acquisitions Department.”

“Oh-ho. Another inside trading scam?”

“Could be,” Samantha says. “Tim, this is a new client with mucho dinero. Will you, for God’s sake, try to dress neatly and talk like a gentleman.”

“Don’t I always?”

She stares at him. “Out!” she says.

Back in his office, he opens a fresh pack of Camels (second of the day) and lights up. He parks his scuffed yellow work shoes atop the scarred desk, and starts flipping through the Pistol amp; Burns file.

It’s a sad story of unbridled greed-and a not uncommon one. About a year ago, P amp;B is engineering a buyout between a big food-products conglomerate and a smaller outfit that’s making a nice buck with a nationwide chain of stores that sell cookies, all kinds, made on the premises, guaranteed fresh every morning. The takeover is a marriage made in heaven. Or, as they say on Wall Street, the synergism is there.

As usual, the ladies and gents in the Mergers and Acquisitions Department of Pistol amp; Burns work in conditions of secrecy that would do credit to the CIA-so word of the impending deal won’t leak out prematurely. But it does. The computers of the Securities and Exchange Commission pick up evidence of heavy trading in the cookie company in the weeks prior to the signing of the buyout documents and the public announcement. The cookie stock goes up almost ten points.

So the SEC launches an investigation to try to discover the insider leak. It turns out that a yuppie-type in the Mortgage Insurance Department of Pistol amp; Burns, who has nothing to do with mergers and acquisitions and is supposed to know zilch about them, is a drinking buddy of another yuppie in the M amp;A section. Not only that, but they’re both doing coke and shagging the same twitch who supplies the nose candy and also dances naked at a joint on East 38th Street called Aristotle’s Dream.

The whole thing is a mess. The two Pistol amp; Burns’ yuppies confess their sins and admit they made almost a quarter-mil dealing in shares and options of the cookie corporation in the month prior to the takeover. What’s worse, they were paid for their insider information by arbitrageurs and attorneys who work for other investment bankers.

This clique of insiders, all with MBAs or law degrees, make a nice buck until the SEC lowers the boom, and everyone has to cough up their profits, pay fines, and is banned from the securities business for three years. The two original Pistol amp; Burns insiders also get a year in the slammer, which means they’ll be out in four or five months. There is no record of what happens to the skin dancer at Aristotle’s Dream.

The entire scandal is a painful embarrassment for Pistol amp; Burns. It is one of the few remaining investment-banker partnerships on the Street. The original partners, Leonard K. Pistol and G. Watson Burns, have long since gone to the great trading pit in the sky, but the present partners try to preserve the stern probity and high principles and ideals of the two founders. Their oil portraits glower down on the executive dining room, spoiling a lot of appetites.

But Pistol amp; Burns muddles through, cooperating fully with investigators and prosecutors from the SEC and district attorney’s office. P amp;B also appoints one of the senior partners, Mr. G. Fergus Twiggs, to be Chief of Internal Security. He institutes a series of reforms to make certain such an insider coup will never again tarnish the reputation of such a venerable and respected institution.

(Which somewhat amuses students of the history of our nation’s financial community. They happen to know that Leonard K. Pistol kept a teenage mistress, and G. Watson Burns drank a quart of brandy every day, without fail, and once had to be dissuaded from making a cash offer to buy the U.S. Government.)

Timothy Cone, reading all this with enjoyment, pauses long enough to light another cigarette and call down to the local deli for a cheeseburger, an order of French fries, a kosher dill, and two cold Heinekens. He munches on his lunch as he continues reading the preliminary report provided by the client.

After enduring the shame of what comes to be known on Wall Street as The Great Cookie Caper, and after tightening up their internal security precautions, Pistol amp; Burns now finds itself facing another disgrace involving insider trading.

They’re in the last stages of finagling a leveraged buyout of a corporation that makes clothes for kiddies, including diapers with the label of a hotshot lingerie designer and little striped overalls just like gandy dancers once wore. The buyers are a group of the company’s top executives, and the transaction includes an issue of junk bonds.

Everything is kept strictly hush-hush, and the number of people with a need to know is kept to a minimum. But during the last two weeks, the volume of trading in Wee Tot Fashions, Inc., usually minuscule, has quadrupled, with the stock up five bucks. An investigator from the SEC is already haunting the paneled corridors of Pistol amp; Burns, trying to discover who is leaking word of the upcoming deal.

“This state of affairs cannot be allowed to continue,” Mr. G. Fergus Twiggs concludes firmly.

So Timothy Cone calls the phone number on the letterhead of the client’s report.

“Pistol and Burns.” A woman’s voice: brisk and efficient.

“Could I speak to Mr. Twiggs?”

“May I ask who is calling?”

“Sure,” Cone says cheerfully.

Long pause.

“Who is calling, please,” she says faintly.

“Timothy Cone. I’m an investigator with Haldering and Company.”

After a wait of almost a minute, he’s put through. Twiggs has a deep, rambling voice. Cone thinks it sounds rum-soaked, aged in oak casks, but maybe that’s the way all old investment bankers talk. Cone wouldn’t know; he doesn’t play croquet.

Their conversation is brief. G. Fergus Twiggs agrees to meet at 10:00 A.M. the following morning to discuss “this disastrous and lamentable situation.”

“Uh-huh,” Cone says. “Okay, I’ll be at your office at ten tomorrow morning. Who’s the SEC investigator?”

“His name is Jeremy Bigelow. Do you know him?”

“Yeah,” Cone says, “I know Jerry. I worked a case with him earlier this month. Good man.”

“Seems rather young to me,” Twiggs says, and then sighs. “But at my age, everyone seems rather young to me.”

Cone smiles. The guy sounds almost human.

It’s a close and grainy evening; when he walks home from John Street to his loft on lower Broadway, he can taste the air on his tongue. It isn’t nice. He stops at local stores to buy a large jar of spaghetti with meat sauce, a jug of Gallo Hearty Burgundy, and a link of kielbasa for Cleo, his neutered tomcat, who eats everything, including cockroaches, fish heads, chicken bones-and thrives.

Cone notes mournfully that the outer door of his cast-iron commercial building has once again been jimmied-an almost weekly occurrence. Since it is now later than 6:00 P.M., the ancient birdcage elevator is shut down for the night, so he climbs the six flights of iron staircase to his apartment.

Cleo is waiting for him, and gives him the ankle-rub treatment, crying piteously, until he hands over the sausage. Then the cat takes its treasure under the old claw-footed bathtub and gnaws contentedly while the Wall Street dick mixes himself a vodka and water. He works on that as he heats up the spaghetti in a battered saucepan and sets his desk that doubles as a dining table. The china and cutlery are bits and pieces of this and that. The wineglasses are empty jars of Smucker’s orange marmalade.

Samantha Whatley shows up a little after seven o’clock. She’s picked up a container of mixed greens at a salad bar, and also has two strawberry tarts for dessert and a small chunk of halvah for Cleo.

An hour later, they’ve got their feet up on the littered table and are drinking noggins of cheap Italian brandy with black coffee. They decide to save the tarts, but Cleo gets the halvah, mewling with delight.

“Good dinner,” Cone says.

“Not very,” Sam says. “Do you have to buy canned spaghetti?”

“It wasn’t canned,” he tells her. “It came in a jar.”

“Whatever. Is it so difficult to buy a package of pasta, boil it up, and add your own sauce?”

“Oh-ho,” he says, beginning to steam, “now I’m supposed to be a gourmet cook, am I? Bullshit! Either eat what the kitchen provides or bring your own. And now that we got that settled, you staying the night?”

“Half the night,” she says. “Maybe till midnight or so.”

“Okay,” he says equably. “I’ll put you in a cab.”

“My hero,” she says. “You talk to Pistol and Burns?”

“Yep. I’m seeing G. Fergus Twiggs tomorrow morning at ten. I’ll be in late.”

“So what else is new?” She looks at the mattress on the linoleum floor of the loft. It’s been spread with clean sheets. “I feel horny,” she says.

“So what else is new?” he says.

Timothy Cone is a scrawny, hawkish man who’s never learned to shave close enough. Samantha Whatley is a tall drink of water with the lean body of a fashion model and the muscles of a woman at home on a balance beam. He is taller, but stooped, with a shambling gait. She is sharp-featured: coffin jaw and blue-green eyes. His spiky hair is gingery; her long auburn hair is usually worn up, tightly coiled. His nose is a hatchet, and his big ears flop. Her back is hard and elegant. His skin is pale, freckled. She is dark, with a ropy body that holds secret curves and warm shadows. He is all splinters, with the look of a worn farmer: pulled tendons, used muscles.

They have nothing in common except …

Naked on the floor mattress they have another skirmish. Not combat so much as guerrilla warfare with no winners and no losers. They will not surrender, either of them, but assault each other with whimpers and yelps, awaiting the end of the world. They think capitulation shameful, and their passion is fed by their pride.

They recognize something of this. Their relationship is sexual chess that must inevitably end in a draw. Still, the sweat and grunts are pleasure enough for two closed-in people who would rather slit their wrists than admit their vulnerability.

Shortly after midnight, he conducts her downstairs and stops an empty cab.

“Take care,” she says lightly.

“Yeah,” Cone says. “You, too.”

Then he goes back up to his desolate loft, eats both strawberry tarts, drinks a jar of vodka, and wonders what the hell it’s all about.

The offices of Pistol amp; Burns, Investment Bankers, on Wall Street, look like a genteel but slightly frowsty gentlemen’s club. The paneled walls display antique hunting prints in brass frames. The carpeting seems ankle-deep. Employees tiptoe rather than walk, and speak in hushed whispers. Even the ring of telephones is muted to a polite buzz. The atmosphere bespeaks old wealth, and Timothy Cone is impressed-not for the first time-by the comfortable serenity that avarice can create.

He is kept waiting only ten minutes, which he endures stoically, and then is ushered into the private office of G. Fergus Twiggs, P amp;B’s Chief of Internal Security. This chamber, as large as Cone’s loft, is more of the same. But on the floor is an enormous, worn Persian prayer rug, and on the beige walls are oak-framed watercolors of sailing yachts, most with spinnakers set.

G. Fergus Twiggs is a veritable toby jug of a man: short, squat, plump, with a smile and manner so beneficent that the Wall Street dick can see him with a pewter tankard of ale in one fist and a clay pipe in the other.

He is clad in a three-piece, dove gray flannel suit of such surpassing softness that it could have been woven from the webs of white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant spiders. But the pale blue eyes are not soft, nor do they twinkle. They are the unblinking, basilisk eyes of an investment banker.

“Thank you for coming by,” Twiggs says genially, shaking hands. He gets Cone seated in a leather chair alongside his mastodonic desk. “I needn’t tell you how upsetting this entire matter has become; the whole house is disturbed.”

“Look, Mr. Twiggs,” Cone says, “there’s not much I can do about the Wee Tot Fashions deal. The cat is out of the bag on that one. You’ll just have to take your lumps.”

“I realize that. The problem is how to prevent it from happening again.”

“You can’t,” Timothy says. “Unless you figure a way to repeal human greed-and I doubt if you can do that. Listen, how do you define insider trading?”

“Define it?” Twiggs says, looking at him curiously. “Why, it’s the illegal use of confidential information about planned or impending financial activities for the purpose of making a personal profit.”

“Yeah, well, that sounds very neat, but it’s not that simple. Insider trading has never been exactly defined, even by the Supreme Court. Let me give you a for-instance. Suppose one of your guys is working every night on a megabuck deal. His wife is furious because he’s continually late for dinner. So, to explain his long hours, he tells her he’s slaving on this big buyout of the ABC Corporation by the XYZ Corporation. His wife mentions it to her hairdresser. He mentions it to another customer. She tells her husband. The husband mentions it to his car dealer, and the dealer runs out and buys ABC Corporation stock and winds up making a bundle. Now who’s guilty there? The original investment banker didn’t profit from his inside knowledge; he just had a big mouth. And the guy who did profit, the car dealer, was just betting on a stock tip. He didn’t have any inside knowledge. How do you stop that kind of thing?”

“Yes,” Twiggs says slowly, “I see what you mean.”

“Also,” Cone goes on, “the leak on the Wee Tot Fashions deal may not have been in your house at all. The arbitrageurs have a zillion ways of sniffing out a deal in the making while it’s still in the talking stage. They pick up one little hint, hear one little rumor, that XYZ is going to make an offer for ABC, and they go to work. They try to track the whereabouts of the chairman, president, and CEO of both corporations. They’ll even check the takeoffs, flight plans, and landings of corporate jets. They’ll bribe secretaries, porters, pilots, chauffeurs, office cleaning ladies, security guards-anyone who can possibly add to their poop on who is meeting whom and what’s going on. There’s a lot of money to be made on advance knowledge of deals in the works, and the arbs want some of it. But I wouldn’t call that insider trading-would you? It’s just shrewd investigative work by guys who want a piece of the action.”

“I suppose you’re right,” the little man says, rubbing his forehead wearily. “Very depressing. That men would go to such lengths to make a profit. It wasn’t like that in the old days.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Cone says. “In the old days there was only a handful of people who knew about a deal in the making-just the principals and a few lawyers-so it was relatively easy to spot the gonnif if someone leaked or made an illegal profit on his own. But now, in any big-money deal, there are hundreds of people with inside knowledge: corporate officers and their staffs, the investment bankers and their staffs, attorneys and their staffs, accountants and their staffs. Then you’ve got secretaries, telephone operators, and messengers. Any one of them could spill or make a dirty buck.”

“Ah, me,” Twiggs says, sighing. “So you believe it’s impossible to stop insider trading?”

“Sure it is,” Cone says cheerily. “As long as people’s itch for a dollar overrides their ethics or morals or whatever the hell you want to call them.”

“I should think that heavier penalties might be effective.”

“Yeah?” Cone says. “Ever hear of the ‘hangup gimmick’?”

“The hangup gimmick? What on earth is that?”

“An arbitrageur hears a rumor that ABC Corporation may be bought out by the XYZ Corporation. The arb has a drinking buddy with the legal firm that handles ABC. He calls his lawyer buddy and says, ‘I hear XYZ has made an offer for ABC. If the rumor is true, don’t say a word. I’ll stay on the phone. But if you’re silent and then hang up after ten seconds, I’ll know which way to jump, and you’ll get your share.’ So the ten seconds pass in silence, the lawyer hangs up, and the arb rushes to buy ABC stock. Who do you prosecute? The attorney, the insider, hasn’t leaked a word, and can swear to it in a court of law. How do you prosecute him? There are a hundred scams like that. So when you talk about heavier punishment for insider trading, you’ve got to realize how tough it is to get a conviction.”

G. Fergus Twiggs gives him a quirky smile. “Are you trying to talk yourself out of a job, Mr. Cone?”

“Nah. I just want you to understand the problems involved. And I’d like to know what you expect Haldering and Company to do about them.”

The investment banker takes a handsome pipe from his top desk drawer. He looks down at it, fondles it, then strokes the bowl slowly between his fleshy nose and cheek, inspecting it as skin oil brings out the grain of the brier.

“Being Chief of Internal Security at Pistol and Burns,” he says ruefully, “is not a task I sought or relish. I have had no experience in this rather distasteful field. I suppose I was selected for the job because, though it may be difficult for you to believe, I am the youngest of the senior partners. In any event, what’d I’d like you to do is spend as much time in our offices as you feel is necessary and review all the security precautions I have instituted. Be as critical as you like. Make any suggestions you wish that will make insider trading at Pistol and Burns, if not impossible, then at least more difficult.”

“Yeah,” Cone says, “I can do that. As long as you understand I can’t make the place airtight. No one can. I’ll tackle your setup like I was an employee, out to make a dishonest buck from trading on inside secrets. That should be easy; I’ve got a criminal mind.”

Mr. Twiggs smiles again and rises. “I think you’re exactly the man for the job,” he says. “When do you plan to start?”

“How about tomorrow? Could you spread the word to guards and secretaries and such that I’ll be wandering around the place and have no intention of boosting women’s purses or swiping a typewriter?”

“Certainly. Is there anything else you need?”

“I don’t think so, thanks. I’d start today, but first I want to compare notes with Jeremy Bigelow, the SEC investigator. Maybe he’s got some ideas on how the Wee Tot Fashions deal was leaked.”

He walks back to John Street. It’s a warm, springy day, but the wind is boisterous, and Cone isn’t sweating in his ratty olive drab parka and black leather cap. He shambles up Broadway, thinking of the interview and wondering if Twiggs himself might not be making a quick, illicit buck on Pistol amp; Burns’ deals. The guy looks like Santa Claus, but maybe his bag is stuffed with illegal greenbacks.

The Wall Street dick ponders how much gelt it would take for him, Cone, to turn sour. Half a mil? A mil? Five mil? But that kind of thinking is strictly wet dreams; no one is going to offer him that much loot to go rancid. Besides, what’s the point of being rich? Right now he’s got a job, a place to sleep, a rotten cat, and enough pocket money to buy beer and ham hocks. He even has Samantha-sort of. What more could a growing boy want?

Back in his cubbyhole office, he takes off cap and anorak and lets them drop to the floor because some office thief has snaffled his coat tree. He lights his fourth or fifth cigarette of the day and sits down behind his scarred desk. He calls Jeremy Bigelow at the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“Jerry?”

“Speaking. Who’s this?”

“Timothy Cone at Haldering and Company.”

“Hey, old buddy! I was thinking of giving you a call. I hear you guys got the Pistol and Burns account.”

“Bad news travels fast. Listen, Jerry, you looked into a possible leak on the Wee Tot Fashions deal, didn’t you?”

“That’s right.” Bigelow’s voice turns cautious. “I’ve been working it. You got something for me?”

“Not a jot or tittle, or tot or jittle, whichever the hell it is. Anyway, it adds up to zilch. But I’d like to buy you lunch and pick your brains.”

“Lunch? Today?”

“Sure.”

“Why not,” the SEC investigator says. “Where?”

“I feel like eating street food. Okay by you?”

Bigelow sighs. “The last of the big-time spenders,” he says. “All right, I’ll eat street. I’ll even come over to your place. Meet you outside at, say, twelve-thirty. How does that sound?”

“Just right. There’s a new stand near Trinity that’s selling hot roti goat. How does that grab you?”

“Instant ulcers-but I’ll give it a go. See you.”

They meet outside the Haldering amp; Co. office and start ambling down Broadway. The day has thickened, with clotted clouds blocking out the sun. There’s a smell of rain in the air, but it hasn’t stopped the lunch-hour throngs from flocking to the street for their falafel fix.

Manhattan is the biggest outdoor buffet in the world. Especially in the financial district, the umbrella carts, vans, trucks, and knockdown booths are all over the place. Foul weather or fair, the street vendors are out hustling and probably dreaming of the day they can build their taco stand into The Four Seasons or maybe sell franchises.

What do you feel like eating? Not falafel? Not hot roti goat? Not tacos? Then how about fried chicken with jalapeno sauce, seeded rolls with cold cuts, sausage heroes, gyros, foot-long franks, turkey hamburgers, pizza, soups hot and cold, Acapulco salads, shish kebab, Philadelphia steak sandwiches, burritos, shrimp parmesan, tortillas, Ben amp; Jerry’s ice cream, chocolate-covered Oreos, coffee, tea, milk, colas, cakes, pies, pastries, nuts, fresh fruit? Sound okay? And you never have to leave a tip!

Cone and Jeremy Bigelow begin their peripatetic luncheon. The first stop is for barley and mushroom soup. They throw away the plastic spoons and drink the rich sludge directly from the foam containers. They try the hot roti goat. Not bad. Then they stop at a Chinese booth for slivers of bamboo stuck through chunks of barbecued pork and kiwi slices. Then cans of cola and ice cream bars covered with a quarter-inch of dark Belgian chocolate.

They eat as they stroll, as everyone else is doing. Meanwhile, between sips and bites, they talk shop.

“What’s your take on that Twiggs?” Cone asks.

“I think he’s straight,” Bigelow says. “A gentleman of the old school. But not too swift when it comes to street smarts. He wanted to hook up everyone at Pistol and Burns to a lie detector. I had to explain to him how easy it is to beat the machine.”

“Yeah,” Cone says. “Like urinalysis for drugs. There’s a couple of ways you can beat that even with an observer there watching you pee in a plastic cup.”

“Please,” the SEC man says, “not while I’m eating.”

“So how do you figure the Wee Tot Fashions leak? The arbitrageurs?”

“I think so, and that’s what I’m going to put in my report. I don’t believe anyone at Pistol and Burns was on the take. It was just rumor and good detective work by the arbs. Those guys can put two and two together and come up with twenty-two. We checked all the trading in Wee Tot in the last few weeks. Not the odd lots, of course. Just the big trades, like ten thousand shares and up. Most were handled by brokerage houses the arbs use. I looked for personal connections with Pistol and Burns staff, and came up with zip. There was one big trade, ten thousand shares, by an amateur. A woman named Sally Steiner. But she works for a garbage collection outfit on Eleventh Avenue. She couldn’t have any access to inside information. She plays the market for fun and games, and just made a lucky pick. Other than that, there’s nothing to justify our pushing this thing any farther. What’s your interest in this, Tim? What does Twiggs expect Haldering and Company to do?”

“He just wants me to double-check his security precautions.”

“That sounds easy enough,” Jeremy Bigelow says. “Most of these investment banking houses are as holey as Swiss cheese. You could stroll in and walk out with their checkbooks, and no one would notice, especially if you were dressed like a Harvard MBA.”

The SEC investigator is a self-assured guy with such strength of character that he can eat one salted peanut. When Cone first met him, Bigelow came on strong, like working for the Securities and Exchange Commission was akin to holding high office in the Papacy. The Wall Street dick had to swat him down a few times, but then Jerry relaxed, and they were able to work together without too much hassle.

He’s a beanpole of a gink who equates height with superiority-but that’s okay; superior shrimps cause more trouble. Cone admires him because he can drink gin martinis. Cone loves gin martinis but can’t handle them, and leaves them strictly alone-especially since an incident several years ago when he ended up in Hoboken, N.J., in bed with a lady midget.

“I got to get back to the treadmill,” Bigelow says. “Thanks for the lunch. I’ll probably be popping Tums all afternoon, but it tasted good. Let’s eat street again-my treat next time.”

“Sure,” Cone says. “Listen, that woman you mentioned who made the big trade in Wee Tot Fashions. … What was her name?”

“Sally Steiner. Why the interest?”

“Did you talk to her?”

“Of course,” Bigelow says, offended. “That’s what they’re paying me coolie wages for. She’s a tough bimbo who practically runs that waste disposal business I told you about. Her father owns it. She claims she bought Wee Tot stock because she wants to get out of garbage and open a store that sells kids’ clothes. She figured the annual reports of Wee Tot would help her learn the business. It makes sense.”

“Sure it does,” Timothy Cone says. “Nice seeing you again, Jerry. Give my best to the wife.”

Bigelow looks at him. “How do you know I’m married?” he asks. “I never told you that.”

“Beats me,” Cone says, shrugging. “I just assumed. You’ve got that married look. Also, you’ve got a pinched band of skin around your third finger, left hand, where I figure you wear a ring but maybe take it off during the day in case you meet something interesting.”

Bigelow laughs. “You goddamn sherlock,” he says. “You’ve got me dead to rights. I better watch myself with you; you’re dangerous.”

“Nah,” Cone says, “not me. I’m just a snoop. Thanks, Jerry.”

“For what?”

“All the info you gave me-like Sally Steiner and so forth. I owe you one.”

“Look,” the SEC man says, “if you find out anything more about the Wee Tot Fashions leak, you’ll let me know?”

“Absolutely,” the Wall Street dick vows. “I’m no glory hound.”

They shake hands, and Cone watches the other man move away, towering over everyone else on the street. Then he trudges back to Haldering amp; Co. He stops on the way to buy a knish. He’s still hungry.