Colin Harrison - Afterburn

"Your success is your vulnerability," Ming observed. "But so, too, is any weakness."

"We're very aware of Manila Telecom," said Charlie tightly. "I mean, I take their sales reports home with me."

Ming watched him. Don't blink, Charlie thought. He blinked.

"As you know, Charlie, corporate financing in Hong Kong is very dynamic right now." Ming spoke like a man gazing across a calm expanse of water. "Our exposure is huge. And we have recently increased our presence in the Philippines."

"Is the government pressuring you to help Manila Telecom?" asked Charlie. "I mean, hell, let's lay it out here."

"I cannot answer that question directly." Ming slipped a tiny shrimp into his mouth. "But I can say they do not fully appreciate our American lending portfolio."

"Great," answered Charlie. "I understand you loud and clear. The other thing I've heard is that the MT sales reps are promising their customers- our customers-a much larger product line in a year or two, with order-fills getting much faster. We've been assuming they have a lot of capital coming in, either through a new stock offering or a direct loan, or even both."

Ming nodded.

"You're not saying?" Charlie asked, watching Barbara Walters get up from her table, hair as soft-looking as a football helmet.

Ming let his fork rest on his plate. He looked away in thought, as if listening to himself tune an obscure and difficult musical instrument. "I am unable to comment on the financing strategies of the bank's clientele," he said.

Charlie leaned forward, his back hurting. "You're telling me that your bank has opened a new office in the same city where my major competitor is located, that your bank has entered into some kind of stock offering or financing deal with them, money that could be used in the very same hostile buyout that is hinted at by the research generated by your very same bank? Is that what you are telling me?"

Ming lifted the fork to his mouth, his expression unchanged.

"You're fucking telling me that!"

The man sat in awkward silence.

"The situation within our bank is very complicated," Ming said finally. "Let's discuss the Q4 surface-mount transformer."

"It's in goddamn development," Charlie hissed. "You know that."

"You've been saying that for six months."

"It's been true for six months."

"I think it's further along than you explained," Ming said.

"We're pleased," Charlie admitted. "But we're not going to oversell it. We need to test it, size it, figure out the costs."

"If that switch hits the market by April, you will have an advantage on MT."

"Yes, until they copy it," Charlie said bitterly. "And sell a bad version of it at ninety percent of our price."

He wondered if Ming was telling him that the internal politics of the bank put Ming and his loan to Charlie in jeopardy. Or that the bank was quietly betting on the whole sector by supporting both companies. Or that the bank was trying to decide which company to back. Or that he, Ming, knew enough about MT's internal intelligence to know that Charlie could seize an important advantage by accelerating the development of the Q4 switch at all costs. Or, quite differently, that he, Ming, wanted to know the exact status of the Q4 so he'd know how to advise MT on the timing of its attack on Teknetrix.

Mr. Ming's trout arrived, swimming through a bed of rice, one eye turned inquiringly upward. Hooked, poached, and soon to be eaten. That's me, Charlie thought. But he could attack back. They could update their poison pill provisions, they could issue stock to water down whatever MT had accumulated, they could throw themselves at the mercy of another bank, refinance the construction loan, pay off Ming, and ride again. And they could accelerate the Q4, nail the factory's start-up date, jolt forward in market share. Afterburn, he told himself. Time to go into afterburn and get out of trouble.

"I need to fly to Shanghai," he announced to Ellie when he walked in the door to their apartment.

Her mouth dropped. "No."

"Yes."

She'd been sorting the mail. "You just got back."

"I know. But the municipal officials in Shanghai have stopped our construction. Our principal construction guy is supposedly in Shenzhen dealing with concrete, although I suspect that's a lie. There's some other problem. I'll leave Thursday morning."

She tossed the envelopes down. "Charlie, you have people whose job it is to fix these things."

"I'm needed on the other end. It's a one-hour conversation, but it has to be face-to-face."

She breathed angrily. "I need you here."

"My company needs me there."

"Your wife needs you here."

"It's a very quick trip, Ellie."

"Then will you see it when you come back?" she asked. "Please?"

"What?"

"The house. Vista del Mar."

"Maybe there are other places we should look at," he answered. "If this idea means so much to you."

"No, I think this is the place. I've been very-" She looked at him fearfully. "I'm searching for the word."

"Thorough?"

"Yes." She smiled in embarrassment.

"Careful? Comprehensive? Diligent? Scrupulous? Have you been all of those things, too, Ellie?"

She began to cry.

She scares me, he thought. "What? What is it?" He caught Ellie's arm and gently turned her around to face him. Her eyes were unblinking, her mouth was set. "You bought it, didn't you?"

"Yes." She watched his reaction. "Yes, Charlie, I did."

"How much?"

"A lot. I put down the deposit. I signed all the papers."

"Couldn't you have discussed it?"

"You would have said no."

He eased down into one of the dining-room chairs. "There's no going back?"

"I paid the membership fee and committed us."

Something like a quarter of a million dollars. "I haven't noticed any cash gone."

She smiled in pride.

"How'd you do it?" he asked.

"I sold some of the jewelry Mother left me."

"That couldn't be that much."

"I got sixty-two thousand for all of it."

"What about Julia? I thought you wanted to give it to her."

"I showed it all to her and let her pick out what she wanted. She just wanted one ring and one necklace."

"Sixty-two thousand doesn't get you into Vista del Muerte, baby."

"I put it into the stock market."

"The stock market has been lousy lately."

"Teknetrix has done well," she reminded him.

He stood up. "You didn't trade Teknetrix!"

She said nothing, only smiled.

"Ellie, all my trades have to be registered! The SEC doesn't distinguish between me and family members who buy the-"

She pressed her hand to his chest. "Give your wife a little credit."

"I don't understand."

"You also said your competition was doing very well."

"Manila Telecom?"

"You bring home reports on them every couple of weeks."

He frowned, barely believing her. "You've been reading my sales intelligence reports on Manila Telecom?"

"They do have a lot of information."

"You've been buying Manila Telecom?"

"If they're in strong competition with you, then they're a very good company."

He took two steps back. "You bought the stock of my competition so you could stick me in Vista del Muerte?"

"I wouldn't put it like that."

"That's beautiful. That's the best I ever heard. I thought I knew a few things, but no, old Charlie doesn't know nothing!"

She moved toward him. "I can tell you are sort of pleased."

"Well, shit, I suppose I'm amused."

"I wanted to surprise you."

"You did. You did that very well, for God's sake." He wondered how she'd done it. "Is this where you've been going so much? Someplace where you could trade?"

"There's a very nice young man down at the Charles Schwab office on Sixth Avenue. I didn't tell him about Teknetrix. All I said was that I wanted to trade Manila Telecom." Her pride was unmistakable. "I was very disciplined about it."