Paul Erdman - The Billion Dollar Sure Thing

That evening they enjoyed another two bottles of wine together and listened to Sammy’s newly acquired radio.

At nine the next morning a warden appeared to tell Bernoulli to collect all of his things. He shook hands with Sammy, bequeathed him the rest of his wine, and left.

By nine-thirty Bernoulli was back in the Euler Hotel. After a rather lame explanation to the man at the reception desk, he retrieved his key and within minutes was in the shower. It was amazing how quickly one felt permeated with the smell of prison.

DR. Bollinger, secretary-general of the Bank for International Settlements, was impatiently pacing up and down his living room. It was furnished in Louis XV. Real Louis XV. A fantastic blue silk Chinese rug covered the floor of the living room. A Paul Klee, a Renoir, two Kadinskys graced its walls. It was lovely.

Bollinger was a bachelor. He was also a homosexual. It never failed to astound the girls in the bank’s secretarial pool how Bollinger’s colleagues managed to overlook the man’s idiosyncrasy. But his colleagues knew quite well why. Bollinger was probably the most brilliantly inventive mind to appear on the international monetary scene in a decade. While all other international institutions appeared to be coming apart at the seams, the BIS experienced, if anything, growing prestige. This was due almost exclusively to Bollinger. He enjoyed the absolute trust and confidence, yes, respect, of all the important central bankers of the world. Although he had been educated at the University of Zurich, then Stanford, and finally the London School of Economics, he sported a French so abominable that by comparison even Edward Heath appeared to be a linguist. His background could hardly have been worse by Gallic standards—still the head of the Banque de France thought the world of the man. The ultimate test of all mortals.

The doorbell rang. It was Bernoulli. The two men knew each other on a formal basis. Yes, Minister Gerber had explained everything.

“Please have a seat, Dr. Bernoulli. May I offer you coffee, or perhaps tea?”

“No thanks, Dr. Bollinger. If you agree, I think we should get right at it,” answered Bernoulli. “First, where’s the safe?”

“Right over there, behind the Klee.”

“It’s rather a large canvas for a Klee.”

“He did it shortly before he died.”

“May I?”

“Certainly.”

Bernoulli took the painting down. It was a wall safe like thousands of others. Nothing special. Probably about ten years old. Easy. He rehung the picture and then returned to his chair.

“Aren’t you going to get some people over to take fingerprints and all that?”

“No. It would be a waste of time at this point. But if you insist—?”

“Of course not. But I just thought—”

“When exactly did you notice that the document was missing?”

“Just a few days ago. On Tuesday morning when I was going to take it to the office with me. That would have been October 28.”

“When had you last seen or used the document?”

“Last Monday.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean—‘why’?”

“Well, you’d had it here in Basel since the middle of the month. What prompted you to look for it, or at it, last Monday?”

“Bernoulli, we’re dealing here with highly complex matters and a highly complex document. Do you think I memorized it?”

“Just asking,” replied Bernoulli with the greatest of calm. “So in other words, it must have disappeared on Monday of this week.”

“Yes.”

“Where were you on Monday?”

“I spent the entire day at the office. I always lunch at the bank.”

“And the evening?”

“I freshened up after five and went out to a cocktail party. Then dinner. It was all in honour of the Belgian ambassador. He spent the day in Basel and the local government put on a do for him. I was invited along with at least fifty other people.”

“You probably came home fairly late?”

“Around midnight.”

“Notice anything unusual? You know, doors ajar that should not have been. Dirt on the rug. That sort of thing?”

“No. I went straight to bed. I don’t have a suspicious mind.”

“No? I thought everybody in the banking business had. No matter. In any case, I think it’s fairly well established when it happened. Monday evening between five and midnight.”

“Yes. The question now is who. And why.”

“I think I already know something about the ‘who’ part,” stated Bernoulli.

“But then why all the—”

“I said I think so. I’d rather not go into details at the moment, but we already appear to have some rather strong circumstantial evidence. A man named Sammy Bechot. Know him?”

“Never heard the name.”

“Looks a little like a beatnick. Twenty-seven years old. Average height. Fairly fat. Long hair, beard. Both dark. Mother tongue is French, but he speaks German quite well, with the usual accent. He’s a professional safecracker. Ring any bells?”

“Hardly.”

“We guessed as much. Fine, let’s try another approach now. And it’s extremely important that you concentrate,” stressed Bernoulli. “Do you mind if I smoke?”

“No, go right ahead.”

“Let’s go over your trip to London step by step. I am not particularly interested in what you did. I am extremely interested in whom you saw, whether deliberately, accidentally, or incidentally. Anybody and everybody who recognized you or could have recognized you.”

Bollinger nodded.

“First, who at the bank knew, or knows, about the purpose of your trip to London?”

“No one.”

“But surely your secretary or deputy must have known that you were meeting the American secretary of the treasury?”

“No, they did not then, nor do they have any knowledge of it now.”

“But how was the appointment arranged?”

“Secretary Crosby telephoned me at home to make the arrangements. Right here is where I took the call.” Bollinger pointed at a white telephone, neatly centred on a lace doily, which covered part of the top of an exquisite little side table that must have set Bollinger back at least a couple of thousand francs.

“Who lives with you?”

“No one. I am a bachelor, and my housekeeper, whom I’ve had for almost twenty years, takes care of the house during the day. She stays and cooks dinner only if I have guests. She is completely reliable and cannot possibly be involved in this dreadful thing.”

“I’ll accept that. So no one, absolutely no one here in Basel, knows about this document, nor about the purpose of your trip to London?”

“No one.”

“But you must have had some explanation for your flight over there.”

“I did give a very good one. The chancellor of the exchequer had repeatedly asked me to drop by to discuss the arrangement for unwinding the remnants of a very complex series of currency swaps which have developed over the years. I met him after my talks with Secretary Crosby, and we agreed on a most satisfactory series of steps to resolve this issue. In fact, my staff and I have been quite busy since my return with the implementation of our agreement.”

“Right. Now let’s concentrate on London itself.”

Bernoulli continued, “As I understand it, you flew over on the one o’clock flight on October 16. That would be sixteen days ago. I think it was a Thursday.”

“That’s all perfectly correct.”

“Now you arrived at Heathrow around two-fifteen local time. Did you talk to anybody at the airport or on the plane?”

“Nobody whatsoever.”

“Who met you in London?”

“No one. I rented a chauffeur-driven car from Hertz. I always do that. It’s only slightly more expensive than a taxi and immeasurably more comfortable. I went directly to the Savoy.”