Майкл Ридпат - The Marketmaker

I bought the Wall Street Journal every day. Things seemed neither better nor worse in Mexico. It was unclear what would happen to the Pinnock Bill in Congress. It seemed to have become sidetracked somehow in a negotiation over which military bases would be shut down in the continental United States.

It was difficult to focus on my thesis, but I did my best. Sitting in my room at the top of Kate and Jamie’s house, my mind kept drifting back to the deal. It was exhilarating. I spent many hours imagining the look on Ricardo’s face when he heard that Dekker had been sold from underneath him. To Bloomfield Weiss, of all people! Surely even he wouldn’t be able to keep his cool. He and Eduardo probably had plenty of cash stashed away for a rainy day, but this would hurt Ricardo much more than merely losing money. This would be a very public humiliation. A statement that the powerful Dekker machine that was so feared by the market was, in reality, nothing but a pile of worthless paper.

I thought of Isabel, and smiled wryly. I was sure she would appreciate it. If she was still alive. The familiar, chronic anxiety returned. I thought of calling Luís again to see if he had any news, but there was no point. I knew he would contact me as soon as he heard anything, if he ever heard anything.

I felt twinges of concern for the other people that worked at Dekker: Charlotte Baxter, Miguel, Pedro and, of course, Jamie. But Bloomfield Weiss intended to keep most of them, in fact it was the people they were really buying. They were good; even without Ricardo, they were the best in the market.

My musings were interrupted by a knock at the door.

‘Come in!’

It was Kate. Her face was serious. She carried a brown envelope in her right hand. I recognized it immediately.

Shit! It was an internal report prepared by analysts at Bloomfield Weiss on Dekker.

‘Where did you find that?’ I asked.

‘By the phone downstairs.’

Damn! I had rung Dwight Godfrey the day before, when Kate was picking up Oliver from his nursery school. He had wanted to know whether the Bloomfield Weiss report gelled with what I had seen at Dekker. It had, more or less.

‘Have you read it?’

‘Yes.’

Kate stood in the middle of the room. She had been a promising City lawyer. If she’d read it, she’d understood it. She was clearly rattled. I felt my cheeks redden; I had been caught.

‘Why have you got this report, Nick?’

I took a deep breath. Nothing but the truth would do now. ‘Because it was my idea.’

‘Your idea?’

‘Yes. I suggested to Bloomfield Weiss that they should buy Dekker.’

Kate sat on the bed, still clutching the envelope.

‘Why?’

I swallowed. ‘Ricardo deserves it,’ I said, slowly and deliberately. ‘And so does Eduardo. They’ve tried to ruin my career. They wrecked my flat, and destroyed my thesis. And it’s not just me they’ve trampled on. They’ve done the same thing to Dave. And to the poor bastards who live in the favelas. And who knows why Martin Beldecos was murdered?’

I was getting quite heated now. ‘Ricardo thinks that the rules of us lesser mortals don’t apply to him. Well, I’m going to show him he’s wrong. Let him feel what it’s like to have his life’s work taken away from him.’

Kate was looking at me hard.

‘But what about Jamie? This will put him in an impossible situation.’

I sighed. ‘I know. But Dekker’s sinking. If Bloomfield Weiss do take them over, Jamie should still have a job.’ I met her eyes. ‘Are you going to tell him?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Kate, and she stood up from the bed and left the room.

I spent the barest possible time with Kate and Jamie that evening at supper, before making an excuse about working on my thesis and escaping upstairs to my room. I sat at my desk, my notes in front of me, my mind elsewhere. Would she tell him? What would his reaction be?

Sure, I had my justification ready, the one I had given Kate. But Jamie wouldn’t see it that way. I knew that Dekker was important to him. I was staying in his house, and I had betrayed him. And I did not want to betray Jamie.

I began to wish I had just left Dekker alone. Forgotten about it, as Dave had told me to. Let Ricardo get away with it, in the same way everyone else did. But I hadn’t. And it was too late to go back now.

I missed Jamie the next morning. He left before the rest of the house was up, as usual. But I had breakfast with Kate and Oliver.

‘Did you talk to him?’ I asked her.

Kate turned to Oliver, who was still in his pyjamas chasing the last few Coco-Pops round his bowl with a spoon. ‘You can get down and play if you want, Ollie.’

He was off like a shot. He hated getting dressed in the morning, and this seemed like a possible reprieve.

‘No,’ she said, when he was gone.

I smiled with relief.

‘But you could have told me what you were doing!’ she protested.

‘I couldn’t,’ I said. ‘It would have put you in an impossible position.’

‘Well, what kind of position do you think I’m in now?’

I winced. Fair point. ‘Are you going to tell him?’

Kate shook her head. ‘No. I thought about it a lot last night. He’s better off not knowing. Then, whether Dekker survives as an independent firm or Bloomfield Weiss take it over, he should be all right.’

‘I’m sorry, Kate. But I’m doing the right thing.’

She nodded. ‘I know you are. And I hope you get the bastards!’

I called Stahl in New York that afternoon. Despite his elevated status, he seemed to like to talk to me directly. It angered his sidekicks, who resented the access I had to him.

‘How are we doing?’ I asked.

‘Great, Nick, great. I just got back from Geneva yesterday. I met with the directors of Chalmet. Boy, I put a rocket up their asses! They have no idea what’s going on at Dekker. In fact, I don’t think they know what their own emerging-markets guys are up to. But they’re scared. It’s beginning to dawn on them that all this great new Latino business isn’t as kosher as it might be. They didn’t even know that Chalmet were using hundreds of millions of their clients’ dough to fund Dekker!’ Stahl chuckled. ‘You should of seen their faces. It was like I’d dropped a whole cartload of shit right there on their pretty polished desks. Which I guess in a way you could say I had.’

‘So what are they going to do?’ I asked.

‘They want outa there, fast. They’ll sell.’

‘Excellent. Does that mean we’re there?’

‘Just about. We’re working to a deadline of June fourteen. There are still some numbers to be run, and Kerton’s got to get the SFA and the Stock Exchange to approve the transaction, but that shouldn’t be a problem. And then we have a done deal.’

The fourteenth of June. That was next Friday.

‘Great!’

‘Yeah. Nice deal, Nick.’

‘Does Ricardo know about it?’

‘Nope. He has no idea.’ Another laugh like a rasping saw. ‘I gotta go, Nick.’ The phone went dead.

I stared at the receiver in triumph. Yes!

I really was working when Kate knocked on my door.

‘Nick, phone. I think it’s Isabel’s father.’

I bounded down the stairs to the sitting room. Kate discreetly left me alone.

‘Luís! How are you?’

‘I don’t know, Nick. I have news.’

‘What is it?’

‘Isabel is still alive.’

My heart leaped. I felt a rush of elation, that was tempered immediately by fear. This was too good to be true.

‘Where is she? With you?’

‘No, Nick,’ said Luís. I knew from his tone what was coming next. ‘I heard from Zico. He says they still have her.’