House of All Nations (107 page)

‘No. I thought there was much more, much more. I am not satisfied. You must show me more gold than this.'

Jules bit his lip. ‘I've gone farther with you than with any living man: do you think I'd have done the same for my own brother? You jump over yourself with ambition, Raccamond. If you're not satisfied now, you never will be.'

‘I had a figure that I set—' said Aristide obstinately, ‘seven and a half millions in gold. If you had shown me that much belonging to the bank I would have been perfectly satisfied; but what you have shown me is only twenty per cent: it is not enough. You must show me more; if you have it. Why do you say you are doing it for me? It is for the clients. I get nothing out of it.'

‘Backing for the million guarantee you want to swallow,' gibed Jules, ‘for the bank you want to get hold of. Let's put things plainly, Aristide: everyone knows what your object is.'

‘My object is honest: I want to see business done in a fair and square fashion. I want to see the rest of the gold. If there isn't any more, it is your wife's duty to give some of that gold of hers to the bank; it is your family duty to the clients who accepted your personal guarantee.' Claire-Josèphe looked at Aristide quietly, without speaking. He took it for assent. He looked upon Claire-Josèphe as a silly, meek woman with a head full of frivolities, impressed by all businessmen. He continued, ‘Besides that, the only thing you can do at the moment is to buy in the greater part of your positions, so that in any case, the gold you have shown me almost if not quite covers them.'

‘If you're so honest,' said Jules, ‘why not buy in the lot? If it's only a question of fair and square.'

‘We have to be reasonable,' said Aristide, troubled. ‘We can't make that big disturbance in the market. Let us buy back or sell out gradually. The position is—' he paled at the thought, ‘colossal.' He seemed shaken. ‘Colossal! I have not slept since I saw the London books. How is it possible for you to have taken on this immense responsibility so lightheartedly. I cannot understand it. Either there are books I have not seen, or you and your brother are the most bizarre businessmen I have ever seen. No thought of the future. Why, you could be ruined by a move in the markets, while we're standing here talking.' He wiped his forehead, not ashamed, even pleased, with the sweat of fear that had come out on him. He began to tremble somewhat, though. ‘It is terrible, terrible,' he cried in anguish. ‘I have not had a moment's peace since I learned of it. And it's been going on for years! We have walked on the edge of a volcano—it can blow up any moment. God! I don't dare face the facts—if it weren't for my clients … If anything went wrong, before we have time to straighten the accounts, there would be nothing for us but to commit suicide.' He looked at Jules. ‘I know you, Mr. Bertillon, you could never stand it. You don't seem to realize where Alphendéry brought you with his wild, fanatic—unspeakable—speculation.'

Jules looked calmly at him: ‘Yes, Alphendéry should never have done it. That's what comes of trusting a man too far. You can't trust anyone to keep his head.'

‘The commissions!' cried Aristide.

‘What?'

‘The commissions back, half-commissions, he must have got from the brokers. What else would induce him to speculate like this? You've been robbed, Mr. Bertillon. You ought to send an officer of the law after him. You don't seem to see the abyss, the profundity of self-interest. Why, the whole bank has been run by Alphendéry for his own profit! You have not counted. And your brother either a party to it or blind.' He wrung his hands. Jules laughed.

‘Nobody twists me round his little finger,' said Jules impatiently. ‘Don't be melodramatic, Aristide. I was lax, all right, but I wasn't robbed. Be sure of that. I have never been and I never will be. That's all. Forget the subject, will you? You have Alphendéry on the brain. Forget him, too. I'll meet you in Paris tomorrow, Aristide. Now, don't go near the Amsterdam office, you hear. I don't want them to know we've been up here without calling in: they wouldn't like it.' Aristide said nothing. ‘Do you hear, Raccamond?'

‘They have no supervision. I'm a director: it's my right if I want to inspect it.'

‘You keep away from my bank, understand that,' shouted Jules suddenly. ‘It's my bank. If you're a director, you're my director … you're under my orders. Stop getting round like a field marshal: you make me sick. You don't seem to realize that all this is mine, arises in me, is nothing without me. If I shut up shop tomorrow, you'd be on the street. The whole crowd of you forgets that. You all posture, but I'm the one who charms the comtesses. I'm the one that gets the rake-off and if I divide with you, it's because I want to and not because anyone forces me to. Remember that. I can fire you tomorrow and give no reason. Remember that. And I can have you locked up, if I want to. I don't give a twopenny darn for your so-called books. I'll deny them. I'll take you for a ride into Belgium if you're not careful and have you arrested there. Your accounts! They're half in the red; I'm out of pocket over them. They don't pay their margins and we have to foot it lightly because it's the Princesse; they lose money and yell and we have to “make reparation” because it's the Comtesse, and we mustn't offend her. They've got an overdraft and they won't pay up, and we've got to forget about it because it's the Duchesse. And you call that business. Those are the accounts you brag about! You'd make a nice figure taking your accounts to another house: no one would take them. I can only afford to keep them because of my “practices” that don't suit you. Why, you're living on my charity, all of you, half the time and you go round inflated with righteousness, like a cow that's eaten a bad weed; you shriek and dance thinking you're the whole show. I'm the whole show. I'm the Barnum and you're the only freak in the works.' He laughed suddenly, angrily, looking at Aristide's dignified and rebelling attitude. ‘Cheer up, Aristide. I'm king. I wouldn't be in business if I couldn't be that. I'm not going to be anyone's partner, and I'm not going to work in with anyone. I'd rather shoot myself. That's my nature. So don't push me too far. Take what you can get, take what I offer you, and be thankful. I'm not mean. I'm willing to give you a fair share. But understand how things are in my bank.'

Aristide pressed his lips together. ‘Then you're immoral,' he said thickly, articulating with some difficulty. ‘All this is just to tickle—your vanity. I understand now. There is no bank. You just think it's a booth in a bazaar. But I'll settle the affairs of the bank without you. I've got your books and I can force you. It's not just your toy!' he said loudly. ‘It's a public institution … there's public money in it, the money of the people. I'll put it right without you. I'll clean it out and if you won't co-operate I'll force it from you and run it honestly: that's my duty. I see where all this has been leading to. I'm not satisfied with your attitude or your gold and I'm going to crush the bank like match-wood unless you give me a written promise to co-operate with me.'

‘Help!' cried Jules. ‘I say, Aristide, you're crazy. You better go slow.'

‘Otherwise I go straight to the police.'

Alphendéry encountered them in the hotel lobby. He intervened, ‘We have more gold—elsewhere … you can see that if you want to.' He spoke with authority. ‘Aristide, don't you realize one thing, that we may cover the position today to suit you, and tomorrow the crash in prices will come that we've been waiting for? You would have made us cover too soon, at a loss. We would lose everything. What is the use of waiting so long, if we don't wait till the end? You don't seem to understand that this was not an imbecile operation done for the sake of being evil.'

Aristide turned his back on Michel and spoke to Jules.

‘If I saw enough gold, I would say yes,' Aristide explained, ‘I'd wait till the collapse came. Then I'd insist on your covering. But the danger is too great. You must have made immense profits: where are they?'

‘In my gold deposits.'

‘I don't believe you.'

‘Go to hell then.'

Alphendéry said eagerly, ‘You can see them, Aristide: some are in Belgium, some Switzerland, some London.'

Aristide saw that Alphendéry believed this; at last he said, ‘I will consider it. In Paris I will let you know my decision. As it is now, I am very disappointed.'

They parted. Jules looked after him, said negligently, ‘Don't worry: I'll get him. He'll never get back to Paris.'

But that was the last of it, and Aristide did get back, and reported to Marianne with horror the small amount of gold he had seen. He came to the bank the following morning, primed with indignation, moral superiority, and masterful intentions. Marianne had warned, ‘Don't travel with them any more. Ask to see the gold receipts of the brokers—they are dangerous men and may take you for a ride, as they say. And not too much about the Parquet … that's your trump card but you don't want to play it. You don't want to go to the Parquet; you want to get the bank in your hands. You can do it now. Bertillon is weakening. He's neurotic. The game is ours. A high tone, a little more bluff, and he'll take you in as partner. After that, no more threats. Work along with him. You'll soon get to be known as the man that saved Bertillon's and, even by your Comtes, as a strong man. They will work in with you.'

In the meantime, Alphendéry had learned that Jules really had no other gold that he would show Raccamond. (He only had the gold shipped to Oslo which he would not mention to anyone.) He remained in Amsterdam with Henri Léon, and two days later appeared in the Bank in Paris, full of joy, the messenger of miraculous news. For his sake (said Alphendéry), Léon offered, of his own accord, to put his vaults in Switzerland at Jules's disposal, to convince Raccamond that Bertillon was a Midas. Aristide insisted on seeing seven and a half million gold francs: he had seen four million.

Léon had in two vaults in Switzerland, under a private number, the equivalent of more than twenty million paper francs of his own. Léon was willing to write a letter to his Geneva bank announcing that a gentleman, with the keys and the private number of the vault, would visit the bank, in Léon's company, and that this gentleman was to be shown round, shown the gold, and to be treated as Léon's agent. Léon would be in attendance, as witness, but only as a witness. For business reasons, Léon wished the person presenting the keys to be treated as the owner of the vault. Léon did immense business with the bank and believed that they could only obey this order. Alphendéry had believed up to this moment that Léon was, as he loved to paint himself, a ‘mean bastard,' a man who couldn't play straight, who had to get his rake-off even out of his sister's dowry or a whore's pocketbook, a man who hedged even happiness, who courted women on the deposit technique, and dealt with fellow Balkans because he loved to outcheat them, as he had when a boy at home. Alphendéry now found out that Léon was capable of an act of generosity, almost unprecedented in the business world. Why was it? Jules refused to see anything surprising in Léon's offer, but Alphendéry puzzled for days. Was it for some superstitious reason? Was it to appease the old White Rabbi of Botoshani, whose denunciations had frightened Léon on several visits? Was it because, in some way, Léon associated himself with the fate of Jules, like himself a meteor following the orbit of great planets? Was it in dislike of Raccamond and his ways? It might have been that Léon, like many others, hated to see that delightful fellow, Bertillon, in a mess; and it might have been Jules's astonishing luck.

Alphendéry was now sure that Jules was saved, and that he himself, after this one act of grace, could leave the bank forever and take up one of the jobs offered him by Stewart and Léon. He would not feel that the friendship for William or love for Jules was spoiled, or that he was leaving them to a dark and shameful future. It was the ideal, unhoped-for, incredible solution.

Jules said carelessly, ‘Yes, I'll accept the offer.'

But Raccamond would not go to Geneva. ‘It is only some trick,' he said, and though they argued he stood firm. Jules was disinclined to be in Léon's debt, also.

* * *

Scene Ninety-seven: Man of Destiny

N
ow Aristide was walking about with his three agreements in his pocket and his books and papers, ‘the evidence,' in a safe at home; but he felt he was a startling personality and should be heard from every day, one way or another. It was difficult for him to wait for his reign to begin; there were weeks, months, six months, and much work to be done. And it had to be done underhand, in the dark; it had to be slowly painted on people's minds, the picture of his importance. He could not understand why now he got nothing but rebuffs, although he was in the right, with the law on his side, and all the evidence that anyone could ask for. That he was a blackmailer, he never for a moment admitted; he was an injured man serving himself and others. Now that he was ventripotent with destiny, he brooded at the relative secrecy of the whole business. He had shouted, clamored, and his cries had fallen on deaf ears.

Alphendéry had returned to the bank; he was there every day and in his old post: was he being used to manipulate the accounts and restore the shares? Aristide knew nothing of Alphendéry's occupations still. He went to Jules and asked.

‘Alphendéry is doing my private business. Go and get clients, Raccamond.'

‘No. If he remains I must advise my clients to withdraw their accounts.'

Jules's pale thin face as it hardened looked like an old man's or a corpse's. ‘Another house won't take them. What are you going to transfer, may I ask?'

‘Mme. de Sluys-Forêt,' proclaimed Aristide forcibly.