Numbered Account (29 page)

“I’m afraid your trip will have to be postponed.”

Sylvia smiled awkwardly. Had she heard him correctly? “We have to visit these schools before the end of March, or the top graduates will have committed to other companies. The trip will only require two weeks of my time. I planned on sending up a schedule to your office tomorrow.”

Ott’s lips twitched for a moment, then he spoke. “I am sorry, Fraulein Schon. Surely you can see that the Chairman requires your skills at home. Unless we repel Mr. Konig, we will have no need whatsoever for your crop of M.B.A.s.”

Sylvia went to her desk and picked up the itinerary for her recruiting trip. “If you look at my schedule, you’ll see that I plan on returning a full week before the assembly. Plenty of time to ensure that all votes will be cast for Herr Kaiser.”

Ott brushed away the schedule and lowered his bulk into a chair. “You’re still under the impression that since Herr Kaiser asked you to go to New York in my place, he has taken an interest in your career? My dear, your dining with Mr. Neumann showed admirable foresight. Very clever, indeed. Kaiser was quite impressed. Oh yes, you’ve poisoned the Chairman against me. That I grant you. I shall not be going to New York. But alas,
Liebchen
, neither shall you.”

“Really Herr Doktor. I’m sure we can find a solution acceptable to you and to Herr Kaiser. I can shorten my trip.”

“I think not. As I said, your services are too much in demand here.”

“I must insist,” Sylvia said loudly, unable to keep her desperation from spilling into her voice. “It was the Chairman’s wish.”

Ott slammed his hand on the table. “There will be no trip. Not now. Not ever! My dear, did you truly believe that your dalliance with the Chairman would insulate you from the rest of us? Did you think it would hasten you along your chosen path?”

“My personal life is no concern of yours. I have never tried to gain any benefit from my relationship with the Chairman, but in this matter I won’t hesitate to speak with him directly.”

“Do you think you can run back into the arms of Herr Kaiser now? Dear child, the Chairman is finished with you. He is a disciplined man. Should he require the company of a woman, we will choose someone far less grasping than you. Preferably, a woman with no ties whatsoever to the bank.”

“You can’t control his heart, who he loves, who he desires . . .”

“Desire is one thing, my dear. Utility, another. The Chairman requires me. Today, tomorrow, and for as long as he shall manage the bank. I am the oil that makes this intricate machine run smoothly.” Ott stood, pausing for a moment to glory in his exalted position. He extended a stubby finger in Sylvia’s direction. “You didn’t actually believe that a Swiss bank would allow itself to be represented in the United States of America by a woman? A child practically?”

Sylvia moved her mouth to respond but nothing came out. Of course, Ott was right. Switzerland was light-years behind England and France and America in its treatment of women. Just look at USB. How many women were on the executive board? None. How many women were executive vice presidents? Still, she knew that things had to change soon. And she had seen herself as the one changing them.

“You did,” said Ott, at once incredulous and supremely certain. “I can see it in your eyes. How quaint!” He walked from the office, calling over his shoulder, “Have that letter ready for me by five o’clock this afternoon without fail, Fraulein. We must have our votes.”

Sylvia waited a few minutes after Ott had left, then walked to the ladies’ rest room. She made her way to the farthest stall, and after shutting the door, collapsed against the tile wall. Ott’s words burned like acid in the space behind her eyes. He had won. He had broken her. Another soul vanquished so that he could strengthen his alliance with Wolfgang Kaiser.

Ott was such a bastard!
she thought, and then a fresh wave of self-pity swept over her and she cried. She lamented her short affair with Wolfgang Kaiser even as she remembered the day they had met. It had been at the bank’s annual picnic on a warm July afternoon almost two years ago. She had never expected to speak with him, let alone flirt. No one at her level even knew the Chairman. There was no telling where the discussion might lead. The chances for disaster were simply too high. So when he drew her aside and asked if she was enjoying herself, she had been reticent, even afraid to meet him in conversation. But instead of hearing some dry rot regarding the bank’s newest hiring policies, she had listened as he enthused over the visiting Giacometti exhibition at the Kunsthaus. Instead of a dreaded “do tell” about her colleagues, he had asked if she had ever rafted down the Saanen River, and then related his own trip two weeks before. She had expected a severe but polite functionary but had met a warm and effusive man.

Two weekends at his summer home in Gstaad, that had been the extent of their liaison. He had treated her like a princess. Dinners on the veranda of the Palace Hotel; long walks roaming the grassy hills; romantic and, she still had to admit, passionate evenings drinking exquisite wine and making love. She had never been so blind to think it would continue forever, but neither had she dreamed it might be used against her.

Fifteen minutes later, a becalmed Sylvia ran cold water over her face. She kept her head near the sink and ladled handful after handful of water onto her swollen cheeks. She looked into the mirror for a long time. Trust. Dedication. Effort. She had given her whole being to the bank. Why would they choose to treat her this way?

The United Swiss Bank was an internationally active bank. Should anyone hope to rise to the directorship of the bank’s personnel division,
he —
Sylvia wouldn’t waste another breath considering herself — would be required to supervise hiring not only in Switzerland but in New York, in Hong Kong, in Dubai. Should that person be blocked by the Chairman’s eminence grise from representing the bank abroad, his career would be at an end. That was that.

Sylvia straightened herself up and dried her face. She needed to unburden herself of the grief that sat on her chest robbing her of oxygen. She needed to escape the confines of her office. But that was impossible. Activity in the bank was running at a fever pitch: every department gearing up for presentations to be made at the general assembly; managers nervous to learn the annual operating results; the Adler Bank hovering ever closer. She couldn’t consider taking a day off for at least a month.

Sylvia chided herself for her misplaced loyalties. The avenue leading to a successful future at the United Swiss Bank had been blocked, perhaps permanently, yet she continued to think of nothing but her duty to the bank. She slipped her hand into her pocket and discovered that at some point during her discussion with Ott she had jammed Nick’s messages into it. She uncrumpled the papers and memorized his extension. Was she so alone that the only person she could turn to was a younger man she barely knew?

Sylvia looked in the mirror. She was a mess. Eyes swollen, makeup smeared, cheeks redder than a baby’s. You’re pathetic, she told herself. Allowing the decision of one man to tear apart your dreams; letting a lieutenant tell you the captain’s orders. Go to Wolfgang Kaiser. Present your case directly. Convince him that you can represent the bank overseas. Fight back!

She replayed the meeting with Kaiser Friday morning. She recalled the callused grip of the Chairman’s hand. His lingering touch. Instead of desire, she saw in it hunger. Instead of strength, weakness. Weakness of a variety she knew well. Weakness she would exploit to her own advantage.

Sylvia took a tissue from her purse to wipe away a trail of mascara. She dabbed it in cold water and raised it to her face. Halfway to her cheek, she paused and stepped away from the mirror. Something was wrong. She looked at her hand and saw that it was shaking uncontrollably.

Nick spotted Sterling Thorne loitering under a blinking street-lamp twenty yards from the entrance to the bank’s
Personalhaus
. The federal agent was wearing a tan trenchcoat over a dark suit. For once, he looked like part of the landscape rather than a blight on it. When he saw Nick, he raised his hand and offered a faint salute.

Nick had half a mind to take off in the other direction. But it was after ten and he was exhausted. And this, after only his second day working with the Chairman. From eight in the morning until ten at night, Wolfgang Kaiser was on the move. And his newest aide-de-camp, assistant vice president Nicholas A. Neumann, was always somewhere close behind.

The day had begun on the trading floor with Sepp Zwicki, a visit to the front lines for a briefing on Konig’s latest sorties. Mid-morning took them to the Emperor’s Lair, where Kaiser dished out instructions on what line to give dissenting shareholders, then placed a few calls himself to show how to charm the greedy bastards. Lunch was spent in one of the bank’s private dining rooms, veal chops, a ’79 Chateau Petrus and Cohibas all around for the jolly good fellows from Bank Vontobel and Julius Baer. Both banks held large blocks of USB. During the afternoon, rolls of USB shareholders were reviewed and telephoning chores divvied up between Nick and Reto Feller. At seven, dinner was sent in from Kropf Bierhalle.
Bratwurst mit Zwiebeln
. The three hours since had passed in a flurry of calls to stock analysts in Manhattan. Go, go, go.

And now Thorne. Nick’s first instinct was to throw him against a wall and demand whether he’d been the asshole who’d broken into his apartment on Friday.

“Working late, are you, Neumann?” Thorne asked, hand extended in welcome.

Nick kept his hands buried in his pockets. “There’s a lot to do these days. The general assembly is coming up soon.”

Thorne lowered his hand. “You gentlemen announcing another year of record profits?”

“Are you angling for some inside information? Trying to beef up that government paycheck? I remember how skimpy Uncle Sam can be.”

Thorne tried to smile affably but wound up looking like he’d bitten into a rotten apple. Something had soured on his end. Nick was sure of it. Why else the strained courtesy? “How can I be of service to my country this fine evening?”

“Why don’t we take it inside, Nick? Get out of the cold.”

Nick considered the request. Like it or not, Thorne was an officer of the United States government. He deserved some respect. For now. Nick showed Thorne into the apartment’s alcove and led the way up the single flight of stairs to the second floor. He unlocked the door to his apartment and nodded for the agent to go in.

Thorne stepped inside the apartment and looked around. “I thought bankers lived a little better than this.”

Nick took off his coat and hung it over the chair. “I’ve been in worse.”

“So have I. You been mulling over our conversation? Been keeping your eyes open?”

“I’ve been keeping my eyes where they belong. On my work. Can’t say I’ve come across anything that might interest you.”

Nick sat down on the bed. He glared at Thorne, waiting. It was his show. Finally, the lanky agent unbuttoned his jacket and took a seat across the room. “I’m letting down my guard tonight because we need your help,” he said. “It doesn’t happen often, so you’d stand well advised to take advantage of my kind disposition. Won’t last long.”

“Noted.”

“Numbered account 549.617 RR ring a bell to you?”

Nick didn’t answer right away. He kept his face passive, while inside him Thorne’s bell clanged mercilessly. Account 549.617 RR. The Pasha.

“It does, doesn’t it?” continued Thorne. “Has to be hard for a poor city boy to forget seeing so much money being moved around.”

Impossible, if you really want to know, Nick replied silently. “I can’t comment on either a client’s identity or account activity. You know that. It’s confidential information. Bank secrecy and all that.”

“Account 549.617 RR,” Thorne repeated. “I believe you fellas call him the Pasha.”

“Never heard of him.”

“Not so quick, Neumann. I’m asking you a favor. I’m as close to falling onto my knees as I’m ever going to get. I’d like to give you a chance to do some good.”

Nick smiled inadvertently. He couldn’t help it. A government agent doing good was in his experience the most fundamental of oxymorons. “I’m sorry. I can’t help you.”

“The Pasha is a bad man, Nick. His name is Ali Mevlevi. He’s a Turk by birth but lives in a monumental private compound just outside of Beirut. He’s an important player in the world’s heroin trade. We estimate he’s responsible for the importation into Europe and the former Soviet Union of about twenty tons of refined number four heroin — China White, in our lingo — each and every year. Twenty tons, Nick. This is no dilettante we’re talking about. Mevlevi is the real thing.”

Nick put up both hands in front of him, signaling Thorne to stop. “And so? If he is, what about it? How does that concern me or the bank? Haven’t you gotten it through your skull that I am prohibited by law to discuss anything I do for USB with you, or with anybody else for that matter? I’m not admitting that this Pasha fellow is my client. I’m not saying he is, or he isn’t. Doesn’t matter. I could have Satan calling me twice a day and still I couldn’t tell you.”

Thorne just nodded his head and kept talking as if the sheer brunt of his evidence would eventually win over Nick’s essentially good soul. It was a good strategy.

“Mevlevi’s got himself a private army of about five hundred souls in his backyard. Trains them morning, noon, and night. And he’s got a mountain of materiel on top of that. Russian T-72s, a few Hinds, plenty of rockets, mortars, you name it. A ready mobile battalion of mechanized infantry. That’s what’s got us worried. You remember what happened to our boys at the marine barracks in Beirut. Several hundred good men had their lives taken by a lone suicide bomber. Imagine what five hundred of them could do.”

Nick leaned closer, the infantry officer in him cognizant of the havoc to be wreaked by such a force. Still, he did not speak.

“We have hard-copy proof of the transfers Mevlevi’s been making to and from your bank for the last eighteen months. Irrefutable evidence that your bank is laundering his dough. Our problem, Nick, is that the Pasha has gone under. Three days after we put his name on your bank’s internal account surveillance list, Mr. Ali Mevlevi has stopped making his weekly payments. We were expecting about forty-seven million dollars to hit his account on Thursday. Did it?”