“In no more than ninety days,” Larsen said.
“And what would you anticipate the stock price will do at that time?”
“That’s when the initial public offering would be made,” Larsen said, “and I believe it will at least triple on the first day of the offering. It’s going to be the hottest thing since Google.”
“Is the software in beta yet?” Stone asked.
“It finished beta testing yesterday,” Larsen said, “and the results were fantastic—very few bugs for a brilliant new program. The next three months will be devoted to organizing the IPO and slipping subtle hints to the trade and business press to create a high level of buzz.”
“And at what level will the stock be offered?” Stone asked. He turned his head slightly so that his earbug would capture their voices clearly.
“Somewhere in the fifty to seventy-five range, probably,” Larsen replied. “You could make a bundle, Mitzi, by selling on the first day.”
“That’s what I wanted to hear,” Mitzi said.
“And at what level would you like to participate?” Larsen asked.
“I’ll take a hundred thousand shares,” she replied, removing an alligator checkbook from her handbag and opening it. “At fifty dollars a share. Do you have a pen, Sig?”
Larsen nearly broke an arm extracting a pen from his jacket pocket and handing it to her. “I will get you that price,” he said. “I must say, I had expected a cashier’s check.”
“You think my personal check isn’t good, Sig?” Mitzi asked, gazing at him across the table.
“Of course I don’t think that, Mitzi; I’ll just have to wait until the check clears before having the stock issued to you.”
“Well, that will take only a few days,” Mitzi said. “To whom shall I make the check?”
“Larsen Enterprises,” Sig replied.
“Not directly to the company?”
“I’ll have to move your money through my firm and issue my own check to the company, since its name must remain secret. I shouldn’t think it would be more than four or five days before I can issue the stock.”
Mitzi wrote a check for five million dollars and noted “100,000 shares” on it. “Let’s be clear,” she said. “This is for shares in the company that you described in the prospectus, not in Larsen Enterprises.”
“Of course it is,” Sig said, looking at the check. “A Charleston bank?”
“I don’t have a New York account yet,” Mitzi said. “Perhaps you could suggest a bank here?”
“I work with half a dozen,” Larsen said, “mostly small, privately owned banks. I should think that for your purposes one of the big banks, Morgan Chase, perhaps, would be fine. Just pick a branch near your home.”
“Thank you. I may do just that,” Mitzi replied.
Their eggs arrived, and Mitzi and Stone began to eat.
Conversation seemed to pall, and Larsen and Sharpe seemed a bit antsy.
Larsen consulted his wristwatch. “Oh, Derek and I have another appointment downtown in half an hour,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind if we leave you to your breakfast.” They stood up and hands were shaken. “You’re going to be a very happy woman in three months,” Larsen said. “Bye, now. Bye, Stone.”
“Derek, could I speak to you for a moment before you leave?” Mitzi asked.
Stone put down his fork. “Please excuse me for a moment.” He went looking for the men’s room.
SHARPE TOOK
Stone’s seat. “How can I help you, Mitzi?”
“Well, Derek,” she said, “my friends from Charleston were very pleased with the quality of the, ah, ‘art,’ you sold them, and they’d like to make another purchase.”
“The same again?”
“No. This time they’re less interested in the grassy picture and more interested in the powdery ones.”
“All right. How much would they like?”
She leaned forward and whispered, “Ten kilos.” “My goodness,” Sharpe said. “Your friends have become more … commercial, shall we say!”
“Perhaps. I’m not familiar with their business arrangements.”
“Of course not.”
“And how soon could you deliver?”
“Two, three days,” Sharpe said. “And at the same price per.”
“Oh, I should think a volume discount would be in order,” Mitzi said.
“I might be able to get you five percent off,” Sharp replied.
“Oh, I think ten percent would be more acceptable to my friends,” Mitzi said, giving him a brilliant smile.
“Given the quantity, I can do that,” Sharpe said.
“We’ll do it the same way as last time,” Mitzi said. “I’m more comfortable with this sort of transaction in my own home.”
“I don’t know about that, Mitzi,” Sharpe said. “My sources don’t like to repeat themselves geographically. I’m sure you understand.”
“No, I don’t,” Mitzi said firmly. “And I’m not going to do this on some street corner. Anywhere else but my home would be a deal breaker.”
Sharpe shrugged. “All I can do is try,” he said.
“Try hard,” Mitzi replied. She shook his hand, and he went to join Larsen in the lobby, just as Stone was returning.
“How’d it go?” Stone asked.
“I got ten percent off!” Mitzi squealed. “He bridled at doing it in the apartment again, but I put my foot down.” She looked around. “This is an awfully nice hotel; why don’t we get a room?”
Stone looked at his watch. “I’m afraid you’ll have to wait until tonight before I can jump you. Eight thirty at Elaine’s?”
“Oh, all right,” she said, giving him a luscious kiss.
50
STONE WALKED HOME,
and as he came through the front door, Joan flagged him down.
“A Brian Doyle is waiting in your office,” she said. “He insisted; he showed me a badge.”
“Right,” Stone said. He tiptoed down the hall to his closed door and put his ear to it. He could hear the sound of drawers being opened and closed. Silently he turned the knob, then threw open the door.
Brian Doyle was caught with a handful of cancelled checks. “What do
you
want?” he demanded, as if Stone had entered his office unannounced.
“I think that’s
my
question,” Stone replied, “since you’re rifling my desk.”
“Oh, this?” Doyle tossed the bundle of checks onto the desk. “They were just lying here.”
“No. They were at the back of my center drawer,” Stone replied. “You’re the one doing the lying.”
“I have a perfect right to search your desk,” Doyle said, as if he really did.
“I think that’s called breaking and entering,” Stone said.
“Not if you’re my subordinate.”
Stone came around the desk, grabbed Doyle’s necktie, dragged him to a chair, and pushed him into it. “Let’s get something straight, Brian,” he said, “once and for all: I am not your subordinate in any sense of the word—intellectually, morally, or sartorially. I am your superior in every department, and if you think your little prank with the badge makes any fucking difference, I’ll stick it up your ass sideways.”
Doyle held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “All right, all right, just calm down.”
“State your business, then get out,” Stone said, glaring down at him.
“I just want to talk about the Sharpe and Larsen bust,” he said.
“So, talk.”
“I’m concerned about Mitzi’s safety,” Doyle said.
“So soon? I’ve been concerned about it from day one.”
“Well, me, too. Why do you think I put Tom there to take care of her?”
“Because he’s her partner, and it’s his responsibility, perhaps?”
“Well, sure, but he’s the right guy for the job.”
“So, why aren’t you talking to Tom instead of me?”
“Because since we have him set up as her driver, he’s not going to be welcome at the buy. You will be, though.”
“I’m aware of that,” Stone said. “I’ve just come from a meeting with Sharpe and Larsen where Mitzi proposed the big buy, and Sharpe agreed to the terms.”
“I heard that from Mitzi’s earpiece,” Doyle said. “And why weren’t you wearing yours?”
“Because it’s a pain in the ass and because I don’t want you listening to every word I say,” Stone replied. “I’ll wear it when it’s necessary.”
“It’s necessary every time you have a meet like that,” Doyle said. He was beginning to recover his composure and adopt his superior attitude again. “We’ve got to have yours as a backup, in case Mitzi’s goes on the fritz.”
“I’ll wear it when it’s necessary,” Stone repeated.
“I want us to have another meeting with Tiffany Baldwin about the bust,” Doyle said, changing the subject.
“You have another meeting with her, not I.”
“What, are you afraid of her?”
“If you knew her better,” Stone said, “
you’d
be afraid of her. You’d better watch your ass, Brian, because I think even the commissioner is a little afraid of her. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been at the last meeting.”
“Why should I be afraid of that bitch?” Doyle asked.
“Because she could destroy you in a heartbeat if she felt like it,” Stone explained.
“And how would she do that?”
“Oh, I don’t know, how about a federal grand jury indictment?”
“Indictment? For what?”
“Don’t you think that if she chose to put a couple of investigators on you she wouldn’t find something? You’re not exactly squeaky clean; you never have been.”
Doyle reddened. “I have nothing to fear from her.”
“No? Well, you’d better not screw up the Larsen part of the bust, because if you do she’ll come down on you like an Amazon goddess, and she’ll hand you your balls.”
Doyle pushed his chair back and stood up. “I can see I’m not going to get anywhere with you,” he said.
“Finally,” Stone said. “Now let me tell you how this bust is going to go down. Mitzi has set it up at the apartment, but you’re not going to have anybody in the building except me.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Because Mitzi is borrowing the place from a friend of mine, and her neighbors would not take kindly to having a SWAT team in their lobby and elevators. And you can’t grab him when he comes out of the building, either. You’ll have to put four cars on him and wait until he’s well away from there.”
“At his place? Why?”
“Probably not at his place.”
“Then where?”
“If you want Sharpe and Larsen together, you’d better do it at Teterboro Airport, because they’re ready to run.”
Doyle shook his head. “I don’t want to pull any Jersey cops in on this.”
“Then you’d better have some FBI there, hadn’t you?”
“That’s what I want to talk to Tiffany about,” Doyle said. “I don’t want them there. This is our bust.”
“It’s yours because Tiffany allowed you to do it, and she said so in the presence of the commissioner,” Stone said. “So you’d better not fuck it up, and that means having a federal presence there.”
“I hate the FBI,” Doyle said sullenly.
“What cop doesn’t?” Stone asked. “You think you’ve got a monopoly?”
“I don’t want to ask her for help.”
“She’s waiting for you to do just that, and if you don’t, then this case is going to fall on you from a great height.”
Doyle thought this over. “Teterboro, huh?”
“That’s where Sharpe and Larsen have chartered in the past,” Stone said, “but you’d better have enough people to cover Westchester Airport if they decide to go there instead.”
“You think they might do that?”
“If they have the slightest inkling that you’re on to them, they could do anything.”
“How many people do you think we’ll need?”
“An army,” Stone replied. “Go put it together, and ask Tiffany for help.”
Doyle got up and left, muttering under his breath.
51
MITZI LOOKED AT STONE
over the rim of her glass of Knob Creek. “You seem a little down,” she said. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m worried about the bust,” he said.
Mitzi adjusted her push-up bra. “I thought you liked it.”
“Not that bust,” Stone said, laughing in spite of himself. “Sharpe and Larsen.”
“Sounds like a Dickensian accounting firm, doesn’t it?” Mitzi said.
“I wish it were,” Stone replied.
“Oh, come on, Stone. It’s pretty straightforward, once we cover all our bases.”
“We don’t even know where all the bases are,” Stone said.
“Brian and Tom had a meeting with the U.S. Attorney this afternoon and asked for some of her people. That should help.”
Stone admired her bust again. “Do you have a vest that will protect those?”
“Without looking overweight and dowdy? No.”
“Just this once?”
“Maybe, after we make the buy.”
“Wear it during the buy.”