To admit that I disliked his presence at the bank would have been to admit my guilt about the past, so I had always tried
to conceal my feelings. In fact I made a great effort to like him and up to a point I succeeded, but the truth was he made
me uneasy and my uneasiness not only persisted but increased over the years. Just why he made me so uneasy was hard to pin
down. It was too simple to say he reminded me of a part of my past which I preferred to forget; this was undoubtedly true,
but human beings tend to adjust to adverse circumstances and I had long since reached the point where I did not automatically
remember Steve Sullivan’s death whenever Scott walked into the room. It was a help that Scott bore no obvious resemblance
to his father. He neither smoked nor drank nor, as far as anyone knew, had a steady girlfriend. He worked late every night
and was often at the bank on weekends. He dressed conservatively, charmed the clients with his well-informed conversation
and sent his stepmother Emily flowers every year on Mother’s Day. No young American’s behaviour could have been more exemplary,
as Cornelius was always telling me
with quasi-paternal pride, but I was beginning to wonder if perhaps this was in fact the reason why Scott made me so uneasy;
he was just a little too good to be true.
With his latest market report still in my hand I sat down and flipped the intercom. ‘More coffee.’
My secretary’s secretary came running at the double. I picked up the red phone which connected me directly to the senior partner’s
office below.
‘Mr Van Zale’s wire,’ said one of Cornelius’ aides.
‘Keller. Is he there?’
‘No, sir, he’s not in yet.’
I hung up. My secretary arrived with some inter-office mail. The phone rang.
‘Hold all calls.’ I skimmed the new batch of papers, shoved them aside and turned to Scott’s report. The phone rang again
and kept ringing. I flipped the switch on the intercom again. ‘Pick up that phone, for Christ’s sake!’ The noise died. Returning
to the report I found it was immaculately written, and leaning forward I reached again for the intercom.
‘Sam?’ said Scott a moment later.
‘Get in here.’
He arrived clean-shaven. I held up the report. ‘This is very good. Thank you. Now let’s discuss how we’re going to get a line
into the rival camp to see how their bid’s shaping up. We’ve got to win this Hammaco bid, Scott. A ninety-million-dollar issue
isn’t a two-bit crap game. Do we have a complete list of the other side’s syndicate?’
He had brought it with him. I was impressed but said nothing, just glanced down the list of names, but for a moment I was
back in those far-off days before the Crash when I had stood where Scott was now standing and his father had been sitting
in my chair. The memories snowballed. The silence lengthened. I went on staring at the list in my hand.
‘Sam?’ Scott said nervously at last. ‘Is something wrong?’
‘No. No, it’s just fine. I was just trying to figure out which of these firms is the weak link we can snap to find out what’s
going on. Let me see … Bonner, Christopherson – maybe we could work out something there. Cornelius got Bonner himself out
of trouble with the SEC recently in order to make up for screwing Christopherson over the Pan-Pacific Harvester merger back
in ’43. Christopherson’s dead now, of course, and Bonner wants to get back alongside us next time Harvester launch an issue.
Call Bonner. He’s a tough customer but lean on him. I think he’ll know which side his bread’s buttered on.’
‘Bonner himself isn’t involved in this syndicate, Sam. It’s his son-in-law Whitmore.’
‘That’s better still. I’ve known Whitmore for years and he’s got as much backbone as a jellyfish. In fact it was he who got
Bonner into such hot water with the SEC. You call Whitmore and don’t just lean on him – squeeze him till the pips squeak,
to use the immortal words of that British bastard Lloyd George. I want a line into that rival camp today, Scott. I don’t care
how you do it, but get it in.’
‘Right, Sam. Will that be all?’
I sighed, moved restlessly to the window and looked down at the magnolia tree in the patio. ‘I guess so … But how times change!’
I added impulsively. ‘When I was a young kid on Wall Street we all sat around like gods and waited for clients to come crawling
to us for money. Now the clients sit back and let us fight each other for their custom. Competitive bidding! My God, Paul
Van Zale must be turning in his grave!’
Scott smiled but made no comment, a respectful young man tolerating the nostalgia of an older generation.
‘Okay,’ I said abruptly. ‘That’s all. Check back with me when you’ve talked to Whitmore.’
‘Yes, Sam.’ He departed.
I reached for the red phone again.
‘Mr Van Zale’s wire,’ droned the aide.
‘Christ, isn’t he in yet?’ I hung up and summoned my secretary. ‘I’m going to have to chair the partners’ meeting. Get me
the major file on Hammaco.’
In the conference room I found a dozen of my partners lounging around the table and gossiping about golf. In the old days
at Van Zale’s long before I had joined the firm, the half-dozen partners had sat at huge mahogany desks in the bank’s great
hall while the senior partner alone had been secluded in the room which now belonged to Cornelius, but later when the bank
had merged with another in 1914, the great hall had been assigned to the syndicate division and the partners had been given
their own individual rooms on the second floor. Now that the bank had expanded the space had again been rearranged; Cornelius
had kept the senior partner’s office on the first floor and the six partners who had been longest with the firm had kept their
rooms on the second, but the remaining partners had returned to the great hall, still known as ‘the sin-bin’ in commemoration
of the syndicate division. The syndicate men themselves had moved to Seven Willow Street, the adjacent building which we had
acquired during our expansion after the war.
Cornelius had chosen his partners with typical shrewdness. First came the window-dressing, six men in their sixties who could
provide not only solid experience but a solid respectable front. Then came the six men in their fifties, men who might be
somewhat less orthodox but who had all resigned themselves to the knowledge that they would never sit in the senior partner’s
chair. That left the three men in their forties, and these had to be watched with scrupulous care in case they acquired delusions
of grandeur and attempted to annex more power than they could be trusted to handle.
Cornelius and I were, as always, the youngest. Cornelius had not yet faced the day when he felt obliged to hire a partner
younger than himself, although now we were both past forty we knew he should give the partnership a shot of youth before it
became senescent. However Cornelius disliked thinking of young ambitious men one rung below him on the ladder. People thought
this was odd and said most men in his position would have welcomed the opportunity to impose their power on younger men, but
I understood Cornelius’ reluctance all too well. Cornelius and I knew better than anyone just how dangerous ambitious young
men could be.
As I entered the conference room the partners straightened their backs and stopped talking about golf. I smiled warmly at
them. They smiled warmly back. Cordial greetings were exchanged as one of the Van Zale aides passed around the coffee cups,
and then we all settled down to our traditional daily discussion.
In fact the partners’ meetings were a waste of time and I favoured cutting them back to one a week. The purpose was to keep
each other abreast of our different projects and to have consultations about policy, but the partners in the sin-bin always
knew what everyone else in the sin-bin was doing, and the select six partners upstairs with the exception of myself were all
too old to be involved in work of any importance. Through various informants Cornelius and I were also well aware of what
went on in the sin-bin so we would hardly have lacked information if the daily meetings had been abandoned, but like all wise
dictators Cornelius wanted to maintain the formal trappings of democracy. The daily meetings persisted under the fiction that
we were all deciding what was best for the firm: occasionally we even took a vote which Cornelius would quietly ignore if
it turned out to be contrary to his wishes. Sometimes partners became annoyed but not for long. Cornelius did not like being
surrounded by discontented people, and any partner who complained was gently advised to move to another firm.
‘For after all,’ Cornelius would say solicitously, ‘the last thing I want is for you to be unhappy.’
The surviving partners learnt their lesson and took care to appear well content in Cornelius’ presence. Cornelius had a controlling
interest in the partnership with absolute authority to hire and fire whom he pleased, so it was only sensible to be on the
best possible terms with him. Also every partner knew he was far from irreplaceable. Van Zale’s was a great investment banking
house with a history which stretched far back into the nineteenth century, and there was never any shortage of good men who
wanted to work at Willow and Wall.
‘What’s the news on Hammaco, Sam?’ asked a partner, one of the forty-five-year-old mavericks who had to be watched with care.
‘Good,’ I said. ‘The bidding closes tomorrow. Everything’s shaping up well.’
‘What exactly is this Hammaco business?’ said one of the silver-haired veterans who had just tottered back from a vacation
in Florida.
‘This is a ninety-million-dollar issue for the Hammer Machine Corporation who are planning to expand into the armaments business.
With the Cold War hotting up this is obviously good business, particularly for a corporation like Hammaco. The bidding conditions
were tough – I’ll have a copy of the terms of sale, the preliminary prospectus and the proposed purchase statement routed
to you in the inter-office mail. We’ve had the ‘due diligence’ meeting at the Hammaco offices and also a preliminary meeting
of our syndicate. The main price meeting is tomorrow morning with a final price meeting at two tomorrow afternoon.’
‘How’s the rival camp?’ said another maverick. Those mavericks always enjoyed keeping me on my toes.
‘I’ve got a line on them. As soon as I know what they intend to bid I’ll make damned sure we outbid them. I see no problem.’
I turned to the two partners from the sin-bin who were supervising the syndicate division’s spadework on the Hammaco bid.
‘I’d like a word with you guys after this meeting.’
There was a knock on the door and Scott slipped in. ‘Sam, an important call.’
I glanced at my partners. ‘Excuse me a moment, gentlemen.’ In the corner by the phone I murmured to Scott: ‘Is it Neil?’
‘No, the president of Hammaco.’
‘Christ!’ I picked up the receiver and found the president wanted to invite me to lunch. I accepted. ‘Cancel my lunch date,’
I said to Scott as I hung up, ‘and find out if by some miracle our rivals couldn’t stand the pace and have thrown in the sponge.’
I was just moving back to the conference table when the phone rang again, making me jump.
‘Keller,’ I said, picking up the receiver.
‘I want to see you,’ said Cornelius in a voice of ice and severed the connection as violently as a guillotine severing a criminal
neck.
I did not stop to think what I had done. Sometimes it’s better not to think in case one loses one’s nerve imagining disasters
which have never happened. I got a cigarette alight, politely asked the eldest partner to chair the meeting and then, unable
to stop myself fearing the worst – whatever the worst was – I ran downstairs to the senior partner’s office and prepared to
face the lion in his den.
[1]
Cornelius, looking as exhausted as if he had just suffered an asthma attack, was sitting huddled in his swivel chair behind
the enormous desk. I almost inquired anxiously about his health but when I saw the brutal line of his mouth I decided to keep
silent. With reluctance I at last allowed myself to speculate about the unknown mistake which had roused his wrath.
‘If I asked you a very simple question,’ said Cornelius in a tired patient voice, the one he regularly used before losing
his temper, ‘would it be too much to hope that you might give me a very simple answer?’
I was being invited to take the bull by the horns. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘I mean, if I asked you if you were in the habit of repeating confidential conversations conducted with me in this room, you
wouldn’t go into some rambling evasive explanation that I’d find embarrassing, would you? I’d hate to be embarrassed by you,
Sam. I’d be very upset.’
‘Cut it out, Neil. You know damned well I don’t go broadcasting our private conversations to all and sundry.’
Cornelius immediately jumped to his feet, leaned forward with both hands on the desk and shouted at me: ‘Then why the hell
did you tell Alicia that I wanted you to marry Vicky?’
‘Because she gave me the impression she already knew all about it.’ My reflexes for warding off attack were so finely developed
that it was only after I had spoken that the shock made my heart thump painfully in my chest. I clasped my hands behind my
back, took a deep breath to steady myself and then made the classic move from defence to
counter-attack. ‘And why the hell didn’t you tell me,’ I demanded angrily, ‘that Alicia thought you shared her view that Vicky
should marry Sebastian? How do you think I felt when Alicia and I ended up talking at cross-purposes and she realized you
were trying to double-cross her? I don’t like being embarrassed by you either, Neil, and don’t think you have the monopoly
on getting upset by your friends.’
Cornelius slumped back in his chair. Long experience of dealing with him had made me aware that when he was angry with himself
he often tried to deflect his anger on to others, and long experience of dealing with me had taught him I was adept at absorbing
his anger and neutralizing it by remaining unintimidated. Now his anger was spent I saw that only the misery remained. He
began to breathe unevenly and I turned away as he produced the pills which warded off his asthma. He hated anyone to see him
when he was unwell.
‘Neil, believe me I’m sorry if this has resulted in trouble between you and Alicia, but—’
‘I’m not discussing my marriage with you either now or at any other time,’ he said, but as he paused to swallow the pills
it occurred to me that he longed to discuss it but was held back by complex emotions which I could not understand. ‘And talking
of marriage,’ he said, still breathing badly but unable to stop a second rush of anger, ‘Alicia tells me that you – quote
– were going to have to tell me – unquote – that you couldn’t marry Vicky. That sounds like an interesting decision, particularly
since you implied to me yesterday that you were willing to consider the idea. Can you possibly bring yourself to tell me more
about it? I just hate having important decisions relayed to me second-hand.’
Now I was really in deep water. Flicking a speck of dust from the seat of the client’s chair I sat down leisurely in order
to give myself a few precious seconds to plan my strategy. Should I lie, stall or tell the truth? I decided that the situation
was so far beyond redemption that an outright lie would be pointless, but I could not make up my mind whether to tell the
whole or the partial truth. Finally, unable to decide how partial the partial truth should be, I gave up any idea of stalling
and resigned myself to unvarnished honesty.
‘Well, Neil,’ I said with the smile which one friend might reserve for another in very adverse circumstances, ‘don’t think
I wasn’t tempted by your suggestion. And don’t think I wouldn’t normally do everything I could to help you, but I’m afraid
that right now I’m not in a normal situation. I’m very much in love with Teresa – Kevin’s caretaker – and I’ve made up my
mind to marry her.’
He stared at me blankly. His delicate classical features might have been sculpted in marble. Then he tried to speak but his
asthma had worsened and the words were lost in his sporadic gasps for breath.
To give him privacy I moved to the concealed bar behind the bookcase and filled a glass of water from the sink. I knew better
than to show alarm or summon help. When the glass of water was in front of him I moved to the window, and keeping my back
to him as if nothing had happened I said levelly: ‘I know you’ll have trouble understanding why I should feel this way about
a penniless Polish-American girl from a coal-mining town in West Virginia, but my mind’s made up and I’d be lying if I let
you believe that either you or anyone else could alter it. I’m fond of Vicky; she’s very pretty and very cute, but she’s not
for me, Neil, and if I married her I wouldn’t be doing anyone a favour, least of all Vicky herself.’
I stopped to listen. His breathing seemed fractionally better, as if the pills were already doing their work, and I decided
to risk turning around. ‘Would you prefer that we continued this discussion later?’ I said, giving him the chance to get rid
of me and complete his recovery in private.
‘Yeah,’ he whispered. ‘Later. Lunch?’
‘I’m lunching with Fred Bucholz of Hammaco.’
Cornelius visibly revived. His breathing quietened, and as a barely perceptible colour returned to his face he looked me straight
in the eye and said: ‘Win that bid and we’ll forget about everything else. Even Vicky.’
It was most unlike Cornelius either to give up so easily or to reverse himself for no apparent reason. The Hammaco bid was
important but hardly crucial to the firm’s welfare, and as I eyed him sceptically he saw my suspicion and smiled. ‘You know
me too well, Sam!’ he said, all anger forgotten at last. ‘Yes, Hammaco’s just a side issue. The truth is I’ve changed my mind
about Vicky. Alicia succeeded in convincing me last night that (a) it’s a mistake for girls to marry too young and (b) it
would be a mistake for Vicky to marry you no matter how old she was. So we’ll forget all about it. I’m sorry if I put you
in an awkward position.’
I knew that Alicia had great influence over him, but I knew too that Cornelius tended to cling obstinately to his more perverse
ideas, and I still could not quite believe he had abandoned the scheme. ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Let’s forget it.’ I moved towards
the door.
‘You’ll have to explain to me some time about Teresa,’ said Cornelius. ‘Maybe when you become officially engaged. I always
enjoy your engagements. Do you realize you would have had at least three
wives by now if you’d succeeded in coaxing all those fiancées to the altar?’
I smiled back at him. ‘This time I’ve no intention of letting history repeat itself! I’ll check back with you later, Neil,
to report on the Hammaco lunch.’
‘Good luck.’
The door closed. The back lobby was dim and cool. I allowed myself a moment to savour my relief, and then still aware of a
weakness in the pit of my stomach I returned to my office to recuperate from the interview. But the phone rang before I could
relax. The representative of one of our syndicate’s leading investment banks was on the line.
‘Sam, I’m getting worried about this Hammaco business. With the price of zinc still falling and steel showing no signs of
recovery—’
‘I have inside information from the Treasury that there’ll be no slump in spite of all the talk of deflation.’
After I had calmed him down I got rid of him and summoned my secretary.
‘Get me the Treasury.’
I wanted a drink but it was only ten o’clock. I lit another cigarette instead, but five minutes later with the inside information
from the Treasury no longer a figment of my imagination but a trump card firmly embedded in reality, I felt sufficiently cheered
to call Teresa.
‘Hi,’ I said when she picked up the phone. ‘Tell me right away if I’m calling at a bad moment, but I just wanted to know how
you are.’
‘I’m okay.’ But she sounded uncertain. ‘I’m sorry I was so mean to you last night, Sam. It was just that I was so depressed.’
‘Sure, I understand. That’s okay.’ Since it was a medical fact that women were moodier than men I made a big effort to be
considerate. ‘I’d sure like to get together with you tonight or tomorrow,’ I said, ‘but why don’t I give you a little more
time to straighten out those work problems of yours? However I’m going to come and get you on Saturday night even if I have
to carry you off by force! I’ve got tickets for
South Pacific
.’
‘Oh great.’
There was a pause while I tried to suppress my baffled disappointment.
‘Sorry, Sam, did you say
South Pacific
? Gee, that would be
wonderful
! How did you ever manage to get tickets? What a great surprise!’
I felt much better. ‘We’ll make a big evening out of it,’ I said, ‘an
evening to remember.’ Then I blew a kiss into the phone, replaced the receiver and feeling in excellent spirits summoned Scott
to resume the battle of the Hammaco bid.
[2]
‘Sam, I’m out of my depth,’ said Scott. ‘The other side are definitely still in the running so I called Whitmore at Bonner,
Christopherson but he refused to talk to me, and it’s hard to squeeze someone till the pips squeak when they have their secretary
perpetually geared to say they’re in conference.’
‘The sonofabitch! And to think I helped put that bastard where he is today when I let Bonner’s in for a slice of that railroad
pie back in ’35 – he’d never have got to marry his boss’s daughter without that kind of success under his belt! Okay, get
on the extension, Scott, and take a lesson in how to fillet a fickle fish.’
There followed one of those conversations with which I had become all too familiar during my years as Cornelius’ right-hand
man. In fact the technique of bending an opponent gracefully into an ally was so familiar to me that I might have conducted
the conversation in my sleep. I called the offices of Bonner, Christopherson. Whitmore again tried to hide behind his secretary,
much to my disgust. I despise cowardice in businessmen who should have the guts to make at least a token attempt to brazen
their way out of a tight spot.
‘Tell Mr Whitmore,’ I said to the secretary, ‘that I’m calling to do him a favour. I’ve just received private information
from the SEC.’
He came gasping to the phone.
Leaning back in my swivel chair I idly watched the sunlight playing on the mellow mahogany furniture and listened to myself
talking very soothingly in a steady stream of clichés. When I had been young and had fallen back out of sheer nervousness
on the use of ingratiating clichés, I had noticed with surprise that my opponents nearly always wilted beneath the hypnotic
cumulative effect of so many banal phrases uttered in a honeyed voice. It was a lesson I had never forgotten.
‘Why, hullo there, Frank! Long time no see! How are you doing? How’s your wife … and children … gee, that’s just wonderful!
I’m real happy to hear it … Say Frank, I’m calling because you’re one of my oldest dearest friends and I want you to know
that I can do you a favour. I never forget my friends, Frank. If there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s a man who forgets his
obligations to his friends …’
I went on like this for some time. Briefly translated from the crap, I reminded him that Bonner, his father-in-law, wanted
Van Zale’s to include his firm in the next Pan-Pacific Harvester syndicate. I reminded him that Van Zale’s were always besieged
with firms who wanted to participate in a syndicate where the pickings were guaranteed to be opulent, and that inevitably
some firms had to be disappointed. I reminded him that even though the relationship between Van Zale’s and Bonner, Christopherson
had recently improved I could imagine circumstances in which it could go rapidly downhill again with the result that Bonner’s
would be excluded from the new syndicate.
‘… and your wonderful father-in-law – how is he by the way? Great! – yes, your wonderful boss would be real disappointed,
and if there’s one thing that makes me feel sad, Frank, it’s the thought of a nice guy like Mr Bonner being disappointed …’
And so on and so on.
‘… so I thought maybe you and I could get together, you know, nothing official, just a quiet little drink some place this
evening—’
‘Six-thirty at the University Club?’ said Whitmore faintly.
‘The Metropolitan Club,’ I said, ‘and make it six sharp.’
I hung up and went on watching the sunshine streaming through the window. Presently Scott returned to the room.
‘Congratulations, Sam!’ he exclaimed with enthusiasm. ‘You nailed him cold!’
I looked at him. There was no reason why I should doubt his sincerity, but I did. The doubt existed for no more than a second
but I found it so hard to explain. As usual my uneasiness was followed by guilt that I should distrust him, and to make amends
for my inexplicable suspicion I was careful to spend a minute being nice to him before I sent him back to his desk.
When he had gone I was about to recall my secretary when a glance at my calendar told me Good Friday was only a week away.
To underline his Episcopalian upbringing Cornelius gave his employees a holiday on both Good Friday and Easter Monday, and
I always took advantage of the long weekend to visit my mother in Maine. I decided to call her to confirm that I was coming,
and automatically as I picked up the receiver I pictured her in the hideous little frame house which I had bought for her
after my father died. It was not the kind of home I would have chosen for her, but my mother had been insistent. She did not
want a new house on the outskirts of town with a view of the sea. She wanted a property within walking distance of the stores
and the church. She did not want a car. I gave her presents for the house
but afterwards she put them away because she felt they were too good to use. I had given up inviting her to stay with me in
New York because I had now accepted that she would never come. The idea of air-travel terrified her, she disliked trains and
she regarded my offer of a chauffeur-driven limousine as too intimidating to be seriously considered, while beyond this fear
of travel was the unswerving conviction that she would be either robbed or killed if she were to set foot in New York City.
My father, much more adventurous, had been proud to visit me once a year, but neither he nor I had ever been able to prise
my mother loose from Maine.