Gino Makdisi said, "Remember the gun, Mr. Neumann. It carries your fingerprints. I may be a criminal, but in court my word is as good as the next man's." He shrugged his shoulders as if things weren't so bad, then twisted his bulk toward the Pasha. "Can you drop me at the Schiller Bank? We'll have to hurry if we're to make the transfer this afternoon."

The Pasha smiled. "Not to worry. Mr. Neumann is an expert at processing late-arriving transfers. Every Monday and Thursday at three o'clock, right, Nicholas?"

CHAPTER 48

Peter Sprecher drummed his fingers on top of his desk and told himself in a stern voice that he must count to ten before exploding. Silently, he invoked Almighty God, the King James variant, thank you, to pacify the jabbering crowd gathered around the hexagonal trading desk adjacent to his own. He heard Tony Gerber, a rat-faced options specialist, rave about the "strangle" he had put on USB shares. If the shares stayed within five points of their current level, he'd take down a two-hundred-thousand-franc profit in just thirty days. "Go ahead and annualize that return," he heard Gerber brag. "Three hundred and eighty percent. You try and beat it."

Sprecher reached seven before deciding he could stand it no longer. He slid his chair back and tapped his neighbor Hassan Faris, the bank's chief of equities trading, on the shoulder. "I know it is a quiet Friday afternoon but if you wish to continue this infernal racket, take your pack of thieves off to another corner of the cave. I've another dozen calls yet to make and I can't hear myself think."

"Mr. Sprecher," answered Faris over the continuous buzz, "you are sitting in the center of the trading floor of a bank that derives its entire income from buying and selling financial instruments. If you have a problem hearing, I'll be happy to order you a headset. Until then, mind your own fucking business. Okay?"

Sprecher grumbled something about not being an operator and slid his chair back to his desk. Faris was right, of course. The place was supposed to be a hive of activity. The more frenetic, the better. A moving market meant someone somewhere was making money. He scanned the floor. Like bumpers on a snooker table, seven hexagonal desks sprang from the green baize floor. Around them, men stood in varied positions of action. He heard someone fire off an order for a thousand OEX contracts at the market. Beside him, Alfons Gruber was whispering feverishly into his handset, "I know Philip Morris is up twelve percent in the last week, but I still want to short the sucker. I hear the jury's ready to convict. I'm telling you, short it!"

Sprecher felt lost. This was not his world. It was everything he had rebelled against. A trader's career was nasty, brutish, and short. He did not enjoy phoning ladies and gentlemen with whom he had no prior acquaintance and hectoring them to put in their lot with Klaus Konig and the Adler Bank. It made him feel cheap. In his heart he was still a USB man, and probably would be until the day he died.

Sprecher returned to the task at hand. Officially stated, his job was to rally the votes of those institutional shareholders holding sizable blocks of USB stock to the Adler Bank's cause. It had been a difficult task, confidential shareholder lists pirated from USB notwithstanding. Holders of Swiss bank stocks tended to be a conservative lot. The Adler Bank was having little luck winning votes based on its past returns. Too risky, too aggressive by half, stammered the stodgy investors. With days remaining until USB's general assembly, he was convinced that the sole route open to capture two seats on the board of the United Swiss Bank was straightforward share accumulation: cash purchases on the open market.

There was only one problem. The Adler Bank's cash reserves had dried up. The bank had leveraged its assets beyond any prudent measure to secure its current position of thirty-two percent of USB's outstanding shares, a stake valued as of yesterday's close at 1.4 billion Swiss francs. God forbid Konig failed to gain the deciding one percent: the price of USB stock would collapse, and the market value of Adler's portfolio would drop between eighteen and twenty percent overnight.

Sprecher spotted a tall man waving to him from across the room. It was George von Graffenried, Konig's number two and head honcho on the bond desk. He waved back and began standing but Von Graffenried motioned for him to stay seated. A few moments later he was squatting by Sprecher's side.

"I've just received another surprise from our friends at USB," Von Graffenried said quietly, handing him a sheet of paper. "Get on it. A block of one hundred forty thousand shares. Exactly the one percent we need. Find whoever runs this Widows and Orphans Fund of Zurich and get your butt over there as quickly as possible. We have to capture their votes!"

Sprecher picked up the photocopy of USB stationery and brought it closer to his eyes. The Widows and Orphans Fund of Zurich. Fund manager Mrs. F. Emmenegger. He smirked. His American friend's ploy had obviously worked. Such was the pressure to surpass the thirty-three percent vote barrier that neither Konig nor Von Graffenried, despite never having heard of the fund, had bothered to research its authenticity.

"I'll expect an answer by tomorrow," said Von Graffenried. "We'll be here all day long."

Sprecher slapped the paper onto his desk and withdrew a pen. He read the sheet, suppressing an urge to laugh aloud. Look at the handwritten notes Neumann had inscribed: Called at 10:00, called at 12:00. No answer. We must not fail!! Young Nick, earnest to the last.

Dutifully, Sprecher picked up the phone and rang the number written on the sheet. An answering machine responded after the fourth ring. The voice sounded familiar but he couldn't place it, and upon hearing the beep, he left a brief message. "This is Mr. Peter Sprecher calling on behalf of the Adler Bank. We would very much like to speak with you as soon as possible regarding the voting of your block of USB shares at the general assembly on Tuesday. Please feel free to call me back at the following number. Mr. Konig and Mr. Von Graffenried would personally enjoy meeting with you to discuss the Adler Bank's famed investment strategies and to point out how the value of your shareholding would greatly increase with benefit of the Adler Bank's wise counsel."

"Very well done," applauded Hassan Faris. "This is Mister Peter Sprecher. Send out your wives and daughters. Trust us. We want only to ravage and enslave them. Do not worry."

Hassan's troop burst into laughter.

A light on the equity trader's desk lit up. Faris jabbed at the lit button and brought the phone to his ear. He plugged his finger into his other ear, then motioned for his charges to be quiet.

"Shut up!" yelled Faris. He swept his hands through the air, and his followers dispersed.

Sprecher sat up and took note. He rolled his chair closer to his neighbor while inclining his head so as best to eavesdrop on Faris's conversation.

"Wait a moment, sir, I must write this all down," said Faris. "I never make a mistake on so big an order… Yes, sir, that is why you hired me… For-tee million… Is that U.S. dollars or Swiss francs?… Dollars, yes sir… At the market… One minute… Mr. Konig, our cash account shows only two million dollars… Yes, of course I can arrange for settlement on Tuesday… No, we aren't required to say anything… Well, technically, yes, but we'll just pay twenty-four hours late, that's all… On Tuesday morning at ten… Will the money have arrived by that time?… Yes, sir… I repeat: An order to buy forty million U.S. dollars of USB shares at the market for settlement Tuesday. The entire purchase to be booked into the Ciragan Trading Account."