It was a perfect segue, I thought, into Duke Securities and then into broaching the possibility of an FBI investigation. Yes, better to allude to the FBI now, to almost predictan investigation, as if the Wolf had seen it coming all along and had already prepared himself to fend off the attack.

Once more I held up my hand for quiet. “Listen, everyone—I’m not gonna lie to you here. Settling with the SEC was one of the toughest decisions I’ve ever made. But I knew that Stratton would endure no matter what. See, what makes Stratton so special, what makes it so unstoppable, is that it’s not just a place where people come to work. And it’s not just a business looking to turn a profit. Stratton is an idea! And by the very nature of being an idea it can’t be contained, nor can it be quashed by a two-year investigation at the hands of a bunch of bozo regulators, who froze to death in our conference room and thought nothing of spending millions of taxpayer dollars to embark on one of the biggest witch hunts since the Salem witch trials!

“The very idea of Stratton is that it doesn’t matter what family you were born into, or what schools you went to, or whether or not you were voted most likely to succeed in your high-school yearbook. The idea of Stratton is that when you come here and step into the boardroom for the first time, you start your life anew. The very moment you walk through the door and pledge your loyalty to the firm, you become part of the family, and you become a Strattonite.”

I took a deep breath and pointed in Carrie’s direction. “Now, everybody here knows Carrie Chodosh, right?”

The boardroom responded with hooting and howling and catcalling.

I raised my hand and smiled. “Okay, that was very nice. In case any of you weren’t aware of it, Carrie was one of Stratton’s first brokers, one of the original eight. And when we think of Carrie, we think of her the way she is today—a beautiful woman who drives a brand-new Mercedes; who lives in the finest condo complex on Long Island; who wears three-thousand-dollar Chanel suits and six-thousand-dollar Dolce and Gabbana dresses; who spends her winters vacationing in the Bahamas and her summers in the Hamptons; you know her as someone who has a bank account with God only knows how much in it”—probably nothing, if I had to guess, since that was the Stratton way—“and, of course, everyone knows Carrie as one of the highest-paid female executives on Long Island, on pace to make over $1.5 million this year!”

Then I told them the state of Carrie’s life when she came to Stratton and right on cue, the lovely Carrie responded in a loud, forthright voice: “I’ll always love you, Jordan!” at which point the boardroom went wild once more, and I received my fourth standing ovation.

I bowed my head in thanks, then after a good thirty seconds I asked for quiet. As the last of the Strattonites retook their seats, I said, “Understand that Carrie’s back was to the wall; she had a small child to worry about and a mountain of bills crashing down on her. She couldn’t allow herself to fail! Her son, Scott, who happens to be an incredible kid, will soon be attending one of the finest colleges in the country. And thanks to his mother, he won’t have to graduate owing a couple a hundred grand in student loans and then be forced to—” Oh, shit!Carrie was crying! I’d done it again! The second time in one day I’d brought a woman to tears! Where was the Duchess?

Carrie was crying so loudly that three sales assistants had surrounded her. I needed to hit my final points quickly and then end this farewell speech before someone else started crying. “Okay,” I said. “We all love Carrie, and we don’t want to see her cry.”

Carrie held up her hand and said, through gooselike snorts, “I’m—I’m fine. I’m sorry.”

“Okay,” I replied, wondering what the appropriate response was to a crying female Strattonite during a farewell speech. Did such a protocol even exist? “The point I was trying to make was that if you think the opportunity for quick advancement doesn’t exist anymore—that because Stratton is so big and so well-managed that your path to the top is somehow blocked—well, in the history of Stratton there’s never been a riper time for someone to rise through the ranks and go straight to the top. And that, my friends, is a fact!

“The simple fact is, now that I’m leaving, there’s a huge void Danny needs to fill. And where’s he gonna fill it from? From the outside? From somewhere on Wall Street? No, of course not! Stratton promotes from within. It always has! So whether you just walked in the door, or if you’ve been here for a few months and just passed your Series Seven, or if you’ve been here for a year and just made your first million, then today is your lucky day. As Stratton continues to grow, there’ll be other regulatory hurdles. And just like the SEC…we’ll overcome those too. Who knows? Maybe the next time it’ll be the NASD…or the states…or maybe even the U.S. Attorney’s Office. Who can say for sure? After all, virtually every big Wall Street firm goes through that once. But all you need to know is that at the end of the day Stratton will endure and that from out of adversity comes opportunity. Maybe next time it’ll be Danny who’s standing up here, and he’ll be passing the torch to one of you.”

I paused to let my words sink in, and then began my close. “So good luck, everyone, and continued success. I ask you for only one favor: that you follow Danny the way you followed me. Pledge your loyalty to him the way you did to me. As of this very moment, Danny is in charge. Good luck, Danny, and Godspeed! I know you’ll take things to a new level.” And with that, I lifted the mike in the air in salute to Danny and received the standing ovation of a lifetime.

After the mob finally settled down, I was presented with a going-away card. It was three feet by six feet, and on one side, in big red block letters, it read, To the World’s Greatest Boss!On either side were handwritten notes—brief accolades from each of my Strattonites—thanking me for changing their lives so dramatically.

Later, after I went inside my office and closed the door for the last time, I couldn’t help but wonder if they would still be thanking me five years from now.

CHAPTER 25

REAL REALS

H ow many reruns ofGilligan’s Island can one man watch before he decides to stick a gun in his mouth and pull the trigger?

It was a frigid Wednesday morning, and in spite of it being eleven a.m., I was still lying in bed, watching television. Forced retirement, I thought—it ain’t no fucking picnic.

I’d been watching a considerable amount of TV over the last four weeks—too much, according to the doleful Duchess—and, as of late, I had become obsessed with Gilligan’s Island.

There was a reason for that: While watching Gilligan’s Islandreruns, I made the shocking discovery that I was not the only Wolf of Wall Street. Much to my chagrin, there was someone sharing this not-so-honorable distinction with me, and he happened to be a bumbling old WASP who’d been unlucky enough to get himself shipwrecked on Gilligan’s Island. His name was Thurston Howell III, and, alas, he truly wasan idiot WASP. In typical WASP fashion he’d married a female of his species, an atrocious pineapple blond named Lovey, who was almost as great an idiot as he but not quite. Lovey felt it necessary to wear wool pantsuits, sequined ball gowns, and a full face of makeup, despite the fact that Gilligan’s Island was somewhere in the South Pacific, at least five hundred miles from the nearest shipping lane where she would ever be seen by anyone. But WASPs are notorious overdressers.

I found myself wondering if it was only by sheer coincidence that the original Wolf of Wall Street was a bumbling moron or if my nickname was meantto be a slight—comparing Jordan Belfort to an old WASP bastard with an IQ of sixty-five and a penchant for bed-wetting. Perhaps, I thought glumly, perhaps.