‘Would you like me to unpack now, sir?’
‘No, I’m going to climb into a hot tub and get some of that travel dust out of my wrinkles.’
‘Very good, sir. You’ll find everything you need, I think.’ The servant opened the cabinet alongside the window. There were tumblers and wine glasses with some bottles of claret in a rack and an unopened bottle of Jack Daniel’s bourbon.
‘And in the ice box there’ll be branch water,’ said Stein delightedly. ‘The colonel never forgets a thing.’
‘That’s right, sir,’ said the servant. He paused respectfully and then said, ‘Dinner will be served at 7.30, sir. The colonel will have a drink in the study about seven. He would like you to join him there.’
‘I sure will,’ said Stein.
‘The bell is by the door should you require tea or coffee or anything to eat.’ He always said the same thing, but Stein did not interrupt, knowing that he preferred it this way: he was Swiss.
‘No, I’m just fine. I’ll see the colonel at seven, in the study.’
With a short bow, the servant departed. Stein opened the bottle of Jack Daniel’s and poured some down the sink. He had long since lost his taste for bourbon, but there was no point in hurting anyone’s feelings. After flushing some bottled water after it, Stein held the whisky to his nose. That sweet smell brought the memories flooding back upon him. He marvelled at the silence and stood for a moment or two in the sunless light, holding the whisky and looking out across the mauve rippling surface of the lake. From the hall below there came the soft chimes of the colonel’s favourite clock. He remembered his mother quoting the old Polish proverb, ‘In a house of gold, the hours are lead.’
Stein’s arrival at short notice meant that there were other guests for dinner. They were all casual acquaintances, people whom Pitman had met by way of business. A commodity broker from Paris on vacation with his wife and teenage daughter, and a French couple who owned a car-leasing agency in Zurich. The conversation was confined to polite banalities. So although Stein was able to outline the MacIver episode before the guests arrived, it was not until dinner was finished that Stein and Pitman were alone.
‘You’re looking well, Stein.’
‘You too, Colonel.’
‘What about a nightcap? Shall we see what we have in the cellar?’
It was always the same ritual. They went downstairs into the neatly arranged basement, passing the coal storage and the gleaming racks of logs to enter the long corridor where the wine was stored. ‘Claret or burgundy?’ the colonel asked.
‘The wine we drank at dinner was delicious.’
‘We might be able to do better than that,’ promised the colonel, searching carefully through the ranks of dusty bottles. ‘For an old army buddy we serve only the best.’
Behind the wine there was a storage area where old suitcases were piled. There were some stags’ heads and other hunting trophies there too, tusks and antlers grimy and cobwebbed. Stein remembered when they were the colonel’s pride and joy, but some of the boys from the battalion had made jokes about them at a party back in the late sixties, and the colonel had changed his mind about them. Colonel Pitman set great store by the opinion of his men. Perhaps sometimes he overdid this tendency.
‘Hermitage!’ said the colonel. ‘You’ll enjoy this one, I’m sure. It has the real flavour of the north Rhône and will make an interesting comparison with that Châteauneuf-du-Pape we had at dinner.’ The decision made, Pitman led the way upstairs to his study, negotiating the cellar steps with a care that made Stein concerned for him. ‘I get a little giddy sometimes,’ he explained.
‘Let me take that bottle, Colonel.’
Colonel Pitman held tight to the rail and picked his way up the steep steps. ‘I’ve never fallen,’ he explained, ‘but the light here is deceptive.’
‘All these wine cellars are the same,’ said Stein. ‘The steps wobble as you go out. You’ll have to cut back on the Evian water, Colonel.’
The colonel chuckled softly, appreciating Stein’s attempt to relieve his embarrassment.
They went to Pitman’s study. It was a small room, decorated like a businessman’s office. There was an oak desk arranged between the windows, two comfortable leather armchairs with a battered foot rest and brass ashtray near them. The walls were filled with photos and certificates and souvenirs of the colonel’s army days and his hunting expeditions. On the shelf near the door were some silver motor-racing trophies.
The light was better in here and Stein was shocked to see how much Colonel Pitman had changed since his last visit just a few short weeks ago. Age seemed to be shrinking him.
Pitman sat down and began to remove the cork from the wine bottle. ‘We’re all getting older, Corporal, there’s no denying that. I had some ghastly news the other day, you’d better prepare yourself for a shock. One of our number is gone.’
‘That’s bad news, Colonel.’
‘Master Sergeant Vanelli. Can you believe it, a fine strong man like that?’
‘Yes, sir, you told me about Vanelli,’ said Stein. In fact the colonel had told him on his last two visits to the house.
‘Reach me two of those stem glasses from the case behind you. Yes, Vanelli left a wife and two daughters. The best senior NCO in the battalion, I would have said. Don’t you agree?’ He took a tissue and carefully wiped any trace of sediment from inside the neck of the bottle, then poured wine into the two glasses Stein had set up on the desk. ‘They got the usual cash settlement, of course. We sent it within fourteen days, as we always do. It came to a lot of money, but only because the US dollar is not what it used to be in the old days. It’s not so long ago that we were getting over four Swiss francs to a dollar; now I’m lucky to get one-seventy. You’d be appalled to hear what it’s costing me to run this house. And, with a lot of money tied up in long-term US fixed-interest investments, we’ve taken quite a beating over the last few years. I think I’ve shown you the figures, haven’t I?’
‘Yes, Colonel, you have. It was something no one could have foreseen.’ Stein walked over to the window. The sky had cleared. It was a fine spring night, bright enough to keep a few birds fidgeting in the purple sky before settling down. Pitman came across to the window as if to discover what Stein was looking at. ‘No one could have foreseen what would happen to the money markets,’ said Stein.
Clumps of young beech trees and some willows made a pattern upon the oily-looking lake. It was just possible to see the movements of motor-car lights crawling along the road that skirted the far shore. It was Saturday evening and the road was busy. Colonel Pitman was holding two glasses of wine. ‘Taste that, Corporal,’ he said handing it to him.
‘Thank you, Colonel,’ said Stein with a courtesy appropriate between master and man. In deference to both colonel and climate, Stein had changed into a sober, dark, woollen suit.
The two men drank and then Pitman said, ‘MacIver you say his name was?’
‘Military police platoon. He was the lieutenant with them.’ So the colonel had been thinking about Stein’s news all through dinner.
‘I just can’t seem to place him somehow,’ said Pitman. ‘And you went along to the film company and talked?’
‘Like I told you, Colonel. They said that Lustig – the man MacIver had talked about – was away in Europe. I spoke with a guy who calls himself Max Breslow. He says he’s probably going to make the film.’
‘What kind of man is he?’
‘Not the kind of guy I’d want to share a seat with on a hang-glider. I have a feeling they know something. I have a feeling they’re going to give us a lot of trouble.’
‘We already have a lot of trouble,’ said Pitman gravely. ‘I told you on the phone that I was personally checking things at the bank. Well, I’ve checked them and we are facing a disaster.’
‘Disaster?’
‘The bank is in trouble. We’re in conflict with the Creditanstalt. Unless we can get them to change their attitude, it looks as if
we stand to lose one hundred million dollars.’
‘One hundred million dollars,’ Stein smiled. ‘You’re kidding, Colonel. Come on now.’
‘I wish I was kidding,’ said Pitman. ‘But I’m afraid we have been the victim of a monumental swindle.’
‘One hundred million dollars,’ said Stein breathlessly. So it was the colonel who had the most surprising news after all. Stein had put his drink down by now and his arms were thrashing about as he drowned in an ocean of dismay. ‘We’ve got a highly trained and highly paid Swiss and German banking staff downtown. How in hell could we be gypped out of one hundred million?’
‘The Creditanstalt is the biggest bank in Austria and it’s state owned. They gave a man named Peter Friedman – and that’s probably a fake name anyway – letters of credit for one hundred million dollars for ten big consignments of pharmaceuticals which were in the Zurich airport free zone. The documents say that Friedman was exporting these drugs from Holland to Yugoslavia, where the deal was to be handled by Interimpex, which is the Yugoslavian international trade corporation. Friedman can’t transfer the Austrian bank’s letters of credit – because they are not transferable – but he can’t be prevented from getting money by assigning the benefit to someone.’
‘How did we get into the act?’
‘Our bank gave Friedman the money, in exchange for that assignment of the benefits of the sale of the pharmaceuticals. A perfectly ordinary trading sequence; and it can be very profitable, as it has been in the past.’
‘OK, Colonel, never mind the commercial. What happened next?’
‘Friedman vanished. We checked the cases in the Zurich airport free zone …’
‘Aspirin?’
‘Not quite, but nowhere near as described in the shipping documents. Maybe worth two million dollars.’
‘Can’t we still cash the letters of credit with Creditanstalt?’
‘I wish we could, but letters of credit are not negotiable – so we can’t handle it – and become void if any part of an import/export transaction is illegal, or even misdescribed. This was misdescribed: the cases contain the wrong drugs. And today we hear from the Yugoslavs that these pharmaceuticals are not even destined for Yugoslavia. Interimpex are only acting as agents in a deal for someone else.’
‘Shit!’
‘We are the victims of a carefully planned swindle,’ said Pitman. ‘I’m not a banker – never have been, never will be – but I’ve learned a thing or two in over thirty years of watching those experts we employ to run our bank. One thing I’m sure about: old Mr Krug is even more upset than you are. And the young cashiers are worrying in case word of it gets around and affects their careers in banking. It’s not an inside job.’
‘Did they check it with you, Colonel? Before they paid out the money, did they check it with you? You’re in the bank almost every day, Erich told me so.’
‘They check everything with me,’ said Pitman. ‘They all run in and out of my office clucking like old hens. I’ve even seen Krug holding banknotes up to the light, to check out the watermarks before cashing fifty dollars for a tourist. But this seemed like a gilt-edged investment … with no risk at all.’
‘What about references?’
‘Friedman gave us wonderful references. My manager suspected that the drugs were not destined for Yugoslavia, because one hundred million dollars seemed far too much for a poor country like that to spend on one type of pharmaceutical. But that made it look better, rather than worse. Such things have happened before, and the bank has made a lot of money from such deals.’
‘Why didn’t those crazy bastards check the references out?’
‘Easy, Corporal. There’s nothing to be gained by getting excited. My manager did exactly that. We got a glowing reference from one of the best banks in West Germany. It said Friedman had been doing business with them regularly over the last eight years and they gave him a first-class rating.’
‘I don’t get it,’ said Stein.
‘I’ve been on the phone to the president of that bank in person, a Dr Böttger. He says that they have no record of such a letter ever having been sent. Furthermore he says that it is their policy never to give such recommendations.’
‘And the letter … No, don’t tell me.’
‘It’s missing from our files.’
‘Jesus!’ Stein hit himself on the face in anger. ‘One hundred million dollars. Can we stand that kind of a loss? What happens now?’
‘I’ve been reluctant to let news of our trouble leak out but I’ll have to turn to other banks to help us. We tried one of the big ones yesterday and they turned us down flat. But that’s not significant. We’ll ride out the storm, Corporal, I’m convinced of it.’
‘Why our bank? Are we the most stupid?’
‘By no means. But we were suited to this kind of swindle. There’s no doubt that the people concerned studied our methods carefully and maybe got someone inside to steal the reference from the files. But references are not normally guarded very carefully. A cleaner could have stolen it. There was no reason to think it would be something a thief would want. Furthermore they knew enough about our banking methods to guess that we would say yes to the Peter Friedman deal. It was rather like deals we’ve made before and made money from. And they perhaps guessed that we’d finance it alone, rather than syndicating it with other banks.’
‘And who is this Dr Böttger? What do we know about him?’
‘He’s the president of a very successful German bank,’ said Pitman.
‘Shit,’ said Stein again, banging a hand on the chair in a purposeless display of energy.
‘There is nothing we can do about it right now,’ said Pitman. ‘Better that we talk about the documents. You saw Lieutenant Sampson?’
‘Yes,’ said Stein.
‘A good young officer,’ said the colonel. ‘An excellent transport officer, always kept his paperwork in order, I remember.’
‘Well, he’s not an officer and he’s certainly not young any more,’ said Stein. ‘I play poker with him every week. He’s got a big law practice with offices in LA, San Francisco and Santa Barbara. Two partners do nearly all the work nowadays. Jim Sampson is in semi-retirement.’
‘Time flies,’ said the colonel.
‘OK,’ said Stein. ‘Well, I went to see him and told him that we’ve got people talking about making the Kaiseroda mine business into a movie.’
‘And he gave you a legal opinion?’
‘He went bananas!’ said Stein. ‘He sat down heavily and went a pale shade of white. But he kinda got used to the idea after a while. I pointed out to him that doing a movie about the Kaiseroda mine doesn’t have to mean showing us stealing any trucks. Maybe they just want to do a story about the treasure.’
‘And if they don’t just do a story about the treasure?’
‘Sampson says that MFA&A and the Allied Reparations Agency issued statements in 1945 that there was nothing missing. Jim Sampson says that, to prosecute us, the US government would have to admit that they were lying through their teeth. He thinks it’s unlikely.’
‘I can see why his partners put Jim into semi-retirement,’ said Colonel Pitman testily. ‘You didn’t tell me he was senile. Doesn’t he read the papers? Doesn’t he know that all the world’s governments tell lies all day every day, and show no sign of contrition even when they are caught out in such untruths?’ Colonel Pitman reached for the wine bottle and poured more for both of them. ‘Goddamned idiot, Sampson. I knew he’d never make captain.’
Stein tried to placate him. ‘Jim says it’s unlikely the US government will act. They’ll just say they know nothing about it.’
‘Very cool, calm and collected, was he?’ said Colonel Pitman sarcastically. ‘Do you remember Jim Sampson on the day I offered to cut him into our caper?’
‘Lieutenant Sampson was in charge of the maintenance platoon,’ said Stein. ‘We had to have him with us so that he could verify to the military police that we’d got a mechan
ical failure and had to stay halted at the roadside while the rest of the convoy continued.’
‘Never mind the details,’ said Pitman. ‘Can you remember all that stuff Jimmy Sampson gave us about having a sick mother who would suffer hardship if he went to Leavenworth?’ The colonel gave a cruel little laugh as he remembered the scene. He put down his drink and walked across the room to the humidor next to the drinks tray. He opened it with the key that released the pressure on the air-tight lid. ‘Want one?’
He didn’t wait for an answer, nor did Stein reply. He had never been known to decline a good cigar, and certainly not one of the cigars that Colonel Pitman had delivered from Davidoff, the best cigar merchant in Geneva.
The colonel selected a large cigar with considerable care. ‘I’m not allowed cigars nowadays,’ he explained. ‘But I’ll enjoy watching you smoke one.’ He cut the tip from it, presented it and lit it for Stein. ‘What are we going to do, Corporal?’ he said at last.
‘Losing one hundred million will wipe us out,’ said Stein.
‘Word of it will get around,’ said Colonel Pitman. ‘Maybe the bank could sustain the loss, but lost confidence will make it very difficult for us to continue trading, unless we find someone who will buy us out. There are the government guarantees and so on. So far, I haven’t taken advice about the legal implications because I don’t want to go spreading the story all round town.’
‘Say two million dollars from the cases of drugs in Zurich airport free zone,’ said Stein. ‘What else have we got in fixed-interest stocks and gold and stuff that we could sell?’
‘Maybe three-quarters of a million US dollars,’ said the colonel sadly. ‘I’ve been all through our assets time and time again. We’ve taken a terrible beating with the decline in value of the US dollar. We should have diversified much more. If I sold this house, maybe I could put another million into the pot.’
‘Nix on that, Colonel,’ said Stein. ‘None of the boys would want to put you on the street, or even in some lousy little apartment block downtown. By the time we’d shared it out, it wouldn’t be so much. We all shared in the benefits and we all have to share in the losses.’ He rubbed his nose. ‘I guess this is the end of the bank.’