Billionaire

by Peter James

  He slipped out of bed, put on his paisley silk dressing gown, which he had bought at Harrods, and walked over to the bedroom window. The view was as always, stunning. It was a view he could never tire of, the little fishing port where he had been born and lived as a child, the tiny white houses. He could see the one where he had lived. The sun was a red ball on the horizon, and the sky was cloudless; it was going to be a beautiful day. There was the steady staccato diesel phut-silence-phut-silence-phut-silence of a deep-sea trawler coming back in after its night’s work; several other smaller boats were also heading in towards the stone mole of the port. There was the smell of sweet wet dew in the air.

  Culundis padded downstairs in his bare feet as the bell rang a third time. ‘All right, all right,’ he said. ‘I’m coming!’ He opened the door, just a fraction, and peered round. He saw a short man in a thin, dark raincoat; the man smiled pleasantly. ‘Good morning, Mr Culundis,’ said the stranger, politely.

  ‘Er – good morning,’ said Culundis baffled.

  The stranger forced the door wide open; for a second, Culundis could not quite understand the man’s behaviour, and then he saw for the first time, that the stranger held in his hand a Walther automatic pistol with a silencer fitted to the end. For the first time in his life he felt real fear, an icy chill wind that swept through his veins, pumped into his stomach, down through his bile duct and into his rectum. He shat onto his feet. It probably would not have cheered him to know that this actual gun, silencer, and the bullets inside it had all been supplied by him, as part of a large order, to General Isser Ephraim’s team of Mossad agents.

  The man fired four bullets into Culundis’s chest, two of which completely removed his heart. As with all products supplied by Jimmy Culundis, the silencer worked perfectly.

  The man from the Mossad closed the front door, walked back to the gate, past the security guard with the broken neck, and drove off into the night. Culundis’s family continued to sleep for three more hours.

  30

  At 5.15 on Tuesday evening, Rocq drove the Porsche down the ramp of the multi-storey car park behind Lower Thames Street, nodded to the attendant, and stopped, waiting for a gap in the traffic to pull out into the street. Even if he were looking closely, he would have been unlikely to have noticed the figure in the shadows on the second floor of the concrete buildings who watched the appearance of the car with interest, stop-watch in his hand.

  The gap came, Rocq gave a light tap on the Porsche’s accelerator, and the car surged out into the traffic stream. Rocq was feeling extremely vulnerable; he had barely slept the last three nights, and Amanda told him she thought that he was cracking up. He wanted desperately to tell her what had happened in Switzerland, but he didn’t want to frighten her.

  He had thought about the incident a million times, and each time he was no nearer a firm opinion. When gold had gone through the $700 mark, Elleck had called him up. He had watched Elleck’s face closely, and thought that Elleck looked strained, under pressure – but there was nothing Elleck did or said that gave him any possible cause to think Elleck might have been involved in an attempt to murder him.

  Maybe, he wondered, the Range Rover driver had just been a nutter? Maybe he had accidentally carved him up somewhere around Geneva Airport and the guy had a screw loose and had come after him. He had heard of incidents like that occurring. But it had lasted for several hours – surely the driver’s companion would have calmed him down. It was a possibility and he felt a little comforted by the thought, but not much.

  For two days, he had racked his brains backwards and forwards to think of any enemies he might have made. He knew there were people jealous of him, people in the office, but none he believed could be so jealous as to try to kill him. No, he knew each time, it came back to Elleck’s syndicate. It had to be them; and if they had tried once, he had little reason to doubt that they would try again. He thought about going to the police, but he dismissed that idea; he decided they would think he was nuts and, in any event, the British police would hardly be interested in something that happened in Switzerland.

  He looked constantly in his mirrors, noting any car that appeared to be staying close behind him. He was paranoid, he realized; but he equally well realized he would have to be a fool not to be. He decided not to stay in his own flat tonight, but to stay at Amanda’s. He couldn’t relax in his own flat, and he knew he was going to end up as a basket case if he had to endure another night without sleep, listening to, and thinking about, every single noise.

  It had altogether been one hell of a day, he reflected: gold had continued to rise all through the morning, hitting $700 just before noon. Elleck had called him up to his office and told him he was still convinced it must start dropping, and to hold on until two o’clock in the afternoon. At two o’clock, gold was at $712 and Elleck was a very agitated man. Between two and five o’clock, on Elleck’s instructions, through Johnson Matthey of London, Mocatta, Rothschild, and a number of commission houses throughout Europe, Globalex, Goldilocks Ltd and four other companies that Rocq had established on behalf of the syndicate bought 2,500,000 ounces of gold. The world gold market was not aware of the single buying entity and, by the close of the London market, the price of gold had dropped off to $707. Elleck had buzzed him every half hour throughout the afternoon to ask him how he was getting on, and the only thing that gave Rocq any satisfaction at all was listening to the squirming nervousness of his chairman’s voice. He remembered a couple of weeks ago how he had ventured an opinion to Elleck about the price of gold, and had been shot down in flames. If Elleck wanted to hang himself on gold right now, Rocq was more than prepared to give him all the rope he asked for. The thought cheered him up considerably: maybe, he thought, just maybe, no one was going to kill him after all.

  Sir Monty Elleck had spent the most twitchy day of his life. The threatening words of Viscomte Lasserre had hung over him like a funeral shroud. It had never occurred to him that by mixing with those in the killing business he could ever be in a position where he could become a victim himself, and he didn’t like the feeling. He was annoyed with himself, too, for he had missed out on the chance to make a personal fortune on the rise in gold over the past few days. He had deliberately held back on buying for the syndicate because he had wanted to buy a few million pounds’ worth for himself first, to cash in on the rise he knew the syndicate’s buying and subsequent activities ought to have produced: but then, when gold had begun to rise on its own accord, on the strength of a whole mixed bag of rumours, he had held back, waiting for a drop. No drop had come, not until 4.15 that Tuesday afternoon; not until the full £1000 million committed by the syndicate had been spent.

  Elleck had decided not to put money in himself after all. The rise was too high, far too high, for his liking. Even though he felt it probably would go higher still on the news that was to come from Israel and from Umm Al Amnah in the morning, he had been at the game long enough to know when to keep his chips off the table. He was going to make a handsome enough profit out of commissions from just handling the deal: he didn’t need to take any risks himself. He smiled. Let Lasserre and Culundis be on the hook; they could afford it.

  When Rocq had buzzed him to tell him the final amount of the thousand million had been spent, at 4.45, Elleck buzzed his secretary and asked her to get him Viscomte Lasserre.

  Two minutes later she buzzed him back. ‘I can’t get through, Sir Monty,’ she said. ‘All the lines are engaged.’

  ‘Keep trying, will you, Jane?’

  ‘Yes, Sir Monty.’

  The anger he had felt at the time the Viscomte had passed the thinly veiled threat to him welled up in him again, only much stronger now. He thought of the elegant but weak French aristocrat, and the greasy fat Greek pervert, and he was amused that his delaying had lost them so much money. He wasn’t going to be threatened by anyone. He was the king sitting on his throne at 88 Mincing Lane. When it came to money, God help anyone who tried to get one over him; when b
attles involved money, he won every time. He knew how to fight with money the way field marshals know how to fight with soldiers. His company client list didn’t read like an elongated version of Who’s Who for nothing: he was the best in the Commodity Market, not only in this country, but anywhere in the world. He wasn’t scared of anyone – he would take on all the best fighters in the world – as long as they fought with money.

  His chain of thought was interrupted by his secretary bringing him in the evening paper, the New Standard, as she always did at five o’clock. He glanced at the headlines: ‘BLOODY END FOR THE MERCHANT OF DEATH.’ The photograph beneath it struck him like a fist between his legs: it was the contorted face of Jimmy Culundis.

  Constantinou ‘Jimmy’ Culundis, billionaire international arms dealer, was found shot dead in his Athens home early this morning. A personal security guard was also found dead nearby. An Athens police detective said Culundis had many underworld connections as well as many international political connections; it was known that he supplied armaments to a wide variety of organizations ranging from right-wing governments to left-wing terrorist organizations.

  The journalist who wrote the ten-column article concluded with the words:

  It is inevitable for a man who profits by violence, in the way Culundis has throughout his career, that one day, one of his dealings must come home to roost: For Jimmy Culundis, under a blazing dawn sky on a perfect Greek morning, that day was today. Culundis leaves a wife and three children.

  Elleck sat back in his chair, and began to think hard. A moment later, his intercom buzzed. It was his secretary, and she sounded strange.

  ‘Sir Monty – I have Viscomte Lasserre’s personal secretary on the line now – would you like to speak to her?’

  ‘Er – isn’t he there?’

  ‘I think you’d better speak to her.’

  ‘Put her on.’

  There was a click, and then a voice in broken English: ‘Allo? Sir Montay Hellix?’

  ‘Yes, speaking.’

  ‘I ’ave to tell you bad news. The Viscomte Lasserre was killed in an aeroplane accident last night.’

  ‘Viscomte Lasserre?’

  ‘I am afraid so – yes, sir – he –’ she broke down and began sobbing. After a few moments she stopped. ‘I can’t talk more now. I am sorry; I am so sorry.’ The line went dead.

  Elleck stared blankly into the receiver for a few moments, then replaced it. He began to pick his fingernails, violently. He felt numb. For ten minutes he sat, staring blankly across his office, trying to focus his mind on what had happened.

  The £1,000 million of gold that Rocq had bought on the syndicate’s behalf today – Globalex had guaranteed the payment of the entire amount. His arrangement with Lasserre and Culundis was that they would transfer the funds to his bank each day, as the gold was bought. As he hadn’t bought until today, he had not required the funds. The purpose of his telephone call to Lasserre had been to ask Lasserre for immediate payment of the £100 million of margin. There was nothing in writing, nothing at all; he had never had anything in writing with Lasserre – everything was always done verbally. Globalex was now on the hook for £1,000 million worth of gold, which it had bought at the top of the market. With the drop of $5 an ounce at the close of play it meant, on the 840,000 ounces they had bought today, they were down over £2 million already.

  His brain raced; he had a chill fear run through him as he wondered if the two deaths were connected. The coincidence was too great, he decided, for them not to be. Was it the syndicate someone was wiping out, or were they killed because of some other business dealing? He thought with an even deeper chill about the break-in, the murder of Sarge, and suddenly he did not want to be alone in the building; he pressed the intercom. ‘Jane – would you mind staying on for a bit longer? I – er – I may have a few urgent letters to give you.’

  ‘Well – I can stay another half hour, Sir Monty – we have to go to a dinner tonight, and the 6.10 is really the latest train I can catch.’

  ‘Okay, fine. Can you get Rocq, please. I need him up here immediately.’ With Lasserre and Culundis dead, he had no idea whether the plan would still go ahead or not. Perhaps they had set it into irreversible motion? Perhaps their deaths were intended to stop it?

  He couldn’t risk it: £1,000 million of gold was a lot of money to be on the hook for, a damned lot, by anyone’s standards.

  Elleck did some calculations in his head: he had cash reserves on short-term deposits of £40 million, specifically for covering particularly good clients whom the company did not want to bother with small margin calls. He had another fifty million on one-year term deposits, and a further forty million in stocks, shares and commodities. The Globalex building was worth about three million. At a pinch, he could rustle up £140 million. If gold dropped twenty per cent, he would have to fork out £200 million; he didn’t have £200 million. His legs began to tremble. It was impossible he thought, impossible; he could never have allowed such a thing to happen. But he had allowed it. He had actually allowed himself to get into a position whereby he could go to the wall.

  The intercom buzzed and he pushed the button: ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m afraid Mr Rocq left about twenty-five minutes ago, Sir Monty.’

  ‘Damn. Try his home.’

  ‘I just did, Sir Monty – no answer.’

  ‘Keep trying it every five minutes. Do you have any idea where he might have been going?’

  ‘No, Sir Monty, and there’s no one to ask in his office – they have all left for the day.’

  ‘Okay – well, keep trying his home.’ He let go of the switch. He wanted to sell the entire thousand million pounds-worth of gold now. Take the two million loss, that was okay. He could not take the risk of the plan not coming off and, with the two principals dead, it seemed to him pretty unlikely that the plan could come off. He had to get hold of Rocq, because he had no idea where Rocq had done the buying. He had bought in bits and pieces all over the world, including the Swiss company and numbered accounts. ‘What a mess,’ he said to himself. ‘What a bloody mess.’

  31

  It had been a long time since Baenhaker could remember a bollocking as severe as the one he had received from General Ephraim on the Monday afternoon, when Ephraim had telephoned him at Eisenbar-Goldschmidt. It was Wednesday morning, and he was still smarting under the General’s torrent of abuse.

  Switzerland had never been particularly helpful towards the Mossad at the best of times: Israel had been doing its best for some years to woo the Swiss, and their efforts had been beginning to pay off. ‘What the hell do you think you’re up to, trying to get your killing done for you, and in Switzerland of all places?’ Ephraim had shouted.

  Baenhaker knew what he’d done, and he tried to explain it to Ephraim: that he hadn’t wanted to bring the full weight of Scotland Yard crashing down upon them by having killed three people from the same company within a week. Ephraim’s anger was all the more fuelled by the fact that he had given his instructions on Friday, expressed the urgency of the situation, and it was now Monday. Apart from losing two of his top Swiss agents and having the wrath of the Swiss government brought down upon his head, nothing had been achieved. The threat to relieve Baenhaker from the assignment and instruct another agent to do the job had hit Baenhaker hardest of anything.

  ‘It’s Monday afternoon, General,’ Baenhaker had said. ‘By Wednesday night, they will both be dead, I promise you.’

  ‘They had better be,’ replied Ephraim.

  Baenhaker had not had an altogether happy weekend. He had planned to kill Elleck while Rocq was in Switzerland, only to discover that Elleck had gone sailing with friends and would not be back until Monday morning – and he had no idea where Elleck had gone sailing.

  He had spent Sunday evening surveilling Elleck’s London home in Bishop’s Avenue, Hampstead, but Elleck had in fact remained on the boat Sunday night, and had driven straight to the office on Monday morning. It was now Wednesday mor
ning; he hadn’t yet killed Elleck because he wanted to plan the killing of Rocq and leave as short as possible a time gap between the two killings. This evening, at about five o’clock, Rocq would be killed. Elleck was going to a City Livery dinner at Cutlers’ Hall; his chauffeur would be driving him home afterwards. Baenhaker knew the exact spot in the rhododendron bush opposite Elleck’s front door where he would be waiting, with the silenced Walther in his hand.

  At exactly five to nine, he watched from the street corner where he was standing as Rocq’s metallic dark-grey Porsche turned into the entrance to the Lower Thames Street multistorey car park. He smiled to himself. A few minutes later he saw Rocq emerge, holding his neat briefcase in one hand, and with a mackintosh slung over his other arm. Baenhaker looked up at the sky; there were quite a few clouds. Maybe Rocq was right, he thought, maybe it would rain today.

  He waited a full ten minutes, just to make sure Rocq had not left anything behind in the car, and then he slipped up the fire escape staircase of the concrete building. The Porsche was in the same bay as the previous evening, and he was pleased to notice all the other bays around it were also taken, which meant it was unlikely he would be interrupted with his work.

  He slid, with his large briefcase, down between the Porsche and the car next to it, a blue Ford Cortina. He opened the briefcase, and pulled out a slim metal cylinder with a fixing plate at either end, a small drill, a screwdriver and two screws; then he eased himself under the bottom of the Porsche, directly below the driver’s seat.