The Moneychangers

by Arthur Hailey

The sight of Roscoe, seeming to hang for an instant in air, then disappear from view with a terrible scream which faded quickly, left Alex horrified, shaking, and for moments unable to speak. It was Tom Straughan, who was right behind him on the stairway, who had taken charge, ordering the balcony cleared, an order with which Alex had complied.

  Later, in an act of futility, the door to the balcony had been locked.

  Below, returning to the 36th floor, Alex had pulled himself together and gone to report to Jerome Patterton. After that, the rest of the day was a mélange of events, decisions, details, succeeding and merging with each other until the whole became a Heyward epitaph, which even now was not concluded, and there would be more of the same tomorrow. But, for today, Roscoe’s wife and son had been contacted and consoled; police inquiries answered—at least, in part; funeral arrangements overseen—since the body was unrecognizable, the coffin would be sealed as soon as the coroner agreed; a press statement drafted by Dick French and approved by Alex; and still more questions dealt with or postponed.

  Answers to other questions became clearer to Alex in the late afternoon, shortly after Dick French advised him that he should accept a telephone call from a Newsday reporter named Endicott. When Alex talked to him, the reporter seemed upset. He explained that just a few minutes earlier he had read on the AP wire of Roscoe Heyward’s apparent suicide. Endicott went on to describe his call to Heyward this morning and what transpired. “If I’d had any idea …” he ended lamely.

  Alex made no attempt to help the reporter feel better. The moralities of his profession were something he would have to work out for himself. But Alex did ask, “Is your paper still going to run the story?”

  “Yes, sir. The desk is writing a new lead. Apart from that, it will run tomorrow as intended.”

  “Then why did you call?”

  “I guess I just wanted to say—to somebody—I’m sorry.”

  “Yes,” Alex said. “So am I.”

  This evening Alex reflected again on the conversation, pitying Roscoe for the agony of mind he must have suffered in those final minutes.

  On another level there was no doubt that the Newsday story, when it appeared tomorrow, would do the bank great harm. It would be harm piled on harm. Despite Alex’s success in halting the run at Tylersville, and the absence of other visible runs elsewhere, there had been a public lessening of confidence in First Mercantile American and an erosion of deposits. Nearly forty million dollars in withdrawals had flowed out in the past ten days and incoming funds were far below their usual level. At the same time, FMA’s share price had sagged badly on the New York Stock Exchange.

  FMA, of course, was not alone in that. Since the original news of Supranational’s insolvency, a miasma of depression had gripped investors and the business community, including bankers; had sent stock prices generally on a downhill slide; had created fresh doubts internationally about the value of the dollar; and now appeared to some as the last clear warning before the major storm of world recession.

  It was, Alex thought, as if the toppling of a giant had brought home the realization that other giants, once thought invulnerable, could topple, too; that neither individuals, nor corporations, nor governments, could escape forever the simplest accounting law of all—that what you owed you must one day pay.

  Lewis D’Orsey, who had preached that doctrine for two decades, had written much the same thing in his latest Newsletter. Alex had received a new issue in the mail this morning, had glanced at it, then put it in his pocket to read more carefully tonight. Now, he took it out.

  Do not believe the glibly touted myth [Lewis wrote] that there is something complex and elusive, defying easy analysis, about corporate, national or international finance.

  All are simply housekeeping—ordinary housekeeping, on a larger scale.

  The alleged intricacies, the obfuscations and sinuosities are an imaginary thicket. They do not, in reality, exist, but have been created by vote-buying politicians (which means all politicians), manipulators, and Keynesian-diseased “economists.” Together they use their witch doctor mumbo-jumbo to conceal what they are doing, and have done.

  What these bumblers fear most is our simple scrutiny of their activities in the clear and honest light of commonsense.

  For what they—the politicians, mostly—on one hand have created is Himalayas of debt which neither they, we, nor our great-great-great-grandchildren can ever pay. And, on the other hand, they have printed, as if producing toilet tissue, a cascade of currency, debasing our good money—especially the honest, gold-backed dollars which Americans once owned.

  We repeat: It is all simply housekeeping—the most flagrantly incompetent, dishonest housekeeping in human history.

  This, and this alone, is the basic reason for inflation.

  There was more. Lewis preferred too many words, rather than too few.

  Also, as usual, Lewis offered a solution to financial ills.

  Like a beaker of water for a parched and dying wayfarer, a solution is ready and available, as it has always been, and as it always will be.

  Gold.

  Gold as a base, once more, for the world’s money systems.

  Gold, the oldest, the only bastion of monetary integrity. Gold, the one source, incorruptible, of fiscal discipline.

  Gold, which politicians cannot print, or make, or fake, or otherwise debase.

  Gold which, because of its severely limited supply, establishes its own real, lasting value.

  Gold which, because of this consistent value and when a base for money, protects the honest savings of all people from pillaging by knaves, charlatans, incompetents and dreamers in public office.

  Gold which, over centuries, has demonstrated:

  —without it as a monetary base, there is inevitable inflation, followed by anarchy;

  —with it, inflation can be curbed and cured, stability retained.

  Gold which God, in His wisdom, may have created for the purpose of curtailing man’s excess.

  Gold of which Americans once stated proudly their dollar was “as good as.”

  Gold to which, someday soon, America must honorably return as its standard of exchange. The alternative—becoming clearer daily—is fiscal and national disintegration. Fortunately, even now, despite skepticism and anti-gold fanatics, there are signs of maturing views in government, of sanity returning …

  Alex put The D’Orsey Newsletter down. Like many in banking and elsewhere he had sometimes scoffed at the vociferous gold bugs—Lewis D’Orsey, Harry Schultz, James Dines, Congressman Crane, Exter, Browne, Pick, Richard Russell, a handful more. Recently, though, he had begun wondering if their simplistic views might not after all be right. As well as gold, they believed in laissez-faire, the free, unhampered function of the marketplace where inefficient companies were allowed to fail and efficient ones succeed. The obverse of the coin were the Keynesian theorists, who hated gold and believed in tinkering with the economy, including subsidies and controls, calling it all “fine tuning.” Could the Keynesians be the heretics, Alex wondered, and D’Orsey, Schultz, et al, true prophets? Perhaps. Prophets in other eras had been lonely and derided, yet some lived to see their prophecies fulfilled. One view Alex shared in totality with Lewis and the others was that grimmer times were close ahead. Indeed, for FMA they were already here.

  He heard the sound of a key turning. The outer door of the apartment opened and Margot came in. She removed a belted camel’s-hair coat and tossed it on a chair.

  “Oh God, Alex. I can’t get Roscoe out of my mind. How could he do it? Why?’

  She went directly to the bar and mixed a drink.

  “It seems there were some reasons,” he said slowly. “They’re beginning to come out. If you don’t mind, Bracken, I don’t feel like talking about it yet.”

  “I understand.” She came to him. He held her tightly as they kissed.

  After a while he said, “Tell me about Eastin, Juanita, the little girl.”

  Since yesterda
y Margot had masterminded arrangements concerning all three.

  She sat facing him, sipping her drink. “It’s all so much; coming together …”

  “Often things seem to happen that way.” He wondered what else, if anything, there would be before this day was done.

  “Miles first,” Margot began. “He’s out of danger and the best news is that by a miracle he won’t be blind. What the doctors believe is that he must have closed his eyes an instant before the acid hit, so the eyelids saved him. They’re terribly burned, of course, like the rest of his face, and he’ll be having plastic surgery for a long time.”

  “What about his hands?”

  Margot took a notebook from her purse and opened it. “The hospital has been in touch with a surgeon on the West Coast—a Dr. Jack Tupper in Oakland. He has the reputation of being one of the best men in the country for surgical repair of hands. He’s been consulted by phone. He’s agreed to fly here and operate the middle of next week. I assume the bank will pay.”

  “Yes,” Alex said. “It will.”

  “I’ve had a talk,” Margot continued, “with Agent Innes of the FBI. He says that in return for Miles Eastin’s testifying in court, they’ll offer him protection and a new identity somewhere else in the country.” She put down her notebook. “Has Nolan talked to you today?”

  Alex shook his head. “There hasn’t been much chance.”

  “He’s going to. He wants you to use your influence in helping Miles get a job. Nolan says if necessary he’ll pound on your desk to make you do it.”

  “He won’t need to,” Alex said. “Our holding company owns consumer finance shops in Texas and in California. We’ll find something for Eastin in one or the other.”

  “Maybe they’ll hire Juanita as well. She says wherever he goes, she’s going with him. Estela, too.”

  Alex sighed. He was glad there would be at least one happy ending. He asked, “What did Tim McCartney say about the child?”

  It had been Alex’s idea to send Estela Núñez to Dr. McCartney, the Remedial Center psychiatrist. What mental harm, if any, Alex wondered, had befallen the little girl as a result of her kidnapping and torture?

  But the thought of the Remedial Center now was a dismal reminder to him of Celia.

  “I’ll tell you one thing,” Margot said. “If you and I were as sane and balanced as little Estela, we’d both be better people. Dr. McCartney says the two of them talked the whole thing out. As a result, Estela won’t bury the experience in her subconscious; she’ll remember it clearly—as a bad nightmare, nothing more.”

  Alex felt tears spring to his eyes. “I’m glad of that,” he said softly. “Really glad.”

  “It’s been a busy day.” Margot stretched, kicking off her shoes. “One of the other things I did was talk with your legal department about compensation for Juanita. I think we can work something out without taking you to court.”

  “Thanks, Bracken.” He took her drink, and his own, to refill them. While he did, the telephone rang. Margot got up and answered it.

  “It’s Leonard Kingswood. For you.”

  Alex crossed the living room and took the phone. “Yes, Len?”

  “I know you’re relaxing after a rough day,” the Northam Steel chairman said, “and I’m shook up about Roscoe, too. But what I have to say can’t wait.”

  Alex grimaced. “Go ahead.”

  “There’s been a caucus of directors. Since this afternoon we’ve had two conference calls, with other calls between. A full meeting of the FMA board is being summoned for noon tomorrow.”

  “And?”

  “The first order of business will be to accept the resignation of Jerome as president. Some of us demanded it. Jerome agreed. In fact, I think he was relieved.”

  Yes, Alex thought, Patterton would be. He clearly had no stomach for the sudden avalanche of problems, along with the critical decisions needed now.

  “After that,” Kingswood said with his usual blunt directness, “you will be elected president, Alex. The appointment to take effect immediately.”

  While talking, Alex had cradled the telephone against his shoulder and lit his pipe. Now he puffed it while he considered. “At this point, Len, I’m not sure I want the job.”

  “There was a feeling you might say that, which is why I was elected as the one to call you. You could say I’m pleading, Alex; for myself and the rest of the board.” Kingswood paused, and Alex sensed he was having a hard time. Beseeching did not come easily to a man of Leonard L. Kingswood’s stature, but he plowed on just the same.

  “We all know you warned us about Supranational, but we thought we were wiser. Well, we weren’t. We ignored your advice and now what you predicted has come true. So we’re asking you, Alex—belatedly, I admit—to help us out of this mess we’re in. I might say that some of the directors are worried about their personal liability. All of us remember your cautioning about that, too.”

  “Let me think a minute, Len.”

  “Take your time.”

  Alex supposed he should feel some personal satisfaction, a sense of superiority, perhaps, at being vindicated, able to say, I told you so; a conviction of power at holding—as he knew he did—trump cards.

  He felt none of those things. Only a great sadness at the futility and waste, when the best that could happen for a long time to come, assuming he succeeded, was for the bank to regain the state in which Ben Rosselli left it.

  Was it worth it? What was it all about? Could the extraordinary effort, deep personal involvement and sacrifice, the stress and strain, be justified? And for what? To save a bank, a money store, a money machine, from failure. Wasn’t Margot’s work among the poor and disadvantaged far more important than his own, a greater contribution to their times? Yet it wasn’t all that simple because banks were necessary, in their way as essential and immediate as food. Civilization would break down without a money system. Banks, though imperfect, made the money system work.

  Those were abstract considerations; there was a practical one. Even if Alex accepted the leadership of First Mercantile American at this late stage, there was no assurance of success. He might merely preside, ignominiously, over FMA’s demise or take-over by another bank. If so, he would be remembered for it, his reputation as a banker liquidated, too. On the other hand, if anyone could save FMA, Alex knew he was the one. As well as ability, he possessed the inside knowledge which an outsider would not have tune to learn. Even more important: Despite all the problems, even now, he believed that he could do it.

  “If I accepted, Len,” he said, “I’d insist on a free hand to make changes, including changes on the board.”

  “You’d get your free hand,” Kingswood answered. “I personally guarantee it.”

  Alex drew on his pipe, then put it down. “Let me sleep on it. I’ll give you my decision in the morning.”

  He hung up the phone and retrieved his drink from the bar. Margot had already taken hers.

  She regarded him quizzically. “Why didn’t you accept? When both of us know you’re going to.”

  “You guessed what that was all about?”

  “Of course.”

  “Why are you so certain I’ll accept?”

  “Because you can’t resist the challenge. Because your whole life is banking. Everything else takes second place.”

  “I’m not sure,” he said slowly, “that I want that to be true.” Yet it had been true, he thought, when he and Celia were together. Was it still? Possibly the answer was yes, as Margot said. Probably, too, no one ever changed his basic nature.

  “There’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you,” Margot said. “This seems as good a time as any.”

  He nodded. “Go ahead.”

  “That night in Tylersville, the day of the bank run, when the old couple with their life savings in that shopping bag asked you the question: Is our money absolutely safe in your bank? You answered yes. Were you really sure?”

  “I’ve asked myself that,” Alex said. “R
ight afterwards, and since. If I own up, I suppose I wasn’t.”

  “But you were saving the bank. Right? And that came first. Ahead of those old people, and all the others; ahead of honesty even, because “business as usual’ was more important.” Suddenly there was emotion in Margot’s voice. “It’s why you’ll go on trying to save the bank, Alex-ahead of everything else. It’s the way it was with you and Celia. And,” she said slowly, “as it would be—if you had to make the choice—with you and me.”

  Alex was silent. What could you say, what could anyone say, confronted with the naked truth?

  “So in the end,” Margot said, “you aren’t all that different from Roscoe. Or Lewis either.” She picked up The D’Orsey Newsletter with distaste. “Business stability, sound money, gold, high share prices. All those things first. People—especially little, unimportant people—a long way after. It’s the big gulf between us, Alex. It will always be there.” He saw that she was crying.

  A buzzer sounded in the hallway beyond the living room.

  Alex swore. “Goddam the interruptions!”

  He strode toward an intercom unit connecting with a doorman on the street floor. “Yes, what is it?”

  “Mr. Vandervoort, there’s a lady here asking for you. Mrs. Callaghan.”

  “I don’t know any …” He stopped. Heyward’s secretary? “Ask if she’s from the bank.”

  A pause.

  “Yes, sir. She is.”

  “All right. Send her up.”

  Alex told Margot. They waited curiously. When he heard the elevator on the landing outside, he went to the apartment door and opened it.

  “Please come in, Mrs. Callaghan.”

  Dora Callaghan was an attractive, well-groomed woman, nearing sixty. She had, Alex knew, worked at FMA for many years, at least ten of them for Roscoe Heyward. Normally she was poised and confident, but tonight she looked tired and nervous.

  She wore a fur-trimmed suede coat and carried a leather briefcase. Alex recognized it as belonging to the bank.

  “Mr. Vandervoort, I’m sorry to intrude …”

  “I’m sure you have a good reason for coming.” He introduced Margot, then asked, “Could you use a drink?”