Shadow Banking

by C. M. Albright

  Fergal could see the pain and fear on Tia’s face. For a moment, he thought he might put his hands over her ears and block out the sounds of desperation and mayhem all around. But what was the point? Reality was upon them; they were drenched in it. There was no point trying to find shelter. The smoke was getting thicker by the minute and with it came the heat from the fire. Information was now exchanged at a hysterical frequency. What Fergal had managed to glean from the shouted exchanges between the terrified former breakfast guests and staff of the Wild Blue restaurant was that the doors to the observation deck above them where helicopters might have been able to evacuate them were locked. The fire raged down below them, the flames clearly visible through the long thin floor-to-ceiling windows. Some of the windows had been smashed out by men wielding heavy objects. One of them was Gerry. He was stripped to the waist and as he wielded a fire axe at a window, smashing out the glass, he looked around and caught Fergal’s eye. Neither spoke. At that moment, whatever history they might have had, whatever acquaintance they might have shared, was gone. They were different people.

  Fergal felt no compunction to run away. There was nowhere to run. He held Tia in his arms. A coffee, an orange juice and a box of Advil was all they had in common, that and their imminent transformation into statistics.

  Not thirty feet away through the smoke was the bar, all in full working order, its beverages all in place, Champagne racked neatly in the glass fronted refrigerator. If he was going to die then why not dull the pain? Why not get behind the bar and mix up some seriously ridiculous drinks for the final time? Drink himself into oblivion. A few years ago, he might have done just that. Not now. For a moment, he was reminded of the sense of panic he had felt on that day all those years ago when Keith Peake had asked him to watch his Yen position when he went to the Golden Hind for lunch. He thought of his training as a trader: don’t panic, remain calm and assess. But it was pointless to fight this situation; there was no stop to run; no trade to do, no hedge to make.

  All he had was a glimmer of hope that somehow the fire could be quelled. It wasn’t much of a hope. Somewhere over towards the elevators, flames shone through the clouds of thick black smoke. His coughing had been a constant from just a few moments after the impact of the plane as his lungs struggled with the polluted atmosphere. Now it had gone beyond coughing. He was choking. Tia’s head rested heavily against his shoulder. She stopped coughing and pulling her close, he felt her body go limp. He looked around towards the windows – or where he thought the windows might be. It was difficult to see. A gust of clean air – possibly the down draft from a helicopter – cut a hole through the vicious rolling vapours and he had a glimpse of blue sky. He stood up and lifting Tia’s limp body in his arms, he carried her nearer to the window. A gust of clean air tasted like the most intoxicating elixir. Fergal placed Tia in a chair near to the window and sat next to her. The floor was hot; the carpet had begun to smoke. The heat was unbearable; Fergal moved nearer to the window, pulling Tia’s chair with him. Someone was screaming. Fergal could see that it was Gerry, all semblance of his humanity stripped away as he bellowed into the abyss. Fergal couldn’t turn around to face into the room any more, the heat was too intense and he could feel the back of his jacket and the hair on his head smouldering. It felt as though his lungs were on fire. Looking down at Tia, he could see that her nostrils were caked with soot; she wasn’t breathing. Between his convulsive coughs, he managed to kiss her on the forehead. Gerry’s screams had built to a crescendo. Fergal turned and watched him. Gerry dropped his fire axe, his fingers curled around the broken shards of glass in the long narrow window pane and he pulled himself forward, stepping out into the sky.

  10yr US Treasury yields: 4.7425%

  USD/CHF: 1.651

  SP500 Futures: 1073

  Miles’s voice – urgent but at the same time measured and logical – sounded incongruous amidst the cries of anguish all around. It sounded like a broadcast from another time and place. A safer and happier one, one where money and the making of it still counted for something. Al listened to him as he stared up at the twin towers.

  ‘Sorry Karl, I can barely hear you. What? Yeah, I’ll get out of here. I’m heading uptown.’ Al took Miles by the arm and started to lead him through the crowds. Miles resisted a little at first but Al pulled harder and he relented, allowing himself to be led through the people on the sidewalk.

  Al couldn’t stay still for a moment longer. There was only one place that he wanted to be and that was as close as possible to Fergal.

  20 In the Eye

  The sirens gave a pulsating background rhythm to the sounds of engines and urgent human voices while the flashing lights provided a shimmering almost surreal air to the downtown streets. Nearly all of the vehicles stood empty while their former occupants raced towards the towers.

  At first, Miles had allowed himself to be pulled along reluctantly but seemingly aware of Al’s urgency, he sped up although his cellphone never left his hand as he desperately tried to call London. When they came up against the police line and could move no closer to the towers, he punched the keys on the phone with increasing ferocity.

  ‘Can’t get through?’ said Al, watching him as he redialled yet again.

  ‘No, the signal’s gone. This thing is so fucked.’

  ‘You’re telling me.’

  ‘Did you manage to get hold of Fergal?’

  ‘No. Just got to hope that he managed to get down somehow.’

  Al couldn’t take his eyes off Miles. Suddenly, he felt a huge wave of antipathy for his so-called friend. Here he was surrounded by this unspeakable scene of human tragedy and all he was concerned about were his trading positions.

  Paramedics from ambulance crews were administering to people who had made it out of the towers. To call it a war zone didn’t do it justice. In war, casualties were expected, provisions could be made. This was so unexpected, so sudden and violent that people were trapped in their own surprise, panicking, their individual perceptions desperately trying to process the overload of horrifying information. Al looked around at the people being treated, hoping, craving for a sight of Fergal’s ginger hair. He stared into the darkness around the base of the towers, thrown into shadow by the clouds of black smoke up above. If this were a cliché Hollywood movie, maybe Fergal would come swaggering out of the shadows, coughing smoke, his clothes singed, a snowy white grin plastered across his face. But although the scene in front of Al, shimmering in the flashing lights, had all the unreal aspect of a disaster movie, he could breathe in the fumes and the smoke of reality and feel the fear deep down in his stomach that even the most frightening movie could never deliver.

  Where was Fergal?

  He checked his phone yet again. Nothing.

  ‘Karl? Karl, can you hear me? Shit!’

  Al turned to Miles; he was going to have to say something. But as he went to speak, there were screams and shouts all around. A man’s voice nearby: ‘Oh my God!’ Al turned to see the top of the south tower fall into itself, churning out clouds of shattered rubble as it collapsed.

  ‘Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!’ Still it came down, shattering, exploding outwards.

  ‘Oh my God!’ The voice became more desperate, cracked, choked but didn’t relent.

  ‘Oh my God!’

  Then another man’s voice, more urgent, pleading: ‘Run!’

  A storm of grey rubble, like a tidal wave thundered towards them.

  ‘Shit! Come on.’

  Al grabbed Miles by the sleeve and dragged him down the sidewalk as a stampede of people ran from the collapsing tower. Miles didn’t need dragging this time. They ran together, sprinting, slaloming between the obstacles: people, fire hydrants, mail boxes, lamp posts. Al chanced a glance over his shoulder. It was nearly upon them. A warm gritty wind preceded it and blew against the back of his neck. At any moment, the fog would engulf them and with it, everything that it contained. There wasn’t a side street for another block. By then, it wou
ld be too late. Al looked at the premises on the side of the street. Their metal shutters had been pulled down. There was nowhere to shelter. The darkness overtook them. It was as though they were being swept up in a whirlwind of masonry and stone. And then Al saw it, a Laundromat, the door had been left open. Miles was a little in front of him. Al made a grab for him, put his hand around Miles’s neck and dragged him sideways towards the door which he kicked open as they both fell inside. Everything went black as the south tower, its components unleashed from its once geometric construction, flooded the streets, hammering against the Laundromat’s windows in a hailstorm of stones and grit.

  They lay on the floor, breathing heavily, neither of them saying anything as the storm raged outside. Al waited for the glass in the window to shatter but it held. After a minute or so, the maelstrom began to abate although the darkness remained.

  ‘You OK?’ Al couldn’t see Miles but he could hear him breathing next to him on the floor.

  ‘Yeah. Good call, Al. Well spotted.’

  They pulled themselves into a sitting position and leant against the row of washing machines. The darkness had become a sombre twilight. Al could see enough to make out Miles as he held his cell phone and dialled a number.

  ‘Miles, what are you doing?’

  ‘Trying to get London again.’

  ‘You’re what?’

  Miles didn’t respond, just carried on dialling.

  Al snatched the phone from Miles’s grip and threw it hard against the wall, shattering the plastic.

  Miles let his hand drop to his side as he exhaled slowly, containing his anger.

  ‘What the fuck are you doing?’ Al shouted it this time. His emotional trauma now had a focus. He felt disbelief for so much – for the strangest day of his life that was unfolding outside the window; for the loss of Fergal; for the vacuous grasping betrayal of Miles Ratner. Miles said nothing, just stared at the wall against which his phone had just been destroyed. Al stood up and grabbing Miles by his shirt, dragged him to his feet and pulled him towards him, their foreheads cracking together.

  ‘Doesn’t it mean anything to you that Fergal is dead?’

  ‘You don’t know that he’s dead.’ Miles suddenly came alive, energised by Al’s fury. ‘For all you know, he’s out there now.’

  ‘Don’t talk shit. He’s dead and all you can do is stand there pissing about with your cell phone, worrying about your risk. You make me fucking sick.’ Al pushed Miles back against the row of washing machines. As Al turned away from him, Miles hit him with a punch to the side of the face. As Al’s head recoiled and he felt the pain radiate up through his jaw, he knew that this was a moment that he had been waiting for for a long time. This was something that he should have done a long time ago but his admiration for Miles, his respect for his intelligence and ability, his mysterious feeling of pity for him, for his sadness that came from God only knew where, had held him back. It was as though Miles knew this and wanted to provide him with a reason to fulfil his long stifled desire. When Al punched Miles, he leant into it, put his weight behind it and as his fist made contact with Miles’s jaw, he felt an intense satisfaction as Miles went down, cracking his head against the side of a machine.

  ‘Fuck you!’ shouted Al and for a moment he scared himself, such was his desire to pile into Miles and shower him with kicks and punches until he was wet with the bastard’s blood.

  ‘Miles! Don’t you fucking get it? Fergal’s gone.’

  ‘You don’t know that.’

  ‘I do know that – you know that too – but all you can do is try to find an angle, try and make some more money. Because that’s all you can do. That’s all you’re capable of.’

  ‘Don’t be a sanctimonious prick, Al.’

  The urge to beat Miles to a pulp had passed but a violent tension continued to tremble through his body. He delivered a kick that he might have aimed at Miles’s kidneys at the washing machine next to him.

  ‘All I’m doing is what I’m paid to do,’ said Miles. ‘I have a responsibility to people, to the investors of the funds that I manage. I need to protect them; they have placed their trust in me.’

  ‘Fucking excuses.’

  Miles pulled himself to his feet and he and Al stood like silhouettes against the grey light of the Laundromat window.

  If he could have wept he would have done but he felt so numb, it was as though he had gone past the stage where he could summon up the necessary emotion.

  ‘Look Al, I feel as bad about Fergal as you do.’

  ‘I seriously doubt that.’

  ‘Yes, I do. If it turns out that he didn’t make it down out of the tower then I’ll grieve as hard as anyone. I love Fergal, you know that. Don’t judge me by what I need to do here. I love Fergal but I also have responsibilities.’

  Miles stepped forward and put his hand on Al’s shoulder. They stood looking at one another. Outside the window, people were moving about once more. There was shouting and the ever present sound of sirens, an acoustic collage that blanketed the city.

  ‘Whatever happens,’ said Miles. ‘Life goes on.’

  Al noticed a full length mirror on the wall. Standing reflected in it were two men from whom it appeared as though the colour had been stolen. They were covered in brick dust, a grey facsimile of their former selves.

  ‘It’s not all about the fucking money.’

  ‘I didn’t say it was.’ Miles let his hand drop from Al’s shoulder.

  ‘You’re a disgrace.’

  ‘You’re just upset.’

  ‘And I guess you’re not.’

  ‘Of course I am. For Fergal. For all those thousands of people out there. But like I said ...’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, life goes on.’

  Miles nodded.

  ‘Get out of my sight.’

  ‘Al ...’ Miles placed his hand on Al’s shoulder again. Al knocked it away.

  ‘Just fuck off Miles. I never want to see you again.’

  Miles went to say something then stopped himself. He looked down, turned around and walked towards the door. Al watched him go. As Miles swung the door open and stepped out without turning back, Al could see the grey lunar landscape outside in which dust and rubble covered every surface. And then the door closed and it was gone.

  Al fell to his knees. Finally, the tears came and carved two parallel lines through the dust on his cheeks.

  21 The Lee

  It took a couple of hours to get there. It would have been impossible to get a cab even if he’d wanted one – and he didn’t. He wanted to walk, he wanted to see the familiar streets that he had walked as a boy; he wanted to see the people even if so many of them wore masks of tragedy and despair. Finally, he made it and stood on the opposite side of the street and looked across at the apartment above the store. The sign read: ‘Ratner’s Stationery’. It was probably the first time that he had ever looked at it with any degree of dispassion. Whenever he had looked at it as a boy, it had filled him with shame. This was where the family came after his father was disgraced. It was the first time he had seen it since he had left for London seven years before.

  How could his father have accepted something so mediocre? How could he have allowed himself to fall so far from grace?

  His grandfather had spent a lifetime building up his business, only for his son – Miles’s father – to ruin his good name with an insider trading scandal. By the time the case was taken up by the FBI and ended up in court, Miles’s grandfather was a broken man. Not only was he losing a son but he was losing all the good will that he had fought to build up over sixty years in the business. The jail time that Miles’s father received – eighteen months which was reduced to nine for good behaviour – completed the perfect storm. Two months after he was released, Grandpa was dead, his heart and his spirit wrecked. Miles could never forgive his father. But it wasn’t why he despised him. What he had done was stupid, deceitful and treacherous but what happened had happened and he had been punished for it. What made M
iles feel nothing but contempt for his father was the way that he let this experience break him and grind him down. Miles had loved his father, loved his strength and optimism. When members of the family had written his dad off, said that he was finished – his Grandpa included – Miles had allowed himself a secret moment of pleasure at the thought of how his father would return from his time in jail and would rise even higher than he had done before. These little moments of smugness provided him with comfort during those dark months. But the man that returned from prison was not his father. Gone was the fighter. At first, Miles hoped that this was only a temporary setback and it was only a matter of time before his father would be setting off to work on Wall Street and buying back the big house that they had lived in on Park Avenue. Miles had said to his ailing Grandpa that days of plenty would come again. As the months passed, however, Miles came to realise that the man who had made all those promises to his son that they would never be downtrodden and come what may they would rise higher than they had been before, had gone, never to return. Instead of the house on Park Avenue, his father had bought the stationery shop. After Grandpa died, Miles’s respect for his father died with him.

  As Miles grew older, he refused to have anything to do with his wider family, the aunts, uncles and cousins who could never hide their expressions of pity whenever they looked at him. Miles would show them; he would do better than all of them. His cousins might have gone to better schools, they might have had better connections through their fathers who had not been to prison like his had but what they lacked was his fire.