The Mandibles

by Lionel Shriver

  “What, is it just, presto!” Carter flailed. “And the dollar is worth zip?”

  “Theoretically, the US could buy into the bancor along with everyone else. But only by ponying up real assets to back it. That’s the difference in a nutshell. To swap fiat currency for bancors, you have to fork over to the New IMF a strictly proportioned basket of real commodities—corn, soy, oil, natural gas, deed to agricultural land. Rare earths … copper … Oh, fresh water sources! And gold, of course.”

  “No way is Fort Knox moving to Moscow.”

  “I don’t expect Washington to play ball. It’s too humiliating. Though if it makes you feel any better? The likes of Indonesia and Pakistan may have leapt to embrace the bancor as an antidote to chaos, but this new regime is going to screw plenty of the very governments that are backing it to the hilt. There’s modest flexibility built in, to avoid another euro debacle. Countries who’ve merely pegged their currencies to the bancor can appeal for devaluation. But the NIMF is bound to be stringent on that point. Since the whole idea of the bancor is to restrict the money supply. From the 1970s, the G-30 have all been churning out Monopoly money as if drawing from a board game with the combined components of several sets. It’s going to ferociously mess with some heads that now you have to cover your expenses and pay your trading partners in a currency that has real value.”

  “The whole thing stinks to high heaven. Maybe Putin and his new friends were passively waiting for an opportune moment to pounce. But it’s a hell of a lot more likely that they caused the crash of the dollar.”

  “Oh, that’s certainly how the White House is playing it. Big conspiracy. Threat to national security. Nothing to do with a Congress that won’t rein in entitlements. Nothing to do with the deficit, or the national debt, or a monetary policy modeled on the population’s waistline. Only evil outside forces conniving to destroy the greatest country in the world.”

  Carter raked his fingers through what remained of his hair; the gene for male pattern baldness being handed down from the mother was a formula for father-son resentment. “I don’t understand how this happened.”

  “Carter. I will let you in on what isn’t a secret to any housewife who’s bought a cucumber. The American dollar is worthless now not because of the rate spike, and not because of crashing on the international currency exchange, and not because of the bancor. It is worthless now because it was worthless before.”

  “That’s melodramatic.”

  “Not melodramatic—dramatic. In the hundred years following the establishment of the Federal Reserve in 1913, the dollar lost 95 percent of its value—when one of the purposes of the Fed was to safeguard the integrity of the currency. Great job, boys! Ever wonder why no one talks about millionaires anymore—why no one but a billionaire rates as rich? Because a man who had about ten grand in 1913 would be a millionaire a century later. Hell, everyone’s a millionaire these days, every halfway solvent member of the middle class. And the majority of that currency decay is historically recent. Why, the dollar lost half its value in the mere four years between 1977 and 1981.”

  Never a science-fiction fan, instead Douglas now immersed himself in the more recently minted genre of apocalyptic economics, rehearsing debt-to-GDP ratios as he had once memorized Saul Bellow. (When younger, Carter had never imagined he’d grow nostalgic for being quoted to death from Seize the Day.) If Pop couldn’t remember the age of his only son, the chances were poor that any of this pontificating tutorial was even ballpark accurate. What few scraps of his feverish reading that the old man did recall verbatim would be exaggerated for effect. Yet the last Loony-Tunes statistic was the limit.

  “You might double-check that,” Carter chided gently, in preference to what a load of crap. “In 1981, I was a junior in college. Why wouldn’t I remember my own currency that steeply in freefall?”

  “Because it’s boring, son. The American government counts on your being bored by it. Why, I barely remember the fallout from Nixon going off the gold standard myself. I buried my head in books. Perhaps the wrong books, looking back, but it’s too late now. The point is, when you’ve debased your currency that utterly, there’s not much further left for it to fall. Besides the sheer dullness of it all, the dollar sliding to the penny hasn’t been all that noticeable because every other government has been busy doing the same thing—running the printing press overtime on the justification that a junk currency advantages exports. The world is drowning in worthless paper. But America in particular has been getting away with murder—playing on the heartbreaking international belief in Treasury bonds as the ultimate ‘safe haven.’ Really, the blind trust bears all the irrational hallmarks of theology. What else, financially, is there to believe in besides the full faith and credit of the United States? So we’ve borrowed for basically nothing on the basis of a childlike credulity for thirty years. You know the Fed’s been steadily trying to monetize the debt—”

  “Cut it out, Pop. You’re showing off.” In the agency days, Douglas Mandible held forth about anastrophe, metonymy, and onomatopoeia—and now it was all arbitrage, margin calls, and open market operations. Day trading had infected his father’s mind like a fungus.

  “You try living to ninety-seven with a wife who can’t recognize a fork. You’d acquire new expertise out of desperation, too. And it’s not complicated. Why, I taught Willing about monetizing the debt the last time you brought Florence up here, and the kid got it right away. Though I have to say that boy’s got a knack. Has that sharp-eyed, quick-on-the-uptake quality that was obvious in Enola by the time she was three.”

  Drawing on an inhuman self-control, Carter stifled, Oh, give me a break!

  “So,” Douglas continued. “You loan me ten bucks. I photocopy the bill four times, give you back one of the copies, and announce that we’re square. That’s monetizing the debt: I owe you nothing, and you’re stuck with a scrap of litter. For years, the fact that one can swap dollars for tangible goods and services has been a miracle of God. Why do you think I’m invested in the market? In theory, stocks entail owning real things. Unfortunately, I didn’t take into account that most of those stocks are denominated in dollars. And I’ve been as vulnerable as the next idiot to the bias that keeping the majority of your funds in American companies is erring on the safe side. So I do apologize. Had I any idea what was in the offing, I’d have diversified quite differently.”

  The apology was Douglas’s first acknowledgment that the portfolio that may or may not have abracadabra-ed into a bunny rabbit was in the long run more his son’s than his own.

  “I was going to ask you.” Carter’s tone was defeatist; he already knew the answer. “I have a 401(k), and a small pension from the Times. Is there anything I should do, to protect myself?”

  “There’s nothing you can do, for as long as this asset freeze is in place—which is relaxing, too, isn’t it?” At last Douglas gentled his diatribe with a note of paternal tenderness. “As for when the SEC says, ‘Ready, set, go!’—I’d advise moving to gold, but that’s what millions of competing investors will be trying to do at the same time. There’s simply not that much of the metal on the planet, which is one of the main reasons it’s been a staple store of value for five thousand years. When the SEC called time, gold was already at an all-time high. When and if the game resumes, it will go through the roof before you can say Jack Robinson. I’m afraid the same advice pertains to any of the commodities that back the bancor. It’s too late,” Douglas announced elegiacally. “I wouldn’t bother.”

  It had long before grown dark, and the banker’s lamp on the table between them cast a soft, protective glow. Once again Carter was struck by how nothing, or nothing tangible, had changed. He’d gulped a horrifying quantity of bourbon, and it was only mid-evening. He shouldn’t drive in this condition, and hadn’t the presence of mind to figure out the driverless function in the BeEtle now. He’d have to stay over. Jayne would be frantic. She wasn’t accustomed to spending the night alone. His wife had determinedly
not kept up with the news this week, and wouldn’t be amenable to the idea that exceptional times required extensive consultation with his father. Jayne had become a firm believer in rising above news of any sort, all of which was bound to blow over if you ignored it resolutely enough. The head-in-a-paper-bag strategy worked a surprisingly high proportion of the time.

  Douglas patted Carter’s thigh. “What say we have a bite? There’s the dining room, or Grace could whip up something here that isn’t low-salt, low-fat, low-fun.”

  “This conversation hasn’t done wonders for my appetite.” Carter continued to slump. He didn’t call Jayne, who if she had attended to the nature of this errand at all would only want the gist. Which he still hadn’t grasped. A bit of bravery was in order—not his strong suit. “Have you been trying to tell me that we’re—that you’re wiped out?”

  Douglas laughed. “No, no, no! It’s not as bad as that.”

  Relief didn’t immediately drain the surge of adrenaline. Heart pounding in his ears, Carter felt faint, and dropped his head. “You never tell me about this stuff. Like you don’t trust me.” Hard booze made Carter morose.

  “Not at all! I simply haven’t read you as interested in the nitty-gritty.”

  “I guess I haven’t been. Now there’s nothing but nitty-gritty.”

  “Quite. Some detail, then. I’ve steered clear of index funds, but only because I’ve got a piece of every company listed on the Dow.” The same pride once attended acquisition of the complete works of W. Somerset Maugham. “That aspect of the balance sheet could be grim. But I hold gold ETFs, mining stock, even the title to bullion in a safe-deposit box in downtown Manhattan. I always keep 10 percent in cash—with which one will still be able to buy a loaf of bread in the country, and you don’t have travel plans, do you?”

  “No, the safari in Tanzania can wait for another year. No animals left anyway.”

  “Good. Since the next endangered species will be the American tourist. Otherwise, a good tranche of the portfolio is in Treasuries. The yield is piss-poor, and they’ll drop in value now that the rate’s gone up, but, worse comes to worst, one can always wait for maturity. Times like these, it’s the principal you most want to hold on to.”

  “But you said buying American bonds was a sign of worldwide gullibility.”

  “That’s right! So why should I be any different?”

  They were rising to head to the dining room—if Carter didn’t get some food into him soon he’d be sick—when a knock rapped on the library door. “Mr. Mandible, sir?” The orderly who’d been minding Luella poked his head in. “The president is about to address the nation on TV. The desk was sure you’d want to know.”

  • CHAPTER 4 •

  GOOD EVENING, FELLOW AMERICANS

  Mom! Alvarado’s on in a minute!”

  “That’s okay, sweetie!” his mother shouted from the kitchen. “I’ll watch it later.”

  This was another of those where-were-you-then moments, and it was ominous when they bunched together. Back against Great Grand Man’s heavy wine-colored sofa, Willing nestled cross-legged on the floor, where he always felt safer, more deeply seated. The thrum of the announcer’s in a few moments … has made only one other address to the nation … rose up from the wooden parquet and trembled in his palms. For once he didn’t feel self-conscious about the blare intruding on Kurt in the basement. Alvarado was their tenant’s president also. Kurt should be paying attention: Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States. That was another sign that stuff was going roachbar. When they had to say it the long way—not only “the President” but “the President of the United States.” “The United States of America.” That was the worst.

  Milo barked. Just once, before huddling into the protection of Willing’s thigh. Milo had never seemed too sure about Alvarado.

  His mother was making a mistake. There were copies of everything. The duplicates seemed identical to the originals. Willing, too, could wait and listen to this speech later. On fleX or catch-up TV, the address would be indistinguishable from the image he was following now. But the copy would not be happening. He couldn’t explain it, but that made it completely different. Forever after, Willing will have watched this address when it was happening. Those sounds again, the artificially downward music of the announcers’ suppressed excitement, the forcing of their voices into darker, whispering tones when really they wanted to shout, assured him that later he would be glad and proud that he was watching this now and not after the fact.

  Because big news got old fast. If you waited, somebody was bound to tell you about it before you learned it for yourself. They’d change the words around, too, and get everything in the wrong order. Willing hated being told what had happened. The telling people always seemed so smug and powerful, and they maintained their power by keeping their special knowledge to themselves for as long as possible. So they would feed you bits of information in sadistic dribs, like dog treats for Milo. You couldn’t trust the telling person either. Even if they claimed to hand over all that they knew, they only conveyed the part that they liked or especially hated. Being told—it was not the way to find anything out.

  Buenas noches, mis compatriotas americanos. Daré instrucciones en español inmediatamente después de esta versión en inglés. Pero esta noche, y sólo esta noche, presionen uno para inglés.

  Good evening, fellow Americans. At the beginning of this century, extra-national terrorists hijacked our own airplanes to rupture the Pentagon and destroy the World Trade Center. More recently, in 2024, our vital internet infrastructure was cataclysmically paralyzed by hostile foreign powers.

  Modern warfare comes in many guises.

  During this past week, our nation has once again been under attack. No towering skyscrapers have tumbled. Both the physical and digital systems on which we depend continue to function. Yet the attack we are currently sustaining is potentially no less devastating than nuclear missiles hurtling toward our cities.

  What has been targeted is the very medium through which we trade with other nations and conduct commerce with one another—the medium through which our labors are rewarded, our debts are repaid, our tables are laid, and our children are secured medicines for their ailments.

  What is at risk is no less than the almighty dollar itself.

  Coordinating their chicanery, countries that wish this nation ill have played on the cowardly compliance of our allies. In the last ten days, a sequence of carefully timed financial dominoes were toppled—designed to raise the cost of financing our national debt, which would translate into you the American taxpayer keeping less of your hard-earned income. Our currency was also sabotaged on the international exchange markets. Most perfidiously of all, world leaders who resent the power, prestige, and success of our great nation have cobbled together the so-called “bancor”—an artificial, pretender currency with no history as legal tender.

  Make no mistake. The bancor is not intended as a harmless alternative to the dollar. It is meant to replace the dollar. In a move every bit as threatening as raising a gun to our heads, we have been informed that the crops and raw materials on which we rely for our daily lives and livelihoods must now be traded internationally in bancors. A gesture of exceptionally high-handed insolence: the United States Department of the Treasury has also been apprised that American bonds held by foreign investors must henceforth be redeemed in bancors, at an unfavorable exchange rate capriciously chosen by an International Monetary Fund gone rogue. American bonds sold to foreign investors must henceforth be denominated in bancors—which is a challenge to our very sovereignty as a nation.

  Ironically, the parties behind this organized fiscal coup immediately suffered from it. The American dollar is the lifeblood of international banking, and the backbone of financial markets around the world. That is why, as most of you know, we suspended trading on the New York Stock Exchange last week to prevent precipitous loss of wealth. But trading has also been halted in the wake of the same shock to the sy
stem in London, Paris, Berlin, Moscow, Hong Kong, and every other major stock exchange across the globe. International finance is holding its breath. As with every other crisis for more than a hundred years, the world waits for America to act. And this brave country never sustains insult without reply.

  Right before addressing you, the American people, this evening, I convened an emergency session of Congress. Almost unanimously, your representatives passed a bill deeming that, until further notice, for American citizens to hold bancors, either onshore or within the confines of our financial system, shall from this point onward be considered an act of treason. In the interest of preserving not only our present prosperity, but our future prosperity—in the interest of maintaining our integrity, our capacity to hold our heads high as a nation—Americans and American entities are also forbidden from trading in bancors abroad.

  For the time being, and only for the time being of course, capital above the amount of $100 is not to leave the country. These controls are temporary, their duration destined to be brief, and they will be lifted the moment that economic order is safely and securely restored.

  As with military confrontations, fiscal warfare demands weaponry, and the fashioning of weaponry requires sacrifice. As we mobilized our forces and our industries to defend the cause of liberty in World War Two, so must we mobilize our resources to defend our liberty today. Rest assured that the greatest burden of this sacrifice will be borne by the broadest shoulders.

  Using the powers vested in your president by the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977, I am calling in all gold reserves held in private hands. Gold-mining operations within our borders will be required to sell ore exclusively to the United States Treasury. Gold stocks, exchange-traded funds, and bullion will likewise be transferred to the Treasury. In contrast to Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s gold nationalization of 1933, when FDR made his bold bid to rescue our suffering nation from the Great Depression, there will be no exceptions for jewelers or jewelry. All such patriotic forfeitures will be compensated by weight, albeit at a rate that does not reflect the hysterical inflation of gold stocks in the lead-up to this emergency. Hoarding will not be tolerated. Punitive fines of up to $250,000 will be levied on those who fail to comply. Retaining gold in any form beyond the deadline of November 30, 2029, will thenceforth be considered a criminal offense, punishable by no less than ten years in prison.