The Ego's Nest (Dave Hart 5)

by David Charters

  I like pissing people off. Who do they think they are, these little people with small expense accounts whose firms won’t sign off the kind of excess we can get away with? We can do anything we want. Well, almost.

  I look across, catch the eye of a couple of scowling middle-aged men and raise my champagne glass. ‘Cheers, chaps.’

  ‘Fuck you.’

  What did he just say? I look again. He’s mid-forties, big, shaven-headed and would have been tough once upon a time, but now he’s running to fat. He’s wearing a cheap ready-made suit and a tie that might even be polyester. He’s drinking beer, and he doesn’t have a girl on his lap or under his table. His friend is taller and leaner and looks away, not wanting to get involved.

  ‘Not got a girl? Want one of ours?’ I say it as if I’m being generous. ‘Go on – help yourself. We’ve got plenty.’ I know I’m winding him up, but what’s wrong with a little exuberance from time to time?

  But when he gets up from his table and walks over to ours, I wonder if I’ve gone too far. I hold out my hand.

  ‘Dave Hart. And this is my team.’

  The girl sitting next to me, a twenty-one-year-old from Estonia whose name I keep forgetting, senses trouble and slips away to the ladies’ room. He leans forward and jabs me in the chest.

  ‘I don’t give a fuck who you are. As far as I’m concerned, you’re just a rich wanker.’

  I push my chair back just far enough from the table for him to get sight of the blonde head bobbing up and down in my lap.

  ‘I’m not a wanker. No need. See?’

  For some reason this doesn’t have the effect I intend. Instead of being impressed by my awesomeness, he’s incensed and grabs a beer bottle from the table – one of our beer bottles – and holds it like a weapon.

  Which is when a large Japanese hand picks up another bottle and I find myself sitting in semi darkness as Nob steps between Mr Angry and me, blocking out most of the light.

  Mr Angry’s still mad at me and stands his ground. ‘This is between me and him. Nothing to do with you. I’m not looking for trouble. This is private.’

  Nob says nothing, just raises the beer bottle he’s picked up and smashes it over his own head, shattering it and spraying glass and beer everywhere. Mr Angry takes a step back, still holding the bottle he picked up earlier. Somebody turns the music off and in the sudden silence all eyes are on him. He looks around, feeling the pressure … and slams the bottle against his own head. Oddly, it doesn’t smash, just makes a thunking noise. He sways, his eyes roll upwards, and he staggers back a step and topples over onto the floor, unconscious. I guess it’s all a matter of technique. His friend rushes forward and tries to drag him back to their table, but the bouncers have arrived and the pair of them are shown the door. Or at least his friend is shown the door. Mr Angry is carried out. I half expect similar trouble, but they leave us alone.

  Well, you would, wouldn’t you?

  I can’t remember when we finished, but I do remember Sly and Timur helping me out to a cab, my trousers falling down, my shirt undone, my legs somehow not obeying orders, and my body covered in lipstick marks that I’d discover the following morning ... always a helpful reminder of what you were up to the previous evening.

  WELL, THAT was a success.

  Tom’s driving me to a meeting with some private bankers who want to invest in the fund. That’s right. They’re asking me now. And they’re grateful when I find time for them. We’ve done a second closing that takes us through the thirty billion level. That’s thirty billion with a two per cent management fee and twenty per cent of any upside over ten per cent a year. Real money.

  This is how I like it. If I keep going like this, I could even buy Grossbank.

  The private bankers would have come to me, but I don’t want them to see the team in their present condition, so I’m even more accommodating than they could possibly have hoped.

  Tom has a twinkle in his eye. ‘Good night last night?’

  ‘Not sure I remember.’

  The people I’m meeting are based, of all places, in Canary Wharf, which means we have to brave the traffic all the way from the West End and sit and fume at all the wasted time while I start to sweat out last night’s alcohol and observe the slow onset of a dull ache in the centre of my brain and a general slowing down of my responses and ability to think.

  I’d like to say I’m beyond hangovers. There was a time when I was much younger when I really didn’t seem to get them. I’d drink huge quantities, watch everyone else getting pissed and acting foolishly, and pick my moment to take whatever advantage I was seeking, particularly if they were young and cute and female. And then I started to worry. I could drink and drink and nothing would happen at all, except that I’d feel like shit the next day. Luckily that was when I discovered drugs.

  I relax into my seat and close my eyes, and could easily drift off into a deep sleep, hoping the journey will never come to an end and that I’ll wake up with my energy restored, ready to party once more. Unfortunately, though, Tom knowing London better than most cabbies, we get there quickly and on time, and I find myself reporting to reception and being shown into a meeting room.

  Three of them come in, smartly dressed young women, two blondes and a brunette, in conservative business suits, and curiously, all three of them are wearing glasses and have their long hair rather severely tied up. They’re enthusiastic, very excited to meet me and full of compliments about the performance of the fund: the clever play with conglomerates, the daring moves in the mining sector, the visionary reinvention of the fund management business.

  And as they talk, they let their hair down. Literally. And then they take their glasses off, showing just how cute they are. One of them, with bright red lipstick, starts sucking the end of the pen she’s brought to take notes. And then the one at the end of the table starts unbuttoning her blouse. Is this for real? It can’t be. I know I’m a sex god, superhuman, a finance rock star, and I can understand why beautiful young women might fall for me, but it does seem a little odd in a private banking meeting. I pinch myself. Could I still be asleep in the back of Tom’s car, day-dreaming? Nah, because then the real action starts as they get up and all the clothes start coming off. In no time they’re down to their lingerie, classic black stockings and suspenders, the bras come off and their hands are all over me.

  Which is when the meeting room door opens and a familiar voice calls out, ‘Surprise!’

  Fuck. Shit. This is not fair. I’m not in great shape today. My brain is not working properly. I have one of those awful ‘Where am I? Who am I?’ moments. I look to my left and there’s Dan Harriman, with a grin as wide as a double-decker bus.

  Dan and I have history together. We worked as colleagues and competitors in the City, we were drinking buddies, shagging buddies and fellow miscreants. Together we misbehaved massively and put a lot of miles on the clock. He even had a thing going with Two Livers at one point, which stretched our friendship a little far.

  But now Dan must be about fifty and wears his years badly. Fat, balding, florid, permanently puffing and perspiring, he’s the living embodiment of a government health warning on the perils of excess. Fifty going on sixty.

  But he knows how to live.

  I stand up, disentangling myself from the girls, and he gives me a bear hug.

  ‘How are you, Dave? You don’t write, you don’t call. Being dead was a good excuse, but you’ve been back ages now.’

  ‘I’m good, Dan. Big night last night, but I’m good. And you’re right. I should have been in touch. But things have just been … crazy.’

  We talk about old times, the girls get busy working their magic, and thanks be to God for whoever invented Viagra. Dan is the most hospitable of hosts, and it would have been churlish of me not to take full advantage. Afterwards, when they’ve gone and we’re slumped on the sofa in the conference room, he tells me what he’s up to.

  ‘Private banking. It’s the next big thing, Dave. There’s
so much money in the world. So many rich people. And they’re just like us. They want service. All kinds of service. And they find it hard at most firms to get the kind of special services they want, if you know what I mean. It’s a huge opportunity. Especially for washed-up old has-beens like me, who can’t get a job at a proper firm anymore.’

  Dan used to run equities at Hardman Stoney – a big job. But now I look at him closely, at the lined face, the latticework of little red veins on the end of his nose, the perspiration running down his forehead from the exertions he just put himself through with what were clearly a very well-briefed team of professionals, and I see what I might have become – or might yet if I don’t achieve what I intend with Two Livers. Dan has had two divorces, probably slept with more women than I have, certainly drinks more and, I’m guessing, has done more drugs. He’s a living pharmaceutical miracle. Eat your heart out, Keith Richards.

  But it’s come at a cost. He’s fallen off the career ladder and ended up at a private banking firm, earning a living supplying hookers and drugs to rich people. On reflection, it’s probably a lot more fun than running equities at Hardman Stoney, and there’s definitely more of a long-term future in it. As long as he doesn’t get caught. But that applies to most of the things we do.

  I pick up my jacket, which is lying in a heap on the floor where it was discarded in my earlier haste to get fully involved in the action, and I take a couple of Cohibas from the inside pocket and offer him one.

  ‘Can’t. Not in here.’ He points at a smoke detector in the ceiling.

  ‘Really? What kind of firm is this? Lucky they don’t have CCTV in the meeting rooms.’

  ‘Smoking’s against the law. Management won’t allow it.’

  ‘But hookers are OK?’

  ‘They’re more understanding about that.’

  ‘Dan, what are you doing here?’

  ‘I didn’t have much choice. I was knifed in the back at Hardman Stoney and I needed to make money. Where am I supposed to get money from? The fairies don’t bring it.’

  ‘I have money.’

  ‘So I heard.’

  ‘Well, you can have it too. Some of it anyway. Come to us. You’re old enough to be our chairman.’

  ‘Why do you need a chairman?’

  ‘We don’t. No one needs a chairman. You’d be perfect.’

  ‘What does it pay?’

  ‘Whatever you want.’

  ‘You’re taking the piss.’

  ‘Try me.’

  SO NOW we have a chairman. Maria disapproves, and her instincts are usually good, because Dan has a certain reputation – as if I don’t. But the trading team like him, because he goes into the dealing room every day and orders lunch with them, and probably other things as well, and even the investment committee like him, because he chairs our meetings particularly efficiently, so that the formal business of the day is rapidly concluded and we can all adjourn to somewhere more interesting, which he’s happy to organise. He gets into the office first in the morning and often leaves last. In fact he’s putting in so many hours I can’t even work out myself what he’s doing. Most chairmen understand they don’t actually have to work – they’re just a figurehead. OK, so quite often they’re an expensive figurehead, but all the best ornaments cost money.

  When I meet Two Livers for a martini, she asks why I hired him.

  ‘Was it pity?’

  ‘Love.’

  ‘Love? What do you mean?’

  ‘He’s a mate. Someone I can trust. And in this business that’s all you have. Your mates.’ It’s true. In the Square Mile the word ‘colleague’ can cover a multitude of evils.

  She nods. ‘I understand. You know he has a bad reputation?’

  ‘For drink? Or drugs? Or women? Or all of the above?’

  ‘For business. He got fired from Hardman Stoney.’

  ‘Who cares? Good people get fired all the time in our business. Your face doesn’t fit, you get fired. You don’t sing the corporate song loud enough, you get fired. You don’t ask brown-nose questions at a town hall with the chairman, you get fired. You show some character, you get fired. You’re just in the wrong place at the wrong time, and you’re toast. All roads lead to hell. These days the best people get fired.’

  ‘Not if they produce. He stopped producing.’

  ‘Producing what? He spent a lifetime on the trading floor pushing stocks to big investors, writing tickets, getting bored. Same old, same old. You can’t do that forever.’

  ‘OK, but I don’t think that’s what got him fired. Dave, I heard he became unreliable.’

  ‘What does that mean? We’re all unreliable. Well, some of us are, anyway. The males who work around here, which just happens to be most of us.’ I’m feeling angry, defensive, even like I’m getting pissed off with her, which I don’t want because I’m meant to be selling.

  She picks up her glass and drains it in one. Damn, she’s good. ‘I’d better go. Think about what I said. And don’t get caught short.’ She gets up to leave.

  Damn. Fuck. Shit. This is not meant to be happening. A couple of martinis – well, a couple for me, she might have three or four – and then on to dinner and eventually bed. That was the plan. Fuck Dan Harriman.

  ‘OK, I’ll fire him. Consider it done. He’s gone. He’ll be taken out and shot first thing tomorrow. I’ll do it myself. Sayonara.’ I look up at her hopefully, puppy-like, pathetic.

  ‘Don’t.’ She holds up a hand and looks away. A sigh. She’s pissed off. Exasperated. The last thing I wanted. ‘Dave, just be Dave Hart. Listen to what I said. Think about it. I said it for a reason.’

  ‘OK, got it.’

  ‘And remember it.’

  I tap the side of my head. ‘Goldfish brain. Three-second memory. But I’ll write it down.’ I reach for a napkin, get a pen from my jacket pocket and write ‘Fire Dan’ in large letters.

  This at least gets a laugh, but she doesn’t change her mind and gives me a brief kiss – on the lips – and leaves.

  Fuck Dan Harriman.

  I’M GOING to the Treasury again. This time I’ve actually got an appointment to see the minister – the new one, who took over from Lord Bigmann – and this time I have a fully worked-up proposal that doesn’t involve the NHS.

  The new minister is a ‘real’ politician, one who’s never done anything else, and so he isn’t a patch on his predecessor. Bigmann finally crashed and burned in business as well as everything else. It seems the word went out in the scrap metal industry that his firm was not to be trusted. Funny how these things spread. All of a sudden no one wanted to do business with him anymore. And then he was arrested and charged with tax evasion. He only spent one night in prison before being bailed, but apparently it was a ‘slopping out’ jail, where the inmates get to use a bucket in their cells if they’re caught short in the night. As a former politician, the good lord made too tempting a target for a golden shower in the morning. Life’s a bitch.

  So I’m sitting opposite Jim Bradman, a thirty-eightyear- old Lib Dem idealist who thinks that bankers’ bonuses are egregious, that the City needs reform and that it’s all so terribly unfair that bankers fucked up and ordinary people had to bail them out. Get real, pal. That’s what ordinary people are for. And that’s why we need so many of them. It’s all those little guys who carry the rest of us – including the politicians who tell them what to do, take half their earnings away and spend it badly on crappy things we’d be better off buying for ourselves.

  I thought about wearing sandals today as a sign of respect, but they wouldn’t have gone with my suit, so I chose slip-on shoes with a side buckle by Fratelli Rossetti instead of lace-ups. I think slip-ons are more Lib Dem.

  I’ve come alone and empty-handed, which rather throws him, because he was warned about the last meeting and has a line-up of eight on his side of the table. And someone did a coffee run and there are takeaway cups from Starbucks lined up in military ranks at one end of the table, as well as a box of Krispy Kreme d
oughnuts.

  Village People is there again and makes a point of offering me a coffee.

  ‘Thank you, that’s very kind. Can I get a skinny hazelnut latte with a shot?’

  He looks cluelessly at the rows of coffee cups, then at one of his colleagues, a young guy with a high forehead, long, delicate fingers and the kind of cerebral air of someone with a first in economics from Cambridge who’ll go far at the Treasury but will never be trusted with a coffee order again.

  I can sense the bewilderment, so I decide to let Village People off the hook and turn to the coffee boy and speak slowly.

  ‘Don’t worry. Just let me have a grande, two-pump vanilla, non-fat, extra hot latte.’

  He looks helplessly at his boss. The minister clears his throat.

  ‘Mr Hart – I think we only have a simple selection here. Would you like any of these?’

  ‘Of course, minister. Regular black filter will be fine.’

  The young guy looks relieved as he passes me a coffee. ‘Doughnut, Mr Hart?’

  He’s about to open the box, so I get my order in quickly.

  ‘Sure. Cinnamon apple and butterscotch fudge.’

  He looks crestfallen.

  ‘OK, lemon meringue pie?’

  He shakes his head.

  ‘Chocolate iced with sprinkles?’

  ‘Yes!’ He opens the box and produces one with a flourish. I hold my hand up and we high five. I turn to the minister and I’m about to high five with him, but I get a glare from Village People and sit down instead. Bonding moments are great, but we have to respect the dignity of office.

  I can tell that for the Treasury team this is like a work outing. Coffee and doughnuts with the minister, and all they have to do is listen to me for half an hour.