Cashback

by Duncan James

  ***

  Once again, Robin and Marian found themselves sitting in the office of a bank manager. This was an altogether different office, though, and a much younger bank manager. According to the nameplate on his door, Monsieur Renoir was responsible for new business.

  They were greeted warmly, but with less of an air of formality than before. M. Renoir, for instance, sat behind his very modern desk, in shirtsleeves. Indeed, the whole building was much more modern than the previous bank, and they had obviously gone to some trouble and expense over its interior design.

  "Do please sit down," he said, indicating two steel framed armchairs in front of his glass-topped desk. This time, as it was mid-afternoon, they accepted the offer of coffee.

  "You are obviously here because you wish to open an account with us," said M. Renoir, "but before I ask you any of the boring but necessary questions, let me first tell you something about us."

  Robin nodded his agreement, and the man quickly rehearsed much the same sort of background briefing that had been available to the couple on the Internet. However, they let him finish.

  "Finally," he concluded, "I can give you details of our assets if you wish, but you may like to know that we are one of the larger of the Swiss private banks, and we have branches in London, New York, Moscow, and, most recently, Beijing."

  "Thank you for your briefing," said Robin. "In fact, one of the reasons we are here is because we had noted that you were able to operate in Russia."

  "Ah ha!" said the man, eagerly, "so you have business interests there, do you? Tell me, though, why you chose to use our services rather than a UK bank like the Hong Kong Shanghai, for example."

  From then on, their interview followed much the same lines as their earlier meeting with M. Gilbert. Robin explained the political difficulty faced by a large American corporation making payments to mathematicians who came from a country that, until very recently, had been seen as a great threat and potential enemy, and how they were seeking anonymity and security, both areas where Swiss banking had an enviable, even unique, reputation.

  M. Renoir nodded sagely as Robin went on to explain how he wished to set up, on behalf of the Russian mathematicians, an annuity fund which would pay them something of a pension, as well as transferring to each of them a modest lump sum in recognition of their earlier service.

  Renoir told them what they already knew, in that it was unusual - indeed possibly illegal - for any Swiss bank to act on behalf of third parties except through a Swiss attorney. He was almost sure, however, that in view of the special circumstances of this case, there would be no real difficulty in the end.

  "There is, however, the question of the opening deposit," said an embarrassed M. Renoir. "I almost hesitate to mention it, but I must point out to you, Monsieur Hood, that we seek quite large sums when arranging new business. Perhaps you could tell me, if you would be so kind, the sort of sum you had in mind."

  "Certainly," replied Robin. "I can arrange for three quarters of a million pounds to be with you overnight. I hope that will be satisfactory?"

  "My dear sir," said the new business manager, almost rubbing his hands in glee, "that will be more than adequate, I can assure you."

  "Excellent," said Robin. "I should tell you, however, in all fairness, that I shall probably need to remove ?250,000 of that fairly quickly."

  "Absolutely no problem, monsieur," replied the man, summoning his secretary on the intercom. "I hope you will both join me in a glass of champagne to mark the beginning of our relationship."

  "Do I assume, then, that you can accept my business?" asked Robin.

  "But certainly, Monsieur Hood," replied the man. "I need consult no-one, and I can have papers ready for you to sign later tonight. Where are you staying?"

  Robin told him.

  "I shall bring the papers myself at a convenient time - perhaps after dinner, if that is agreeable to you?"

  When they got back to their hotel, which was only a short walk from the bank, Marian suggested that they should treat themselves to half a bottle of bubbly to have with their dinner.

  "I'm quite getting a taste for it!" she said.

  What with that, and a glass of brandy with M. Renoir after they had signed all the documents at a quiet table in the hotel bar, they slept quite well that night, although it was late when they turned in. Robin had to work at his laptop computer, moving money about, while Marian watched the setting sun colour the snow-capped peaks that surrounded the lake.

  Robin's father was on the phone before breakfast.

  "My excitable bank manager is getting quite apoplectic!" he said. "They seem to have lost half the money that suddenly arrived only a few days ago."

  "That's careless of them!" exclaimed Robin.

  "Exactly what I said," laughed Denis Hood. "Now they have two problems! Not only do they not have a clue where the money came from in the first place, they have no idea either where half of it has now gone!"

  "They'll have to replace that, you know," said Robin.

  "That's what the man said," replied Robin's father. "I made out to be extremely cross, demanded explanations and all that! I felt quite sorry for the man in the end, but he has promised to tell me immediately they discover anything."

  "As you know, I rather hope they don't," said Robin.

  "I'll let you know if I hear anything positive," promised his father.

  "We're off to Nairobi and then Bulawayo tomorrow," explained Robin. "We've managed to open the two numbered accounts here I wanted, so now we move on to the next stage of our little operation."

  "Be careful, then, and take care," responded his father. "Don't do anything daft, and give our love to Marian."?

  "Thanks, Dad. I'll keep in touch - promise."

  "What was all that about?" asked Marian, emerging from the bathroom.

  "Aunt Gladys's bank is going bananas, apparently!" replied Robin. "They haven't been able to trace the source of the two million quid that suddenly appeared in her account the other day, and now half of that has disappeared again!"

  "I can imagine they are very concerned," she said. "Things like that aren't supposed to happen to secure banking systems!"

  "The next few days could be quite interesting," said Robin.

  "Some clever chap will invent something to stop it happening again, I expect!" joked Marian.

  "I wonder how Grudge is getting on with that? He said last night that he thought it was going well."

  "Leave him to get on with it, then," said Marian. "We've got a day off today - what shall we do?"

  "Have breakfast, and then decide," suggested Robin.

  "We could get the train and go shopping in Geneva," proposed Marian, tentatively.

  "OK, and I could perhaps buy you a nice Swiss watch," offered Robin. "But only after I've murdered some scrambled eggs and bacon!"?

  12. BANKING AT A LOSS?

  The Interbank (Nederlandsche) Group had its UK headquarters in London. It took up several floors of one of the new tower blocks of offices in the Canary Wharf area, near enough to the City and other financial institutions with which it dealt, and handy, too, for the City airport in Docklands and its regular flights to Holland. Not that there was really a need for much commuting between the two capitals, since most of the work carried out between London and the Amsterdam site of the bank's world headquarters, was done electronically. But some of the staff who could afford it, liked to take advantage of the cheap and frequent flights to get home for the odd weekend now and then.

  The bank's Head of Security, Jan Bergen and his wife, had been home for a long weekend to attend a family wedding, but were back in plenty of time for Bergen to be at the regular weekly board meeting. It had been a pretty routine affair and, in all honesty, more than usually boring until the end, when, under 'any other business', the Customer Affairs Director, Pierre van Hague, had mentioned what he called 'a small problem'

  "It seems, Mr. Chairman," he said, apologetically, "that we are having an unusual diff
iculty with one of our UK private accounts. It's not the sort of thing I would normally bring to the attention of the Board, but in the circumstances, I felt you should be advised of it at an early stage, just for your information, you understand."

  "What circumstances?" asked the Chairman of the London operation.

  "Well, what makes this rather unusual is the sum of money involved," said van Hague. "It frequently happens, as you all know, for money to go adrift from time to time in the odd account here and there, normally due to some clerical error or other, and the matter is usually cleared up quickly once the customer has brought it to our attention."

  "How much money?" demanded the Chairman, getting impatient for his lunch.

  "Um, well, Chairman," said an embarrassed Customer Affairs Manager, shuffling his papers, "in this case it seems to involve about two million pounds."

  "Two million pounds?" bellowed the Chairman.

  "Yes. sir," said the man. "Two million pounds. Or, depending on how you look at it, um, perhaps three million."

  "Three million!" The Chairman leant forward, red faced. "And you call that 'a small problem'? What the hell's happened, man?"

  "We surely can't have many private accounts with that much on deposit can we, Pierre?" asked the Finance Director.

  "No; quite; very few indeed actually," admitted Pierre.

  "I think you'd better start at the beginning and give us all a proper explanation," said the Finance Director.

  "Yes, of course," said Pierre, cursing his luck. This wasn't going at all as he'd hoped. He shuffled his papers again.

  "Come on, man", said the Chairman, losing his patience. "We haven't got all day. Whose account is it, anyway - anyone important or well known?"

  "No, sir," replied van Hague. "The account belongs an elderly lady, a Ms. Gladys Hood. She is quite a wealthy lady, and holds many investments, judging by the details of her account, which I have seen. But she also keeps a large sum of cash on deposit - something in the order of one and a half million pounds. We have, on a number of occasions, sought to persuade her to invest the money, but she has always refused, for some reason, enjoying the interest we pay."

  "Get to the point, man," demanded the Chairman. "What's happened to this wretched woman's account?"

  "An extra two million pounds suddenly appeared in it, that's what," van Hague retorted, getting equally irritated. "And we have so far been unable to trace where it came from."

  "Clerical cock-up somewhere, I'll be bound," said the Chairman, gathering his papers. "Get it sorted, quickly."

  "Hang on a minute," said the Finance Director. "I thought you said it was three million, 'depending on how you look at it'. What did you mean by that?"

  "Well," explained Pierre, wishing he'd never mentioned the business, "no sooner had the money appeared in her account, than a million of it was withdrawn again. The problem is that we don't know who withdrew it or where it went."

  "But that's not possible, surely," commented the Finance Director.

  "That's exactly what I would have thought," agreed van Hague, "but at the moment we have been unable to trace the source of the funds, or the destination of the withdrawn sum. Neither do we know who withdrew it. Which is why I thought I should mention it," he concluded, wishing again that he hadn't.

  "Sounds to me as if this old lady is playing about with her money," said the Chairman.

  "She is no longer able to do that, as a matter of fact," said Pierre. "She has given power of attorney to her nephew, since she is judged to be no longer mentally, or physically, well enough to look after her own affairs."

  "Well, there you are, then," said a very cross Chairman. "The man's obviously trying get his hands on her cash." He turned to Jan Bergen. "Sounds like a job for you, as Head of Security. Get on to it straight away," he demanded, and, there being no other business, declared the meeting closed and strode off for his lunch.

  Bergen had already started to take an interest, as it happened. He said to Pierre, "Let's go to my office, and talk through this again, in a calmer atmosphere."

  The Finance Director had moved round the table and sat next to them. "Surely," he said, "if Miss Hood's nephew has power of attorney, and had taken the money on her behalf, we would know that, wouldn't we? And why would he put such a large sum into her account only to take half of it out again?"

  "I'm sure he didn't," replied Pierre, "and, as you say, if he did, we would have immediately known about it. And I can tell you that he is furious! I have spoken to him personally twice now, and, like the rest of us, he wants to know where the money came from and where it has gone."

  "Well, you two had better get it resolved soon. The old man's not in the best of moods at the moment, as you can see! Let's just hope this isn't a case of money laundering, which really is the Chairman's pet hate!"

  The Customer Affairs Manager and his security colleague left the Board Room for Bergen's office, along the corridor.

  "Let's get the lady's account up on my screen," said Bergen, "then we can see what we're talking about." As he entered his password, he said to van Hague, "Are you doing anything for lunch, by the way, or shall I get some sandwiches and a bottle of wine?"

  "That would be a good idea," replied Pierre. "We can work through, then, and hopefully between us come up with a solution to this mystery."

  Eventually, Gladys Hood's account appeared on the screen.

  "If we scroll back a few years," suggested van Hague, "you'll see that she has invested quite large sums of money, mostly in fixed interest bonds, but also sometimes in shares."

  "Always kept a huge balance in her account, though," Bergen observed. "It also looks as if she has worked on her own, rather than through a financial advisor."

  "Yes, I noticed that, too," agreed Pierre.

  "So there's no third party there, to investigate," concluded Jan.

  "You'll see, too," Pierre pointed out, "that the frequency of her transactions has slowed down considerably in recent years."

  "As she got older, and less able to cope, no doubt."

  "Quite possibly," agreed van Hague. "But look how quickly her balance built up."

  "I always thought we paid too much interest!" said Bergen.

  "What's interesting is the payments into her account," observed the Head of Security. "Frequently, very large sums indeed - certainly by our standards - but always the source has been identified."

  "Either the sale of shares, or, more often, a bond maturing," said Pierre.

  "But never, apparently, any anonymous payments."

  "Until last week," said van Hague, ruefully.

  "But there must be some clue or other," protested Bergen.

  "Nothing that I can spot," replied van Hague. "It's an electronic transfer, which seems to have appeared simply out of the blue. It's from a bank, and possibly one of the big UK banks, but don't ask me which one."

  "Yes, it's a bank all right," agreed Bergen. "Finance companies and investment advisors leave a trail a mile long usually. There's no record I can see of the lady making any investment that would suddenly mature at this figure, and in any case, it's too neat a sum - no odd pounds or shillings anywhere. Yes, it's from a bank, all right," he repeated.

  "If a bank somewhere suddenly lost two million quid, wouldn't they kick up a fuss about it?" asked the Customer Affairs man, chomping into a chicken and coleslaw sandwich.

  "Probably not," replied Bergen. "If they spotted it, there would be a sharp intake of breath internally, as there was here this morning, but it's a flea bite compared with their total turnover every day. They might not even spot it until the next audit, and even then it would be within the margin of error."

  Suddenly, the Chairman appeared in the doorway.

  "Mind if I join you?" he said, "My bloody lunch has been cancelled."

  "Have a sandwich then," offered Bergen, as the Chairman helped himself. "Glass of wine?"

  "Thanks," he replied, sitting on the edge of the desk. "How are you two getting on? Is it
really a mystery, or something simple?"

  "Mystery, I'm afraid," replied van Hague.

  "You were right to raise it, then," acknowledged the Chairman. "What do you make of it, Jan?"

  "Not a lot at the moment," replied the security man. "This is Miss Hood's account, on the screen," he pointed, "and there's no sign of an investment maturing that would produce that sum of money. In any case, it's too neat a figure for that, and investment companies always leave a trail, as you know. More than likely, it's an electronic transfer from a bank, and probably one of the big UK banks as it's in pounds sterling. But to be honest, there is no sign of where it came from."

  "Or why," added the Chairman.

  "Or why," agreed van Hague.

  "The real worry, though, is trying to explain how a million quid was taken out," said Bergen. "Again, an electronic transfer, but absolutely no trace of where it went or who took it out. And that, Chairman, is supposed to be quite impossible."

  "That's what worried me, too," agreed the Chairman. "We have a layered security system, like everyone else, with every level guarded by encryption devices, passwords and God knows what. And we paid millions for our encrypted operating system, like nearly every other bank worth talking about, and nobody is supposed to be able to get into it."

  "Somebody has," observed Bergen. "But who and how - that's the question."

  "Quite," agreed the Chairman. "Check out that fellow who has power of attorney," he demanded. "At the moment, we owe Miss Hood a million pounds, since we can't account for it. I'll leave you to it."

  He downed the last of his wine, took the remaining sandwich, and left them to it.

  Bergen's secretary appeared.

  "Shall I get some more?" she asked, nodding towards the empty plate.

  "Yes, please," replied Bergen.

  "He scoffed nearly all the prawn mayo," complained Pierre, "and they're my favourite!"

  "Tell me," asked Jan. "Who exactly has power of attorney over the lady's affairs? Does he sound OK?"

  "Retired RAF Group Captain," replied van Hague, "now working in industry, selling aeroplanes. Very respectable, large house in Surrey, son just out of Oxford, and all that. Not short of the odd bob, I should say, with a good military pension and an even better income."

  "Doesn't sound like a suspect to me," said Bergen, "but I'll check him out anyway. I know someone who might be able to help. How did he react when you rang him?"

  "Cross, he was! Said he had no idea whether or not his aunt might be expecting such a sum to be paid in, and couldn't ask because she was gaga, so we'd better find out where it came from and whether it was legitimate. Then later, when I had to tell him we'd lost half of it, and he went ballistic! Demanded that we continued to pay interest on it all, and pointed out that we would have to make good the loss. I'm under orders to report progress," concluded van Hague.

  "Things like that don't happen in the military, by the sound of it."

  They sat in silence for a minute or two, deep in thought and prawn sandwiches.

  "Where the hell can that money have gone to?" said Bergen, almost to himself. "It can't possibly be a hacker."

  "Inside job?" asked Pierre. "Someone inside could have got the codes and passwords," he suggested.

  "But why would he put all that in first, that's what I don't understand, only to take half of it out again the next day? And where did it come from in the first place?"

  "You're assuming it's the same chap," commented van Hague.

  "It would be too much of a coincidence for it to be two people, unconnected," he said. "No, it has to be the same chap."

  "I wonder what he plans to do with the million he's left in the old lady's account?" pondered Pierre.

  "Leave it alone, I hope! But why pick on her account? There has to be a connection between Ms. Hood and whoever is playing about with two million quid, don't you think?" asked Jan Bergen

  "Quite possible, I suppose," agreed Pierre van Hague. "On the other hand, it could just be some lucky hacker somewhere, hitting all the right buttons."

  "You don't really think so, do you?" asked Bergen.

  "No, I don't" replied the Customer Relations man.

  They sat in silence again.

  "What about money laundering? It's a nice round sum," suggested Pierre.

  "Possible, I suppose," replied the security expert. "But it arrived from somewhere electronically, over the Internet, and went again the same way. That sort of thing is supposed to be impossible."

  "But someone's just done it," protested Pierre.

  "Maybe they have, but if you had two million quid to get rid of, from drugs or something, would you fart about trying to hack it into an old lady's bank account, and then go to all the trouble of doing it again the next day just to move it out?" asked Jan Bergen.

  "Probably not," agreed van Hague.

  The two men sat in silence again, staring blankly at the screen displaying Gladys Hood's account.

  "So what are you going to do now, then?" asked van Hague. "The boss wants you to sort it, don't forget."

  "Thanks for reminding me!" replied Jan Bergen. "I suppose I shall have to do something, just to keep him quiet."

  "I'll let you know what happens when I next speak to the Group Captain," said Pierre.

  "Retired," Jan reminded him. "I'm inclined to have a word with him myself, at sometime, but I'll do a bit of digging first. The problem is that I don't know anyone with a military background who might know the gallant Mr. Hood. I suppose, sometime, I should have a word with my opposite number at the Bank of England. He's a retired Serious Fraud Squad man from Scotland Yard, and he keeps his ear to the ground. He may know someone who knows someone - know what I mean? I've got a feeling his predecessor was in the RAF. But I don't really want to alert the boys at Threadneedle Street yet. Not officially, anyway. Perhaps I'll buy him lunch."