The Billion Dollar Sure Thing

by Paul E. Erdman

  “No,” said Stanley, “there’s one place I’ve always wanted to go to, but somehow never made it. I know it’s a bit touristy, but—”

  “Not the Moulin Rouge?” exclaimed Claudine.

  “No. The Crazy Horse Saloon.”

  So the Crazy Horse Saloon it was. Packed as usual, but as always with space for people who waved $10 bills. Stanley and Claudine ended up beside each other, jammed behind a table squeezed onto a semicircular extended settee immediately in front of the small stage. The din was deafening, the smoke in the room overpowering, and the number of Midwestern Americans with their plastic wives astounding.

  “It’s wonderful!” screamed Claudine, as the music started, adding yet another claustrophobic element to the atmosphere of total suffocation already pervading the place. But in spite of it all, the show was full of electric excitement from the very outset. The flashing lights, the kooky costumes, the gorgeous girls brought the temperature of the room up another ten degrees within minutes. The middle-aged woman from Little Rock pressed between Stanley and her husband, one elbow stubbornly imbedded in Stanley’s ribs, noticeably recoiled when one of the girls damn near shoved her well-groomed pubic hair into her hubby’s rather red nose. The man’s self-control collapsed completely, as he broke into a series of violent sneezes.

  Claudine thought this was hilarious and burst into pealing laughter, soon infecting the dozens of people immediately around them, especially when the nice American lady, with a touch of silver in her hair, turned to her embarrassed spouse and said, in a loud voice, “Henry! Don’t make a fucking ass of yourself.”

  The tableaux on the stage before them changed, this time to an African pair. Soon all female attention in the room was riveted on the crotch of the enormous black man, as, with a rather noticeable swelling where it counted most, he began a relentless pursuit of his virginal partner. As the room became increasingly hushed, Stanley stiffened. For there, tugging at his zipper with immediate and complete success, was a hand. And as soon as he was totally unleashed, yet another hand took a firm hold.

  “Jeezus,” whispered Stanley out of the side of his mouth. “What’re you trying to do?”

  The only reply came from the two hands, which slowly began to move in rhythm with the pulsing drums, now providing the background to the frenzy of the increasingly entangled pair on the stage. As the climax slowly began the approach, the room went into total darkness. The two carefully prepared naked bodies reflected the ultraviolet lights which now played upon them, creating images of dark and eerie sex.

  At this point the American lady on Stanley’s left stirred. To his utter horror, a third hand was laid upon him. Ever so cagily it had dropped to his knee, as if by accident under the crowded circumstances. But then, purposefully, it began inching its way up. There wasn’t a goddamned thing Stanley could do but sit there in awful anticipation, since he was totally wedged in by solid flesh on both sides and blocked by the table in front. The rather oversized tablecloth which, thankfully, concealed Stanley’s lap, started to flutter like a tent in a hurricane, as the confusion below increased. He could almost feel the anticipation of the new set of chubby fingers as they worked their way, ever faster, toward the target area. They paused, thrown into doubt as contact was made with that other set of busy French fingers. But then, with regained courage, they searched for, and found, if not all, at least the tip of the object which had developed such enormous local popularity.

  By now it appeared to dawn on Claudine that something extraordinary was happening.

  “Is that you?” she whispered.

  Stanley was too paralyzed to reply, but words were hardly necessary since there, right on top of the table, his white cuffs—two of them—unmistakably reflected the bluish light of the ultraviolet lamps. Suddenly Claudine’s hands withdrew, and with the air of royalty she leaned past Stanley and said in the sweetest of loud voices to the matron on his left, whose hand was firmly clutching its prize:

  “Madame, would you mind taking your hand off my friend’s cock?”

  Which she did, as Stanley went into violent withdrawal symptoms that became even more accentuated when Claudine went on, equally loud, “Stanley, zip up your trousers. We’re leaving.”

  One would think that this happened every night at the Crazy Horse Saloon, for not a head turned during the entire episode. The American lady, now primly clutching her husband’s arm, did not even take her eyes from the stage as Stanley struggled to his feet and wrestled his way to freedom, with Claudine following haughtily behind. But then her giggles started again, and she couldn’t stop until they had stepped outside the club onto the Avenue George V, after Stanley, in midflight, had hurriedly pressed $50 into a surprised waiter’s hand.

  “Stanley,” she said when finally calmed down, “at least you’ve got to give her credit for having good taste. Although, come to think of it, she didn’t get that far. Poor thing. She’ll never know what she’s missing. But maybe you prefer threesomes?”

  Stanley was still too unnerved to either laugh or cry. But then slowly he had to admit to himself that, until Claudine had broken up things, they had been moving toward a rather interesting crescendo. In fact, the more he thought of it, of the very audacity of the situation, the more he began to anticipate the rest of the evening. By the time Claudine and he had entered his hotel suite, both were in a state of white heat. But again it was Claudine who took the lead.

  “I want you, Stanley. Now!”

  She flung the mink aside and pulled Rosen into the bedroom. Her urgency was so great that the white mini stayed on until both had reached a crashing climax, which left Claudine—all six feet of her—thrashing on top of him, as she came time and time again. Finally she lay still. Then breathing hard, she rose to remove the rest of her clothes. She did the same for Stanley, her hands busy with his body all the time. Suddenly she disappeared into the living room, to return carrying a chilled bottle of champagne and two glasses.

  “You stay right there,” she said to Rosen, as he lay sprawled across the bed. “From now on, I’m going to provide the treats.”

  With just a flick of the thumbs, the cork flew off. Claudine filled the glasses to the brim, handed them to Stanley, then climbed into the large bed, pulling the eiderdown on top of both in a series of easy movements. She retrieved one of the glasses and tipped it toward Stanley.

  “Stanley darling. You are such a wonderful man. Except for one thing.”

  Rosen was startled again. He was not used to complaints in bedrooms.

  “There was something wrong?” he asked anxiously. “After what that woman pulled, I wouldn’t be surprised. The bloody nerve!”

  “No, nothing wrong, darling,” she said laughing. “Just that you would be absolutely perfect if you had a moustache.”

  “Aha,” said Stanley, relieved. “You mean like your little banking friend from Switzerland.” Now he took his first sip of champagne.

  “Yes.”

  “But I thought, from what you told me last time, that he turned out to be a total failure on his last trip.”

  “Well, not total. He at least had a stiff moustache. But let’s not talk about him.”

  “But,” insisted Stanley, “I’d like to. Just for a minute. The guy intrigues me.”

  “How could he intrigue you? You’ve never met.”

  “Of course not, but what I mean is that it intrigues me that a guy could get so worked up about business that even you could not get him worked up in bed.”

  “I told you. He had something very big on his mind.”

  “How could anything be that big?”

  “He said that the meeting of those two men he saw together in London could mean that something very very important was going to happen. You know, with gold and dollars and all that stuff.”

  “You mean the American Secretary of the Treasury?”

  “Yes and that other one.”

  “From what bank was he again?”

  “In English I don’t know. But in
French it’s the Banque pour le . . . I forget. He called it BIZ or BEEZ or something like that.” Then she paused and gave Rosen a curious look.

  “But why,” she continued, “are you so interested?”

  “Well, I mean he is more or less your boyfriend, isn’t he?”

  “In a way. But not in any way that has anything to do with us.”

  “I’m not so sure. I mean, you can hardly be happy with a man who is impotent.”

  “I never said that. In fact, that was the first time that such a thing happened.”

  “Sure,” said Stanley.

  “Now you listen to me. You hardly think that I would become involved with a man who couldn’t even—” She was obviously insulted.

  “Claudine,” interrupted Rosen, “let’s change the subject. I’m sorry. You’re right. It’s hardly any concern of mine. I just hope that you’ll be seeing a lot more of me in the future than that Swiss jerk.”

  The fact was that during the next four hours they saw quite a bit of each other, often from some of the most amazing angles. It was just before dawn when they sank into an exhausted sleep.

  The first thing Stanley did when he woke up around noon was to look at the date on his watch. October 23. Time to get back to work.

  7

  EXACTLY six days later, on October 29, George Bernoulli had just straightened out his desk at the headquarters of the Special Branch of the Swiss Federal Police in Bern ready to leave for lunch, when the phone rang.

  “Herr Doktor Bernoulli?” asked the metallic voice.

  “Jawohl, am Telefon.”

  “One moment please, Herr Doktor. You have a call from the Federal Council chambers.”

  The call was extremely brief. The minister of finance wanted to see Bernoulli within the shortest possible time—immediately, if convenient. It was.

  The quickest way was to walk. Fifteen minutes later Bernoulli entered the office of the minister. The latter was not alone. He had two additional members of the Federal Council with him. After the usual round of handshakes, the finance minister, Jakob Gerber, took over.

  “Herr Bernoulli, please accept our apologies for the short notice. But we have a problem that is quite urgent, and most delicate. I think you are the man to help us.”

  Gerber gave Bernoulli that super-earnest look which seems to be a prerequisite for high public office, no matter what the country.

  “Thank you, sir. I would, of course, be most happy to help in any way I possibly can,” said Bernoulli, the obedient servant.

  “Good. Let me outline the situation. It apparently started in Rome last month, at the IMF meeting. The Germans, French, and Japanese came to a decision that if the United States was going to refuse to restore gold-dollar convertibility, they would force the issue by banding together into a gold bloc. Feelers were put out to us to join in, but in view of our neutrality we of course abstained. For this whole project would have amounted to nothing short of an open rebellion against the United States. In addition, I personally doubt whether it could have been carried off anyway. But that is now a moot point. For somehow the Americans got wind of the whole affair.”

  Gerber paused. He liked to formulate his thoughts quite precisely before speaking. “Well, as I said, the American delegation apparently got tipped off, and nothing short of a miracle happened. The president took the decision to restore the dollar-gold link by revaluing the official price of gold to $125 per ounce. This is extremely good news, of course. And you are probably wondering how we have come to know about it.”

  Bernoulli had no choice but to nod.

  Gerber continued: “For good reasons, the president decided to put the secretary-general of the Bank for International Settlements in the picture. Apparently the Americans realized that it would be absolutely essential to inform Bollinger in advance—you know Bollinger, of course—since the BIS will have to assume a good share of the responsibility for steadying the foreign exchange markets, after the announcement is made. By the way, the firmly established revaluation date is November 8. In just over a week.”

  Gerber paused again. In contrast to the other six members of the Federal Council, who together represented the collective presidency of Switzerland, he was not a professional politician. He came from an industrial background and was known to be a man who could make tough decisions quickly. In spite of the fact that he had held the governmental post for over two years, he still appeared more than slightly uncomfortable in the company of some of his colleagues. The associate on his left, the minister of the interior, was best known for his ability to yodel at the conclusion of rural gatherings, which were much more noted for their alcoholic than political content. The man on his right, the minister of justice, was an ex-part-time university professor. He had no such claim to fame in the yodeling field, or for that matter, in any other. The law required seven men on the Federal Council, and he was simply the seventh. He could, however, smoke a pipe with a certain amount of élan.

  The finance minister went on. “Obviously I still have not fully explained why we are involved. For the Americans demanded, and received, a pledge of absolute secrecy from Bollinger. Well, an accident happened. Upon his return from London, where he met with the American Secretary of the Treasury, Bollinger put his copy of the gold plan into a small safe which he maintains at his home. This was not all that unusual. Bollinger told me that he often brings documents home, especially over weekends, as we all do, I suppose. In this instance there was a special incentive for Bollinger to use his private facilities. He did not want any of his associates at the bank—most of them foreigners, as you know—to stumble upon this document, for obvious reasons.

  “Somebody tampered with the safe a week later—which was the day before yesterday. Bollinger found himself in a most difficult dilemma. If somebody had deliberately taken illegal steps to get hold of the plan and maliciously leaked its contents, the result would probably be the biggest monetary explosion the world has ever seen. Even if the Americans now changed the plan, documentary evidence that it existed would produce such mass exodus from the dollar, and flight into anything else, ranging from marks to yen to lire, from Swiss common shares to South African gold mines, that possibly every bank in the free world, as well as all securities and commodities exchanges, might have to close their doors for weeks, maybe months. It would mean total chaos. I think that should be obvious. The German government leaked their exact thoughts about letting the mark float in May, 1971. The ultimate result was that in the final thirty-five minutes before they stopped accepting dollars, they took in over one billion! Just imagine what would happen under these circumstances.”

  The room remained completely silent.

  “One possibility is that somebody is out to sabotage the dollar, once and for all. The other possibility is that this is the start of a highly organized criminal effort. You can imagine what this information could be worth to a speculator, or a group of speculators. An absolutely staggering amount. Then there is still the chance that a freak coincidence is involved. Perhaps some petty thief took a crack at this safe hoping for the best and, finding nothing of value, took along what struck him as the most impressive set of papers. For Bollinger claims that no one, absolutely no one, could possibly have known that a dossier of this importance was in his possession. But in any case, it was gone.

  “After giving the matter twenty-four hours of thought, Bollinger decided not to tell the Americans. He is Swiss, like you and me. And we all know quite well that for all the good features of our friends in the United States, one talent they are not endowed with is the ability to tackle a problem with finesse, subtlety, a fine hand. This is not a criticism, mind you. Just a well-proven fact. As one of my British colleagues has often repeated, ‘At the United States Treasury, every night is amateur night.’ Had Bollinger told them, they would have come storming into Basel like a bunch of drunken cowboys, if you’ll excuse the expression.”

  Bernoulli, who knew Americans well, felt that Gerber was overdoing t
hings somewhat. But the minister of the interior, whose closest contact with America had been an occasional bottle of Coca-Cola amply laced with rum, burped his obvious approval. Also the pipe of the minister of justice seemed to be sending up positive signals. The resulting increased density of alcoholic fumes and smoke in the air did not seem to bother the minister of finance. He had apparently hardened in office. Gerber spoke again.

  “The end of the story is quite simple. This morning, very early, Bollinger came to me, quite unofficially, of course, and asked for advice. I have pondered it ever since and reached the following conclusions about an hour ago. They are: First, we as a country very strongly desire that this gold revaluation plan be implemented as foreseen. It is in our national interest. Second, the fact is that the harm has already been done. The dossier is gone. Third, if we take this matter to the Americans, either a disastrous type of investigation will be started, and/or the devaluation will be called off permanently. Everybody, including the Americans, would suffer as a result. Fourth, we do not want any international institution domiciled in Switzerland to get involved in a scandal of such monumental proportions if we can help it. Thus my decision, based upon these conclusions, is the following: We will try to run this thing to the ground immediately. It may very well be a quite simple internal Swiss affair. If so, we will just squelch it. If a foreign government is involved, we will immediately withdraw from the scene, and everybody forgets everything. In any case, we as a government—and I cannot stress this fact more strongly—have no, absolutely no, knowledge of this incident. I hope you all quite clearly understand what I am saying—and especially you, Bernoulli.”

  “Yes, sir,” replied the young man, “I understand this most clearly.”

  “But I don’t.”

  Gerber was startled. Of all people, it was the ex-professor who was speaking.

  “As I understand these matters, a massive revaluation of the official gold price would mean, ipso facto, a massive devaluation of the dollar.”