The Financial Terrorist

by John Gubert

  “There’s a hotel, just opposite the old World Trade Centre. It’s called the Millennium. It has a popular bar the yuppies like. I’ll be there at noon and wait till twelve thirty. The password should be your granddaughter’s second name.”

  “You’ll be met. Ask them to show you their ID as well. It’ll impress you and you’ll realise why. Always better to be doubly sure.”

  With that, Charles rang off and headed out of the hotel. Douglas was waiting with the car. They headed south.

  “Is there any chance of us being attacked? I gather you had trouble last night.”

  Charles was surprised. “How do you know?”

  “The driver left me a message. Said it was better to have a gun. I had one already but he passed me another. There’s no reason for him to know anything about me, other than the fact that I drive you. They must think you’re pretty green if they believe that your driver is a mere chauffeur.”

  “That’s true, but to them I’m just a money man. They may have heard about the fights before I married Jacqui, but I was more of an amateur then. I really was; even more than I am now. I only do the gangster bit when it is needed. It’s not my career.”

  Douglas laughed. “You’d have been better than your father-in-law if it had been. But drugs and prostitution are out of fashion. Money is the best weapon now. And you know how to handle that.”

  “Douglas, don’t think too much about what I do. It’s not healthy.”

  Douglas said nothing. Charles thought about his words. He thought back to Maria’s comments the previous night. He had to be careful. This was dangerous territory and amateurs, however well meaning, had limited life expectancy.

  The weeks ahead were going to be more fraught than he had hoped. It was with this in mind that, after having stopping off at Saks to buy a suit, he arrived at the New York office. He walked in. Nobody was expecting him. Nobody recognised him, at first.

  Then McGarth’s secretary came in and took over. Charles was whisked up to the boardroom. He asked where McGarth was. He would be in later, he had a breakfast meeting and would only be in at ten thirty. The Honourable James’ son was also away from his desk. It was confirmed that was not unusual. It hardly surprised Charles, as his nocturnal habits had been one reason for their selection of him as the second fall guy in the Americas.

  Charles called his father and was updated on the different positions. He carefully used his mobile to avoid being recorded on the tapes that were linked to the in-house phone system.

  They had almost closed out all the trading positions. The banks had crystallised a huge number of losses and yet he had not been informed. Irrespective of their real innocence on any charge of having instigated the trades or manipulated the books, they were guilty of withholding information. Charles could hardly fail to feel pleased about that; this was their undoing rather than something he could have foreseen. The Honourable James and his revolting son; Dunkillen, Sir Brian and McGarth were heading for the big dipper in serious downward mode.

  He called Jacqui. She was fine. The birth hadn’t been difficult. The baby was sleeping and feeding well. They would tell the world her name when he returned, hopefully at the weekend. He said he would look up Di Maglio that evening. He hinted that he didn’t like the prognosis. She didn’t react. She still felt bitter towards him and appeared to have shut him out of her life. Little Claire Jacqueline Di Maglio Rossi cried for attention and food in the background. Charles smiled as he heard his daughter’s voice for the first time. Jacqui told him he was soppy and she had to go back on shift.

  He talked to the office, carefully using the office phone. The recording would be useful. He talked to the Honourable James and even asked him for a first cut of the last quarter’s results. He expected them any day but hadn’t had them yet. He queried if the Honourable James thought they‘d beat the budget. Charles was assured they were hopeful. Charles said he was impressed at the results in America and hinted that the Honourable James’ son seemed to have buckled down to his new role. He couldn’t get a reaction, which was unfortunate but not unexpected. There was no real love lost between the pair.

  He asked to be transferred to Lord Dunkillin and asked him specifically how things were on the trading side. He enthused. He believed they would produce record results. Charles allowed him to prattle on and then finally talked to Sir Brian. He heard all was well and was assured that the business was booming. They all obviously knew the truth but were hoping against hope for a miracle. They were petrified of being forced off the gravy train and, in reality, out of the City, for they were in it too deep not to be deemed undesirable even by the low standards of many of their old chums.

  Soon afterwards, McGarth walked in. He was full of his successes. Once again there was no mention of the trading losses. He showed Charles a pack he had prepared for the board the next week. Financial product sales outside of the dealing room were up. Investment funds were growing. New accounts were at a record. Charles asked to keep the paper. It was wonderful evidence of the man’s dishonesty and incompetence. McGarth happily left it with him, especially as Charles implied that he expected the remuneration committee to ensure that this result was reflected in the end of year bonus awards. Then having ensured that greed blossomed even more, he left for his lunchtime meeting. The last thing he wanted was for the bank to implode before he had sorted out Di Maglio and his erstwhile operations.

  And if the fools he employed talked to their friends in similar vein, the share price would soar and that would allow his father to sell even more shares at even higher prices. Everything was going their way at the moment. More time meant just that they made more money. It was no issue if they waited the month they needed to rid them of the corrupt Di Maglio legacy.

  Charles walked up Wall Street and across Broadway, then down to the glass fronted Millenium and up to its bar. Wall Street is not a place of lunchtime drinkers. In London the place would have been packed. Here it was half-empty. He sat and waited for the contact to appear. A tall man, with steel rimmed glances approached him. His thin face was topped with thinning slicked-back blond hair. He had a lop-sided smile and a quiet voice that said in a Southern burr, “Clarissa said you’d be here.”

  “I guess you have a badge to show me.”

  He calmly passed the black wallet over. In it was the presidential insignia; he was part of the President’s bodyguard. His unmistakable face was younger in his photo. But it was the same smile and the same gaunt appearance. A small, yellow piece of paper was stuck to the edge of the photo and it said in minuscule writing “I owe my life to Delaney.”

  The waitress took their order for two sodas. “I need Di Maglio to pass away. Can you arrange it?”asked Charles.

  “Why?” The voice was inquisitive but not shocked.

  “You know our long game plan. Originally, we were to fabricate gang warfare. Now we can’t. It’s real. And there’s danger in that. I need to get rid of Di Maglio. Whatever his state, his presence threatens us. He could cause trouble. I always knew that. There’s a solution now. I need you to finish him. I’d have it done myself but I have no people I can trust for such a job. Just do it.”

  “We’re not going to lose any sleep if he’s dead. We’ll do it tomorrow. His people want him moved back to his house. It’ll look like natural causes. Nobody will think he died of any cause other than from a cardiac arrest. You can trust us. We have drugs that nobody even knows about. And they won’t leave any traces.”

  Charles looked at him suspiciously, “Are you wired?”

  He smiled that lop-sided smile again, “Don’t you trust me?”

  “I don’t trust many people. I trust Delaney. But I’ve no reason to trust you.”

  He opened his jacket. There was a wire. A tape of everything they‘d said.

  “Bastard,” Charles muttered fiercely. “Just do your job and keep out of my way.”

  With that, Charles got up and strode over to the lift. He punched the button
angrily. He stalked into the lift, paced it up and down. Then, with a face that looked like thunder, he left the hotel. He walked back to the office. He stopped and looked at the kiosks in Wall Street. He didn’t think that he’d been followed but couldn’t be sure.

  He rode up to the executive floor in the office. He walked to the washroom. Nobody was there. He went into a cubicle. Then he took out his miniature recorder and played it back. He heard every word he had said. He heard the agent speak. He heard him confirm he was wired. He had him on tape. This was his insurance. It was strange that the agent hadn’t asked him if he was wired. Either he had slipped up or had assumed he would be anyway.

  Charles walked over to the office and called Delaney, “I saw your friend. He can exit Di Maglio as he is my only option. But tell his superiors that the bust is off. He was wired. I don’t trust them any more.”

  “I’ll call,” Delaney replied. “They said they wouldn’t. Is the bust really off?”

  “It is for them. Stay on stand-by. I may find another place to do it, but only if they deliver on Di Maglio.”

  Charles then called Maria and told her to come over. She arrived half an hour later. He came straight to the point.

  “We have a change of plan. We need to divert the plane with the drug consignment. I don’t want it to land in the US. There’s a danger that they’ll set us up. We’ll land it in Canada. What airfield should we use?”

  She hesitated, “There used to be a strip just north of Buffalo near Niagara. We used it a few times. It almost straddles the border. It should be OK now. It’s unusable in winter because of the weather. I can check if it’s still operative, I assume it will be. It was mainly used as a flying club’s place.”

  “Good. And change the planes. We’ll split the cargo in two and put it on executive jets. We land them at the strip within a few minutes of each other. But, first of all, get me the exact location. And find out what the border control is like while you’re at it.”

  She nodded, “Do I tell Maddy?”

  “Once we’re organised and if I agree. There’s no need to tell her yet. She may tell Delaney and I want him to know as late as possible. The fewer who know, and the shorter they know for, the better.”

  “What do we do tonight?” she asked.

  “I have no plans. I want an early night. Best to get as much sleep as possible before the pace steps up. Tomorrow we head off for California. Maddy can stay here. But we’re visiting the bank there. I don’t want to be too close when the heist takes place. The further away we are the more credible it appears.”

  He didn’t want to tell her that he also wanted to be out of New York when Di Maglio died. And it was for the same reason. But there was no way that he was going to admit that one to Maria.

  The rest of the day was spent on the phone as they planned the bank’s demise. His father had sold more shares in IBE. Jacqui would spend a couple of hours at the office on Friday and adjust the share register by reshuffling certain holdings.

  Jacqui would just move the stock out of the names of the big institutions to the new owners. Later, once Jack Ryder had bought back their stock at rock bottom prices, she would move the stock back in again.

  None of the staff knew that she was also able to hack into the system, change records and then cover her tracks. The beauty of it all was that, in the end, the programme would eliminate all records of what had actually happened and then self-destruct. An expert would know there was a problem. But there would be no link with Jacqui, her terminal would have reverted to its normal view only. That meant that, officially, she could look at the records but not change them.

  Charles called Jacqui but they kept the discussions down to family matters. She would leave the hospital that afternoon. Everything was arranged. They did not talk about the job needed on Friday for he was on the office phone. He had used his mobile for the discussion with his father. It was important that they completed their illicit sales of IBE shares quickly, it was impossible that the good or bad news about the bank, depending on who you were, would not break over the next week or so.

  The losses on all their trades had crystallised and been paid away into the money launderer’s maze known as the international banking payment systems. And some of the larger loans would default at the end of the following week and start a roller coaster of failed loans for the bank.

  The end game was now in play. The next two weeks would see the collapse of the Di Maglio Empire and of IBE. Meanwhile, the Empire carried on making its money and the IBE share price soared on to reach twenty-six dollars, more than fifty per cent up on the price at its launch.

  Charles had some business calls and even accompanied McGarth to the New York Federal Reserve. McGarth painted the regulators the rosy picture that had become his trade mark. His patrician jowls quivered with excitement as he vouched that all was well in the bank. All the ratios were moving in the right direction. Their capital was strong. Their investment funds were performing well. Loan losses were negligible. In short, business was exceptional.

  McGarth’s blindness to the danger of their situation was staggering. He was already aware that they had been burnt badly on the trading desks with hits of well into two billion for the US end alone.

  And Charles knew that, within a week, their investment funds would also slump, as his father stopped manipulating the prices of the worthless shares they had bought; then worried clients would start to panic as their fund prices crashed.

  Then the loans would start defaulting. And IBE stock would slump as the market absorbed one bad news announcement after another. The darling of the market had risen to a staggering price, and would now plummet to unknown depths as it edged close to bankruptcy amid a public display of incompetence and apparently fraud by its top management.

  Charles just built up the image of his total innocence. He commented on his dependence on McGarth and his experienced management team. He noted that he would be doing a courtesy call to California. He stressed the shortness of his visit to New York. They were duped and there was no way that they could be surprised that he was too.

  That was the last meeting and Charles declined the offer of a drink from McGarth. He needed to get up early for the West Coast the next morning. He wanted a quiet evening to go through papers from the family businesses. And with that he headed back to the hotel. Maria was there.

  She told him what she had arranged, “I‘ve established the landing strip is still operative. It’s not manned normally. We’ve booked two slots on it for Friday and arranged our own ground crew. We have two of the latest executive jets. The locals in Canada think that they are arriving from Chicago, according to the manifest. The cover is that they’re bringing executives to see the Niagara Falls.

  We’ve also rescheduled the South American flights and already had the cargo split. That wasn’t difficult, as it hadn’t been loaded anyway. We’re all set for Friday. I haven’t told Maddy. She won’t be happy not knowing but won’t make a fuss of it.”

  She gave him the co-ordinates and expected timings. All was ready. They knew the room was clean of bugs but couldn’t be certain about the phone. Since the meeting with the US agent, Charles was not in the mood to take chances. The rooms had been empty at times during the day and phones could be tapped. He was comfortable about using the mobile with its scrambling device from the office but less so from the room. So he and Maria headed off down street and went over to Trump Tower. He called Delaney.

  “Change of plan. First, you’ll need the Canadian police. I suspect they’ll need the US to help them as they are unlikely to have the right resources. But the hit will need to be early evening on Friday, New York time – that’s around six in the evening there. They’ll be told the co-ordinates around two that afternoon. You’ll need teams standing by in Toronto. They need all to be ready to scramble and fast.”

  Delaney was angry at the lack of information but Charles cut him off, “Don’t preach at me. You had your chance a
nd you blew it. Or at least your agent did. You’re playing it my way. This is for all of our protection. If anything else doesn’t go to plan, the whole deal is off and not just relocated.”

  Delaney didn’t say another word. “I’m off to California tomorrow. I’ll call you from there,” said Charles. There was no answer. Charles sensed his anger but he knew that Delaney would control it. Delaney wanted the Empire dead even more than he did.

  They called Maddy to join them and told her to set up the Russians between Toronto and Niagara. That gave little away as that area was littered with airstrips. She called a contact she had in the Russian camp “I have a big shipment. I want a hundred million for the location. I want fifty up front. It’s a big one. Two executive jets. It will be around a billion in value. That’s a few weeks supply for the US of A.”

  There were voices on the other side and then she replied, “I’ll give the general area once the money’s in the account and the exact co-ordinates in time for you to make it there. You have a few days but I want the cash there by Thursday, or I’ll call off the planes.”

  With that she cut them off. She turned to Charles and grinned. She sensed the Russians had fallen for it. Once the fifty million was in her account they would definitely have been duped. The Russians would believe her story of being unhappy with the cut she was getting. They understood greed and respected it.

  She dialled again. This time she would be calling another Mafia syndicate. The story was similar. The code name was different. The other side agreed to pay. This time it was fifty million with twenty-five up front. The Italian Mafia were always tighter than the Russians. It came with their long traditions.

  She smiled, “That’s all arranged then. It was so simple. I can’t believe it.”

  Charles turned to Maddy, “I’m heading back from California to London. I need to be there on Thursday. Are you staying in New York after Thursday?”

  “No. I’ll head back to Geneva once I give the green light to the Russians and Italians. I’ll arrive there on Friday morning and wait for the call with the exact location. Then I’ll contact you and we’ll have to see what’s left to be done.”