Darke Mission

by Scott Caladon

  “Zhang. You’re up,” said the familiar Kentucky voice of her boss Kevin Morgan.

  “Hi Kevin, what do you mean?”

  Kevin began, sounding both urgent and upset. “There’s been a terrorist attack, we think, at the Boston Marathon. Two explosions for sure. There are definitely several people dead including children and a whole lot more injured.”

  Bai Ling took in the headline news, but didn’t know what to say.

  “The facts are sketchy just now but I’ve been in touch with Ricky Deslauners, the FBI’s special agent in charge of the Boston office. He says the bombs contained BB-like pellets and nails. One of the bombs was hidden in a small pressure cooker in a backpack, the other was in some form of metal container too. Ricky said he’s not sure but it might not be Al-Qaeda or any of those other towel-head mother fuckers. He said the bombs seemed to be a bit amateurish, not really the power or timing to do maximum damage, but they were lethal enough. Apart from the dead, it’s been reported that many of the injured lost limbs or parts of limbs from their lower body. It’s a fucking mess and we’re in the frame for answers along with all the other agencies.” Kevin paused for breath.

  “What can I do?” asked Bai Ling. “I’m no bomb expert and I’d have thought the Feds and the CIA would be all over this like a rash?”

  “They are, as are Homeland Security, the Boston Police and anybody else who thinks their ass is on the line.” Kevin continued, a little calmer now. “Our guys in Boston are reviewing all the phone calls, emails, texts, instant messages, internet communications, anything that they’ve intercepted in recent weeks. They’re already plugged into all the operating CCTV cameras in the area of the attack and they’re working round the clock. They’re short staffed and they have a billion truckloads of data to search. You’re the closest NSA Intelligence Officer to Boston. They want you there. A fresh pair of eyes and ears. Also, since they hadn’t picked up one damn inkling of intel before the attack, it may be that the bastards have used some coded communications that the Boston guys missed. Time to get that big brain of yours into gear.”

  Kevin was right about the geography, Bai Ling knew that Lexington was only twenty miles from Boston. She had her car with her in the LINEAR car park, and always had an overnight bag in the trunk, though it sounded like she may well be there for more than one night.

  “I can be there in less than an hour, Kevin. What will I tell my boss here at LINEAR?” asked Bai Ling.

  “Don’t worry about that. Concoct a story of family bereavement and that they shouldn’t expect you back for a couple of weeks. When you get to the Boston office ask for Jane Hayden, she’ll brief you. Call me later with an update. Good luck.”

  “Sure, bye Kevin.”

  Bai Ling’s head was whizzing round and round or so it felt. A bomb attack in Boston. My god! Who could have done it? Why hadn’t the NSA or the other security agencies picked anything up? She had wanted more front line exposure and now this bloody tragedy had given her that opportunity, not the way she wanted it but she’d need to deal with that emotion before getting down to hard analysis and acute observation. As she gathered her things, phone, bag and the pair of silvery white trainers under her desk, she could not have known that she would not be returning to LINEAR, that this was going to be her first and only field mission for the NSA and that she would never see Kevin Morgan again. She glanced back at her computer and just as she was shutting it down she felt the faintest of smiles grow on her face. Her selection for honoured Ceres Connection student 2013 was Gilian Baz Haning, a young woman of similar age to Bai Ling with a Spanish mother and Swiss father. Great name, thought Bai Ling.

  * * *

  JJ had prepared well for the FCA meeting. This relatively new regulator of the UK’s financial system, along with the PRA, Prudential Regulation Authority, had emerged like a phoenix from the ashes of the FSA in 2013. JJ thought that, in reality, the FSA had been hard done by. He knew the FSA’s boss, Hector Sants, he was as honest as the days were long, a good leader, articulate and motivated. The several years after the 2008 financial crash had left the British government with what seemed like a carte blanche mandate to allocate blame for that disaster, as long as all fingers were pointing away from Westminster. There was nothing the FSA could have done any differently that would have lessened the economic impact of the crash but the entire jigsaw puzzle involving Lehman Brothers, Bernie Madoff’s fraudulent activities, the LIBOR scandal, to name but a few, meant that someone or other had to be sacrificed to the baying pack of media hyenas and men in the street. Hector and the FSA got chomped.

  The night before, JJ had organised an offsite with Toby and Yves-Jacques. Not so much a lavish 1980s style offsite where you could slope off to some fancy country house or other for a few days to discuss the most irrelevant of stuff. This was the ‘hair-shirt teenies’ so a cheap drink in a wine bar was your lot. JJ and his colleagues were going over the sequence of events that led up to their extraordinary ‘good luck’ last December. The only electronic communications there had been before the action began were Marcus Whyte’s initial call to Toby’s mobile phone, Toby’s text message to JJ, and his text to Yves-Jacques to get himself into the office sharpish, then Toby’s chaser call to Yves-Jacques on his work landline to get a move on with the target buy list. The latter communication contained no potential regulatory haz chem material. A head trader urging a young analyst to get a move on was normal daily chatter. Thank god the other three communications were mobile to mobile.

  At the first meeting the FCA bods probably wouldn’t ask for mobile phone records. They would already be armed with any emails that day sent or received by the relevant MAM employees and a print out of any Bloomberg instant messages or chat room exchanges with brokers. MAM’s Compliance department, a bunch of barely living no-marks as far as Toby was concerned, were actually very good at their jobs. John Cougar Mellencamp’s line about life continuing even if living was no fun any longer surely must have been aimed at Compliance personnel, whether or not they were called Jack or Diane. Living or not the Compliance geeks would already have handed over all the relevant electronic communications of that day. JJ had made this all crystal clear to Toby and Yves-Jacques at their offsite. There was no point denying what was in black and white, especially since most of it would have been typed by one of the three amigos. The key to a successful FCA meeting today was to be light heartedly content with how lucky MAM was in its timing of the trades, to have a credible, watertight explanation when the FCA fellow or fellowette enquired why trade so large that day and to ensure they left satisfied with no need or desire to requisition personal mobile phone records.

  JJ wasn’t even sure that it would pass muster as an insider trading issue. Marcus Whyte was a paid employee of MAM and he was paid to do research. He’d have been in regular contact with PASOK Theo, his brother in law, anyway. Theo may or may not have known MAM had a bucket load of Greek quasi junk bonds when he blurted out his bailout vote news to Marcus. JJ had already asked Marcus, by a circuitous non-traceable route, i.e. first class air mail letter, since destroyed, whether or not he had given Theo a backhander for his info. Marcus said no. JJ had other issues with the insider trading nomenclature and regulation. Many economists thought information not in the public domain was fine, that if acted upon it simply meant a reallocation of capital, but with no overall negative effect on world utility. Usually, this group was populated by the same bunch of dismal scientists that thought all drugs, Class A and otherwise should be made legal. The argument was that if they were legal and readily available then the price would drop relative to demand. Drug cartels, dealers and couriers would go out of business and those folk who just did things because they were illegal cool would need to find something else to be dope about. Convincing as JJ felt his thought processes were he didn’t think that this morning’s meeting with the regulatory boys and girls was the optimum arena to air them. Those FCA hounds would probably believe that if it wasn’t on a Sky News, CNBC and CNN
loop then it wasn’t in the public domain. No, JJ would be needing to answer some potentially barbed questions. The thorniest of them all would probably be why the three MAM employees were in the office in the middle of the night.

  “Hi. I’m Tom Watts,” said a slim English fellow of about 5ft 10in, thirty years old, short blond hair, trendy rimless glasses and a difficult to place regional accent. “This is Rachel Woodhouse, and Gareth Jones.” Tom Watts was clearly the lead FCA officer, backed up by some moderately stylish eye candy and a Welshman, just in case a sing-song was on the agenda, thought JJ, irreverently.

  “I’m JJ Darke, head of portfolio strategy and investment. This is Toby Naismith, our chief FX and commodities trader, and Yves-Jacques Durand, an analyst in the Research department. Please sit down.”

  They all exchanged business cards, not meant to be a contact sport but often was when there were six or more at a table, three a side. They were in one of MAM’s larger meeting rooms on the fifth floor with a nice view, albeit a bit bleak that day. They sat in very comfortable black leather chairs which surrounded a two tone long leaf shaped walnut burr table. Still and sparkling water and glasses were already on the table. JJ suggested to his FCA guests to help themselves to the water.

  “If anyone wants tea or coffee let me know,” said JJ, presently the perfect host. Yves-Jacques was about to ask for a coffee, but Toby gave him a painless dunt in the ribs with his elbow. All the FCA-ers had declined and Toby knew JJ wouldn’t want the meeting either held up or interrupted by the junior analyst satisfying his Gallic desire for yet another strong morning coffee.

  The meeting began like all these meetings do, on a slow burn. Tom Watts thanked JJ for taking the meeting, knowing full well that had he not there would have followed a summons to FCA headquarters. Eye candy asked some questions that she and her colleagues already knew the answer to and the Tom Jones wannabe just took notes. Then, ‘ding’. Round One.

  “Your Compliance department’s records show that you all came into this building in the early hours of the 13th of December,” stated Tom Watts. “Mr Durand, you entered first at 1.55am and Mr Darke and Mr Naismith, you both entered a few minutes later at 2.04am. Why was this?” Watts continued, adding that surely that wasn’t a normal or regular time for them to be working. Eye candy looked smug and young Gareth looked up from his notepad.

  “Yves-Jacques, you go first,” instructed JJ.

  “A couple of weeks prior to the 13th December,” began Yves-Jacques, “Toby, I mean Mr Naismith, told me that Mr Darke wanted me involved in developing a game tree and a pay-off matrix regarding various probability outcomes for our portfolio of Greek bonds.”

  “And you just wanted to do that at two o’clock in the morning on 13th December?” interrupted Tom Watts.

  “No Sir,” responded Yves-Jacques with a decent measure of deference in his voice. “I had been getting behind in the deadline for my work to be completed. I knew the weekend was coming up and I’d promised my girlfriend a couple of nights in Paris. That would have made me even further behind. I couldn’t sleep properly so I just got up and came in.”

  “Did you finish the task?” Bejesus thought JJ. Eye candy was paying attention.

  “Yes I did. It’s all on my computer, it can be easily checked,” said Yves-Jacques calmly. JJ thought the young chap was playing a blinder so far.

  “Mr Darke, you and Mr Naismith’s nocturnal work ethic, was that coincidence too?” interjected Watts.

  “No,” said JJ swiftly, then pausing.

  “Care to enlighten us?” continued Watts.

  “Toby had been out celebrating a few good trades with a couple of his broker dealer friends at Nobu. He gave me a ring, a bit worse for wear, and asked if he could come over to partake in a decent malt Scotch. Cocktail bars, even in the heart of London, don’t always have the best malts.” JJ was dragging out the description of this social scene. “I said fine. I’d been playing a Wii game with my son, he’s fourteen soon, he toasted me as usual, and I would have stayed up a while longer anyway after he went to bed. I’m a widower so seeing a work colleague who is also a friend for a few whiskies seemed like a good idea. As it turned out it was a very good idea,” finished JJ. Lone parent, sympathy vote, JJ was laying it on thick.

  “How so?” asked Watts.

  “Well, after a couple of eighteen year Macallans when we had passed the peak of bonhomie and were on the slowing down phase we started talking about work. Naturally enough our Greek bond position came up. It was our largest exposure in both the bond portfolio and our emerging market debt programme so it was the one to talk about,” elaborated JJ.

  Gareth was taking a few notes again and eye candy didn’t look quite so smug. The tale of two guys, drinking spirits and talking about Greeks was not fully engaging her mind any longer.

  “By about 1, 1.30am or thereabouts, we realised that neither of us was going to get any sleep that night, so we more or less mutually agreed to go into the office and sort out our Greek portfolio once and for all, before year end and before market liquidity dried up as everybody headed for their Christmas break. Toby Hailo-ed a cab, I sent my son’s nanny a text asking her to be in the house before Cyrus awoke and we headed off. On arrival, we knew Yves-Jacques was already there, the night security guard on the desk mentioned it. That was a bonus. If we needed any top mathematics on hand, then we had it.”

  Tom Watts couldn’t tell whether this was a load of old tosh, or one of those occasions when a major hedge fund got itself a lucky break. He had checked all the FSA and FCA files on MAM’s three employees before today’s meeting. The French dude was a bit too new to have much of a file and both Darke and Naismith’s records were clean, spotless, whiter than white. Watts’ FSA and FCA record at nailing financial miscreants was second to none. He was partly responsible for digging out some Madoff connections in London when he was in his twenties and he helped bring two of the LIBOR fixers to light. Jail terms and substantial fines ensued. He knew that if this MAM incident was an insider trading case and he proved it then his regulatory star would burn even brighter in the night sky.

  After a minute’s pondering, Tom Watts said, “I’ve one final question, Mr Darke.” Watts had racked his brain and forensically studied every communication that MAM’s Compliance department had given him. Their file was comprehensive, detailed with no time gaps or omissions. Any content, Bloomberg, BlackBerry, landline or email communication that December day was in his sticky mitts and those mitts were not yielding any wrongdoing. He could ask for their personal mobile phone records and he might still do that. At this juncture, however, he did not have the size of a gnat’s eyelids piece of dirt on these guys. He had one more shot.

  “Do you Mr Darke or your colleagues have any Greek family or friends?” asked Watts.

  JJ looked at Toby then Yves-Jacques straight in the eye. “Well, I don’t,” said JJ. “How about you guys?” Toby said he hadn’t and Yves-Jacques shook his head. Good job he wasn’t Bulgarian.

  Tom Watts looked a little deflated, eye candy was already off her seat, ready to leave and the note taker had closed his pad and tucked his pen away in his man bag. JJ and Tom Watts both knew that Round One had gone to MAM. One of them hoped it was a one round contest and while the other did not, Watts’ sad little chopper expression suggested that he wasn’t thinking there was going to be a Round Two. JJ was also moderately amused that their answer to Tom Watts’ hopeful silver bullet question was totally truthful. Neither he, nor Toby, nor Yves-Jacques did have any Greek family or friends. Marcus Whyte did, but Marcus hadn’t been asked to the meeting, Marcus Whyte didn’t do any of the trades and, from an FCA perspective, Marcus Whyte was a ghost.

  After the FCA contingent left, Toby and Yves-Jacques were all full of the joys of life. JJ was a little more reserved. He knew that the FCA could return with more questions if they felt the need. The only real part of their story that seemed less than titanium robust was the apparent spontaneity of Toby and him just deciding to go
to the office at two in the morning, all Macallaned up. If the FCA came back for mobile phone records then the gig was up. JJ could still argue that there were no net losers from their actions that night. The gainers were MAM and its employees, outside investors who were already short Greek bonds and equities and short USD/JPY. The losers were holders of Greek bonds, equities and those long USD/JPY. He had almost convinced himself it was a zero sum game, no overall winners or losers, just a redistribution of capital.

  JJ left for the Marsden and then home that night reasonably content with his day’s work. The only thing that bugged him was the phrase, in the public domain. Zero sum game or not, if the phone calls from Marcus Whyte or Toby ever saw the light of day then it was that requirement that would send them all to buggery in a handbasket.

  * * *

  Bai Ling was lying nearly flat out in her gadget full seat in the new Boeing 787 Dreamliner plane, first class, aisle seat, starboard side, heading from Boston’s Logan airport to Heathrow. As a child she had preferred the window seat on a plane, in fact she still preferred the window seat if truth be told. Her left knee, however, hurt like hell even though it had been a few weeks since Boston. She needed the aisle seat for ease of access, but it was still awkward and incredibly annoying. The bullet hadn’t smashed her kneecap to smithereens, but the knee is a very complex mechanism, made up of muscle, ligaments, cartilages and bone. The 9mm projectile had more or less destroyed her medial collateral ligament, one of the four major ligaments of the knee. Normally, certain skiing injuries and contact sports like American football – helmet to knee action – can severely damage this ligament but, hey, a stray bullet can do the trick too. The medical profession grades this type of ligament injury from one to three, with three being the most severe. Bai Ling’s was about one and a half. She still had a small limp but the doctors had said that with regular physio and then light exercise that may go away. It hadn’t yet. She wouldn’t be running the 100 metres in Olympic qualifying time though and, more distressing for Bai Ling was that she would not be capable of any roundhouse kicks to the head on anybody taller than an oompa loompa.