The Vulture Fund

by Stephen W. Frey

  Mace stared at Webster. The man always seemed to be one step ahead of the game.

  * * *

  —

  “It’s been a long time, Mace,” Slade Conner yelled above the music blasting from the speakers over the bar of Poor Richard’s, a popular watering hole at the South Street Seaport frequented by Wall Streeters. The bar was one of a collection of pubs, restaurants, and shops in a three-story pavilion overlooking the East River, just north of the downtown financial district.

  Mace smiled, pushed his mug of beer against Slade’s, then took a long drink of the amber liquid. After a few moments he lowered the mug and spoke directly into Slade’s ear so as to be heard over the music. “Let’s move to the back, where the noise isn’t as bad.”

  Slade nodded in agreement.

  Slowly the two men made their way toward the back of the room, carefully picking a path through the mass of bodies crowded around the bar area. Just as they reached the edge of the congestion, a blond woman in a short red dress caught Mace’s hand.

  “Wanna dance?” she screamed above the music.

  Mace smiled quickly. “Sorry, not now. Maybe later.” He squeezed her hand gently, then let it go and continued his attempt to break out of the pack.

  Finally the two men reached a spot against the back wall where they could hear each other more easily.

  Mace took another sip of beer and shook his head. “You sure you want to stay here, Slade?”

  “Absolutely.” Slade was watching a group of three women dancing together on the small dance area. They moved easily and seductively to the beat of the bass, without male accompaniment. “Oh, yeah, I’m sure I want to stay here.”

  “You said you wanted women and music when we talked on the phone. This is the best place I know of downtown for that combination.”

  “It’s perfect,” Slade said, not taking his eyes from the three women.

  Mace smiled and took another sip of beer. Slade’s sexual appetite could not be satisfied. It had been that way since Slade had come to the orphanage in Plymouth, Minnesota, at age thirteen, and Mace supposed it would always be that way. Slade had been the first boy in their age group at the home to have the audacity to walk up to the counter of the local 7-Eleven and purchase a Playboy magazine, then successfully smuggle it into the orphanage dormitory. He had also been the first of their crew to “do the deed”—at fourteen, after a mixer with a local girls’ orphanage. At least he claimed to have done it.

  Mace watched him watch the women. Slade was not tall, under five feet eleven inches in his leather cowboy boots, but he was extremely muscular. His neck was that of a lion’s, his arms were those of a blacksmith, and his legs tree trunks. And his physique was not just a facade. He was strong. He always had been. Mace had seen Slade pull a drowning cow from the deep waters of the Minnesota River when they were just sixteen—by himself. He had also seen Slade in a fight, when they were seniors in high school. The fight had lasted all of twenty seconds, but the other boy, who had made the mistake of inciting Slade, had stayed down on the ground for at least five minutes before groggily crawling away. Slade did not anger easily, but once he was aroused, about the only way to stop him was with a firearm.

  After high school they had gone to the University of Iowa to play football together, Mace the quarterback and Slade the hardworking offensive lineman who never made the spotlight. But that hadn’t mattered to Slade. The only thing that mattered to him was that they played four years of football together. He had protected Mace so that Mace could make the big plays and garner the media attention while he remained in the shadows. He was one of the most loyal and team-oriented individuals Mace had ever known.

  Upon graduation Mace had gone to New York to work for Chemical Bank before attending Columbia Business School, and Slade had gone into the Marines and become a heavily decorated soldier. Now he was in Special Services or something. He was not forthcoming about his work.

  Mace stared at the long blond hair flowing over the back of Slade’s maroon turtleneck and grinned. They saw each other infrequently now, but they were such good friends that there was no period of discomfort old acquaintances sometimes felt before the familiarity returned.

  “Like that, huh?” Mace gestured at the women.

  “Yeah.” Slade nodded vigorously.

  “So, tell me about yourself. What’s going on?” Mace asked.

  Slade’s gaze lingered several seconds longer on the women. Then he turned toward Mace and grinned, revealing two lines of crooked teeth, which had never been touched by braces. Braces were extras the orphanage could not afford. “I could tell you what’s going on, but then I’d have to kill you.” He turned back toward the women.

  Mace laughed. It was the standard military response Slade gave every time Mace attempted to pull the cover back just a little.

  The impression Slade made upon a first-time acquaintance was that of a gentle, plodding blond bear. He was quiet, rarely used words of more than three syllables, and did not seem to have many strong opinions. A nice enough man, but one who probably wouldn’t be able to find his way out of bed in the morning without directions. It was not an accurate assessment. Slade was extremely bright—enough to maintain a straight A average in electrical engineering all four years at Iowa. And bright enough to be on special assignment for the United States government somewhere in the world, though Slade would never specify exactly what or where the mission was. That was another of Slade’s special qualities: he yielded no secrets.

  Slade took his eyes from the women. “What’s going on in your world, Mace? Hell, you’ve got a much more interesting life than I do.”

  Mace sincerely doubted that. “Well, I’ve got a new job as of this afternoon.”

  “You’ve gone to another firm?” Slade asked incredulously. “I thought you were going to be at Walker Pryce until the day you died.”

  Mace shook his head as he finished the beer. “No, I’m still at Walker Pryce. I’m just taking on some new responsibilities there.”

  “Oh.” Slade seemed relieved. “What kind of responsibilities?”

  Mace hesitated. He shouldn’t say anything. But Slade hardly cared about Wall Street. And he would never tell anyone if Mace told him not to say anything. “It’s highly confidential.”

  Slade rolled his eyes. “You say that all the time.”

  “Yeah, but I mean it this time.”

  “Okay. I understand. I’m not going to tell anyone. So go ahead. Tell me what’s happening, Brother.” Brother was a nickname Slade had used for Mace since grade school. They were that close.

  Mace glanced around to make certain no one was listening. “We’re going to try to raise a pool of money from several wealthy families and invest it in Manhattan real estate and common stocks. We think there will be large downward corrections in the values of these assets in the near future. We’ll wait until the values drop sufficiently, then buy. It’s called a vulture fund.”

  “A what?” Slade’s face twisted into a strange expression.

  Mace smiled. “A vulture fund. If prices of real estate and stocks drop significantly in a short period of time, there will be a lot of unhappy people. People who are worth a lot of money one day and then suddenly, poof, the next day they owe more than they have. Those people will be putting guns to their heads or jumping out of windows because they can’t meet loan payments and margin calls. We’ll circle for a while, and then, when things get really bad, we’ll come in and feed off the carnage. We’ll offer cents on the dollar for properties that would be worth a great deal more than that in a stable economic situation. But people will accept our offers because they’ll want to get some cash in a hurry. Then, when prices rebound, we’ll make lots of money.”

  Slade shook his head. “A vulture fund. You investment banking guys crack me up. You’re almost as quick with a joke as you are with your hand in someone else’s pocket.�
��

  “Just making sure the markets are efficient. That’s the job. Someone has to do it.” Mace winked at Slade.

  “Oh, yeah. Tough job. Put together a buyer and a seller and make millions. My heart bleeds for you, Brother. Let me tell you about tough jobs.”

  “I wish you would.” Mace raised his glass toward his friend.

  Slade smiled the wide, toothy grin and brought his glass to Mace’s. Mace had almost pulled the cover back. Slade finished the glass of beer, pulled it away from his lips, and wiped his mouth with the back of his shirtsleeve. “So how big a pool of money are you going to try to raise?”

  Mace glanced around again. “A billion dollars.”

  Slade’s eyes widened. “Jesus Christ! That’s a lot of money.”

  Mace continued to smile but said nothing.

  Slade laughed and turned back toward the crowd. “My buddy. Mr. Wall Street.” He nodded at a waitress, signaling for her to bring two more beers.

  “Tell me what’s going on in your personal life.”

  “I could, but then I’d have to kill you,” Mace joked.

  Slade broke into another grin, then turned his gaze once again toward the group of women dancing in the middle of the floor. The group had increased from three individuals to five and seemed in desperate need of male participants.

  Within the hour the man would be deep in discussion with one of those women, Mace thought, telling her whatever was necessary to be able to climb into a taxi with her at the end of the evening. Mace had to get back to Walker Pryce. There was a great deal of work to do if the fund—Broadway Ventures LP, as he and Webster had christened it—was going to make it off the ground.

  Slade watched the five women. As he did, he wondered if Malcolm Becker’s request that he make contact with Mace had anything to do with the billion-dollar vulture fund Mace was now involved with.

  * * *

  —

  The ring of the private office telephone Webster had reluctantly installed last week suddenly pierced the serenity of the late evening. In the first moment its shrill noise reached his ears, a flood of emotions rushed through him. He knew the identity of the caller instantly. Only one man had this number: the man in Washington.

  Webster’s eyes narrowed, and his head tilted forward at the second ring. He did not want to answer. He wanted to close his eyes and have it go away. The man in Washington. The fund. Mace McLain. The telephone. All of it. Just go away. The man was calling more often now as the conspiracy was falling into place, as Webster was constantly being squeezed more tightly in the snake’s coils. And the increasing frequency and intensity of the calls were beginning to tear him apart.

  At the third ring Webster glanced out the large window into the darkness of Wall Street. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to conceal himself. Even with all his money. Because of all of his money. The man would find him if he ran. That was clear. And when the man found him…Webster shuddered at the thought of what had been threatened. Finally he drew in a deep breath and reached for the receiver.

  7

  The engineer sipped coffee from the steaming cup, careful not to burn his lips as he watched the security guard clean the .30-caliber rifle. The guard was a retired New York City policeman, living off a generous pension plan and what he earned here at the Nyack Nuclear Generating Facility. It probably wasn’t a bad life, thought the engineer, to which the guard’s burgeoning belly attested.

  The guard stopped cleaning the gun for a moment and reached for the half-eaten huge Danish lying atop waxed paper on the metal desk. Cheese and fruit dripped from the side of his mouth and onto the blue uniform as he bit into the pastry.

  “Damn it!” The fat guard reached for a wad of paper towels lying next to the waxed paper.

  The engineer smiled and looked away toward the black waters of the Hudson River flowing relentlessly southward, far below the lookout tower. The sun’s first rays were just beginning to break through the morning clouds well to the east, and the engineer could barely discern the outline of a tugboat as it churned north against the current. He sipped again from the mug, which he held with both hands. The mouth of the Hudson and New York City’s harbor lay not more than twenty miles to the south.

  He took a deep breath. The engineer enjoyed winter mornings up here on the lookout tower after a long graveyard shift in the control room of the huge two-thousand-megawatt electric generating facility. He closed his eyes and leaned back. Perhaps he would stay up here for a while before heading down the long stairway to ground level. It was quiet, and he might be able to catch a little shut-eye before heading home to his wife and children.

  “How was the shift, Mr. Wilson?”

  The beautiful brunette walking toward him on the beach in nothing but her bikini evaporated from the engineer’s daydream. He rubbed his eyes for a moment, then opened them and focused in on the old guard, who was busy cleaning the gun again. “Fine, Liam. It was fine.”

  “Any problems?” Liam asked.

  “No.” Wilson sat up in the chair and took another sip of coffee. It was clear that Liam wasn’t going to allow him to return to the woman on the beach.

  The security guard rubbed a rag lovingly over the rifle’s shiny black barrel. “Mind if I ask you a quick question, Mr. Wilson?”

  “No, Liam. Not at all.” Wilson liked the guard. He was a simple man who came to work every day and did his job. No fuss, no muss. As it should be.

  “I feel kind of silly.” Liam placed the gun on the desk, then smiled sheepishly.

  Wilson eyed the guard. “Christ, Liam. You aren’t going to ask me where babies come from, are you?” he said, teasing the older man.

  “No! Of course not.” The guard was instantly embarrassed.

  “Good. Well, I can probably handle any other question you might have, so fire away.” Wilson eyed the rifle and sort of wished he’d used a better choice of words.

  Liam paused. “It’s like this. I mean, I come to work here every day at this nuclear plant, and I really don’t know how it works. I know it generates electricity for New York City—”

  “All of the city’s needs by itself,” Wilson interjected.

  “Uh-huh.” Liam nodded as if he were having a hard time believing what Wilson had just said. After all, New York City’s population was approaching eight million people. “Well, I’d kind of like to know how it works.”

  Wilson smiled at the security guard. It was commendable for a man to want to know more about his workplace. “Sure, okay,” Wilson said. “You’ve heard the other engineers and me talk about the nuclear core, right?”

  “Yeah, of course.”

  “Well, that’s where most of the action takes place. The core is filled with water, and when we move the fuel rods into place from the—”

  “Fuel rods?” the guard interrupted.

  Wilson nodded. “Yes. Long bundles filled with pellets of uranium. From the control room we can automatically move these rods into place in the core, and when we do, a nuclear reaction begins, like when you strike a match and it bursts into a flame, generating heat. The nuclear core is pretty much the same concept, except on a much bigger scale. The nuclear reaction generates tremendous heat, in excess of two thousand degrees, which boils the water in the core pretty quickly and turns it to steam. The steam moves through pipes leading from the core to the turbines. As the steam moves the turbines, they begin to turn, thereby generating electricity. Pretty simple, huh?”

  The guard seemed unconvinced of the operation’s simplicity. “So then that steam from the core is filled with radiation?”

  “Yeah.” Wilson lowered his voice. “Yes, it is. Lots of radiation. If you came into contact with it, you’d be a very unhappy camper.”

  The guard glanced out the window of the lookout tower at the steam rising from the two massive cooling towers.

  The engineer followed his gaze,
then began to laugh. “No, no, Liam.” Wilson knew what the man was thinking. “That steam is coming from the water we pump in from the Hudson River to cool the steam coming from the turbines, to condense it into water again so that it can go back into the core and be reheated. The steam coming from the towers doesn’t have a lick of radiation in it.”

  Liam gazed at the cooling towers for a few minutes. “Must get pretty damn hot in the core.”

  “Incredibly hot.”

  “How do you cool it down in there?”

  “There are rods we can move into place that are called control rods. They are made of boron. Inserted into the core, they interrupt the nuclear reaction, and the core cools down.”

  The guard stared at the engineer. “What if the control rods don’t work? What if they don’t move for some reason?”

  Wilson stared back at Liam. “We send you in there to see what the hell the problem is.”

  Liam did not laugh. “Seriously.”

  Wilson inhaled deeply again. He had explained the basics of the Nyack Nuclear Generating Facility hundreds of times to people who didn’t understand how it worked. There were thousands of ways the conversation could go, yet the discussion always seemed to end up here: at the meltdown question. Yet Nyack had never experienced a serious accident in its twenty-year operating history. A few small things here and there, which were to be expected, but nothing major.

  People didn’t realize how much they were saving on their electric bills because the Nyack plant was nuclear. If they had known, they wouldn’t ask so many questions. “Nuclear power is one of the safest means of power known to man. And it is cleaner and infinitely more efficient than coal or oil.”

  “But what if the control rods don’t work, Mr. Wilson?” Liam asked the question a second time. He wanted an answer.