for him and stood aside to let Phil step into Morgan Wise’s office. Normally in a brokerage of this age and exclusivity, the partners’ offices tried to suggest a tradition of discretion and reliability by affecting a lot of leather and heavy wood paneling. But this space was light, bright, and nearly bare: white-walled, floored in blond wood, with one white desk, a single understated chrome-and-rattan Eames chair on each side of it, and a single white flat screen monitor standing on the desk.
Morgan Wise was standing behind the desk waiting for him: tall, slim, her shoulder-length dark hair swinging free above the jacket of a dark-skirted suit. She reached out across the desk to shake his hand as always, then sat down again while the silver-haired office assistant shut the door. “So,” Morgan said in that soft, sultry voice that always made Phil think she would do well as a late-night radio host if she ever wearied of working the markets. “You have some news for me?”
Phil nodded. “The timings have come through,” he said.
Morgan tapped the desk briefly and a keyboard appeared in its surface. “Is the date still the same?”
“Yes.”
More tapping; then she looked up. “So?”
Phil pulled a piece of note paper out of his inside jacket pocket, handed it across the desk to her. Morgan looked closely at it and tapped again at the keyboard, pausing once or twice to check the figures written on the note. “All right,” she said, pushing the note back to Phil. “I’ll have my silent colleagues in the Far East start bracketing our shell companies’ buy orders around those times. After that—” She folded her hands above the keyboard, rested her chin on them. “I think the twenty-first is going to be a very busy day for you. Because in the wake of the day’s events, I’d say you could be majority stockholder by . . .” She studied her monitor for a moment. “Let’s say midnight.”
Phil smiled. “That’s when their rollout party is supposed to start,” he said softly. “Won’t it be interesting if the company has a new owner by midnight their time?”
Morgan smiled. “We’ll see how it goes,” she said. “But if the share price reacts as emphatically to what’s about to happen as our calculations suggest, it could happen even sooner. All we can do now is wait.” She arched one eyebrow. “Always the hardest part.”
She stood up. So did Phil. “You can always pass the time by thinking about your commission,” he said.
“Please,” Morgan said. “Some things one does for art’s sake.”
Phil smiled, shook her hand again, and headed for the door.
It opened before him: the silver- haired assistant showed him down the stairs. As he swung the gate to the sidewalk open and the beaux arts door shut at his back, Phil began to hum, and as the limo door was opened for him and he slipped in, he started to sing softly.
“The party’s ooooooverrrrr . . .”
And the limo door closed.
FOUR
I N A CIRCULAR ROOM directly under the pointed tower-roof of Castle Dev, the circular table of inlaid black ironwood was being prepped for a meeting. Pads were being laid out, bottles of mineral water fresh from the cooler set out with glasses and napkins, laptops brought in and set down at the places where their owners would sit. But out in the sunshine, half a mile away, a man on a black bike was pedaling slowly down a nearby path, thinking hard.
His phone rang, its ringtone singing a music-box version of “Hail to the Chief.” Dev sighed, braked, and hopped off the bike, walking it off the path onto the grass under a nearby tree and then letting it lean against him while he fished the phone out of his pocket. From about fifty feet farther back along the path, Dev heard the sound of badly smothered laughter. He glanced that way and saw a couple of his employees, one male and one female, watching him as they approached. The lady was talking to someone on her own cell phone, while the guy was
Morgan Wise was standing behind the desk waiting for him: tall, slim, her shoulder-length dark hair swinging free above the jacket of a dark-skirted suit. She reached out across the desk to shake his hand as always, then sat down again while the silver-haired office assistant shut the door. “So,” Morgan said in that soft, sultry voice that always made Phil think she would do well as a late-night radio host if she ever wearied of working the markets. “You have some news for me?”
Phil nodded. “The timings have come through,” he said.
Morgan tapped the desk briefly and a keyboard appeared in its surface. “Is the date still the same?”
“Yes.”
More tapping; then she looked up. “So?”
Phil pulled a piece of note paper out of his inside jacket pocket, handed it across the desk to her. Morgan looked closely at it and tapped again at the keyboard, pausing once or twice to check the figures written on the note. “All right,” she said, pushing the note back to Phil. “I’ll have my silent colleagues in the Far East start bracketing our shell companies’ buy orders around those times. After that—” She folded her hands above the keyboard, rested her chin on them. “I think the twenty-first is going to be a very busy day for you. Because in the wake of the day’s events, I’d say you could be majority stockholder by . . .” She studied her monitor for a moment. “Let’s say midnight.”
Phil smiled. “That’s when their rollout party is supposed to start,” he said softly. “Won’t it be interesting if the company has a new owner by midnight their time?”
Morgan smiled. “We’ll see how it goes,” she said. “But if the share price reacts as emphatically to what’s about to happen as our calculations suggest, it could happen even sooner. All we can do now is wait.” She arched one eyebrow. “Always the hardest part.”
She stood up. So did Phil. “You can always pass the time by thinking about your commission,” he said.
“Please,” Morgan said. “Some things one does for art’s sake.”
Phil smiled, shook her hand again, and headed for the door.
It opened before him: the silver- haired assistant showed him down the stairs. As he swung the gate to the sidewalk open and the beaux arts door shut at his back, Phil began to hum, and as the limo door was opened for him and he slipped in, he started to sing softly.
“The party’s ooooooverrrrr . . .”
And the limo door closed.
FOUR
I N A CIRCULAR ROOM directly under the pointed tower-roof of Castle Dev, the circular table of inlaid black ironwood was being prepped for a meeting. Pads were being laid out, bottles of mineral water fresh from the cooler set out with glasses and napkins, laptops brought in and set down at the places where their owners would sit. But out in the sunshine, half a mile away, a man on a black bike was pedaling slowly down a nearby path, thinking hard.
His phone rang, its ringtone singing a music-box version of “Hail to the Chief.” Dev sighed, braked, and hopped off the bike, walking it off the path onto the grass under a nearby tree and then letting it lean against him while he fished the phone out of his pocket. From about fifty feet farther back along the path, Dev heard the sound of badly smothered laughter. He glanced that way and saw a couple of his employees, one male and one female, watching him as they approached. The lady was talking to someone on her own cell phone, while the guy was
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