House of All Nations (31 page)

Jules looked at him with a bright eager smile.

‘You think the bank would collapse without me?'

Michel said, ‘I am only thinking of you, now, Jules: not that making money is not creative: that it employs no one, gives no one work—'

‘Now, Michel, I employ forty people in Paris alone.'

‘Yes, you money-makers try to fool yourselves that you are of some use to mankind! You would be benefactors, too. You see what I mean?'

Jules shuttled his legs, laughed, ‘No, I don't give a hoot for them. Why should I be mean? No reason. And why should I be generous? No reason. I do what pleases me.'

‘What is the secret attraction of this money you so fanatically build up. You're a fanatic yourself. Why money? Why not sequins? Why not candied apples? Why not pebbles? Because the figure in your bank balance is a tally of counters, counters invented by your sort, and passed among yourselves in secret recognition of your right to, and power of, robbery.'

‘Oh, now, Michel, you're getting fantastic,' said Jules charmingly. ‘What would I do if I didn't rob? Let someone else rob? Why? Will robbing stop if I stop robbing? No. It's human nature. Look at Rothschild and those culture hounds. They know all about music, art, and philosophy. If there were really anything in it, they'd stop making money and study art. Who ever did?'

‘Then I'm practically an idiot,' laughed Michel.

‘Oh, you're a bit off center: you've got the brains. You could transfer a couple of hundred thousand francs, a million francs, a couple of million francs, any day, into your name and you don't. Now, that's just lunatic. There are guys in the world who don't care for money. There are people born blind, too. They don't count. You think like a logician, a mathematician; but the world isn't syllogisms—it's grab and graft.'

‘In any case, the theory that socialism consists of dividing up the money was invented by millionaires to flatter themselves with an absurdity,' said Alphendéry. ‘Socialism consists in putting the means of production of wealth, land, railways, mines, etcetera, in the hands of the people, or rather of their seizing these things from those that now have them. It is your system truncated, grab without graft.'

‘There's no such thing,' pouted Jules. ‘You're just an idealist. The people who can't make money invent a theory that those who do are thieves. Without us there'd be no money at all. We make it: the smart people. Listen, you revolutionists are
crazy
! People don't want to make money. They want to rest and listen to the radio. Stalin is a smart one. He runs the state and lets the workers get tired out building dynamos and then he teaches them to sing songs about Lenin. I'm not one of those superpatriots who can't stand the sound of Russia—I think they've a smart gang there, a lot smarter than we have here. Every country's got a right to its own system. And naturally they try to sell everyone the idea that they've got the ideal system: it makes the other countries green with envy. I wouldn't go and shoot the Russian worker. His mouth's stopped for another fifty years. But if I didn't know you, Michel, I would shoot men like you, who go round stirring people up, while their own brains are confused about the world …' He looked at Michel, laughing at the provocation.

‘Jules, why do you say those things? You don't believe them.'

‘I do. I don't have to shoot my workers: generosity is gamblers' luck, you know. I'm not in business: I'm a sheep shearer. The lambs eat grass and grow wool and I clip it.'

He stopped, having lagged and grown thoughtful during the last few minutes. ‘Well, Michel, what do you think of this idea of skipping? I'm serious. I want you to go and see Maître Lemaître and see how much he can do it for. If you're really dead set against a simple walk-out.'

‘I suppose I'm old-fashioned or timid, but I love you, Jules, and I don't want to see you end up this way. Why can't you pay off your clients? You've got the money.'

‘Wha-at? Don't be funny.'

‘Then why can't you wait till we form this consortium you were talking about? You can pay off your clients and put the residuum into the pool and make money on your own with no overhead and no liabilities. Just one room and a telephone: you and William and me. We'll plant the twins abroad or keep them.'

‘The residuum! I'm not in business for any residuum! What consortium? The Banque de France is a better consortium than any I can get up. No, I'm cashing in. When I get another streak, I'll go back into the market.'

‘Why be in the market at all? Let the suckers guess for you and you bet against them: our old line is the best, wisest, most innocent.'

‘I'm not an old maid playing patience. I want big money and what have I got round me? Savers, hoarders, go-gentlies, abacus gentry back in the carpetbags of the Middle Ages, squirrels, ants, census takers, penny-bank campaigners—installment-plan robbers, shilling-a-week shortchangers, Saturday tillshakers, busfare embezzlers, dime defalcators—you're as bad as Etienne. You're honest. It's no good hiding it. All your philosophy hasn't got you farther than scraping and pinching like the knifegrinder's wife. If you start little, you remain little. If you start with bells on, you end with bells on. I know what I want. I only want to hear from you how it's to be done. You're my technical expert, Michel. I employ you for that. Go to Maître Lemaître or Beaubien and find out how to do it. That's all I'm asking you.'

Michel stood up with dignity, still pleading. ‘Jules, you can't make real money without working at it. There's something queer about gamblers' money: it doesn't sound on the counter. And are you just a gambler? You've seen enough at Deauville to know what a breed that is. Are you just that?'

Jules turned his back impatiently, rudely drummed on the edge of the long bookcase, pretended to look at the backs of the books. He turned in a minute, smiling brightly. ‘Ah, Michel, you'll never understand the likes of me! I've never done a stroke of work in my life: neither did my father, I'm glad to say, and my grandfather didn't wear out the small of his back with toil: grinding diamonds isn't exhausting. I come from a breed of men who have harvested, for generations, what others have sown, or dug, or made. Not by the sickle, but by magic. I'm a magician. You can't wonder that I'm impatient with all the sicklers and hammerers of the world. The hammer and sickle! A good sign for a nation of peasants, country Jacks. I'd pay your fare to Russia if I didn't want you here. You'd find an upper class there, and commission men just the same as here. Even so,' he frowned, ‘they paint their propaganda up too red and yellow. Listen, Michel, your father was a lawyer, wasn't he?'

‘Well?'

‘Where did you get these crazy ideas from then, that money comes from work?' He laughed. ‘Well, Michel, unless we can think up a really good out by tomorrow, I've decided to blow up the bank. Hey, how about really blowing it up! Get the dough out and put in a stick of dynamite! Say the Bolsheviks did it! Say, that's brilliant. We'll transfer everything to—Oslo? Some can go to Antwerp in William's name, some to Geneva in yours? What did you say was your limit of honesty? Thirty million francs? All right. I'll trust you with fifty million. That'll be in your name. We'll have a consideration. You can sell me a factory in Schnippezoc. We'll claim it afterwards. When the lawyers and the sleuths fade out, we'll go and get it and start business in Australia, South Africa, Mexico, or Kansas. Antwerp? No one's interested in a bank scandal in Paris: they read them in the papers every day. There's a street there—last time I was in Antwerp I saw a little street, near the Leopoldstraat, full of quiet old houses, and private banks with grilles: dressed gray stone, brass plates with initials; not a sound; respectability at home in the family vault, discreet as a high-class house of rendezvous. No questions asked. Take the name of one of my companies. They look it up; in existence for twenty years! And it's a monarchy and a potty one: no fear of socialist big-game hunting among the bankers. Ideal! You'd like Antwerp, Michel. It's not far from Brussels for gaiety, and there are swell bookshops full of arty books. It's only a quarter of an hour from the Dutch border in case of another German invasion. Let's shift!'

‘Back to your grandfather's stage!'

‘Yes. Thank goodness, everyone is losing confidence. The central banks have to publish pictures of their vaults with a sample of gold ingots: they have to run feature stories on the mint. Let's get hold of their trash paper, before they use it to light their fires, and give them a modicum of hard cash. When you're round at Lemaître's, get him, or one of your other legal pals, to think up a watertight blanket guarantee.'

‘What's it to be? New business or no business? If you're going to collect people's securities, you want a solid name and a good façade. You can't go bankrupt and then expect people to hand you over their only insurance against sickness, old age, and unemployment.'

‘In a time like this, people will hand you anything for cash. It's a hold-up. They're trapped. Um. Let's see: how does this sound? National Credit and Securities Nominees?' He scribbled, ‘How's this? Antwerp Consolidated Securities Assurance, Limited? Good, but not good enough. They're mad on the Congo, aren't they? How's this: Ruanda and Urundi Gold Trust, Consolidated? Leopoldville Gold Corporation? What about Amstel Securities Corporation? Amstel Nominees. Solid and plain. I seem to have heard of it for years, myself. Amstel Banking Corporation? Have you ever heard of that?'

‘I might think so, if you popped it to me,' mused Alphendéry.

‘We'll see. Hello? Give me Mr. William's office … William? William, what do people think of the Amstel Nominees Corporation, Leopoldstraat, Antwerp? Didn't Léon mention it?'

‘It's a small, private affair, isn't it, rather old-fashioned?'

‘What do you think we can buy it in for? Find out, will you?' He put down the receiver. ‘Yes, William has heard of it. Let's try someone else. Raccamond, that's the guy … Get me Raccamond at once … Raccamond? You know the Low Countries, don't you? Is the Amstel Discount Corporation, Leopoldstraat, Antwerp, solid? Is it a good bank? … It is? You're sure? … Thanks. No, don't trouble yourself. Very interesting.' He put the receiver down with a broad smile.

Michel asked, ‘He knows about it?'

‘Certainly. It has a few branches. It's worth about a couple of a million guilders (that's the Amstel part of it). Worth a couple of million guilders already and we only invented it two minutes ago … I saw a nice suite of offices in the Rue Tronchet, by the way, yesterday. We might take them, if we don't go bankrupt and work a business there for ourselves, just William, the twins, you, and I, maybe Mlle. Gentil with her husband—just speculate for very big accounts: sift out the small fry: a rich man's securities and speculation outfit. Plowman, Zurbaran, the Silva-Vizcaïnos and all that crew. We don't want any pikers …'

‘Are we going to bankrupt or not?'

‘I'll see … Hello? Get me our printers. No, tell him to come round at once: I've got a new letterhead for him.'

‘What letterhead's that?' asked Michel, anxiously.

‘The Amstel Discount Corporation, of course. When you go round to Lemaître's, ask him to look up Belgian law and find out what incorporation fee, and what rules for directors and all that … Hello? Get me Maître Olympe … Say, that bomb idea is the best. Well pay an old anarchist to throw a bomb, then well hustle him out after he's dropped a few clues, and we don't even have to move from Paris. Or he can sit for six months and well make it up to him Say, I've got a better idea. Let's get “Old” Berthellot to falsify the books—Hello, is that you, Pierre? Say, have you been to see about that lease in the Rue Tronchet? Well, hurry up: I want it signed. I want to get the furniture in. Did you tell the brass-plate makers to make the name plate yet? Well, why the deuce didn't you? I told you the name, Geneva International … Well, get it done. Good-by.' He slammed down the telephone.

‘What about “Old” Berthellot?' asked Michel.

‘Get Berthellot to falsify the books, you see and make believe to run off with about ten million francs. He has always wanted to live in the Channel Islands. You find out, Michel, where there are no extradition laws, and we'll pay his passage. While he's falsifying the books for his ten million he can cover up about—well, the lot: we'll send him round to “inspect” the branches. Then I'll pay the Parquet to forget it. Don't want to crush dear old servant, loyal for many years, et cetera.'

‘Berthellot mightn't like to end his days under a cloud.'

‘Don't make me laugh. “Old” Berthellot. Old thief. He's the only one of our paper directors who turns up for his monthly director's fee. But he's sane. He hasn't got the neurosis of blackmail, like all the accountants and petty clerks who suddenly think they've found out a great scandal and run to the police: your-money-or-the-police breed. Berthellot will see in it a chance to insure his old age. That's better than blowing up the bank. Or could we combine the two?'

‘Will I get Lemaître on the phone or are you just blowing off steam, Jules?'

‘Of course, I'm serious. I say, if I'd thought of it on May first we could have got a bunch of toughs to break into the bank, scare the customers and say they were communists, and loot a few filing cases: the government would adore a chance to search all the communist quarters for stolen cash.'

‘We didn't have the money on May first. Besides, communists are known better than other citizens: they have party cards. This is just scatterbrained, Jules. You're writing a comic-opera scenario.'

‘Couldn't we forge party cards? Give it to some toughs? You've seen what they're like, the cards, I mean, haven't you? Could you remember? Or you could get one for a sample. I say, Adam Constant has one: let's get him up.'