House of All Nations (81 page)

Alphendéry leaned back. ‘He really is moral, that's the funny part of it. But to him there's one giant, shining virtue, white and all-quashing, as a virgin beauty on the Cours Belsunce, and that's big money. And what big money wants he does, he gets, and he gets it with an instinctive glow of self-fulfillment.' Carried away by this personification of the psyche of the man he had just been defending, Alphendéry expanded in a rollicking laugh. ‘Hey-hey! What a mountain of sneak rolls in with Aristide every morning! Oh, William, you and I have a good time looking at the wild animals that bounce in and out of our poor little shop. What would we do if we retired?' But, more seriously, ‘Don't think I mean it; their company isn't healthy for longer than a few years. After that you see that what you took for a rash is really syphilis. It's time to take a rest cure.'

‘I'm in that stage now,' said William, gloomily, turning round on his swivel chair. ‘These boys dying down in the Argentine and in Brazil—it's queer. I'm not superstitious; but I think for once Jules is right. Shut up shop! Go while the going's good. Jules and Claire have the same feeling.'

Michel looked at him with anxious penetration: was this a warning, the prelude to a dismissal of a sort? He and William knew each other as well as a husband and wife, long, but not too long, married. They talked much of the day in glances, apart from pure news. William turned back to his cards.

‘Aristide's always fooling round the card index. He doesn't collect from clients. What does he do? Snooping I guess, to find out our game. “Old” Berthellot says he prods him day after day for information. “Old” Berthellot pretended to doze one day, and Aristide goes in and tells Jules “Old” Berthellot is superannuated.'

‘He's ambitious, poor flea,' said Alphendéry, easily. ‘I really can't believe Mouradzian's tale: you know what
Grand-Guignol
minds these Mediterraneans have! He's a young man, too, got women on the brain.'

Jules lounged in shortly after. William looked up.

‘Can't we sell out a few accounts? Fifty per cent of the piker accounts are undermargined.'

Jules, white-gilled, white-toothed, white-fronted, waved his hand with a graceful adaptation of William's own gesture.

‘Leave them be: I don't waste my time thinking about the small fry. Say, boys, guess who passed out yesterday? Poor old John Tanker, Sr.'

Alphendéry did not draw his hands out of his pockets, laughed faunishly. ‘Say, Universal Cholera is getting the boys.'

‘Three in a string,' said William.

‘You can't count John Tanker, Sr.,' hastened to interpolate Michel. ‘He's been dead for years, only he didn't know it: a nicely embalmed corpse. I wonder what he left?'

‘That's the titbit,' said Jules. ‘His children have nothing coming to them: he made settlements on them long ago and thought he paid them off. The old man passed out just after lunch yesterday. Two sons and a daughter arrived in Paris by midnight. This morning, his sons came in to find out what balance he has in the bank and to ask for an affidavit from the bank: they're going to fight the will. He just had it in a drawer at home and his sister had it waiting for them. Everything to charity. They haven't much chance of fighting it but they want us to help.'

William turned up John Tanker's card: ‘One thousand Anaconda, 575 U.S. Steel, um, um … he didn't get rid of those Eastman Kodak, after all. What do they want us to say?'

‘That the old man was dippy.'

‘Sure, we'll do it,' said Alphendéry. ‘Why not? Everyone's dippy. It's not hard to make out the evidence. Help the boys along; they won't win, anyhow.'

‘They'll refuse to pay this month's hotel bill,' said William. ‘The hotel will be trying to seize his account.'

‘I was calculating this morning,' mused Jules. ‘Michel, do you know how much we'd have if Dick Plowman were carried off, say, by his liver?'

‘Certainly: old Dick himself has a dollars account with us of almost two hundred thousand dollars. His son, Richard, forty thousand dollars; his daughter-in-law, Mrs. Richard, twenty-five thousand dollars; his daughter, Pearl, fifteen hundred pounds; his son-in-law, he's not much, a few thousand francs; his daughter, Estelle, lives in Ireland, four thousand pounds, half her current account; his son-in-law, Tom, two thousand pounds. Dick has outdone himself lately bolstering you up, Jules, ever since Carrière started to bother you. In all—'

‘About three hundred thousand dollars—not bad, eh?' He sang to himself, tapped with his fingers on the blotter, ‘Not good enough to skip with, but sweet. With the rest—'

‘Do you think he's got everything in the world with you?' asked Michel.

Jules answered, ‘No, these rich men always keep half a million out: they don't trust their last reserves even with their alter ego.' His mouth twisted. ‘None of them. Plowman is certainly protected. I don't have to worry about him.'

‘Still, as he has stood by you since the beginning, Jules, you'd do better to pay him off,' protested Alphendéry.

Jules smiled with scorn and disillusionment. ‘He's always putting it to me that I should dismiss you, Alphendéry.'

When Alphendéry went out, Jules came in to William and said in a businesslike way, with no trace of the guying gibing tone which they adopted before all outsiders, even Plowman and even Alphendéry, ‘Come over to the house tonight, Will. You and I and Claire-Josèphe will go over everything together. I don't like our position.' Lower, ‘After the English money, the French money will slip. Let's go while the going's good. Trouble is coming. My luck has changed. I lost twenty-five thousand francs at Deauville this week end. I don't feel like betting on the franc. That's what we've got to discuss. You sound Alphendéry on the franc, see what he knows; but say nothing about our going futt. He'll get nervous and land us in a new mess. He's only a Raccamond with a good heart.'

‘Sure, sure.'

In the afternoon Alphendéry was in Jules's room, at the top of his form.

‘The
scandals
of our society appear to be the romances of individuals; in reality they are indices: Hatry preceded the British crash, Oustric-Tardieu indicates a crash in our own country; reverberations will be heard in Europe. In France, the general index of production from July, 1930, to July, 1931, has only gone down eighteen points, which is inconsiderable compared with the U.S.A., Germany, and England, but this figure doesn't give the real story. Our country is going through an agrarian crisis: the prices of wheat, despite the bad crop, are low. An intense crisis has struck the vineyards, although the 1930 crop was exceptionally bad. The quantity of materials used in manufactures has decreased by almost a third. The economist of the
Journal des Débats
estimates that the foreign trade deficit will exceed thirteen milliards of francs … Likewise for the first time we have a state budget in deficit; we have also the difference between the sums which Germany will not pay us, in accordance with the moratorium, and the sums which we owe the U.S.A. The French stock exchange is beginning to feel the effects of the decline of sterling. First, because twenty-six per cent of all French exports went to England and the fall of the pound decreases the cost of English production. Second, the Banque de France holds in its vaults stocks and paper worth fifteen to twenty milliards of francs, payable in sterling; sterling has gone down twenty-three per cent, so that the Banque de France must suffer an enormous loss. A certain number of French banks and industrial enterprises, also, had and have considerable sums in English banks and enterprises. You will remember several failures and several institutions seriously shaken. The B.C.N., controlling the greater part of the heavy industry of the East of France, and installed in the handsomest building on the boulevards, failed: the Comptoir Lyon Allemand and the Bank Chapuis at Reims, both connected with English exportation, failed. The Banque de L'Union Parisienne, one of the big six which finance the Schneider-Creusot interests and a part of French heavy industry, was badly bunged. This bank has extended its interests to the whole of Central Europe and even in South America. She has a large interest in the Skoda factories in Czechoslovakia, controls a certain number of war industries in Poland, Belgium, and Roumania. Its shares fell within a year to less than one-quarter of their value … And don't think that it's all over, Jules, because there have been these earth tremors. Worse is yet to come. It's sure. It's therefore a question of whether you want to weather the tempest, betting on the bear side throughout, with a possible exception in England, by contrast, or whether you want to shut up shop and wait till the worst is over … Bank shares decreasing in value, stocks ceasing to be quoted on the exchanges, currencies inflating—this is sure to be followed by annoyances of private bankers, by restrictions, the grip tightening and monopoly growing. Will you stay and face it?'

‘No, no,' said Jules, ‘no, no. You are right.'

‘Loucheur said recently, “The franc is solid: but take care, no imprudence lest we find the franc imprisoned between countries with depreciated currencies; in consequence of the fall of the pound, British industry will be favored: let us watch our own.” French and American capitalists cried so loud and rallied round the British bourgeoisie; it is not a question of saving Europe but of saving ourselves! We have to save our own bourgeoisie and how? By an attack on the standard of living of the working class of our own country: Britain began by an attack on her own. A fine example. We will see accentuated in France, as in all capitalist countries an increased exploitation and the screw turned on the colonies.'

Very far from resenting Alphendéry's reference to the class system, Jules found it delightful, sought pointers from his discourse, as to how to direct his own course, picked up ideas from one who liked them, about the temper of the ‘working class,' how they might be exploited, fooled. He regarded Alphendéry as particularly valuable because Alphendéry ‘had their lingo,' ‘knew what they wanted': through Alphendéry he thought he could spy the course of the next few years. He hoped for no more. He was no coward, he was not playing for survival: the attraction lay not in the money he was building up, but in what he could ‘get away with,' in the game.

Of his future he never thought; he never thought of his age, although he was just on the edge of forty, surrounded by young spendthrifts and men attached to him since the ageless and casteless generation of the war; he scarcely knew the passage of time; he never had a presentiment of the failing of his own forces. This was due not only to his gaiety and imagination but to the fact that William himself did all the heavy routine work and arranged the books at the end of the year …

Jules interrupted Michel, ‘What good does that do me?'

‘If the reaction wins in France, there will be a general decrease in the standard of living, of commerce, followed by restrictions and the crushing of the small enterprise, that is you, Jules; if socialism eventually wins, we may look forward to some prosperity a few years from now. In between you will have to go through a difficult period. Foreigners are not so frequent in Paris now: you will have to act as a coupon-clipping establishment abroad for your clients, as an agency for gold deposits, a stock-exchange agent for bears … and there is no money in that for you, unless you risk your own funds, since you are a bear yourself. You can bet on the franc if you wish, but the French are used to banks trying to make a fortune on the franc and they may catch you. The question in currencies is—the franc, the Belgian franc, the Swiss franc, the guilder—when? If you can solve that, you're a Rockefeller; if not, don't stay in business.'

Jules slowly opened his eyes. ‘What will I sell short?'

Alphendéry laughed. ‘You haven't the guts to sell Kreuger and Toll.'

‘Why not?' But Jules got up languidly, exhausted by the lecture, as he had always been at school, ‘I'm tired of selling short: I'll see. I've got to get a haircut. Maybe the Belgian franc? What does Léon think? See about the Tanker memorandum, get eye witnesses, you know—' He took his hat and coat. When he had gone, William said, ‘He's going to the movies. No sight or sign of the magnifico till tomorrow: that's something to be thankful for …'

‘Kreuger and Toll,' began Alphendéry—

‘Forget it: we're short two hundred thousand shares already—it's enough. If Kreuger crashes, it'll be months off with their etching the thing out, and the market will crash, anyhow, and we'll be in the money; we're up to the safety valve now. I've a theory we're going to make a fortune.'

Alphendéry's phrase. Alphendéry turned chagrined eyes on William: William was concealing something.

The next day Alphendéry went round smiling and murmuring to certain of the employees in the bank best known to the customers and most experienced in their accounts. He said to Jacques Manray, ‘You remember old John Tanker? He died about a week ago. He left about six million dollars odd, his estate, to charity, not a penny to the family on the pretext that they were all provided for. They're trying to break the will. They haven't got a chance, I believe, and so there's no harm in our trying to help them out. Would you say that old John Tanker was gaga before he died? That is, about the time when he made his last will? Now, do you remember him at all?'

‘Of course: many's the time the old fellow sat in that very chair all the morning talking to me. A nice old chap. He was always thinking about his shopping. He didn't eat enough. I used to tell him to take a taxi to the bank, poor old chap—'

When the letter was sent off to John Tanker, Jr., it read,

Dear Sir,

In reply to your letter of the 30th October, we wish to relate that during the last twelve months of his life, your father, Mr. John Tanker, Sr., visited this bank every business day, both morning and afternoon, to inquire about his position in the stock-exchange department, about the possibilities of the transfer of his specie, and to watch the stock prices. He was well known to all our employees. We regret to have to say that during the last twelve months your father showed numerous signs that his mental faculties were failing; this was the impression given to various members of our staff, by his behavior. He constantly entered private rooms in the bank, without knocking, even the directors' rooms and Mr. Bertillon's private room, asking for persons who were not there, or who had never been in the bank. Having begun a conversation he would suddenly get up from his chair and walk out; he would ask questions, walk out before the response was given, return in a quarter of an hour, ask the question again, and often walk out again. He interrupted important private conferences of our directors to relate some trivial incident. He occupied the time of our employees with relations of quarrels between a member of his family and himself and consulted our clerks about the price of porridge … He was very concerned about his financial affairs although these were in excellent condition, as you will have observed, and was haunted by the idea of ruin, although this was effectively impossible in view of the nature of his investments and gold holdings. He also several times mentioned that he ought to commit suicide because his children no longer loved him, and that his only friend in his old age was a clerk in the bank … Despite his fortune and the state of his health he refused to spend any money on food beyond coffee and porridge or on transport and walked to and from the bank on every trip, so that he often arrived here exhausted and would sit speechless for half an hour in one of the armchairs … When one of our clerks, the one referred to above, called a taxi for him occasionally on summer days, when he seemed too feeble to get home, Mr. Tanker, Sr., invariably dismissed the taxi with the explanation that he was too poor to afford taxis … When the clerk reproached him he uttered these words, ‘Men eat the face of the old before death, rats after: I'll have no money-relations with any man I see. Did you notice how his eyes ran over my face calculating how much tip he would get? I never give tips: and they call me, “Old madman, sordid beast.”' This certainly points to a species of persecution mania.