Trump Tower (73 page)

“In the meantime?”

She stared at Carson for a second, smiled, then started slipping out of her clothes. “What did Cyndi say, fifty bucks for his balls? I'll give you a hundred.”

O
n Wednesday morning, when Pierre Belasco walked into his office on the ground floor of Trump Tower, off the residents' lobby, he found a large, white envelope with his name on it.

Inside was a letter from Antonia Lawrence addressed to Donald J. Trump, Anthony Gallicano and him.

She wrote, “Circumstances beyond my control have intervened in my ability to carry out my duties with the Trump Organization. I regret any mistakes I might have made. Accordingly, I feel it is best for everyone involved that I herewith resign my duties. I thank you for the opportunities I have been given and wish everyone well.”

I
N THE
master bedroom on the fifty-ninth floor, Cyndi Benson lay in bed alone, staring up at her own reflection in the mirrored ceiling. “Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jacks . . .”

She smiled, then reached for her phone and called her lawyer, Sydney Feinberg.

“You're up early,” he said. “I took care of that little matter . . . Arizona. I understand that your friend's friend is having treatment.”

“And they don't know?”

“I made sure that it was covered six ways to breakfast. There's no way they'll ever know it came from you.”

“Good. Thank you. Now I need to do it again. I'm sending you an envelope this morning. I'll write a note outlining everything. Please take care of it for me. And make sure no one ever finds out.”

“Your secrets are always good with me,” he said.

“I know. I love you.” She pushed herself out of bed, went to the smaller of the two safes she had in the apartment—this one was in the floor in the second bathroom—opened it and pulled out the diamond watch that His Excellency had sent her. She put it in a padded envelope, which she addressed to Sydney.

Then she wrote him a note. “Please sell this for me, getting as close to the retail price as you can. Take the proceeds and donate it anonymously, absolutely and totally anonymously, to the Roberto Santos Gloves for Kids program/ xxx Cyndi.”

I
N THE
dining room on their fifty-second-floor apartment, Alicia sat with her laptop trying to find anything she could about James Malcolm Isbister.

Nothing came up when she searched the terms, Isbister and Trump Tower. Nor did anything come up when she searched Isbister and L. Arthur Farmer. But hundreds of links came up when she searched Isbister and Finfolkmen, most of them noting that the name Isbister was an old Scots name, and examples of it could be found in the United States in some small communities bordering on Lake Superior in Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

So now she wrote a note to Donald Trump and Pierre Belasco, asking them if they've ever heard of L. Arthur Farmer, and whether or not Farmer ever had anything to do with Trump Tower.

D
OWNSTAIRS
, in the twenty-third-floor offices of First Ace Capital, things were moving even faster than Carson had imagined they could.

He was on the phone with Milt McKeever at EXIT-Strategies. “Time to set the trap?”

“Yeah. We confuse him with buying and selling. The increased traffic will peak his interest and then we wait to see how he reacts.”

“If he buys, we sell and if he sells . . .”

“Not necessarily,” McKeever said. “We just need to create confusion in the market. It's shallow enough so it shouldn't be a problem. But if he's seeing
action from several different places, he won't know who or what, and that's going to scare the crap out of him.”

“Which accounts do we use to go after him?”

“We should spread them as wide as we can.”

Carson thought about that for a moment. “Caymans? Luxembourg? Hong Kong?”

“All of the above. And New York is okay, too, as long as it doesn't look like it's you. How about London? Can you work something with Tokyo?”

“I'm on it right now,” he said. “You tell me what to do and when.”

“Get everything set up as soon as possible. Like, right now. We'll aim for just after midnight, our time, tonight. That way, there won't be anyone he can find at work here. Europe will be closed, too. This will drive him crazy.”

“How do I know when to push the button? Will you e-mail me?”

“No, I'll text your cell,” McKeever said. “Harder to trace, just in case the SEC ever comes looking.”

“Okay. Yeah . . . sure.” Except Carson wasn't sure. “The SEC?”

“As long as none of the accounts can be traced back to you . . .”

“I'm not worried about that.”

“Then don't worry about the SEC. Just follow my texts. I'll tell you what to do, to buy or sell, and I'll give you the pricing. You put the orders in. But be sure to use a different money source every time. You'll be selling into yourself, buying at the same time, so he can't ever get hold of any of your shares. The minute he understands he's on the outside looking in, he'll panic. That will unnerve other players.”

“And then?”

“And then he'll make a mistake.”

“Which will be?”

“No idea. But we'll know it when we see it.”

I
N HIS
big living room office on the thirty-ninth floor, Zeke Gimbel was getting ready to meet with James Malcolm Isbister to firm up Farmer's participation in the studio project, when Isbister phoned.

“I'm terribly sorry about this. I'm running late.”

“No problem,” Zeke said. “By the way, as long as I've got you on the phone, I was out last night with Alicia Melendez . . . the anchorwoman at
News Four New York
. . . you know the local channel four. She told me she's writing a history of Trump Tower and thought that Mr. Farmer either once lived here or does live here, and I said I'd put you two together . . . if I gave you her number, would you be kind enough to phone her?”

“No,” he said flatly. “Absolutely not.”

“Oh.” He was surprised at the man's tone. “I'll vouch for her . . .”

“I'm terribly sorry, Mr. Gimbel, but this is not something I appreciate.”

“I didn't mean to insult you . . .”

“Mr. Gimbel, I'm afraid we can no longer discuss any business arrangements with you. Indiscretion is not something we tolerate, and when Mr. Farmer's name is brought up . . .”

“Hold on, all I did was say to a friend . . .”

“Please accept my sincerest apologies for canceling our meeting today and terminating our negotiations. I wish you luck in your endeavors and must now end this call. Goodbye, sir.”

Isbister hung up.

For the longest time, Zeke stared at the phone in his hand. “What the fuck was that all about?”

T
HE FIRST
text message from McKeever showed up on Carson's phone at 12:02, Thursday morning.
Sell at 40, buy it back
. Two minutes later another showed up.
Sell at 41, buy it back
. Then there were several in the space of the next minute.
Sell at 39. Sell at 38. Sell at 38. Sell at 39. Sell at 38. Keep buying
.

Carson did what he was told to.

At 12:11, his phone rang. It was McKeever to say, “There's action . . . a lot of it.”

Carson clicked on his screen and saw the Shigetada share price dropping. “Looks like he's a worried man.”

“He's certainly a confused man. He started shorting at forty. He came in with some real ambition at thirty-eight. He spooked the banks and they came in at thirty-seven. He dumped a big bundle at thirty-six. Hedge funds have forced it down to thirty-two. One bank is in heavy . . . Chiba. They're playing alongside Shigetada, and the two of them are going nuts. They're both sniffing around . . . hold on . . . wow, they've dropped as low as thirty. See that? You watching the screen? Everybody must be thinking the hedge funds are driving it even lower.”

“I see it. At what point does Shigetada run out of cover?”

“This market?” McKeever suggested, “I say the minute he dips under thirty. Chiba might have deep pockets, but your guy's in quicksand. I mean, he's out of control. He's spinning the wheel nonstop.”

“What does the liquidity look like?”

“Right now, besides you, there's next to nil.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Nothing yet. Just stay on the line with me. Then, suddenly, McKeever screamed, “Holy shit.”

“What?”

“He's dumped the biggest bundle of all at twenty-nine. This guy is nuts. Hold on,” McKeever said . . . “let me get this up . . .”

Carson could hear him typing on his keyboard.

“Here we go,” McKeever said. “Ready? Now. Buy it all. Everything.”

“Doing it,” Carson said, and furiously put in orders using those accounts scattered around the world.

“Keep going,” McKeever kept yelling. “Keep going . . . watch . . . look at your screen . . . keep going . . .”

Carson couldn't type instructions fast enough.

Two minutes later McKeever yelled, “Shot through the roof. I'm telling you, this is beyond awesome. I've never seen a market move like this. Japanese authorities are going to investigate this for the next fifty years.”

“We're protected, right?”

“You're completely invisible. And this asshole is still sitting on shorts at twenty-nine. He got greedy.”

“Does he have any idea it's us?”

“Who knows? Who cares? If this price keeps climbing . . . fuck me, Carson, there's zero liquidity left in the market . . . nothing . . . this is a bloodbath.”

“You're the best,” he said to McKeever, hung up with him and dialed Warring on his cell, “I don't know where you are or what time it is where you are, but Shigetada's finished.”

“Great. Now get the company.”

“Call you right back.” Carson phoned his lawyers in Tokyo, “Tell Shigetada he surrenders or dies.”

As soon as the lawyers called back, Carson got Warring on the line again. “Done.”

“How bad?”

“Finished. It's over. He's wiped out.”

“Good work,” Warring said. “What else is going on?”

Carson couldn't believe it. “I pull off the deal of the century, take a company you were willing to buy in the mid-forties, steal it for you in the mid-thirties, destroy the guy fifteen times, and all you can ask is what else is going on?”

“Yeah,” Warring said. “What do you want me to do, bake you a cake?”

“Strawberry shortcake is good,” Carson said.

“We won,” Warring said. “That's what is supposed to happen. Now, that's done, what's next?”

L
ATER THAT
morning, and three and a half miles south of Trump Tower, on the second floor of the New York Criminal Court Building at 100 Center
Street, Richard Lipschitz . . . also known as Ricky Lips . . . accompanied by two attorneys, walked into the chambers of Judge Giovanni Vitali.

The prosecutor was already there with an assistant, as were the judge's two clerks.

“Your honor, thank you for handling this in camera,” one of Ricky's lawyers said.

The judge looked up and scowled at Ricky, who was dressed in a suit and tie. He shook his head. “Mr. Lipschitz . . . are you fucking crazy?”

Ricky shrugged, “Got to admit judge, I came bleeding close.”

“Close only counts in horseshoes and nuclear war. I could throw you in jail. But I always liked the band, so no jail time.”

The assistant district attorney who'd been handling the case blurted out, “Rock-star justice, your honor?”

“You could call it that,” the judge said. “House arrest, the ankle bracelet stays, another full six months. We're starting from the beginning, Mr. Lipschitz . . . count yourself lucky . . . and this time try to get it right. Goodbye.”

“Your honor,” Ricky's other lawyer said, “Please reconsider . . .”

“Goodbye,” he said, and waved them out of his chambers.

B
ACK AT
Trump Tower, before Alicia left for work, three handwritten notes were delivered to her.

The first was from Zeke Gimbel. “The fellow I mentioned, Farmer's guy, bailed out on me. Sorry, I tried. Won't talk to you or me anymore. I'll phone you later.”

The second was from Pierre Belasco. “Although I have heard of Mr. Farmer, vaguely, if he ever was here it's way before my time.”

The third was from Trump himself. “Alicia, I hate it when someone asks me to remember something from thirty or more years ago. You are much too gorgeous to force me to admit that I haven't thought about him in years. Ask me about Liberace. Him I remember. Donald.”