Moroccan Traffic (40 page)

Sir Robert stood up. The Arabs lifted their eyes very slightly, to keep him in focus. Oppenheim folded his arms. Sir Robert said, ‘You are speaking of a public limited company. The suggestion you have made to Mr. Morgan is not only insulting, it is quite invalid. I hold the position of Chairman. If Mr. Morgan remains, as he must, he will continue to serve under me.’

Ignoring him, Mr. B. addressed himself for the third time to Morgan. ‘Would it?’ he said.

Sir Robert remained standing. He said, ‘Did you hear, sir, what I said? I really cannot entertain this line of discussion. Morgan? You will kindly forget what you have heard. I am, and will remain Chief Executive. Whether you dislike me or not, I am offering you everything you will ever need for your work. That, I take it, is all that really concerns you.’ Contemptuous, confident, his eyes were not on Morgan, but on Oppenheim.

Robert Kingsley had a fighting spirit, when crossed, that was the best thing about him. I knew the shabbiness, now, that it could lead him to. I knew how it dominated, that streak of iron self-interest, even when we were alone together, and closest. Sometimes, towards dawn, I used to sense that he was bored: that his stay had outrun his patience and interfered with the most important thing in his life – the royal right to do what he pleased. I had thought, in my naïveté, that in time I could change that.

But Oppenheim, here and now, was not in awe of anyone. He looked up, his arms still crossed, the thick signet ring of his marriage still gleaming on his third finger. He said, ‘I’m afraid you’re wrong, Robert. Under the terms of this loan, the lender would have a seat on your Board, and a significant share of the equity. You couldn’t raise such sums otherwise.’

Sir Robert, resuming his seat, heard him out with excessive patience. He said, ‘A certain transfer of shares was agreed. To oust the resident Board, your friends would require substantially more power than that.’

Oppenheim’s opulent face didn’t change. He said, ‘But Robert, they have it.’

My Chairman, my former Chairman raised his eyebrows. He permitted his eyes to wander without haste round the table. He said nothing aloud, but the figure calmly smoking at its head became very still.

Oppenheim said, ‘It’s your one great weakness, Robert. You don’t trouble to assess the opposition. They have the power, through nominee holdings. Added to the block they now have, it gives these gentlemen what I have just correctly described: a significant share of the equity. If they wish to remove you, they can.’

‘How curious,’ said Sir Robert. His sardonic smile was still in place. ‘You seem to think that, without my knowledge, shares could have been purchased by these gentlemen anonymously? Indeed, you imply you knew such a thing had happened, and didn’t report it to me? That all seems fairly extraordinary.’

‘It happened,’ said Daniel Oppenheim.

‘But you didn’t inform me?’

‘I thought I had,’ Oppenheim said. ‘But then, our meetings were brief.’

‘To me,’ said Sir Robert, ‘they seemed comprehensive enough. Perhaps I might refresh your memory. You told me you had been paid to extract Morgan from Kingsley’s. I have just taken part in a farce to free you from that obligation. You claimed you had found a source of funds for the company, but that this would depend on retaining Morgan, and the quick asset stripping of MCG. Steps to both ends were taken. The present meeting was then arranged. The rift between Morgan and myself was to be healed, and the final steps taken towards a secure future for Kingsley Conglomerates.’

‘It will be secure,’ Oppenheim said.

‘But under different leadership. My relationship with Morgan has been destroyed so that Morgan will stay, while I leave. Shares have been bought, so that when these so-called gentlemen conclude this arrangement, they will have effective control of the company. In a long business life,’ said Sir Robert, ‘I have never experienced such blatant deception. It will not, of course, succeed. You and your associates will face the full weight of public condemnation. I shall see to that personally.’

‘I doubt it,’ said Daniel Oppenheim. ‘You would own up to blackmail? The attempt to blacken my wife will not be widely approved of.’

Sir Robert searched his face, frowning. ‘Those pictures were blank. You provided me with them yourself. Your wife is absolutely blameless, as you very well know.’

‘But can you prove it? I doubt it,’ said Oppenheim. ‘Whereas I have absolute proof of that entire interview between you and me in Auld’s house. It was taken from Mr. Pymm’s pocket. Apparently he had it recorded.’

The Arabs remained motionless, but beside me, Morgan suddenly spoke. ‘If the pictures of Mrs. Oppenheim don’t exist, they can’t be produced as items of blackmail.’

‘But I can describe them,’ Oppenheim said. ‘And play the tape. It is fairly explicit. Really, it doesn’t sound like the farce Sir Robert called it.’

‘And would you play the second half of the tape?’ Morgan said. ‘The bit that makes it clear that your original partner was Johnson?’

The large, dark eyes of Oppenheim appeared to focus, at speed, on Morgan’s pupils. ‘You’ve heard the tape? How?’

‘Magic,’ said Morgan.

Sir Robert, half-aloud, spoke his thoughts slowly. ‘Johnson and Oppenheim? No. MCG was the firm Johnson was backing. He failed to tell me his interest.’

Morgan said, ‘He failed to tell you a lot of things. He was Oppenheim’s chum in the original scheme to uncork me from Kingsley’s. The pantomime at Auld’s house was for Johnson’s benefit. Oppenheim had switched sides for money. He didn’t want Johnson to know, so he invented the excuse of your blackmail to drop out. Johnson, on the other hand, stuck to his remit and went on trying to winkle me out of the company. That’s why he was picked off at Marrakesh.’

‘He wasn’t alone,’ said Daniel Oppenheim. ‘I also suffered through Mr. Pymm’s immediate circle. But of course, Morgan is right. If our late portrait painter had survived, Kingsley’s would have lost MCG and then Morgan. That, however, is not the immediate point. Robert, you really cannot make threats. The Board of Kingsley’s will change. And the change will cause hardly a tremor, why should it? No factories are going to close. You make an admirable product, but high-tech consumer durables have little political mileage. Who, Robert, will care about washing machines?’

I opened my mouth. Morgan kicked me.

Sir Robert said, ‘We are not talking of washing machines. It is not for his work on washing machines that Morgan is being sought after.’

‘But it is!’ Oppenheim said. ‘He has always said so. You have always insisted on it.’

Morgan said, ‘You’ve forgotten the rest of the tape.
Is she worth human lives?
When he said that, Johnson wasn’t talking of high-tech consumer durables, was he?
Who cares,
you said – thank you –
what the little shit does?
And
A large number of villains
is what Johnson replied. Washing machines, would you say? It was Johnson who led you to think I didn’t know what I was designing. I knew. We all knew. Sir Robert’s just as good as confessed it.’

‘But no one is recording this conversation,’ Oppenheim said. ‘And I have the tape from Auld’s house in my pocket.’

‘Well, one of the tapes,’ Morgan said. ‘I’m glad to say we made plenty of copies.’ He waited to let it sink in. Then he said, ‘So the City
would
be interested, wouldn’t they? And the Department of Trade? And the MOD, I shouldn’t wonder.’

‘Not in me,’ said Sir Robert suddenly. ‘I have nothing to do with all this. I didn’t know what Morgan was making. And I didn’t agree to a major change in the equity. It was Oppenheim who bought those shares secretly.’

‘You mean the nominee holdings?’ Oppenheim said. ‘But you know, I did send you the papers. A good while ago. Quite some time ago. Didn’t you see them? I sent them to your office. And someone signed for them.’

It seemed to me that every face in the room turned to me: Sir Robert’s and Morgan’s, Oppenheim’s and the impassive face of Mr. B. with his two moustached executives. I said, ‘I didn’t see them. They didn’t come. They couldn’t have come to the office.’

‘Your mistress is also your secretary? Does she have shares?’ asked the lord of the kasbah. His voice was emotionless also.

Sir Robert said, ‘Of course she doesn’t. And she isn’t my mistress. My God, she’s just one of several perfectly nice little occasional girls who. . .’ He came to a halt, his face sulky. ‘If she says she hasn’t seen it, she hasn’t.’

‘Now you mention it, I think I remember,’ said Oppenheim. ‘The little lady is right: she was vacationing. I gave the share details to your Mr. Dresden.’

Val.

I wondered what he had done with them. I remembered all those depleted filing cabinets. I believe that, thinking myself back to my career, to my office, to last week, I even told myself that this would scupper Val, and the PA’s job would be mine. Then I saw Sir Robert’s face.

There was a silence. Morgan unexpectedly slipped his arm into mine. Oppenheim was smiling. The Arab at the head of the table had raised his black brows. Oppenheim said, ‘And I’m sure he will be ready to testify. But would you want it? Sullivan tells me there are photographs with a little more substance to them than Muriel’s.’

Morgan pressed my arm, but it was actually a moment before I understood what had been said.

Val. Val coming smiling out of Sir Robert’s suite that morning.
‘Slept in the office last night. Don’t go rushing in, sweetie: he’s shaving. .
.’ Charity’s determined individualism and her care for his girls, and for me. Her pity for me. And looking at Sir Robert I remembered that he enjoyed risk and variety. For him there was nothing unnatural about his choice of casual partners, just as he had seen nothing wrong in teaming foreign finance with superb weaponry.

He ignored the reference to Val. He said, ‘
Sullivan
tells you? Sullivan is working for me.’

‘He isn’t even working for me,’ Oppenheim said. ‘Don’t you know he was one of the Onyx company? He could have retired ten times over on what he’s made in the past as a mercenary. He prefers to drive beautiful cars, and freelance for our very good friend here.’

I thought of Sullivan, and his powerful wrists. I thought of that ride on the Harley, and was thankful I chose as I did. I said, ‘So he put the heroin in Johnson’s yacht?’

‘I am tempted to say yes,’ said Oppenheim. ‘But in fact, it was a stray idea of mine. Robert? Shall we look at the final position of Kingsley’s? The company has to have Morgan. It has less need, sadly, for you. We are inviting you to resign from the Chair. You will not be the poorer, and your activities need not reach the public domain. Such as the fact, for example, that you took steps to sell out your company – and Morgan – without referral to your shareholders or Board.’

‘That won’t wash,’ said Sir Robert. ‘One hint of what Morgan designs, and the Defence Departments would jump in to prevent him from working for you.’

‘It could be done,’ Oppenheim said, ‘without touching upon exactly what Morgan does. With everything to gain, he’d hardly force us to be explicit.’

‘Then I shall announce it,’ said Sir Robert. ‘From what you say, I have nothing to lose. The day I leave Kingsley’s, I shall tell the world exactly what Morgan is good at.’

‘Given the chance,’ said the man at the head of the table. He was sitting back, a lit cigarette over his fingers. He watched it, then raised his eyes slowly. ‘On the other hand, Sir Robert, your retirement would bring untold compensations. Does business play such a large part in your life? It would appear otherwise.’

Given the chance.
I thought of Sullivan’s large, golden form, his blue eyes with their ring of white lashes. I gazed at Sir Robert and willed him to play safe and give in. He sat as if ruminating: vanity and disbelief and dismay struggling together. The offer of wealth, I knew, would weigh nothing against the blow to his ego. He drew breath, and was saved from replying.

The door behind opened. The PA stood until acknowledged, and then glided up to the head of the table. There was a Fax in his hand. His master read it, nodded dismissal and passed it to his two colleagues. Then taking it with him he rose and walked to the ornate single desk where, reseating himself, he picked up the phone and addressed it. When he put it down, he remained in his chair, and made no effort to return to the table. He said, ‘I have left the meeting, gentlemen, because the meeting is over.’

‘What?’ said Oppenheim. I saw the two Arabs look at one another. At the desk, the lord of the kasbah laid down his cigarette and picked up the Fax in short fingers. Then he addressed us.

‘We in the East, gentlemen, have a great respect for Western methods of business. We read your manuals, we study your journals and papers, we meet you over the conference table. Yet always you surprise us. Sir Robert?’

At the table Sir Robert sat, one hand in his pocket, and said, ‘I am listening.’

‘Sir Robert, you gave me certain figures indicating the approximate value of Kingsley Conglomerates. They are worthless. Here are the correct ones. They show that without us, the company of itself cannot survive, far less mount the hostile bid you were planning. I am disappointed.’ He picked up the cigarette and drew on it slowly.

‘You are mistaken,’ said Sir Robert. ‘If it matters.’

‘Am I? What about this?’ said the man in the turban.

The figures he reeled off were familiar: they represented half my night’s work. At the end he looked up. He said, ‘You say, “If it matters.” Perhaps it does not. It is further evidence, however, of bad faith, of questionable competence.’ He turned to another part of the table. ‘Mr. Oppenheim?’

For the first time, Daniel Oppenheim looked guarded. He said, ‘Yes?’

‘Mr. Oppenheim, you came to me with a proposal. You engaged my time and attention, and that of my executives. You brought me here to conclude it. You were not aware that these figures were false?’

Oppenheim’s hands were spread on the table. He said, ‘I had every reason to believe they were true. They came from Sir Robert. The safe in London yielded a set for comparison, and I got others through Johnson.’