He walked straight up to a police constable who was standing behind the tape.
‘What’s happened, officer?’
The policeman looked at him, suspicious of anyone that tried to suck up to him by calling him ‘officer’ when it was clear as a bell to anyone that had a pair of eyes, or even one, come to that, that he was not an officer, but a plain constable.
‘Do you work in here?’
‘Yes.’
The constable lifted the tape and jerked his thumb towards the doorway. ‘Okay.’
Rocq ducked under the tape. ‘What’s happened?’
‘Someone’s been murdered.’
‘Murdered?’ He dashed inside the entrance. He had heard of the expression ‘crawling with policemen,’ but he’d never actually seen a place that fitted the description — until now. They were everywhere, dusting, scraping, examining, interviewing. As he waited by the lift, the manager of the metals section, Tony Zuckerman, came down the stairs with a man he presumed to be a detective. ‘What’s happened, Tony?’ said Rocq.
‘Sergeant-Major Bantry’s been murdered. Burglars — whole place been turned upside down during the night — he must have heard them and gone to have a go — poor sod.’
‘What — how?’
‘Bust his neck,’ said the detective. ‘Professionals, whoever did that; vicious bastards.’
Rocq got out of the elevator on the fourth floor; the receptionist, Miss Heyman, was looking ashen faced. ‘Good morning,’ said Rocq.
‘Good morning, Alex.’
‘Nice start to the day,’ he said.
She burst into tears. ‘Poor old man — why did they have to kill him? Surely they could have just tied him up and gagged him?’
Rocq nodded silently. ‘Sickening, isn’t it. What did they take? Ten quid petty cash and Sarge’s wallet?’
‘I should think that’s about all there was of any value in this place.’
‘What the hell do these bastard burglars think?’ exploded Rocq, angrily. ‘That we’ve got bloody gold bars lying all over the place?’
‘Probably,’ she said.
He shook his head exasperatedly, and walked through to his office. He recoiled when he saw it: the drawers of all the filing cabinets were pulled out, and papers were strewn everywhere. Slivitz, Mozer, Prest, Boadicea and the rest of his colleagues had already begun the clearing-up. For a change, nobody got at anyone, and nobody felt like cracking any gags.
At eleven o’clock, Elleck called Rocq up to his office. As he walked down the corridor, he saw Elleck’s secretary checking through a filing cabinet. She stood up and announced him to Elleck.
‘Good morning, Sir Monty,’ said Rocq.
‘Morning, Alex.’
‘I’m sorry about Sarge,’ said Rocq.
‘Yes, yes,’ said Elleck, ‘everyone is. Now, I wanted to see you about the gold situation. As of this moment, gold is $549 — that’s a rise of $51 in a day and a half. This is an unbelievable rise — it seems there is some very heavy buying going on, and it isn’t in this country. But no one seems to be able to pinpoint the source. It’s having a strong impact on the world market — people are starting to panic buy.’
Rocq was taken aback for a moment that Elleck didn’t seem to be affected by what had happened to Sarge Bantry. ‘This is nothing to do with your syndicate?’ asked Rocq.
‘No — well — unless they’re playing some game they haven’t told me about, it isn’t. I just don’t understand it — I don’t understand it at all.’
‘Do you think I ought to start buying for the syndicate now — and not wait until Monday, sir?’
Elleck shook his head. ‘I don’t think so; this buying must subside during the next day or so. There’s nothing to sustain it. Have you heard anything at all? You boys down there often hear far more than I ever do.’
‘Nothing at all.’
‘I don’t know what to make of it; 549 is too high — we must wait for it to go down before we start. It should be at 500 to 510 — that’s the right price — no more. Don’t buy any until it has dropped back to at least 510.’
‘Even if it is higher still on Monday.’
‘Even if it is higher still — unless I tell you. Is that clear?’
‘Yes, Sir Monty.’
‘Good.’
Rocq went back to his office. In the five minutes it had taken him to go and see the Chairman, gold had risen a further $4; by the time he went to lunch, gold had topped 560, and at the second fixing of the gold price that day at Rothschild’s at three that afternoon, the price of gold was fixed at $568 an ounce.
Whatever the power, authority and influence of the men from the largest bullion dealers in the world, within an hour of their fixing, people were eagerly stumping up $5 above it. In Rocq’s office, the death of Sarge and the burglary of the building had already become a thing of the past. There was a gold rush on, and nothing mattered any more except the price people were prepared to pay for those long, thin, dull-yellow metal slabs, over which a thousand wars have been fought, and a million fortunes made and lost, and with which a trillion teeth have been filled.
By nine o’clock Friday morning, the price of gold had soared over the 590 mark, and was soon nudging 600.
In the first hour’s trading in London, the price rocketed to 604 before dropping back to 598. At lunchtime Friday, it stood at 609, and at two o’clock in the afternoon it hit 612. At the Friday afternoon fixing, at 3.00 p.m., the price was fixed at 616; by the close of the London market, gold was at 621, and strongly tipped to go over the $650 mark on Monday morning.
Mozer and Slivitz engaged in a heated argument about the continuation of the boom, and Rocq listened.
‘As long as people keep buying, it will keep rising. I reckon it can stand another hundred, maybe hundred and fifty dollars.’
‘You’re full of shit, Mozer; everyone got caught with their pants down last year when it was up in the early 700s. There were billions bought in the early 700s; the moment the price gets back up there, it’s going to pop like a balloon: bang! There’s going to be so many people bailing out of gold they won’t be able to give the stuff away by the end of next week — just like coffee.’
‘Don’t talk rubbish, Gary — what do you think they’re going to discover — that gold fillings make people’s tongues drop off?’
‘I’m not letting any chick with gold fillings give me a blow job if that’s the case.’
‘You’re disgusting, Slivitz.’
‘At least I know it, Mozer; you’re disgusting and you don’t know it. You’ve got B.O., bad breath, and every orifice in your body is plugged with something nasty.’
Rocq got up from his desk, and closed his briefcase. ‘Night girls, have a sweet weekend.’
‘What’s your hurry?’ said Slivitz. ‘Got to get the suit back to Moss Bros, or the Porsche back to Avis?’
‘No — I just want to go to the lavatory before you two block it for the weekend.’
24
Shortly before 5.00 p.m. Friday, French time, Viscomte Claude Lasserre’s secretary was put through, by Globalex’s switchboard operator, to Sir Monty Elleck’s secretary. As usual, Lasserre’s secretary spoke in English, and Elleck’s secretary spoke in French; in spite of this, the two men were promptly connected.
‘Good afternoon, Monty, how are you?’
‘Well, thanks, Claude. Very enjoyable dinner on Monday.’
‘Thank you. You had a good flight home?’
‘No problems — the airways still aren’t as congested as the roads. To what do I owe the honour of this call?’
‘I was talking with Jimmy and he asked me to call you. We must be making out pretty good with the gold already, no?’