Bach pauses and points to Ruiz’s chest with the neck of his beer bottle. The skin along his hairline is shiny with perspiration.
“Do you own a house, Vincent?”
“Yes.”
“Has it doubled in value? Trebled?”
“I’ve done OK.”
“More than OK, I’d say. You should thank bankers for that. All that wealth we created had a knock-on effect on property prices. Ordinary guys like you, living in suburbia, became millionaires because of what we did. You bought houses and sat back and watched the values rise. You thought you were geniuses. You thought it was down to you.”
Bach looks at the recently hoed garden. He did the work himself, churning the soil until his shirt was soaked in sweat, working through the heat of the day as though avenging himself. He sucks air through his nose and spits into the garden.
“Then it all fell apart,” he says, “the meltdown, the credit crunch, the global financial crisis. People panicked. They wanted out. They cashed in their investments, withdrew their money, and it all came crashing down. They squealed when governments bailed out the banks with taxpayer funds. Hated us even more. But none of them realized how those funds were also propping up their property prices and their jobs and the glorious consumer bubble they had grown to know and love.
“They blamed the bankers. They wanted us put in jail. They wanted to curb our bonuses and tax our salaries. But the only way America and Britain and Europe are getting out of this mess is if the banks recapitalize. And the only way taxpayers are getting their money back is if banks do what they do best. Trade. Hedge. Lend. Make profits.
“People might hate us, Vincent, but you need us. And when things turn around, when things pick up, when wealth returns, they’ll want to be just like us again. They’ll want what we have.”
His face flexes in an idle thought, as though an annoying insect has buzzed across his field of vision. Then he looks back towards the house, thinking of Elizabeth.
“Why are you doing this?” he asks.
“I’m trying to help.”
“In my experience, Vincent, most people don’t do anything unless they see something in it for themselves.” He looks at Ruiz for a long moment. “Why don’t you leave this alone and let my daughter get some rest? She’s about to have a baby.”
Never blinking, he raises the bottle to his lips and drinks it dry.
Inside the house Mitchell Bach has finished his phone call and comes sweeping into the sunroom, calling for “Lizzie.” Kissing both her cheeks. Keeping his hands on her shoulders. “I’m so sorry,” he says. “I should have called you. It was stupid. Thoughtless.” He leads her to a chair, insisting she sit down. He kneels, not wanting to break physical contact.
“I hear the reporters have been giving you a tough time. They’re all shits. I wish someone would doorstep them for a change. We should rent a mob and send them around to the editors’ houses. I bet they’ve all got mistresses or rent boys in the closet.”
Mitchell looks for agreement, but Elizabeth isn’t about to let him change the subject.
“Why was North so worried about some of the transactions?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“Not to me.”
Mitchell contemplates the question, as though wrestling with bad news.
“I hate to say this, Lizzie, but the last time I spoke to North he was quite hostile to me. He was spouting conspiracy theories and making all sorts of wild claims about secret transfers and hidden accounts. I told him to put together a report, but he said he didn’t trust anyone at the bank.”
“When was this?”
“About a week before he went missing. He drank almost two bottles of wine at lunch. He was a mess. Making ridiculous statements. Sounding paranoid.”
Elizabeth knows these descriptions aren’t fabrications. They are carefully chosen statements that are distorted through the lens of self-interest until facts become slurs but still look like facts. North’s reputation is being artfully dismantled, taken apart piece by piece.
A wave of nausea seizes her. She wants to argue. Defend him. A wife’s belief should be enough. Bracing her hands on each side of the armchair, she raises herself up. One hand automatically cups her pregnancy, as though reassuring Claudia that she’s in control.
“You’re a shit, you know that? You’ve always been a shit.”
Mitchell lets her go.
Ruiz and Alistair are still in the garden when Elizabeth emerges from the house. She has fixed her make-up and brushed her hair, pulling it back from her face with a hairband. She has also changed her clothes and is dressed in a high-necked white blouse that makes her look like a pregnant choirgirl. The angel waif. With all the detachment of someone who has witnessed a car wreck, she tells her father she needs him to look after Rowan for a few hours.
“Where are you going?”
“To see Mr. Hackett.”
Bach presses his thumbs against his closed lids, his hands holding his forehead. “I don’t think you should get involved, Lizzie.”
“I am involved, Daddy.”
8
Bernie Levinson isn’t at the pawnshop. One of the machinists from the factory downstairs says Bernie lunches at his club every day-an all-hours drinking hole in the shadows of Spitalfields Market. “Hole” being the optimum word. Darker than a cave, the only light comes from a neon advertising sign above the bar and the copper lamps on the tables. No windows. No clocks. Time doesn’t matter in a place like this. Life is put in abeyance, chemically or alcoholically.
The barman is young, good-looking, dressed in a black T-shirt and Levi’s. Eyes only for Holly. “What can I get you?”
“Mineral water.”
“That’s not a real drink.”
“Alcohol goes straight to my head. Makes me do dangerous things.”
She’s flirting. He’s hooked.
“Is Bernie about?”
“Why do you want Bernie?”
“He promised to look after me.”
“I could do that.”
“Maybe later.”
The barman points across the warped wooden floor that is dotted with old cigarette burns. Up a handful of stairs there is a raised restaurant area with private booths. Only one of them is occupied. Bernie Levinson is sitting by himself, a serviette tucked into his collar, dipping bread into a broken piecrust.
Holly takes her glass of water to a table near the fire doors where Joe O’Loughlin is waiting.
“He’s here. Maybe I should talk to him first,” she says. “You might make him nervous.”
“You’re mistaking me for Ruiz.”
“OK then.”
They cross the floor and climb the stairs, slipping into the bench seat opposite Bernie. The pawnbroker grimaces at the sight of Holly as though something has given him heartburn or blocked his colon. Then he looks at the professor. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Joe O’Loughlin. I’m a friend of Holly.”
Bernie ignores his outstretched hand and goes back to eating, keeping both elbows on the table.
“That stuff I brought you, Bernie. I need it back,” says Holly.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“The nice leather briefcase and the laptop.”
“Huh?”
“This isn’t a set-up, Bernie. I’m not wearing a wire. See?” Holly lifts her top, showing her pale stomach and light blue bra. She turns left and right, showing her back. Bernie waves his hand dismissively.
“How do I know you’re not wearing a wire down there?” He points to her jeans.
“You’ll have to take my word for it.”
“ Your word!” He laughs.
“I just want the stuff. I know you haven’t sold it.”
Bernie covers his ears. “I’m not listening.”
Joe notices the enlarged tips of his fingers and nail clubbing, which suggest low oxygen levels in his blood and congenital heart disease. Mid-fifties, overweight, a signet ring on the little finger of his right hand, a plain wedding band on his left; married, children most likely. Bernie puts down his knife and fork and pats the breast pocket of his coat. There’s something important inside. Not a weapon. Not a mobile phone. Medication.