‘Tell me, how much did all this net you?’ asked Dexter.
‘Just shy of a million dollars.’
The lawyer bit the end off his pencil. No wonder the charge was so vague. ‘In excess of ten thousand dollars’ indeed. The very size of the theft gave him an idea.
Mr Lou Ackerman enjoyed his breakfast. For him it was the best meal of the day; never hurried like lunch, never over-rich like banquet dinners. He enjoyed the shock of the icy juice, the crunch of the cereal flakes, the fluffiness of well-scrambled eggs, the aroma of the freshly perked Blue Mountain coffee. On his balcony above Central Park West, in the cool of a summer morning before the real heat came upon the day, it was a joy. And it was a shame of Mr Calvin Dexter to spoil it.
When his Filipino manservant brought the pasteboard card to his terrace, he glanced at the words ‘attorney-at-law’, frowned and wondered who his visitor might be. The name rang a bell. He was about to tell his manservant to ask the visitor to come to the bank later in the morning, when a voice behind the Filipino said:
‘I know it’s impertinence, Mr Ackerman, and for that I apologize. But if you will give me ten minutes I suggest you will be glad we did not meet in the glare of attention at your office.’
He shrugged and gestured to a chair across the table.
‘Tell Mrs Ackerman I’m in conference at the breakfast table,’ he instructed the Filipino. Then to Dexter, ‘Keep it short, Mr Dexter.’
‘I will. You are pressing for the prosecution of my client, Mr Washington Lee, for having allegedly skimmed almost a million dollars from your clients’ accounts. I think it would be wise to drop the charges.’
The CEO of the East River Bank could have kicked himself. You show a little kindness and what do you get? A ball-breaker ruining your breakfast.
‘Forget it, Mr Dexter. Conversation over. No way. The boy goes down. There must be deterrence to this sort of thing. Company policy. Good day.’
‘Pity. You see, the way he did it was fascinating. He broke into your computer mainframe. He waltzed through all your firewalls, your security guards. No one is supposed to be able to do that.’
‘Your time is up, Mr Dexter.’
‘A few seconds more. There will be other breakfasts. You have about a million clients, checking account and deposit account. They think their funds are safe with you. Later this week a skinny black kid fr
om the ghetto is going to stand up in court and say that if he did it, any half-assed amateur could empty any of your clients’ accounts after a few hours of electronic probing. How do you think your clients are going to like that?’
Ackerman put down his coffee and stared across the park.
‘It’s not true, and why should they believe it?’
‘Because the Press benches will be packed and the TV and radio media will be outside. I think up to a quarter of your clients could decide to move bank.’
‘We’ll announce we are installing a whole new safeguard system. The best on the market.’
‘But that’s what you were supposed to have had before. And a Bedford Stuyvesant kid with no school grades broke it. You were lucky. You got the whole million dollars back. Supposing it happened again, for tens of millions in one awful weekend, and it went to the Caymans. The bank would have to reinstate. Would your board appreciate the humiliation?’
Lou Ackerman thought of his board. Some of the institutional shareholders were people like Pearson-Lehman, Morgan Stanley. The sort of people who hated to be humiliated. The sort who might have a man’s job.
‘It’s that bad, uh?’
‘I’m afraid so.’
‘All right. I’ll call the DA’s office and say we have no further interest in proceeding, since we all have our money back. Mind you, the DA can still proceed if he wants to.’
‘Then you’ll be very persuasive, Mr Ackerman. All you have to say is: “Scam, what scam?” After that, mum is the word, wouldn’t you say?’
He rose and turned to leave. Ackerman was a good loser.
‘We could always do with a good lawyer, Mr Dexter.’
‘I’ve got a better idea. Take Washington Lee on the payroll. I’d have thought fifty thousand dollars a year is about right.’
Ackerman was on his feet, Blue Mountain brown-staining the napery.
‘What the hell should I want that lowlife on the payroll for?’