Chapter 41: Dinner Can Wait!

August 20, 1984, Chicago, Illinois

"Morning!" Jack exclaimed when he walked into my office at 7:30am on Monday.

"Morning. Your first task is to familiarize yourself with my asset allocation strategy and then propose what to do with the $60 million that was transferred into the Cincinnatus fund this morning."

"Any guidance?" he asked.

"The asset allocation document," I replied. "I want to see what you think I should do."

"Do you know?"

"Nothing firm. Your PM business cards should be on your new desk."

"Then I guess I'll get to work!"

He left, and I returned to work on my portion of the daily analyst report, then continued my work on Murray Matheson's special request. I was interrupted just after 9:00am, and Cheryl called and said Noel wanted to see me right away. I locked away my notes on Salem bin Laden and went up to 32.

"We were served with two separate but coördinated lawsuits for the Wabash Street fund, naming Spurgeon Capital, me, and Carl Taylor," Noel said. "Did you speak with either Martin de Jong or Clark Daubert in Florida?"

"No. Neither of them approached me, nor did anyone mention them to me. Well, I did shake hands with them when they arrived and were introduced, but that's it."

"OK. Good."

"Malfeasance and breach of fiduciary duty?"

"The whole gamut — negligence, breach of fiduciary duty, providing unsuitable investment recommendations, and failing to disclose important information."

"What about our arbitration clause?"

"We'll move to enforce that, and we have a good chance of winning because of the Supreme Court decision earlier this year that upheld Dean Witter's right to compel arbitration against a customer."

"Is there anything I need to do?"

"Not at the moment. We'll sit down with outside counsel once the motion to compel arbitration is granted, but that's at least a month away. Did you detect ANY sentiment that might lead anyone else to file suit?"

I shook my head, "No. You resolved Clark Becket's concern in his favor. As I said, I had some pushback from the Arrow Fund investors, but that was mostly because I'm a punk kid."

"You said it!" Noel declared with a grin. "Murray told me he put you on bin Laden and the Emir. Find anything useful yet?"

"I have a fairly detailed history of bin Laden and his family. Were you aware Salem has a house in Winter Garden, Florida?"

"I'd heard rumors, but I never checked into it. Is that confirmed?"

"Yes. He uses it to entertain and might actually be there now. He's reportedly a skilled pilot, but the most interesting thing outside business is that his brother, Osama, went to Pakistan to work with the Mujāhidīn to fight the Soviets. Last year, he and Abdullah Yusuf Azzam, a Jordanian, founded «Maktab Khadamāt al-Mujāhidīn al-'Arab», which in English they call the 'Afghan Services Bureau'. They aim to raise funds and recruit foreigners to fight the Soviets. There are widespread concerns about both of them prioritizing political Islam over everything."

"Fighting the Commies is a good thing," Noel observed. "Even if they're religious fanatics."

"No doubt, but given I'm supposed to present information neutrally, I had to point that out. I don't see it as a concern for doing business with Salem, but it is important information about the family."

"OK. Keep at it. As for the brother, I think so long as he's fighting the Commies, FDR's quote about Somoza carries the day — 'He may be a son of a bitch, but he's our son of a bitch'. Or, as the ancient proverb says — 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend'. Alert me if you find evidence to the contrary."

"Will do."

"What about the Emir?" Noel asked.

"A typical Arab sheikh," I replied. "He married his cousin, and they have at least seven kids. I don't read Arabic, and nobody on the team does, so I'm mostly operating from UK sources, as well as a few English-language sources in the Middle East. His main focus, besides getting his wife pregnant, is turning Bahrain into a modern financial center, and he's having quite a bit of success. The big complaint against him is that he dissolved the Parliament and that he's going after dissenters with a vengeance."

"Any chance of him being overthrown?"

"It would have to be a palace coup. The 1974 State Security Law basically gives him the power to throw anyone who dissents into prison, something Nixon could only have dreamed of. The guy won't win any human rights awards, that's for sure."

"How stable is the country?"

"When you can jail anyone who opposes you, things are stable until they aren't. The real question is whether he relents on the dissolution of Parliament. If he does, or whoever follows him does, there's enough money there to make it a very prosperous country."

"OK. Keep digging and let me know if you think there's a real risk of a palace coup."

"Will do."

"What are you doing with the $60 mil?"

"That's part of today's agenda. I asked Clinton to propose what he would do. That'll give me a good idea of his current skill set."

"And the divorcée?"

"$25 million. The paperwork went to New Accounts on Friday afternoon."

"OK. I have calls to make."

I left his office, returned to mine, and spent the rest of the morning researching the two men, not liking much of what I read about them. That said, from a purely apolitical and otherwise neutral point of view, the AUM they could bring to Spurgeon Capital was huge, and Noel Spurgeon didn't give a damn about the morals of his investors or potential investors. To an extent, neither did I, but I did question whether we should get into bed with someone like the Emir.

At 11:00am, Jack called and asked if he could see me. I decided to go upstairs and have the meeting in my office on 31.

"What's your plan?" I asked once we'd sat down in comfortable chairs in my new office.

"Honestly? I'm not an analyst, but my take is that the money should simply be allocated in proportional amounts across all your asset classes."

"That is the default, and it's a good strategy. I'm going to work on it this afternoon. Why don't you plan to have lunch with Violet, Bianca, and me at 11:30am each day? You can come to the gym with us, too, if you want."

"That sounds like a good plan. What should I do this afternoon?"

"I'll give you a list of every place I sent either a letter or a prospectus. I want you to start calling and see if we can drum up some new capital. Obviously, you'll need to handle any calls that come in tomorrow or Wednesday, given I'll be in New York. I'll also ask Violet to set meetings with Thomas Hart, Brandon Littleton, and their investors to introduce you. More importantly, I'll have Violet set up a meeting with MTB in Cincinnati for October."

"OK. I'll get right on that after lunch."

I returned downstairs and spent twenty minutes on research before it was time for lunch. After lunch and the gym, I headed up to the condo to wait for the building handyman, who was supposed to arrive at 1:10pm to install the mirrors over my bed

"Is there a problem?" Chelsea asked when I walked in.

"No. The handyman is coming to install mirrors for me."

"Like behind the doors for checking your clothes before you go out?"

I realized then I should have scheduled him to come after 2:00pm, as Jessica wouldn't give me grief about it, and she probably wouldn't even have asked. The question was, did I give Chelsea an honest answer or not? I decided to split the difference and just say 'no' and hope she'd drop it.

"No," I replied.

"Where?" she asked.

Of course, I should absolutely have expected that. I could demur, but I chose not to.

"On the ceiling over my bed."

"What?! Why?"

"I think you can work that out for yourself if you think about it."

She gave me a strange look, then about fifteen seconds later, she turned bright red.

"That's just perverted!" she exclaimed.

I decided I'd basically had enough, and if she was offended and decided to leave, we'd handle it. The agency could quickly provide a temporary nanny to cover until we selected a new one.

"Do you remember what I said a month ago? That if you didn't drop it, I'd consider it a demand to go to bed together? And that I'd act on it?"

"You wouldn't!" she gasped. "You said so!"

"No, I said I'd respect your views, but clearly, given you decided to make an issue of the mirrors, you WANT to do it. As soon as the handyman is done, you can watch while we do it!"

"GROSS!" she gasped. "NEVER!"

"Then explain why you chose to make a moral judgment when I expressly told you what would happen if you did!"

She glared at me and didn't say anything, so I simply remained silent. About a minute later, there was a knock at the door, and I went to open it. I let the handyman, Terry, and his assistant, each of whom were carrying a stepladder, into the condo, and we went upstairs to my room.

"Side-by-side, centered over the bed, right?" he asked with a knowing smile.

"Yes. We can move the mattress to the hallway, then slide the bed all the way against the wall. That should give you enough room to hang one, then we'll shift it to the other wall, though we'll have to move the wardrobe."

"No problem at all," he said.

Forty-five minutes later, the mirrors were mounted, and the bed and mattress were back in place. I signed the work order, thanked them, then walked them to the door. Once they had left, I went to where Chelsea was sitting on the couch.