The phone rang. "Mr. Tompkins?" A girl's voice inquired. "Just a
moment, Mr. Willamer of the Securities and Exchange Commission will
speak to you."
I didn't like that "will." "And who the hell, Arthurjean, is Mr.
Willamer of the S.E.C.?" I asked in an aside.
"The woiks," she said.
"Hullo, Tompkins," a clear phonogenic baritone inquired. "This is Harry
Willamer. I saw your list of selling-orders this morning and wondered
if you would drop in and see me."
"Certainly," I said. "Shall I bring my books?"
"Not necessary. This is entirely informal. As a matter of fact, I have
some gentlemen from Washington whom I think you will be interested in
meeting. This is entirely unofficial, of course."
"How about meeting me at the Pond Club at one o'clock?"
"That will be grand," Mr. Willamer answered heartily. "The Pond Club at
one o'clock it is."
I turned to Arthurjean. "What kind of go-round is this? I start selling
and inside an hour the S.E.C. is on my tail. Isn't speculation legal
any more?"
"Baby," she remarked, "anything's legal as long as you're in with the
right guys. All I can tell you is that Willamer is hot stuff. His aunt
is a cousin of Jesse Jones or maybe it's Henry Morgenthau. So you watch
yourself and don't do any talking out of turn."
It was Tuesday, the 10th, and I had launched my plan of selling the war
short in a determined campaign to unload G.M. and U.S. Steel. I was
well covered in case of a rise, but there was already a million dollars
of the firm's money in the operation, behind the Fynch million which I
had used to break the ice.
The Pond Club was the same as ever. Tammy was polishing the glasses in
his little bar and there were no fellow-members in evidence. After all,
I decided, they weren't likely to show up much before three o'clock.
However, I decided that privacy was called for, especially if Commander
Tolan put in an appearance.
"Tammy," I explained, as he produced his usual pick-me-up and waited
for me to down it. "I'm expecting some gentlemen to join me in a few
minutes. Is there a room where we could have a private conversation and
still get something to drink?"
"Well, sir, Mr. Tompkins," the steward said, "I think I could let you
use the Minnow Room. That's private and there's a dumbwaiter to the
bar. Just push the buzzer and say what you want in the phone and I'll
send it right up to you."
"It sounds like perfection," I told him. "I'll go on up to the Minnow
Room. The gentleman I'm expecting is named Willamer and he'll have
some friends with him. Just send them up when they arrive. How do you
get there?"
Tammy looked a trifle startled. "That's where you had your bachelor
dinner, sir," he reproved me. "Up the stairs and first door to your
left, sir. You'll remember it when you see it, I'm quite sure."
Tammy was right. No one who had ever seen the Pond Club's Minnow Room
was likely to forget it. The wall on one side was lined solid with
illuminated tanks containing gold-fish making fishy little zeros with
their stupid mouths. The other walls were enlivened by frescoes of
drunken fish in various hilarious attitudes. Indirect lighting gave a
sort of Black Mass or Diabolical Fish-Fry effect to the whole. It was
definitely not a room to stay sober in.
"Tompkins?" The door opened and an egg-smooth young man with a baldish
head and pale eyebrows stood in the entrance. "I'm Harry Willamer. Meet
the rest of the gang. Here's Winston Sales of the War Production Board,
Lieutenant-Colonel George Finogan of the Army Quartermaster Corps and
Commander Raymond Coonley of the Navy Bureau of Supplies."
Except for the uniforms, they might have been cousins--they were all
fattish, baldish and blondish. They were all egg-like men, middle-aged,
all hearty in manner and all seemed to have no particular reason for
existing.
"Well, gentlemen," I asked, "what will you have to drink?"
"Scotch-and-soda," said Willamer. "Hell, let's make it Scotch for
everyone and save trouble."
"I'd like a whiskey sour," objected Commander Coonley. "I've got
butterflies in my stomach after working with those hot-shots from
Detroit last night."
"Okay," Willamer accepted the amendment. "One whiskey sour. Any other
changes?"
There were none, so I signaled to Tammy and our order was filled.
"Tompkins," Willamer remarked. "You'll excuse this short notice but
when I spotted your selling-orders in the market this morning I knew we
had to move fast. First of all, I'd like to know why you are selling,
when everybody else is buying."
"Mr. Willamer," I explained, "it's none of the S.E.C.'s goddamned
business what or why I sell so long as I follow the regulations."
Willamer laughed. "Who said anything about the S.E.C.?" he demanded.
"Oh, I get it. You thought this was an informal investigation by the
Commission. Right? My fault. Should have told you that this has nothing
to do with your firm's market-position or the S.E.C."
I took a reflective swallow of Scotch. "Then what the hell _is_ this?"
I asked.
Harry Willamer drew himself up, "We," he explained, "are the Inter-Alia
Trading Corporation. Your selling orders suggest that you don't expect
the war to last much longer."
"I don't," I told him.
"Neither do we," Willamer continued. "That's why we've been busy
organizing Inter-Alia. It's a neat set-up. Sales here, on the War
Production Board, is in a position to advise us of all cut-backs in
war-contracts and keep in touch with the whole contract-termination
program. Colonel Finogan is in the Quartermaster Corps and is the only
man in the Army--"
"In the world, Harry," Finogan corrected him.
"Right you are, George, in the world--who knows where all the surplus
war-stocks are located. His office routes them to the depots. That
in itself is worth a million dollars to the company. Anything from
jeeps to nylons, Colonel Finogan knows where they are and what price
will buy them. Commander Coonley is in the same position on Navy
Supplies. Between him and Finogan there isn't an ounce of anything from
parachute-silk to bull-dozers which we can't locate. As for me, I watch
the way money and markets move here in Wall Street."
I finished my drink. "That sounds wonderful, Mr. Willamer, but what
has it got to do with me? You have the makings of a ten million dollar
corporation between the four of you."
Willamer raised a soft, white, well-manicured hand in a
traffic-stopping gesture. "All but one thing, Tompkins," he said.
"We haven't got working capital to exploit this set-up. That's where
you come in. Tompkins, Wasson & Cone controls between three and
five million dollars and are smart operators. So long as you stuck
to conservative methods, no dice for Inter-Alia, but when I saw you
gambling on the early end of the war, I said to myself, this is where
we can do business with Tompkins."
"How much do you need?" I asked.
"Three hundred thousand would be enough to start with," Willamer
reckoned.
"Half a million," Finogan amended.
"Say you need half a million to start with and I put it up, what do I
get out of it?" I demanded.
Willamer looked a little secretive. "Well, Tompkins," he admitted.
"You'll get good security for your money, of course, and a share in
what we make. Say a fifth, since there are four of us in it already."
"That sounds reasonable," I agreed, "assuming you have a sure thing.
What's your first operation, once you get the money in Inter-Alia to
finance it?"
Willamer looked still more secretive. "That is a firm secret,
Tompkins," he told me. "If you decide to come in with us, I'll let you
in on our plans, but this thing is too big to talk about until we see
the color of your money."
I stood up. "Well, then, gentlemen," I announced, "will you have one
more round of drinks and then kindly get the hell out of here? I'm
delighted to have met you personally but I don't see the point of
wasting our time unless I know what I am putting my money into."
"Tell him, Harry," Sales urged. "We can trust Tompkins not to take
advantage of our plans. The way we're set up we could block him easy
if he tried to double-cross us."
"That's right," I said. "It's your plan and you have the inside track."
"Well, then," Willamer explained, "here's our first operation. The
Army and Navy have huge stocks of atabrine and quinine--left over from
Africa and the South-west Pacific. As soon as the fighting stops,
Colonel Finogan and Commander Coonley will declare these stocks surplus
to be sold at spot-sales where they are. We will be the only bidders
and we get a world-corner on malaria. The whole world needs that stuff
and if we move fast, during the confusion after victory, we can sew it
up and make the world pay our price. We ought to double our money in
three months."
"Double!" snorted Sales. "We ought to quintuple it like Papa Dionne.
South America is just lousy with dollars and here's a way to get 'em
back home. Malaria's a big item down there. No quinine, no oil."
"Well, gentlemen," I told the Inter-Alia boys, "I'll have to think
it over. As Mr. Willamer knows, I'm pretty heavily committed in the
present market. Get in touch with me about the end of the month and
I might be able to put--say, twenty thousand dollars--into your
proposition."
Willamer smiled unpleasantly. "Come, Tompkins," he said, "you can do
much better than that. Perhaps you don't realize that the S.E.C. might
just decide to investigate your firm's market-position. You can afford
to put in at least $100,000 now and, when you get out of your present
operation, make up the balance of that half million."
I went to the dumbwaiter and pushed the buzzer. "Tammy," I spoke into
the phone, "will you come up here and show these gentlemen out of the
club. We've finished our talk."
"Nothing doing," I said to the others. "I don't shake down well."
Willamer blinked his watery blue eyes at me. "That's libelous," he
stated. "I'm a lawyer and I ought to know. You can't accuse me of
blackmail in the presence of witnesses. By God, Tompkins, I'll have the
examiners in your office at nine o'clock tomorrow morning. And I'll sue
you for damages."
"Oh no, you won't," I informed him. "I didn't call you a blackmailer
and I doubt that your friends will care to testify. You didn't
know--perhaps I forgot to mention it--but this room is wired for
dictaphones and a complete phonographic record of this conversation is
already on wire. I'll send it over to the F.B.I. in the morning, unless
you--"
"Excuse me, Harry," said Commander Coonley with an air of decision. "I
didn't hear any reference to blackmail by Mr. Tompkins. I'd better be
getting back to my office."
"Me, too," chimed Lt. Col. George Finogan.
"Nice to have met you, Tompkins," Winston Sales observed as he strode
briskly for the exit.
Harry Willamer turned to me, not without dignity. "You son of a bitch!"
he remarked feelingly, and followed the others.
I waited until it was reasonably sure that the Inter-Alia group had
left the building. Then I went downstairs to the bar and found Tammy
alone.
"Tammy," I said. "You overheard our conversation down the dummy, didn't
you?"
"Oh no, sir. Not at all, Mr. Tompkins. I--"
"Of course you did, Tammy. You heard these gentlemen try to blackmail
me and you heard me tell them to go to hell, didn't you?"
I languidly waved a twenty-dollar bill under his snubby nose.
"Now that you put it that way, sir," the little bar-steward admitted,
"I do remember hearing that Mr. Willamer say that unless you gave him
$100,000 he'd start investigating your books."
"Splendid!" I congratulated him. "Just remember that, when the time
comes. Now see if you can get me Mr. Merriwether Vail on the phone.
He's in the Manhattan Directory--a lawyer."
"Merry?" I asked, after we had been connected. "I have a feeling I'm
going to need your legal services.... No, it's not that one ... it's
another kind of jam ... I'm being blackmailed.... No, you dope, it's
not a woman, it's an official.... Yes, I'll stick here until you can
get over.... What shall I order for you, a double Scotch?... Right! At
the Pond Club."
There was one more move to make. I called Bedford Hills,
person-to-person call, and asked for my wife. After the usual duel
between local and suburban operators, Jimmie's voice answered.
"Winnie," she said. "Thank goodness you telephoned me. You'd better
come out at once. The most dreadful things have been happening."
"It's not so wonderful here either," I told her. "Listen, Jimmie, you
come on in--"
"It's Ponto," she said, paying absolutely no attention to what I was
saying. "He's drunk--yes, drunk! He managed to upset that decanter of
old brandy you keep on your night table and lapped it up. Now he's
howling and hiccoughing like mad and I'm afraid to go near him."
"Oh, Jimmie, to hell with Ponto. Let him sleep it off. You come on
in to town. We've got to do some fast thinking. I'll meet you in the
Little Bar at the Ritz at five o'clock. Bring your night things, and
mine, too. We may have to leave town in a hurry. I'll explain when I
see you."