“You heard me. A hundred thousand. But don’t get your balls in an uproar. I only bought nine thousand in my own name. The other buys were made by friends of mine around the country. They’ll get a cut of the profits. And none of them bought more than nine thousand shares each, so there’s nothing to worry about.”
“I hope you’re right,” Sally says nervously, biting at her thumbnail. “Jesus, you must have well over half a million tied up in that stock.”
“About,” he says carelessly. “I had to borrow to get up the kale. And the people I borrowed from wouldn’t like it if I stiffed them. So I’m going to start taking some profits.”
“Oh, my God!” Sally says despairingly. “Don’t tell me you’re going to dump a hundred thousand shares all at once? It’ll kill the market.”
“Whaddya think-I’m a klutz? Of course I’m not going to dump it all. I’m selling off little by little. It won’t hurt the stock price. But I want to see some money. Enough to pay off the sharks. How much you in for?”
“As much as I can afford,” Sally says. Then she figures she better prove her confidence in T amp;D. “I had eighteen thousand shares,” she tells him, “and bought another nine this morning. Through a friend.”
“That’s smart,” he says, nodding. “You really think it’ll go to twelve bucks a share?”
“Now I think it may go to fifteen. It’s a leveraged takeover, and from what my boyfriend tells me, it’s going through.”
He finishes his drink, sets the crystal snifter carefully on the desk. He stands up to go.
“Just remember what I told you,” he says. “Your family keeps the business as long as you keep coming up with cash cows. That’s fair enough, isn’t it?”
“Oh, sure,” Sally says, “that’s really fair.”
At the front door, he pauses and turns to her. He reaches out to stroke her cheek, but she jerks angrily away, and he gives her a mirthless smile.
“You’re some woman,” he says. “You’ve got guts. I’d teach you how to be nice, but I don’t want to ruin what you’ve got going with your Wall Street guy. That’s where our loot’s coming from, isn’t it?”
She doesn’t answer. Just glares at him. She watches until he gets in the Caddy and drives away. She goes back into the den and stares at his empty brandy glass. Enraged, she backhands it off the desk, hoping it will shatter into a hundred pieces. But it bounces harmlessly on the shag rug, and she leaves it there.
She sits stiffly in the swivel chair, thinking of what happened. After a while she cools, and the fact that he came on to her seems small potatoes compared to the fact that the stupid prick has sunk over a half-mil on a stock tip. Suddenly she strikes her forehead with a palm and groans.
Feverishly she digs out the most recent issue of Standard amp; Poor’s Stock Guide. She looks up Trimbley amp; Diggs, Inc., and follows the numbers across to the column headed Capitalization. As she feared, T amp;D is very thinly capitalized. There is no preferred stock and only about 800,000 shares of common stock outstanding.
Then she begins laughing. It’s possible that there’s an insider leak at Snellig Firsten Holbrook, and it’s possible that arbitrageurs have learned of the leveraged takeover and are buying T amp;D for a quick profit. But it now seems obvious that the run-up of the stock’s price is mostly due to Sally buying 27,000 shares and Mario Corsini buying almost 100,000 shares.
Unknowingly, the two of them have been manipulating the goddamn stock! She can’t stop laughing, but eventually sobers long enough to realize that their manipulation can work both ways. If Corsini is liquidating his holdings, she better do the same. Take the money and run-before the whole thing blows away like a house of cards in a sudden belch.
So she unloads her first purchase of 9,000 shares the next morning, making a profit of about $36,000. She gives Paul Ramsey his 5 percent, and he looks at the cash in bemusement.
“Cool,” he says.
“I told you my sister is a financial genius,” Eddie tells him. “She’s a lousy cook, but she knows money.”
So everything’s coming up roses, and looking even better on Tuesday night when Sally, digging through the latest delivery of Bechtold Printing trash, finds smeared proofs on the letterhead of Pistol amp; Burns. There’s a merger in the works between two food processing companies, one small, one big and cash-rich.
Sally smiles grimly. That should keep Corsini happy until she can figure a way to get that murdering punk out of her life-permanently.
Six
Timothy Cone looks up the telephone number of Edward Steiner, West 47th Street, in the Manhattan directory and calls from the loft.
“Mr. Steiner?”
“Yes. Who’s this?”
“Our name is Silas Farthingale. We are the director of client data for the Carlton Insurance Company. A Miss Sally Steiner has applied for a single-premium annuity policy with Carlton. It pays a death benefit, of course, and Miss Steiner has listed you as one of her beneficiaries, giving us your name and address. Unfortunately, she neglected to fill out the space in which the relationship should be stated. We have attempted to contact Miss Steiner, but she seems to be out. We wonder if you’d be willing to state your relationship to Miss Steiner so her application can be processed as expeditiously as possible.”
“Sure,” Eddie says, laughing. “I’m her brother.”
“We thank you very much, Mr. Steiner.”
So now Cone knows that much. The two, brother and sister, could be in it together, but he’s inclined to think the woman is the mover and shaker in these stock deals. After all, she’s the one who bought 10,000 shares of Wee Tot Fashions in her own name. Then Jeremy Bigelow shows up and asks questions. So now Sally is using a front: Paul Ramsey, her brother’s roommate. And she’s buying Trimbley amp; Diggs in 9,000-share lots, figuring that will keep the SEC off her tail.
And those other 9,000-share buys in cities all over the country? Maybe those buyers are friends of Sally Steiner, too. But that’s so neat a solution that Cone is inclined to doubt it.
But none of his theorizing sheds any light on the Steiner woman’s pipeline into Wall Street. She must have an informant down there-unless …
She runs a garbage collection outfit, doesn’t she? So maybe she’s picking up trash from Pistol amp; Burns, Snellig Firsten Holbrook, and God knows how many other investment bankers and stockbrokers. And maybe she’s flipping through that rubbish to glean her inside information. It’s possible. Cone remembers warning G. Fergus Twiggs about safeguarding the contents of Pistol amp; Burns’ wastebaskets by purchasing more efficient shredders.
He digs out the Manhattan Yellow Pages and, in the section headed Rubbish amp; Garbage Removal, finds the address and phone number he wants. He calls.
“Steiner Waste Control.”
“My name is Herschel Dingby. I’m opening a restaurant in the Wall Street area in a month or so, and I’d like to talk to someone at your company to arrange for daily garbage collection.”
“We don’t service any customers below Fourteenth Street.”
“Pistol and Burns. May I help you?”
“Could I speak to Mr. G. Fergus Twiggs, please. Timothy Cone of Haldering and Company calling.”
“Just a moment, please, sir.”
It’s more than a moment, but Cone waits patiently. Eventually the senior partner comes on the line, and they exchange brief pleasantries. Then the Wall Street dick gets down to business.
“Are you a betting man, Mr. Twiggs?”
Short pause, then: “I wouldn’t be in this business if I wasn’t. What do you want me to bet on?”
“Me,” Cone says. “Look, I know that technically Haldering’s job is finished at your shop. I submit a final
