Numbered Account

Sylvia dropped into a chair, her head slumped to her chest. "My brothers haven't come to the house in three years. It's just my father and me. Last night, he spent five minutes berating me for having forgotten to tell them. I just nod and say I'm sorry. So are you satisfied? Happy now that you know all about my daddy's love of beer? How I've abandoned him to grow old alone?"

Nick walked to the dining room table and sat beside her. He felt utterly distraught. His carefully constructed case lay in shambles, a house of cards toppled by a single breath. How could he have been so stupid? How could he have doubted her for a minute? He had distrusted Sylvia when it really counted, insulting her instead of showing his faith in her. Look at her actions. She's been helping you every step of the way. Why can't you just accept that she likes you? That she wants to give you a hand? Why can't you learn that it's okay to rely on somebody else?

"I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to embarrass you."

Sylvia wrapped her arms around herself like a distressed schoolgirl. "Why didn't you believe me when I told you the first time? I wouldn't lie to you."

Nick placed his hands on her shoulders. "I'm sorry. I can't really explain why…"

"Don't touch me," she cried. "I feel like a fool. I didn't tell Wolfgang Kaiser about Armin Schweitzer. If you don't like that answer, get the hell out of here."

Nick tried again to gently cup her shoulders. This time she allowed herself to be touched and then drawn to his chest. "I believe you," he said quietly. "But I had to ask. I had to know."

Sylvia buried her head in Nick's chest. "I took it for granted he would be caught. I always expected it to happen. That doesn't mean I opened my mouth like an indiscreet teenager, blabbing to everyone who might have an interest in what Peter Sprecher had discovered." She laid her head back so that she could see his eyes. "I would never betray your confidence."

Nick held her close to him for a while longer. He smelled the clean scent of her hair and delighted in the drape of her cashmere sweater. "These last weeks have been tough. It's as if I've been under water, swimming with a straitjacket. If I can make it through tomorrow, maybe we'll come out of this all right."

"Is it about your father? You didn't tell me if you found Caspar Burki."

"Oh, I found him all right."

"And?"

Nick held her at arm's length, deciding what he could tell her. Was her knowing part of the bonds that lovers share or simply an admission of his own weakness- a foolish gesture to assuage his guilt at having wounded her fragile heart?

"Tell me, sweetheart," she pleaded. "What did you find out?"

"A lot of things are happening. Things you wouldn't believe…"

"What are you talking about? The takeover?"

"Konig has his thirty-three percent. He's lined up outside financing to make a full bid for the shares he doesn't own. He wants the whole bank. And that's the good news."

Sylvia sagged visibly. "The good news?" Her bewildered expression made it clear she didn't want to hear the bad news.

Nick looked into her eyes and told himself he saw compassion and love. He was tired of being alone, of shouldering life's burden without someone else's help. Tired of suspecting. Why not tell her the rest of it?

"Kaiser is working for Ali Mevlevi," he said, "the man we call the Pasha. He's been helping him launder money for years. Lots of it. Mevlevi is a drug lord operating out of Lebanon, and Kaiser is his man in Switzerland."

Sylvia raised her hand to stop Nick. "How do you know these things?"

"You'll have to take my word. All I can say is that everything I'm telling you I've seen with my own eyes."

"I can't believe it. Maybe this Mevlevi is blackmailing the Chairman; maybe Herr Kaiser has no other choice?"

"Kaiser's crimes aren't limited to his dealings with Mevlevi. He was so desperate to stop Konig from obtaining his seats that he ordered several of us on the Fourth Floor to sell off a large percentage of stocks and bonds held in our clients' discretionary portfolios and to reinvest their money in USB stock. He's violated the trust of hundreds of clients who placed their money in numbered accounts at the bank. He's broken dozens of laws. No one made him do that!"

"But he's only trying to keep the bank free from Konig. It's his, after all."

Nick grasped her hands in his own. "Sylvia, the bank does not belong to Wolfgang Kaiser. He's a salaried employee like you and me. Sure he's spent his life building it up, but he's been hugely rewarded. What do think a guy like that makes? Over a million francs a year easy. On top of that, I wouldn't be surprised if he's received options for thousands of shares of company stock. The bank is owned by its shareholders. It's not Kaiser's private fiefdom. Someone has to stop him."

"You're scaring me with that talk."

"You should be scared. We all should be. Kaiser is as bad as Mevlevi. Neither of the bastards have the least respect for anybody's law. They kill to see that their will is done."