The First Billion

Hanging up the phone, Kirov turned off the lights and went back to bed. It wouldn't do to look haggard on the most important day of his life. Sleep came easier than expected. It helped immensely to know that when he visited the New York Stock Exchange in the morning, he would have plenty of friends with him.

***

Gavallan paced the tarmac at Shannon International Airport, tired, frustrated, and impatient. Salt and brine from the ocean laced the air, giving the predawn sky a welcome bite. He told himself he should be asleep in the plane like Cate, gathering his energy for the coming day. Lord knew, he was tired. But he was too keyed up to sleep.

Delays. Delays.

They had landed at two o'clock local time to top off their tanks before crossing the Atlantic. Three hours later, they were still there. A bulb in the starboard fuel gauge had burned out and the pilot had refused to take off until it had been replaced. Gavallan had tried to bribe him, but such was military operating procedure that the pilot would not consider the proposal for all the money in the world. The future tottered on the availability of a lousy ten-cent part. Gavallan wanted to scream.

A mist was building over the grass that bordered the runways. Soon it would turn to fog and the airport would be socked in. He looked up briefly, catching the blinking lights of another plane flying high overhead. He couldn't know it, but inside the plane a short, wiry man slept, a blanket pulled to his neck. He was traveling to America for the first time. In fact, it was the first time he had ever traveled anywhere outside of his country. A matter of some importance had forced a hasty and unplanned departure. A business arrangement that needed squaring.

In his sleep, he was dreaming of the old country. Of the rough mountains where he had grown up. Of the rocky soil and rushing streams. Of the impoverished villages and the indomitable people who inhabited them. Some called it the "bandit country," and in truth it was a land that robbed its people of much. But out of nature's cruelty, they had learned to rely on themselves. To count on one another. In these mountains, a man's word was his most valuable asset. He gave it sparingly and with his fullest commitment. While nature was capricious, man had an obligation to be steadfast. To break one's word, then, was to break with his fellow man. Nature could not be punished for its whimsy, but a man could. And the punishment would be awful.

The man dreamt of such punishment.

In his sleep, he smiled.

Gavallan lowered his eyes from the sky. The twin beams of an airport jeep cut through the light fog, advancing rapidly on him. It was the pilot, and as he passed he held up a small cardboard box for his passenger's inspection. "Five minutes and we're out of here."

Finally, thought Gavallan, jogging toward the plane.

64

Grafton Byrnes passed through the revolving doors of the Banque Privé de Genève et Lausanne on the Quai Guisan in Geneva at precisely 10 A.M. Tuesday morning. Announcing himself to the receptionist, he was shown to a conference room on the fourth floor. The picture window offered a splendid view of Lake Geneva. Byrnes ticked off the sights, running left to right. The Wilson House, where the League of Nations had first met in 1919; the enormous gray stone monuments that housed the European seat of the United Nations; and farther on, past copses of oak trees and manicured lawns, the building where GATT, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, was overseen.

There was a soft knock on the door, and a hunched, portly figure clutching a pad of paper in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other hurried into the room. "Hello, Mr. Byrnes. I am Pierre Pillonel. Welcome to our bank." He stared at his visitor through thick, owlish spectacles. His hair was mussed and his cheeks flushed and red-veined. If his demeanor was timid, his voice was anything but- a rolling, confident baritone that a politician would kill for. Setting down the paper and coffee, he extended a hand, pulling it back at the last moment. "Excuse me, I see you are injured."

"It's nothing," said Byrnes, turning his hand this way and that to show he was in no way hindered. "A mishap with my car. I find I'm getting clumsier with age. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice."

"A friend of my brother's is a friend of mine. Excuse me if I'm not quite myself. I'm still reeling from the news."

"I'm afraid I don't…" It was then that Byrnes noted the beleaguered cast to Pillonel's eyes. They were red and puffy. His nose was runny, his cheeks not flushed, but inflamed.