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Bad news traveled fast at Aquinnah, as it did in the whole financial world. The worse the news, the faster it sped through the circuits. And this news was very bad.

Aquinnah’s fixed-income division had invested a huge sum—10 percent of the firm’s assets—in Argentinian debt. The news was all over the Wall Street Journal online and Bloomberg and everywhere else: Argentina had defaulted.

While Paul had been having fun with Madagascan vanilla, Aquinnah’s fixed-income division had lost their shirts. To be specific, they’d lost over four hundred million dollars, or 10 percent of all the assets under management. That erased all gains elsewhere at Aquinnah.

It was a disaster. There was no more cash to deploy in the firm. Nothing more to invest, which meant that Paul’s team couldn’t buy stocks. All activity was frozen. And no one would get bonuses.

Everyone, even those who had had nothing to do with the bond guys’ fuckup, was affected. People were leaving the firm in droves. Over the course of one day, Paul realized there was no future for him at Aquinnah.

*

That same afternoon, he got a call from a recruiter. He got such calls from time to time. Headhunters are much reviled in the industry, but they’re used by everybody, and this time, Paul decided to take the call. He was interested in what they had to say.

Everyone on the Street knew what had happened at Aquinnah. They all smelled blood in the water. The headhunter was calling on behalf of the largest hedge fund in the world, Bridgeport Associates, headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut. It was founded and run by Steve D’Orazio and worth twenty-five billion dollars. In 2008, when just about every hedge fund tanked, Bridgeport was up 10 percent. D’Orazio had self-published a book of advice and investing philosophy. He called it Wisdom .

Bridgeport Associates was famous for having an abusive and cruel workplace. Thirty percent of all new employees left within a year. Paul had always sworn he’d never take a job there.

“Tell me what you have in mind,” he said to the headhunter.

*

Tatyana was at home feeding Pushkin, who was a picky eater, easily distractible. When Paul arrived home, the dog trotted to the front door to greet him, jumping up, paws in the air. This was a first.

Paul liked dogs, as much as a non–dog owner could, but he’d found his approaches to Pushkin mostly thwarted. He would lean down to pet the little creature, but Pushkin would scuttle away. Pushkin was a one-person dog.

“You’re home early,” Tatyana said, kissing him. “I need your help.”

“I need a drink,” Paul said.

“First, can you plunge the toilet?”

She had a balky toilet that was prone to overflowing. Since moving into her apartment, Paul had plunged it a number of times. It was one of the things he didn’t like about living in Tatyana’s apartment, besides the fact that it was too small: there wasn’t even room for his clothes, which he piled in neat stacks on the floor.

When he returned from plunging the toilet, Tatyana handed him a drink and thanked him. She’d poured him some Four Roses over ice. She had bought bourbon for him after he moved in. She’d poured herself a glass of Whispering Angel rosé.

They sat at her old enamel-top kitchen table, and Paul told her what had happened at Aquinnah. It took some explaining; she didn’t understand what “fixed-income” meant or how debt worked, but when he told her he wouldn’t be getting a bonus (the biggest part of his annual income, normally) and had no chance of being promoted, then she got it.

He told her about the call from the headhunter.

“Sounds like a good job,” she said. “Are you going to take it?”

“Let me tell you about Steve D’Orazio,” he said. “He was fired from his first job for punching his boss in the face when he was drunk.”

“Oh.”

“He’s a world-class asshole. He has a philosophy he calls radical honesty. Which means that he and all other supervisors and officers of the company feel free to be abusive to their underlings. When you go into work each morning at Bridgeport, you have to lock up your personal cell phone. All employees are under surveillance at all times. D’Orazio’s famous for saying, ‘If you’re not worried, you need to worry.’”

“You wouldn’t work there, would you?”

He gave her a look.

“Good,” she said. “And my father’s offer?”

“You want me to work for your father, don’t you?”

“Me? Don’t misunderstand me, Pasha. I want to support you. I want you to do whatever you want.”

“You don’t care?”

“I mean, it would be nice, but it’s your decision. Really.”

*

The next morning, the whole office was visibly demoralized. People were gathered in clumps, talking nervously about what was going to happen. Michael Rodriguez clapped Paul on the back and said, “Adios, bud.”

“You’re leaving?”

“Got a job at Baupost, in Boston. Less money, but still . . .”

“Congrats. That’s a great place.”

“How about you? Are you staying?”

Paul shook his head.

“Have you told Karp yet?” Karp was their immediate boss; he generally stayed out of the way, in his office. “Or Bernie?”

“I have some emails to write,” Paul said. He emailed Karp, then sent an email to Bernie, thanking him for everything.

Twenty seconds later, his email notification chimed. It was Bernie, asking him to come to his office right away.

Paul was expecting Bernie to try to talk him out of his decision to work for Arkady, so he arrived at Bernie’s office armed with arguments. Instead, Bernie, who was slumped in his chair, looking haggard, not like his usual energetic self, said, “I get it.”

“About leaving?”

“I’d do the same thing, if I was you.”

“Thanks for understanding.”

“I’m sure you have your choice of firms. You want me to put in a good word, just tell me.”

“Thanks, but I think I know where I’m going.”

“Boris Badenov?”

“Who?”

“You probably never saw Rocky and Bullwinkle .”

“Before my time.”

“Boris Badenov was the bad guy. I think he was supposed to be Russian. Called himself the world’s greatest no-goodnik. Had a pencil-thin mustache. Spoke in a bad Russian accent.”

Paul shook his head slowly.

“Let’s grab a steak, okay?” Bernie said.

*

They went out for a drink and a steak at Bernie’s favorite Irish pub in Manhattan. O’Malley’s was the real thing. It offered bangers and mash and shepherd’s pie, decent steaks, and Irish lamb stew. The stained-glass windows in the main room added an ecclesiastical note. Bernie had frequented O’Malley’s since he was a young trader and just liked the place. The roar of traffic from the street was, thankfully, remote.

They started with black-and-tans, Guinness layered on top of Bass Ale.

“What kind of shop does Galkin run?” Bernie asked. “It’s not a hedge fund.”

“It’s an investment fund. I think it just manages his money, his real estate portfolio, and so on. Sort of a glorified family office.”

“How much they run?”

“I don’t know.”

“What’s he worth, Galkin?”

Paul told Bernie the figure he’d heard. It was a lot.

“And do you know where it’s from, all his money?”

Paul didn’t reply. He took a long sip, set down the pint glass, shrugged.

Bernie answered his own question: “Who the hell knows, right? You know, there’s rumors about Galkin. That he got his start by blowing up the competition with a car bomb.”

“Seriously?” Paul asked.

“That his adversaries have an unfortunate way of dying.”

“You don’t really believe those rumors, do you?”

“That’s the trouble. It’s like you’re walking through a cave where you just don’t know what’s around the corner. You don’t want to put yourself in that position, Paul.”

The steaks arrived sizzling on aluminum platters, medium rare, which was how both men liked them. They tucked into their food, and Bernie continued as if in the middle of a thought. “You know what tsuris means?” he said.

“Come on, Bernie,” Paul said through a mouthful of rib-eye. He’d been around Bernie long enough. It was a Yiddish word that meant “trouble.”

“Well, working for immediate family, that’s the definition of tsuris. You’re going to work for your father-in-law?”

Paul shrugged, gave a crooked smile.

“Plus, look, we got a good thing going, you and me.”

“I know,” Paul admitted. “I feel bad about that.”

“These Russian guys, these oligarchs, whatever you want to call them—you don’t know whether they’re criminals. You don’t know whose side they’re on.”

“Whose side ? Bernie, this isn’t the Cold War. It’s not like the capitalists versus the communists. These guys are all on the side of capitalism. They’re on the side of making money, which is our side, right?”

“I don’t think it works that way,” Bernie said, and he deposited another big chunk of prime beef into his mouth. There was silence as he chewed, then swallowed. “I need you, man. Like, when you dug down deep into Cavalier Enterprises and saved me from a lot of legal mishegas . And shame. You were a goddamned hero.”

“Thank you. That means a lot.”

“Maybe we could work out a partnership stake. I mean, it’ll be tight in the short run, but five years from now, you’ll be raking it in.”

“I’ve decided,” Paul said.

“But, candidly, Paul, I think you’re making a mistake.”

“I appreciate that, but I don’t agree,” said Paul.

Bernie nodded. “I hate to see you go, but that’s not it. I’m telling you as your friend. This is a mistake. Don’t make it.”