Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less Read online

  Early in 1972 he hired an oil rig which, with much flourish and advance publicity, he had towed out to the Prospecta Oil site. Having hired the rig on the basis of being able to renew the contract if he made a successful strike, he engaged the minimum number of workers allowed by the Government Regulations, and then proceeded to drill to 6,000 feet. After this drilling had been completed he released from the company’s employment all those involved, but told Reading & Bates, from whom he had rented the rig, that he would be requiring it again in the near future and therefore would continue to pay the rental.

  Harvey then released Prospecta Oil shares onto the market at the rate of a few thousand a day for the next two months, all from his own stock, and whenever the financial journalists of the British Press rang to ask why these shares were steadily rising, the young public relations officer at Prospecta Oil’s city office would say, as briefed, that he had no comment to make at present but there would be a press statement in the near future; some newspapers put two and two together and made about fifteen. The shares climbed steadily from 10 pence to nearly £2 under the guidance of Harvey’s chief executive in Britain, Bernie Silverman, who, with his long experience of this kind of operation, was only too aware of what his boss was up to. Silverman’s main task was to ensure that nobody could show a direct connection between Metcalfe and Prospecta Oil.

  In January 1974 the shares stood at £3. It was then that Harvey was ready to move on to the third part of his plan, using Prospecta Oil’s enthusiastic new recruit, a young Harvard graduate called David Kesler, as the fall guy.

  Chapter Two

  DAVIS PUSHED HIS glasses back onto the bridge of his nose and read the advertisement in the Business Section of the Boston Globe again, to make sure he was not dreaming. It could have been tailormade for him:

  Oil Company based in Great Britain, carrying out extensive work in the North Sea off Scotland, requires a young executive with experience in the stock market and/or financial marketing. Salary $25,000 a year. Accommodation supplied. Based in London. Apply Box No. 217A.

  Knowing it could lead to other openings in an expanding industry, David thought it sounded like a challenge and wondered if they would consider him experienced enough. He recalled what his tutor in European affairs used to say: “If you must work in Great Britain, better make it the North Sea. With their union problems, there’s nothing else great about the country.”

  David Kesler was a lean, clean-shaven young American, with a crew cut which would have been better suited to a lieutenant in the Marines, a fresh complexion and an unquenchable earnestness. David wanted to succeed in business with all the fervor of the new Harvard Business School graduate. He had spent six years in all at Harvard, the first four studying mathematics for his Bachelor degree, and the last two across the Charles River at the Business School. Recently graduated and armed with a B.A. and an M.B.A., he was looking for a job that would reward him for the exceptional capacity for hard work he knew he possessed. Never a brilliant scholar, he envied those natural academics among his classmates who mastered post-Keynesian economic theories like children learning their multiplication tables. David had worked ferociously for six years, only lifting his nose far enough from the grindstone to fit in a daily workout at the gymnasium and the occasional weekend watching Harvard Jocks defending the honor of the university on the football field or on the basketball court. He would have enjoyed playing himself, but that would have meant less time for study.

  He read the advertisement again, and then typed a carefully prepared letter to the box number. A few days passed before a reply came, summoning him for an interview at a local hotel on the following Wednesday at 3:00.

  David arrived at 2:45 P.M. at the Copley Hotel on Huntingdon Avenue, the adrenaline pumping through his body. He repeated the Harvard Business School motto to himself as he was ushered into a small private room: look British, think Yiddish.

  Three men, who introduced themselves as Silverman, Cooper and Elliott, interviewed him. Bernie Silverman, a short, gray-haired, check-tied New Yorker with a solid aura of success, was in charge. Cooper and Elliott sat and watched David silently.

  Silverman spent a considerable time giving David an enticing description of the company’s background and its future aims. Harvey had trained Silverman carefully and he had at his well-manicured fingertips all the glib expertise needed by the right-hand man in a Metcalfe coup.

  “So there you have it, Mr. Kesler. We’re involved in one of the biggest commercial opportunities in the world, drilling for oil in the North Sea off Scotland. Our company, Prospecta Oil, has the backing of a group of banks in America. We have been granted licenses from the British Government and we have the financing. But companies are made not by money, Mr. Kesler, but by people—it’s as simple as that. We’re looking for a man who will work night and day to help put Prospecta Oil on the map, and we’ll pay the right man a top salary to do just that. If we offer you the position, you’ll be working in our London office under the immediate direction of our Managing Director, Mr. Elliott.”

  “Where are the company headquarters?”

  “New York, but we have offices in Montreal, San Francisco, London, Aberdeen, Paris and Brussels.”

  “Is the company looking for oil anywhere else?”

  “Not at the moment,” answered Silverman. “We’re sinking millions into the North Sea after B.P.’s successful strike, and the fields around us have so far had a one-in-five success ratio, which is very high in our business.”

  “When would you want the successful applicant to start?”

  “Some time in January, when he’s completed a government training course on management in oil,” said Richard Elliott. The slim, sallow No. 2 sounded as if he was from Georgia. The government course was a typical Harvey Metcalfe touch—maximum credibility for minimum expense.

  “And the company apartment,” said David, “where’s that?”

  Cooper spoke:

  “You’ll have one of the company flats in the Barbican, a few hundred yards away from our London City office.”

  David had no more questions—Silverman had covered everything and seemed to know exactly what he wanted.

  Ten days later David received a telegram inviting him to join Silverman for lunch at the 21 Club in New York. When David arrived at the restaurant, he recognized a host of well-known faces at nearby tables and felt new confidence: his host obviously knew what he was about. Their table was in one of the small alcoves selected by businessmen who prefer their conversations to remain confidential.

  Silverman was genial and relaxed. He stretched the conversation out a little, discussing irrelevancies, but finally, over a brandy, offered David the position in London. David was delighted: $25,000 a year, and the chance to be involved with a company which obviously had such an exciting future. He did not hesitate in agreeing to start his new appointment in London on January 1st.

  David Kesler had never been to England before: how green the grass was, how narrow the roads, how closed in by hedges and fences were the houses! It felt like Toy Town after the vast highways and large automobiles of New York. The small flat in the Barbican was clean and impersonal and, as Mr. Cooper had said, convenient for the office a few hundred yards away in Threadneedle Street.

  Prospecta’s offices consisted of seven rooms on one floor of a large Victorian building; Silverman’s was the only office with a prestigious air about it. There was a tiny reception area, a telex room, two rooms for secretaries, a larger room for Mr. Elliott and another small one for himself. It seemed very poky to David, but as Silverman was quick to point out, office rent in the City of London was $30 a square foot compared with $10 in New York.

  Bernie Silverman’s secretary, Judith Lampson, ushered David through to the well-appointed office of the Chief Executive. Silverman sat in a large black swivel chair behind a massive desk, which made him look like a midget. By his side were positioned four telephones, three white and one red. David was later to learn that
the important-looking red telephone was directly connected to a number in the States, but he never actually discovered to whom.

  “Good morning, Mr. Silverman. Where would you like me to start?”

  “Bernie, please call me Bernie. Take a seat. Notice the change in the price of the company’s shares in the last few days?”

  “Oh, yes,” enthused David. “Up a half to nearly $6. I suppose it’s because of our new bank backing and the other companies’ successful strikes?”

  “No,” said Silverman in a low tone designed to give the impression that no one else must hear this part of the conversation, “the truth is that we’ve made a big strike ourselves, but we haven’t yet decided when to announce it. It’s all in this geologist’s report.” He threw a smart, colorful document over his desk.

  David whistled under his breath. “What are the company’s plans at the moment?”

  “We’ll announce the strike,” said Silverman quietly, picking at his india rubber as he talked, “in about three weeks’ time, when we’re certain of the full extent and capacity of the hole. We want to make some plans for coping with the publicity and the sudden inflow of money. The shares will go through the roof, of course.”

  “The shares have already climbed steadily. Perhaps some people already know?”

  “I guess that’s right,” said Silverman. “The trouble with that black stuff is once it comes out of the ground you can’t hide it.” Silverman laughed.

  “Is there any harm in getting in on the act?” asked David.

  “No, as long as it doesn’t harm the company in any way. Just let me know if anyone wants to invest. We don’t have the problems of inside information in England—none of the restrictive laws we have in America.”

  “How high do you think the shares will go?”

  Silverman looked him straight in the eye and then said casually, “$20.”

  Back in his own office, David carefully read the geologist’s report that Silverman had given him: it certainly looked as if Prospecta Oil had made a successful strike, but the extent of the find was not, as yet, entirely certain. When he had completed the report, he glanced at his watch and cursed. The geologist’s file had totally absorbed him. He threw the report into his briefcase and took a taxi to Paddington Station, only just making the 6:15 train. He was due in Oxford for dinner with an old classmate from Harvard.

  On the train down to the university city he thought about Stephen Bradley, who had been a friend in his Harvard days and had generously helped David and other students in mathematics classes that year. Stephen, now a visiting Fellow at Magdalen College, was undoubtedly one of the most brilliant scholars of David’s generation. He had won the Kennedy Memorial Scholarship to Harvard and later in 1970 the Wister Prize for Mathematics, the most sought-after award in the mathematical faculty. Although in monetary terms this award was a derisory $80 and a medal, it was the reputation and job offers it brought with it that made the competition so keen. Stephen had won it with consummate ease and nobody was surprised when he was successful in his application for a Fellowship at Oxford. He was now in his third year of research at Magdalen. His papers on Boolean algebra appeared at short intervals in the Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, and it had just been announced that he had been elected to a Chair in Mathematics back at his alma mater, Harvard, to commence in the fall.

  The 6:15 train from Paddington arrived in Oxford an hour later and the short taxi ride from the station down New College Lane brought him to Magdalen at 7:30. One of the College porters escorted David to Stephen’s rooms, which were spacious, ancient, and comfortably cluttered with books, cushions and prints. How unlike the antiseptic walls of Harvard, thought David. Stephen was there to greet him. He didn’t seem to have changed one iota. His suit seemed to hang off his tall, thin, ungainly body; no tailor would ever have employed him as a dummy. His heavy eyebrows protruded over his out-of-date round-rimmed spectacles, which he almost seemed to hide behind in his shyness. He ambled over to David and welcomed him, one minute an old man, the next younger than his thirty years. Stephen poured David a Jack Daniels and they settled down to chat. Although Stephen never looked upon David as a close friend at Harvard, he had enjoyed coaching him and always found him eager to learn; besides, he always welcomed an excuse to entertain Americans at Oxford.

  “It’s been a memorable three years, David,” said Stephen, pouring him a second drink. “The only sad event was the death of my father last winter. He took such an interest in my life at Oxford and gave my academic work so much support. He’s left me rather well off, actually…Bath plugs were obviously more in demand than I realized. You might be kind enough to advise me on how to invest some of the money, because at the moment it’s just sitting on deposit in the bank. I never seem to have the time to do anything about it, and when it comes to investments I haven’t a clue.”

  That started David off about his demanding new job with Prospecta Oil.

  “Why don’t you invest your money in my company, Stephen. We’ve had a fantastic strike in the North Sea, and when they announce it the shares are going to go through the roof. The whole operation would only take a month or so and you could make the killing of a lifetime. I only wish I had some of my own money to put into it.”

  “Have you had the full details of the strike?”

  “No, but I’ve seen the geologist’s report, and that makes pretty good reading. The shares are already going up fast and I’m convinced they’ll reach $20. The problem is that time is already running out.”

  Stephen glanced at the geologist’s report, thinking he would study it carefully later.

  “How does one go about an investment of this sort?” he asked.

  “Well, you find a respectable stockbroker, buy as many shares as you can afford and then wait for the strike to be announced. I’ll keep you informed on how things are going and advise you when I feel is the best time to sell.”

  “That would be extremely thoughtful of you, David.”

  “It’s the least I can do after all the help you gave me with math at Harvard.”

  “Oh, that was nothing. Let’s go and have some dinner.”

  Stephen led David to the college dining hall, an oblong, oak-paneled room covered in pictures of past Presidents of Magdalen, bishops and academics. The long wooden tables at which the undergraduates were eating filled the body of the hall, but Stephen shuffled up to the High Table and offered David a more comfortable seat. The students were a noisy, enthusiastic bunch—Stephen didn’t notice them, but David was enjoying the whole experience.

  The seven-course meal was formidable and David wondered how Stephen kept so thin with such daily temptations. When they reached the port, Stephen suggested they return to his rooms rather than join the crusty old dons in the Senior Common Room.

  Late into the night, over the rubicund Magdalen port, they talked about North Sea oil and Boolean algebra, each admiring the other for his mastery of his subject. Stephen, like most academics, was fairly credulous outside the bounds of his own discipline. He began to think that an investment in Prospecta Oil would be a very astute move on his part.

  In the morning, they strolled down Addison’s Walk near Magdalen Bridge, where the grass grows green and lush by the Cherwell. Reluctantly, David caught a taxi at 9:45 leaving Magdalen behind him and passing New College, Trinity, Balliol and finally Worcester, where he saw scrawled across the college wall, “c’est magnifique mais ce n’est pas la gare.” He caught the 10:00 A.M. train back to London. He had enjoyed his stay at Oxford and hoped he had been able to help his old Harvard friend, who had done so much for him in the past.

  “Good morning, David.”

  “Good morning, Bernie. I thought I ought to let you know I spent the evening with a friend at Oxford, and he may invest some money in the company. It might be as much as $250,000.”

  “That’s fine, David, keep up the good work. You’re doing a great job.”

  Silverman showed no surprise at D
avid’s news, but once back in his own office he picked up the red telephone.

  “Harvey?”

  “Yes.”

  “Kesler seems to have been the right choice. He may have talked a friend of his into investing $250,000 in the company.”

  “Good. Now listen carefully. Brief my broker to put 40,000 shares on the market at just over $6 a share. If Kesler’s friend does decide to invest in the company, mine will be the only large block of shares immediately available.”

  After a further day’s consideration, Stephen noticed that the shares of Prospecta Oil moved from £2.75 to £3.05 and decided the time had come to invest in what he was now convinced must be a winner. He trusted David, and had been impressed by the glossy geologist’s report. He rang Kitcat & Aitken, a firm of stockbrokers in the City, and instructed them to buy $250,000 worth of shares in Prospecta Oil. Harvey Metcalfe’s broker released 40,000 shares when Stephen’s request came onto the floor of the stock exchange and the transaction was quickly completed. Stephen’s purchase price was £3.10.

  After investing his father’s inheritance, Stephen spent the next few days happily watching the shares climb to £3.50, even before the expected announcement. Though Stephen didn’t realize it, it was his own investment that had caused the shares to rise. He began to wonder what he would spend the profit on even before he had realized it. He decided not to cash in immediately, but hold on; David thought the shares would reach $20, and in any case he had promised to tell him when to sell.

  Meanwhile, Harvey Metcalfe began to release a few more shares onto the market, because of the interest created by Stephen’s investment. He was beginning to agree with Silverman that David Kesler, young, honest, and with all the enthusiasm of a man in his first appointment, had been an excellent choice. It was not the first time Harvey had used this ploy, keeping himself well away from the action while placing the responsibility on inexperienced, innocent shoulders.