Текст книги "Catch the Wolf of Wall Street"

Автор книги: Jordan Belfort

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Bo said, “There's gotta be a way to get her to spill the beans quicker.”

The former actress: “Maybe I could strike up a friendship with her. I mean, what if I walked into next week's meeting, hysterically crying, saying that my husband just beat me or something?” The actress paused for a moment. “From what little I know about your wife, Jordan, I think she would come running to my side to help me.”

Oh, good Lord!I thought. I was going straight to hell with this one. There was no way I could ever let this happen. Never! Not in a million years! “That's an amazing idea, Debbie! You could invite her out for a drink even, and then get her sloshed. You should see what she's like with a couple of drinks in her. It's like truth serum!” Good God—what was I saying? “And I know the perfect place for you to bring her: It's called Buckram Stables. It's some old WASP hangout in Locust Valley; it's nice and quiet there, so you can make a clear tape.”

“This is terrible,” said Bo. “I can't allow this to happen”—a pause—”without giving Debbie some sort of small bonus, if she pulls it off.”

“Well, thank you,” said Debbie, “but have no fear: I'll pull it off. I'll just bring an onion with me and peel it in the car before I go into the meeting. I'll walk into that church with tears streaming down my cheeks!”

There were a few moments of silence.

“Christ!” said Bo. “This is bad, really bad. Let's do it!”

“I cannot allow this to happen!” I said forcefully. And then I said, “The only problem is that it's out of my control. It's already been decided. So what can I do?”

“Nothing,” answered Bo. “We've passed the point of no return.”

“Great,” said Debbie. “I'll go buy the onion!”

The man-haters club met once a week, on Wednesdays, and the meeting lasted for an hour, ending at eight p.m. Right now it was close to eleven, and I still hadn't heard from Bo. So I was pacing back and forth in my living room, trying to remain calm and doing my final calculations as to how much good karma I had left in my karma tank.

In a way, though, the Duchess had brought this upon herself, hadn't she? I mean, what man wouldn'twant to know his estranged wife's secret thoughts? I was no worse than any other obsessed husband! The only difference was that I had the resources to take things a bit further than most men. Besides, if she were willing to share her secret thoughts with the first stranger who came along… well, that made her secret thoughts fair game for public consumption.

In truth, I was pretty confident that I would be getting good news tonight. After all, I had gone through everything Debbie had said last week and, all in all, I had distilled the Duchess's inner thoughts down to two simple truths. Truth one: She still loved me, but she was confused. Truth two: In time, she would miss making love to me somuch that she would have no choice but to come back. Yes, even that day on the beach she had specifically raised the issue of sex two times: once referring to us as plain old sex maniacs (which was certainly a good thing), and also commenting on how we never came up for air (which was an even better thing!). Of course, I had heard the past disturbing rumblings about Michael Bolton and her dirt-bag personal trainer, Alex the Douche, but in the end they were probably just that: rumblings.

Emboldened by those truths, I had called Magnum last week and told him what was going on with the Duchess. “Would the Bastard object to me selling my Old Brookville house and buying a much cheaper house in the Hamptons?” Magnum had responded with cautious optimism. He was knee-deep in negotiations with the Bastard, he said, and the Bastard was being his usual difficult self. However, he thought he would look positively on anything I did to cut my expenses. Either way, he hoped to have a deal hammered out by the beginning of May, at which point I would go before Judge Gleeson and enter my guilty plea.

Just then I heard the phone ringing. It was Bo!I made a beeline for the kitchen. When I reached the phone, I froze dead in my tracks. It wasn't the phone; it was the intercom system that interfacedwith the phone. Someone was at the front gate! Who the hell? Cautiously, I picked up the phone. “Hello?”

“Yo—Bo!” said Bo. “It's me, Bo!”

“Bo!” I said to Bo. “What are you doing here?”

“Let me in. I'm making a personal delivery, Bo.”

I took a deep breath, trying to remain calm and trying to keep track of all the Bo-Bos. It could only be good news, I thought. Why else would Bo drive all the way out to Southampton? If it was bad news he would've just called me on the phone—unless, of course, he was one of those people who took joy in seeing another's misery up close and personal. No, Bo was not like that! How could I even think such a thing? He was a true friend, Bo, and he'd proved his loyalty to me a thousand times over. He just wanted to bring me the good news in person.

“Yo—Bo!” snapped Bo. “Are you gonna open the gate-atationor what?”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “I'm sorry, Bo.” I punched in the gate code and headed for the door.

A few minutes later we were sitting at my dining-room table, beneath a wrought-iron chandelier that cost a bloody fortune. Resting on the bleached-wood table was a small tape recorder. Bo was yet to reveal the contents of the tape; he was still in the process of explaining how former actress Debbie Starling had given an Academy Award-winning performance, quickly worming her way into the Duchess's confidence.

“….and the onionatationtrick worked like a fucking charm,” Bo was saying. “So, Debbie's sneezing and wheezing her little head off, and the tears are streaming down her face-atation,as she's telling your wife about how her husband called her this and that and everything else. And, of course, the uh… the Duchesswas very sympathetic to that, because that's how she is with everything.” Bo shrugged. “So the two of them bonded before the meeting even got started.”

I nodded and scratched my chin thoughtfully. “Huh,” I muttered. “That sounds pretty good so far. So what did she say during the meeting?”

Bo shook his head slowly. “It's not what she said duringthe meeting; it's what she said afterthe meeting.”

I perked up. “Oh, really? They went for dinner?”

Bo began rubbing his beard. “Drinks,” he answered. “You know, like in vino veritas.”

“Interesting,” I said. “So what truthsdid the vinodraw out?”

Bo twisted his lips and nodded in resignation. “Well, I think you could stop your house-hunting, Bo. It's not recommended given the, uh, current circumstances.”

All at once I felt my heart drop to my stomach. The Duchess had been deceiving me!Such underhandedness! Was there no level she wouldn't stoop to? To play me for a house showed a complete lack of ethics on her part.

Bo continued: “You know, I came out here tonight because I look at you as more of a friend than a client, Bo.” With that he paused and looked down at the tape recorder, which was no bigger than a deck of playing cards, and then he looked back up. “So I'll make you a deal, Bo: This whole bugatationexercise has run about five Gs so far, but if you let me destroy the tape before you listen to it, we'll call it even. I'll pay Debbie out of my own pocket. But if you make me press the play button, then you gotta pay me. It's your call.”

With a sinking heart, I looked down at the tape recorder. Christ, it was an evil little instrument! So small it was, so tiny… so very fucking deceptive! It was the bearer of bad news, the bringer of bad karma. “It can't be that bad, Bo, can it?”

Bo shrugged. “Like I said, Bo: in vino veritas.”

I shook my head slowly, the saddest of smiles on my face. Then I let out a short chuckle that so much as said, “It serves me right!” And a chuckle that also said, “So this is it: the end of the line, the end of a marriage, the end of all my false hope.” My marriage is a coffin, I thought, and this is the final nail in it. I looked Bo in the eye and said, “Play the fucking tape!”

Bo nodded and hit the play button.

All I could hear at first was a low hum and some background noise, then a mumbled exchange with a waiter. Bo said, “I cued it up to the good part. They're in Buckram Stables, about to make a toast. Listen….”

I nodded and put my elbows on the edge of the dining-room table and crossed my arms, one atop the other. Then I rested my troubled brow on them, staring at the evil tape recorder from a side angle. It was all so terrible. I had bugged my own wife– the mother of my children!And what had Bo said? A woman's secret thoughts…

Just then I heard the Duchess's all-too-happy voice: “Here's to breaking the cycle!” And now the actress's surprisingly believable response: “Yes! To breaking the cycle of codependency!” Then the unmistakable clink of wineglasses.

“Can you believe this shit?” muttered Bo. “I never even heard of this codependency shit before. It's fucking mind-boggling.”

I nodded in agreement without lifting my head. Now the Duchess started talking again. She was bitching about me, saying that I had slept with hookers while we were married. Well, what had she expected? She had been my mistress, for Chrissake! She knew what I was up to wellbefore she married me—and now she was holding it against me.

All at once I was jerked alert: “Well, I've been having the best sex of my life lately; I'll tell you thatmuch! I mean, the last few years with my husband were so boring—you know, the same position over and over again.”

Whuh—how could she? She was emasculating me in front of Debbie—a total stranger! Someone in my employ! How could the Duchess say I sucked in bed? I didn't! I used to rock her world! She used to call me her little prince

Against my better judgment, I snuck a peek at Bo, to gauge his reaction. Was he staring at me? Was he smiling? No. He wasn't. He was staring at the recorder, his face a mask of concentration. He was nodding his head slowly. And gritting his teeth, the way a person does when they're trying to make heads or tails of something. Suddenly he looked up. I opened my mouth, to defend myself against the Duchess's baseless accusations. No words came out. I couldn't think of anything to say. The Duchess had emasculated me in front of Bo too. To deny it would only make me seem guiltier.

Just then Bo smiled and shook his head. “It's all bullshit, Bo! Every wife says her husband sucks in bed. It's par for the fucking course.” He shrugged. “But if you happen to get another crack at nailing her, you should take some Viagratationbefore you stick it in; then you'll teach the girl a lesson!” With that he winked and looked back down at the recorder. I rested my brow back in my arms and prepared for more pain.

“Anyway,” said the voice on the tape, “I had a little thing going with my personal trainer for a while, and that was pretty good”– I knew it!—“but then I got sick of him, so I started dating Michael Bolton. You know him? The singer?”

Debbie's surprised voice: “Yeah, of course! What was helike?”

The Duchess's voice: “Oh, he was nice. Very romantic, actually. We spent a weekend together in the Plaza Hotel. We stayed in the Presidential Suite, and he filled the whole room up with fresh flowers.” The voice on the tape giggled. “Like I said, he was very romantic.”

I looked up at Bo. “That ungrateful bitch!” I snarled. “You know how many times I filled up the Presidential Suite with flowers for her? She forgets that!”

Bo nodded in understanding and then pointed back down at the recorder. “Listen to this, Bo; this is where it gets good.” I shook my head in disbelief and looked down at the evil little recorder. Bring on the pain, I thought.

The voice of the Duchess, twisting the knife: “Anyway, there's been some others too: I met a golf pro while I was up in Pennsylvania, learning about codependency, and then I was with one of my old boyfriends for a while, although that was only for old time's sake.” Then, much happier: “But now I'm involved with a guy who owns a big garment-center company! I kind of like him, actually, although he's a bit closed off emotionally. I'll have to wait and see.”

The voice of the actress: “So you think your husband's gonna buy you the house?”

A suddenly weary Duchess: “Well, I'm still working on him. He's very slick, so I have to handle him a certain way. See, I know he still wants to get back together with me, so I'm kind of using that to my advantage, you know, hinting that there's still a possibility.” A pause, then: “I know it's not the nicest thing to do, but I don't have much of a choice anymore. I won't lead him on any longer than I have to, though; once I get him to buy me the house, I'll file for divorce the next day. Then I can move on with my life. Maybe fall in love with one of the local contractors or an electrician. That would be—”

Bo hit the stop button. “You heard enough, Bo?”

I looked at Bo, speechless. The Duchess had buried me on tape. Yet, of everything she's said, it was the comment about doing it over and over again in the same position that had wounded me most. There had to be some words I could say to Bo to offset that poisonous comment. I racked my brain for them. They didn't exist. I had been officially emasculated. The most important thing was to make sure that Debbie was sworn to secrecy. What must she think of me!

“You all right, Bo?” asked Bo.

I nodded slowly. “Yeah, I'm all right. I'm fine.” I took a deep breath and forced up a smile. “Anyway, it sounds like she still hasn't made up her mind yet, you know, Bo? Maybe there's still hope, right?” I started chuckling.

Bo smiled warmly. “That's the spirit, Bo. You just gotta laugh it off.”

I nodded and smiled sadly, and then I looked around my beautiful home, marveling at its very splendor… and how little it all meant. The happiest I had ever been was with Denise, when we had nothing.

Just then Bo reached across the table and rested his massive hand on my forearm, squeezing it gently. In a dead-serious tone, he said, “Listen to me, Bo, because I'm not gonna bullshit you. What's happened to you over the last six months should happen to no man. There's no sugarcoating it. It sucks. It all sucks.” He shook his head slowly. “But you gotta take a deep breath now and pick up the pieces. It's time to be a man. You understand, Bo? To be a man?”

I nodded. “Yeah,” I said softly. “I do.”

He squeezed my arm tighter now. “No woman can get the best of you, Bo, no wife, no girlfriend, no mistress, no one. Except one. You know who that is, Bo?”

I nodded slowly, fighting back tears now. “Chandler,” I said softly.

“That's right, Bo: Chandler. She's the only one who counts now; the rest of them will come and go out of your life. And you owe it to her to stiffen your upper lip and hold your head high, and you owe it to that little son of yours too.” Bo smiled nostalgically. “I remember when he was first born and almost died of meningitis. I'll never forget how my heart dropped when Rocco called me that night from the hospital and told me what was going on. I went to church and said a prayer for him that night.”

I nodded, wiping a tear from the corner of my eye. “Well, it worked. He's a good kid. He's growing strong.”

Bo smiled. “Yes, he is, Bo, and he's gonna keep growing; then he's gonna look to you one day to show him what it means to be a man and to show him that no matter how much shit comes his way, in the end, he can always come out on top.” Bo shrugged his broad shoulders. “And that's it, Bo, that's the way it goes. Your kids are your constants; they're the only ones who can keep you going through shit like this.

“Anyway, you're about to find out who your true friends are and who was just along for the ride. Remember, friendships bought with money—”

“—don't last very long,” I said.

Bo nodded. “And loyalty bought with money—”

“—isn't loyalty at all,” I added.

“Exactly, Bo.” And with that he reached down to the tape recorder, hit the eject button, and removed the tape and held it up in the air. Then he said, “As far as I'm concerned, this whole thing never happened.” He slipped the tape into his inside suit-jacket pocket. “You don't owe me anything for this, Bo. All I want is your friendship, because, I, for one, am truly your friend. And I always will be.”

And I knew he was.

*Name has been changed

CHAPTER 16

WHEN A MAN LOVES A WOMAN

he next morning I woke up to:

Broooo!—Broooo!—Broooo!… Broooo!—Broooo!—Broooo!

I opened my right eye and, without lifting my head even an inch off the white silk pillowcase, I rolled my neck to the right and made eye contact with the phone of the future—a chrome-plated technological marvel, with two dozen red blinking lights and the world's most annoying ring, the latter of which sounded like a tiny sparrow caught in an electrical wire. The phone was resting on a fabulously expensive end table—part of a matching set, of course.

Broooo!—Broooo!—Broooo!… Broooo!—Broooo!—Broooo!“Jesus,”

I muttered. I was so sleepy… couldn't move. My head seemed to weigh a thousand pounds.

Broooo!—Broooo!—Broooo!… Broooo!—Broooo!—Broooo!

Christ! Who was calling at this hour? The audacity!I popped upright and took a deep, troubled breath. The white silk comforter was draped over my legs now, covering my loins, and in spite of being alone, my vanity caused me to look down at my bare torso and run my fingers over my abdominal muscles. They felt good; I was in fabulous shape. That was important now, especially if I wanted to attract another Duchess, but it wasn't nearly as important as being rich.

Well, at least I still had my mansion for a while. A shabby-chic mansion could be a very powerful aphrodisiac. I looked around the bedroom. The ceiling was thirty feet above the $150,000 tan and taupe carpet, and my bed was fit for a king. Thick bleached-wood poles, carved to resemble pinecones, rose up at all four corners of the bed, where they supported a canopy of tan and taupe Indonesian silk that matched the carpet perfectly. The Duchess loved her fucking canopies! And she loved her silk too. The mansion had seven bedrooms, and each one had a silk fucking canopy!

Broooo!—Broooo!—Broooo!… Broooo!—Broooo!—Broooo!

Fuck it!I reached over and picked up the chrome-plated phone.

“Hello?” I mumbled, in the sort of overly sleepy tone that implies you've been called at an inappropriate hour.

Alas, what I got in return was the bright and cheery voice of my least favorite codependent. “Rise and shine, sleepyhead!” declared the Duchess. “It's eight-thirty! We have an appointment with the real estate broker in two hours!” Cheery, cheery, cheery!

Why, the impudence!I was speechless! At a complete loss for words! What would she say next, that she was going to wear my favorite perfume today? Christ!If I hadn't promised not to blow Debbie's cover, I would be giving the dirty Duchess a piece of my mind right now.

The Duchess, still happy: “Wake up, sleepy-boy! Today's the first day of the rest of your life!” Then: “Why don't you have Gwynne make you some coffee?”

“Gwynne doesn't get here ‘til nine,” I said tonelessly. “And I'm not in the mood for coffee.”

The Duchess, picking up my tone: “Well, someoneseems awful grumpy this morning! Why don't you open the shades and let some light shine in? It's beautiful outside.”

I clenched my teeth in rage and slowly turned my head to the left, to the fabulous taupe shades. Must be twenty feet high, those fucking shades, and they must've cost a fortune! God—how I'd love to have that money right now in cash!

Suddenly—a brainstorm! “You know what?” I said happily. “You're right! I could use some light in here. Hold on a second, sweetie,” and I leaned over to the end table and grabbed the remote control of the future, which controlled everything in the bedroom, from the shades to the recessed lights to the twelve-foot-high entertainment center just across from the bed, with its forty-inch high-definition TV and $75,000 Fisher stereo system, which included, among other things, a three-hundred-CD disc changer.

First, the shades: Remote in hand, I hit a one-inch LCD square marked SHADES, and just like that, the shades slowly slid open, revealing a pair of twelve-foot-high French doors that opened onto a reddish mahogany deck looking out over the Atlantic. “Ah, light!” I said to the backstabber. “Hold on another second, sweetie,” and then I hit a button marked CD SEARCH—causing a new menu to pop up. I punched in the letters B—O—L—T—O—N,and an instant later Michael Bolton's Greatest Hitspopped onto the screen. This was accompanied by a rather annoying picture of him (with his big nose, narrow face, and ridiculous ponytail), along with a list of all seventeen of his ridiculously syrupy love songs, most of which he'd stolen from other, more talented artists and all of which were meant to manipulate the hearts and minds of unsuspecting females.

My teeth were still clenched in rage when I placed my index finger over the song “When a Man Loves a Woman,” and pressed it gently. Then I moved my finger to the button marked VOLUME UP, and I pressed that too and held it for a few seconds.

The still-happy Duchess: “What are you doing over there?”

“Nothing,” I said, staring at my shabby-chic entertainment center and hearing a few clicks and clacks as the CD changer did its thing. “I'm just putting on some music to start my day.”

“Really?” she said, a bit confused. Then: “Okay! I'm heading out to the beach soon. I figured we'd spend the day together.”

“Well, before you get in the car, Nadine, I think you should know that I'm having second thoughts about the Hamptons thing. In fact, I think you should stay put for a while in Old Brookville.”

Not so happy suddenly: “What are you talking about? I thought we already discussed this.”

Just then I heard the opening notes to the song. I took a deep breath, determined not to tip my hand. “Yeah,” I said icily, “but you're already set in your ways out there. You know, you've got all your activities lined up—all the Mommy and Me classes, the cooking classes. And I know how much you like having Alex as your personal trainer. Alex…” I paused for a moment, letting the Romanian dirt-ball's name hang in the air. “I couldn't imagine Alex spending an extra hour and a half driving out to the Hamptons. Know what I mean?”

“He doesn't train me anymore,” she said nervously.

“Oh, really? What happened?”

“Nothing; we had, uh, a little bit of a falling-out.”

Well, that's what happens when you fuck your personal trainer! I thought. But I couldn't just come out and say that, because that would compromise Bo. So I said, “Well, that's what happens when you fuck your personal trainer! You have a falling-out!” Sorry, Bo!

“What are you talking about?” she said defensively.

With venom: “Oh, you're gonna deny that you fucked that slime-bucket of a Romanian?”

“I… I didn't.”

“Oh, save it, Nadine! I know that smelly fuck was sleeping in my bed. I heard all about it.”

Just then I heard the repulsive voice of the ponytailed bastard: “When a man loves a woman, can't keep his mind on nothin’ else.”

I help up the phone to the ceiling for a second—to the 80-watt Bose surround-sound speakers—and then I put it back to my ear and heard the Duchess say, “…you please turn down the music!”

“It's not that loud,” I snapped, and I held the phone back up to the speakers again. Then I put it back to my ear and heard her scream, “… with you, Jordan!Stop! Why are you doing this?”

“Doing what?”I asked innocently. “Blasting Michael Bolton or talking about the Romanian slimeball? Which one?”

Calm panic: “Who's telling you all this?”

With a hiss: “Oh, please, Nadine! Who do you think you're dealing with? I've known about this shit for months!”

The Duchess struck back: “Yeah—well—who the fuck are youto throw stones? Like you've been a fucking angel out there? You slept with that disgusting Jewish girl who gave you all the blow jobs!” A moment of silence, then the Duchess continued, “I also know about all those crazy Russian girls. You'll never change! You're a whoremonger!”

“Yeah, you're right,” I snarled, “and you're a fucking codependent, who fucks her fellow codependents—like that washed-up golf pro from Pennsylvania. What did he offer you: free golf lessons with every lay?”

The Duchess, incredulous: “I… I don't know what you're talking about.”

Through clenched teeth: “I'll never forgive you for what you did, Nadine. You left me on the courthouse steps, you fucking bitch!”

Right back at me: “And you kicked me down the stairs, you fucking drug addict! I hope you die in jail!”

“Oh, yeah?” I snapped. “Well, I hope you die of codependency!” And I slammed down the phone. “Fucking whore!” I muttered to the phone of the future. I took a deep breath and tried to calm myself. Then the phone rang: Broooo!—Broooo!I picked it up in a millisecond: “What the fuck do you want now?”

“Well, fuck you too!” snapped my attorney. “What, are you having a bad morning over there?”

“Oh, hey, Greg!” I said happily. “What's going on?”

“Nothing,” he replied. “What's going on with you?”

I thought about that for a second. “Oh, nothing really. Just a little spat with my soon-to-be ex-wife.”

“I see,” said Magnum. “And can I ask why you're blasting Michael Bolton at eight-thirty in the morning? The guy sucks!”

“Oh, shit! Hold on a second.” I pressed pause on the remote control. “Sorry about that. I'm not a Michael Bolton fan; trust me. In fact, I'm gonna toss that fucking CD right in the microwave, just as soon as I get off the phone with you.”

“And why is that?” asked my attorney.

“Is this conversation privileged?”

“All our conversations are privileged.”

“Fair enough,” I said. “Well, I just found out that the Duchess was fucking Michael Bolton. Can you imagine?”

“Really?” said Magnum. “The guy's a loser! She could do better.”

“Oh, thanks a lot, Greg. Maybe you're not catching my drift here: Michael—Fucking—Bolton was porking my wife!”

“While you were together?”

“No! Not while we were married! Afterward!”

“So what are you so upset about? You haven't exactly been sitting on your hands out there. Anyway, can you come into the city today?”

“Why? Did something bad happen?”

“I wouldn't say bad,” he replied, “but it's not the bestnews in the world. I worked out your deal with Joel.”

“How long can I keep the houses for?” I asked quickly.

“Well, it's different for you and Nadine,” he answered cautiously. “But I'd rather discuss it in person. Take a ride into the city, and we'll order up some sandwiches and have a working lunch. I'd like Nick to be a part of this too.”

I thought for a moment, deciding whether or not to press for more details, but then he said, “And I have some good news for you too, and it concerns your friend Joel. So keep your chin up and I'll see you in a few hours, okay?”

I smiled into the phone. “You got it!” I said heartily. “I'll be there by noon.” And I hung up the phone of the future, knowing that Magnum could mean only one thing: The Bastard was leaving the U.S. Attorney's Office.

My towering attorney was sitting behind his desk, the starchy Yale-man was sitting to my right, and I was sitting directly across from Magnum at justthe right angle to sneak peeks at a photograph of him and Judge Gleeson, which had been taken when they worked together at the U.S. Attorney's Office. And as the three of us engaged in idle chatter about the deficiencies in our golf swings, I found myself tuning in and out—focusing on the picture of Judge Gleeson instead and praying that when the time came he would remember that Magnum and he were good friends.

“… causes me to shank the ball,” Magnum was now saying. “That's why I keep my right elbow close to my hip.” He shrugged knowingly. “It's the key to any good golf swing.”

Who gives a shit! I thought. “Yeah, that's true,” I said, and can we please get down to my case, for Chrissake?

The Yale-man chimed in. “It is,” he added, “but that's not your problem, Greg. It's your grip. It's much too weak; that's why you keep hitting off the hozzle.” He shrugged. “It's simple geometry, really. When you cut across…”

Oh, Jesus Christ! Save me!I tuned out again. I had been in their office for fifteen minutes, and so far so good. As I'd suspected, the Bastard was planning to leave the U.S. Attorney's Office. Just when, Magnum wasn't so sure, although he'd heard from “reliable sources” that the Bastard would be gone before the year was out. The goodnews was, that meant someone else would be writing my 5K letter, and, chances were, they'd be more benevolent than the Bastard.

The bad news, however, was that the Bastard would want my cooperation made public before he resigned. There were a multitude of reasons for this, Magnum explained, not the least of which was that my guilty plea (and subsequent cooperation) was a big-time feather in the Bastard's cap, which he would use to secure a partnership at a major law firm. In addition, there was an emotional component involved, inasmuch as the Bastard wanted his fifteen minutes of fame, where he would get to hold a press conference and say: “Not only have I brought the Wolf of Wall Street to justice, but I've also turned him into a world-class rat—thereby making unprecedented leaps toward the eradication of small-cap securities fraud in America.”

What the Bastard wouldn't say, however, was that small-cap securities fraud was more prevalent nowthan in Stratton's heyday. In fact, with the proliferation of the Internet, stock scams had been elevated to an entirely new level, and God only knew how many millions were being lost each day as a result of puffed-up e-mails, fraudulent message boards, and dot-com mania.

Still, there was no denying that the Bastard's departure was good news for me, so the three of us had felt entitled to spend the last few minutes congratulating ourselves. My lawyers seemed to be chalking it up to some clever legal strategy on their part, although I was convinced that it had more to do with my long-term value as a rat exceeding the Bastard's patience to work for the federal government at near slave wages. Whatever the case, this information was strictly on the QT, and I was not to breathe a word of it to anyone.