Let’s get one thing straight. Under normal circumstances passing the time of day in a pleasant little bar I know in downtown Boston is no bad thing. In fact, I usually positively welcome the chance to sink back into the sumptuous splendor of its cool leather seats, sup my beer and catch up on the news in peace. This, you understand, is no Cheers.
Today it was all the same – but horribly different. I’d sat for an hour reading the paper, slowly trickling down a cold beer and munching a few peanuts. All enjoyable stuff. The difference lay in that I’d arranged to meet a friend there for a drink as he passed through town on a roadshow.
There’s the rub. I’d always set this particular bar aside for solitude, reflection and control of my own time – an antidote to the stresses of the day. Now I was waiting for someone. The ball was in his court and I didn’t like that sort of infringement on my special drinking den. I felt insecure when I should have been relaxed. It was my fault, of course; I’d chosen the venue. But somehow that made it all a darned sight worse and even more his fault. Ben had better have a damn good explanation for his lack of punctuality.
He did and my pent-up anger collapsed under the effusiveness of his apologies. ‘God, I’m so sorry I’m late. No, really, really sorry. This horrible little worm at Fidelity was grilling us for ages. I thought it would never end. I’m so sorry.’ Ben collapsed into his seat and gratefully accepted my offer of a beer.
Some Englishman exude Britishness to a quite outstanding degree when overseas. Ben excelled at the art. It was almost as if he’d got up extra early to polish his accent, stripe his suit and fop his hair before venturing out into the Boston sunshine. In this most European of US cities he stood out like a sore thumb.
It turned out he was on a whistlestop tour with one of his continental European utility clients. Things weren’t going particularly well, either. The portfolio managers they had visited just weren’t convinced that his client was now free to pursue its own agenda. They suspected that the government in question would be ready to twist its retained shareholding to its own advantage as the next election drew closer or, at the very least, give the regulatory environment a bit of a favorable political nudge. In its bid to tempt US capital it currently stood out almost as much as its IR advisor did in his pinstripes.
‘The worst thing,’ sighed Ben, allowing nearly the whole of his body to get involved in a resigned shrug, ‘is that the institutions are probably right. It’s not a security; it’s an insecurity at the moment. I suspect there’s a bit of political back-slapping going on at the highest levels in the company. But I can’t even begin to broach the subject of more open discussion with my client. It’s just awful. I feel out of place on their side of the table. And I’m supposed to be part of a close-knit team.’
‘Maybe you should force their hand a little,’ I suggested. ‘Tell them you won’t work for them anymore unless they agree to open up on the issue of government interference. Get them to prepare some means of dealing with the questions.’
‘They’d dump me on the spot and then I’d really be in trouble back in London. Anyway, even if they were more open, who’s to say the government wouldn’t change its tune at a moment’s notice? They lack control. There’s nothing for it but to carry on papering over the cracks and keep on smiling. God, it’s like defending the indefensible.’
I chomped my way through a few more peanuts and marveled at the speedy turnaround in my own mood. Now he’d arrived, Ben’s input was actually quite enjoyable and my relaxation was feeding off his stress. In any case, tomorrow I’d be back to my solitude and more news of the Red Sox. Ben had at least another two weeks of his outside interference. His client had it way off into the future.
Strange how a couple of beers made life look a whole lot rosier.
