The Wolf of Wall Street

Just behind him, a large walnut bookcase rose up from the floor and touched the ceiling; it was a good twelve feet high. The bookcase was filled with hundreds of leather-bound books, all the same size, all the same thickness, and all the same dark-brown color. But each book had a different name on it, which was inscribed in gold-colored letters that ran down the side of the book, along its binding. I had seen books like this in the United States. They were official corporate books, the ones you received each time you formed a new corporation. Each one contained a corporate charter, blank stock certificates, a corporate seal, and so forth. Leaning against the bookcase was an old-fashioned library ladder with wheels at the bottom.

Roland Franks walked up to me and grabbed my hand before I even had a chance to lift it. He started shaking it vigorously. With a great smile he said, “Ahhh, Jordan, Jordan—you and I must become fast friends! I have heard so much about you from Jean Jacques. He tells me of your wonderful past adventures and of your future plans. There is so much to discuss and so little time, eh?”

I nodded eagerly, a bit overwhelmed by his warmth and girth, but I instantly liked him. There was something very honest about him, very forthright. He was a man who could be trusted.

Roland led me over to a black leather couch and gestured for me to take a seat, then he sat down on a matching black leather club chair. He removed an unfiltered cigarette from a sterling-silver case and tapped it on its end, to pack in the tobacco. From inside his pants pocket he pulled a matching sterling-silver lighter, ignited it, and tilted his head to the side to avoid being singed by the nine-inch butane flame. Then he took a deep pull from the cigarette.

I watched in silence. Finally, after a good ten seconds, he exhaled, but only a drop of smoke came out. Incredible! Where had it gone?

I was about to ask him when he said, “You must tell me about your flight over from the United States. It is the stuff of legend, as you would say.” He winked at me. Then he turned his palms up and shrugged, and said, “But me—ehhh—I am but a simple man, and there is only one woman in the world for me: my lovely wife!” He rolled his eyes. “Anyway, I have heard much about your brokerage firm and all the companies you own. So much for a man as young as you! I would say you are still very much a boy and yet…”

The Master Forger kept going on and on, talking about how young and wonderful I was, but I found it hard to follow him. I was too busy trying to follow his enormous jowls, which seemed to be swaying back and forth like a sailboat on a rough ocean. Roland had intelligent brown eyes, a low forehead, and a fat nose. His skin was very white, and his head seemed to sit directly upon his chest without the benefit of a neck. His hair was dark brown, almost black, and he wore it combed straight back over his round skull. And my first impression had been right: There was a certain inner warmth that this man exuded, a joie de vivre of someone completely comfortable in his own skin, despite the fact that there was enough of it to carpet Switzerland.

“…and so, my friend, that is the long and short of it. After all, appearances are what make the difference in things. Or as you would say, it is about the dotting of the i’s and the crossing of the t’s, no?” asked the Master Forger with a smile.

In spite of catching only the tail end of what he’d said, the gist of it was clear: The paper trail was everything. Speaking more woodenly than usual, I replied, “I couldn’t agree with you more, Roland. I have always prided myself on being a careful man, a man who is realistic about the world in which he operates. After all, men such as ourselves can’t afford to be careless. That is a luxury of women and children.” My tone dripped with sagacity, but deep down I was hoping he had never seen The Godfather. I felt a bit guilty over stealing some of Don Corleone’s thunder, but I couldn’t seem to stop myself. The movie was packed with such terrific dialogue that plagiarizing it only seemed natural. In a way, I lived my life very much like Don Corleone—didn’t I? I never talked on the phone; I kept my circle of confidants to a handful of old and trusted friends; I paid off politicians and police officers; I had Biltmore and Monroe Parker paying me monthly tributes…and countless other things too. But, unlike me, Don Corleone didn’t have a rip-roaring drug habit, nor could he be so easily manipulated by a gorgeous blonde. Well, those were my Achilles’ heels, and no man could be perfect.

Apparently not picking up on my plagiarism, he replied, “That is a most wonderful insight for a man your age. And I couldn’t agree with you more. Carelessness is a luxury no serious man can afford. And today that shall be something we pay great attention to. As you will see, my friend, I can serve many functions for you and wear many hats. Of course, my more mundane functions—such as keeping track of paperwork and filling out corporate forms—I trust you are already familiar with. So we will move past those. The question is: Where shall we start? What is on your mind, my young friend? Please tell me, and I will help you.”

I smiled and said, “I was told by Jean Jacques that you are a man who can be trusted completely, that you are the best at what you do. So rather than beat around the bush, I will operate under the assumption that you and I will be doing business together for many years to come.”

I paused for a brief moment, waiting for Roland’s obligatory nod and smile in response to my patronizing statement. And while I was never a great advocate of patronizing statements…since this was the first time I’d ever been face-to-face with a true Master Forger…well, it just seemed like the appropriate thing to do.

As expected, Roland turned up the corners of his mouth and nodded deferentially. Then he took another enormous pull from his cigarette and started blowing perfectly round smoke rings. How beautiful! I thought. They were flawless circles of light-gray smoke, about two inches in diameter, and they seemed to float effortlessly through the air.

I smiled and said, “Those are very fine smoke rings, Roland. Maybe you can shed some light on why Swiss people love smoking so much. I mean—don’t get me wrong—I’m all for smoking if that’s what turns you on. In fact, my father is one of the all-time great smokers, so I respect it. But the Swiss seem to take it to a different level. Why is that?”

Roland shrugged and said, “Thirty years ago it was the same in America. But your government feels compelled to stick its nose in places where it does not belong—even into the right of an individual to partake in a simple manly pleasure. They have instituted a propaganda war against smoking, which, thankfully, has not spread to this side of the Atlantic. How bizarre it is for a government to decide what and what not a man might put into his own body. What will be next, I wonder, food?” He smiled broadly and laughed, then patted his fat stomach with great relish. “If that day comes, my friend, I will surely put a pistol in my mouth and pull the trigger!”

I let out a gentle laugh and shook my head and waved my hand in the air, as if to say, “Oh, come on! You’re not really that fat!” Then I said, “Well, you’ve answered my question, and what you say makes a lot of sense. The United States government is overly intrusive in all aspects of life, which is the exact reason I’m sitting here today. But I still have many concerns about doing business in Switzerland, most of them stemming from my lack of knowledge about your world—meaning overseas banking—and that makes me extremely nervous. I’m a firm believer, Roland, that knowledge is power and that in a situation like this, where the stakes are so incredibly high, a lack of knowledge is a recipe for disaster.

“So I must become more knowledgeable. Everyone, at some point, needs a mentor, and I look to you for just that. I have no idea how I’m supposed to operate within your jurisdiction. For example, what things are considered taboo? Where is the line of good judgment? What is considered recklessness and what is considered prudence? These are things that are very important for me to know, Roland, things I must know if I’m to steer clear of trouble. I need to understand all your banking laws down to the very letter. If possible, I would like to look at past indictments, to see what other people have gotten in trouble for and what mistakes they’ve made, and then to make sure I don’t repeat them. I’m a student of history, Roland, and I’m a firm believer that he who doesn’t study the mistakes of the past is doomed to repeat them.” This was something I had done—looking through old indictments—when I started Stratton, and it had been invaluable.

Roland said, “That is another wonderful insight, my young friend, and I will be more than happy to gather some information for you. But perhaps I can shed some light on things for you right now. You see, virtually all problems Americans run into with Swiss banking have little to do with what happens on this side of the Atlantic. Once your money is safely here, I will disappear it into a dozen different corporations without raising any red flags, outside the prying eyes of your government. I understand from Jean Jacques that Mrs. Mellor was at the bank this morning, yes?”

I nodded. “Yes, and she’s already on her way back to England. But I have a copy of her passport if you need it.” I tapped my hand over my left suit-jacket pocket, to let him know it was on my person.

“That is excellent,” said Roland, “quite excellent. If you would be kind enough to provide me with it, I will keep it on file with each corporation we form. On a separate note, please understand that Jean Jacques shares information with me only under the authorization you granted him. Otherwise, he would have never mentioned a word about Mrs. Mellor presenting herself at the bank. And I would like to add that my relationship with Jean Jacques is one-way. I will tell him nothing of our business unless you instruct me to.

“You see, I would strongly recommend that you do not put all your eggs in one basket. Do not misunderstand me, though: Union Bancaire is a fine institution, and I recommend that you keep the bulk of your money there. But there are banks in other countries as well—Luxembourg and Liechtenstein, just to name two—that will serve a useful purpose to us. Layering your transactions in many different countries will create a web so tangled it would be nearly impossible for any single government to untangle it.

“Each country has its own set of laws. So what might be penal in Switzerland might very well be legal in Liechtenstein. Depending on what sort of transaction you are contemplating, we would form separate corporate entities for each part of the transaction, doing only what is legal in each particular country. But I am painting broad strokes here. The possibilities are much greater than that.”

Incredible! I thought. A true Master Forger! After a few moments of silence I said, “Perhaps you can give me a brief education on the ins and outs of things. I can’t begin to tell you how much more comfortable that would make me. I mean, there are obvious benefits to doing business in a corporate name—whether it be in the United States or Switzerland—but what I’m interested in are the less obvious benefits.” I smiled and leaned back deeper in my seat and crossed my legs. It was the sort of posture that so much as said, “Take your time in telling me; I’m in no rush.”