A wise man once said...

“Cash is King”. At the time of this timeless utterance I was hunched over my desk, gracefully sweating into an old Boden’s catalogue, a piece of Snus tight against my gums and a pipe jutting out of my mouth. I looked up. I drawled in reply,“Yes, you are quite right, cash is king. Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“Coffee is for closers”, he retorted obviously offended by my altruism. He then proceeded to beat an underperforming salesman with a sock full of pennies. Between the thuds and screams for help and cups of tea I managed to finish my morning reading, halting to occasionally re-pack my pipe.

Lunch was usually delivered by a catamite with a filthy smirk, but news soon arrived that he had failed to return from a board meeting. Alas today I would have to venture out of the office. I entered the automatic lift and impatiently pushed “G”. Two floors down I was accosted by a broker who had just entered. He was muttering the prices of call options into his open bottle of shine. Once he reached the price of a Bear Stearns call with a strike of twenty he looked up, eyes ajar, lips moist with drink and promptly flew into a maniacal rage about moral hazard and the “evil” spectre of Chinese accounting standards. “Cheap money, cheap money” he screamed. Frustrated with his line of reasoning I grabbed him by his collar and slapped him about the face with my now crumpled Boden’s catalogue. My action had the desired effect as he slumped to the floor and began talking to himself again in a slow comforting misery.

Relieved to be out of the lift I re-packed my pipe and made my way to Patriot’s, the best soup kitchen in The City. Upon my arrival I looked with exasperation at the usual forty man pinstripe queue. Three Nigerian hard bodies were ladling out slops of onion gruel into expecting tin bowls. I took a great swell from my pipe and headed towards the back.

In front of me was a beautifully tanned, gaunt Arabian wearing a Muttoner & Plum silk shirt and a Versace tie. He tilted his head as I approached. On seeing my face his eyes lit up with suicidal depression. “Jim! Silver Dollar Jim”, he cried. His curled lips exposing doglike teeth. Realising escape from this corporate warzone was now impossible, I hastily pronounced, “Good Morning Faisel, how does the day greet you?”

He paused for a while, making a point of leering at passing tourists. Then began a ten minute diatribe, “Never better. I’ve spoken to my trainer we feel it is time to change to a fully cardio workout. You see I have been steadily losing weight… I can’t deny the shortages haven’t helped… but you see when the margin call bastards came knocking… Last week I killed a beggar for reading the Wall Street Journal. If I had known he was head of equities at Lehman I would have offered him a lick of my salt cube, but alas, fate has brought his career to a quizzical end. You know he was slated for the board? Did I tell you that Hamilton Capital has moved into paper profit as most of the back office staff have either perished or taken flight?” He bowed his head for a moment. I took the opportunity and sprinted all the way back to the office.

My entrance was, it seemed, well timed. The wise man was breaking in his new five wood at the expense of one of the interns. Unshaken I returned to my desk, re-packed my pipe and opened Boden’s to the accessories section.