Moonlight

Sixteen

A few weeks later, Alice and Tom were having breakfast. Tom was reading the newspaper. In fact, you couldn't see his face. He kept it up, spread wide, almost to hide behind him. From time to time, he picked a piece of toast and ate it.

He kept clearing his throat. Alice was busy with the children, but when he coughed so loud the kids stopped eating and looked at him, Alice was forced to pay attention.

And there it was, on the front page of the newspaper, right before her eyes, Vincent's face in black and white.

Largest Private Lender Bankrupt! It said in large fonts.

Tom lowered the paper. He was beaming at Alice. She was speechless.

'The guys felt bad about what he did to you – I did too, of course,' Tom explained. 'We decided to short his stocks. Some loans couldn't be renewed either.'

'It means – ?'

'He's ruined, and nobody will bail him out.'

That was it: once you had lost your powerful friends, the laws of the country applied to you as they applied to those on five percent. There would be a trial, and all the irregularities that the people in the circle saw as a natural and necessary part of the way to conduct profitable business would come to light. The funds moved from general accounts to private ones, the holidays houses paid with investors' money, the missing invoices... Nobody would turn a blind eye to it now that he had been ostracised.

The kids were making noise again, but Alice couldn't take her eyes off Tom. He was the knight in shining armour who had come to her rescue. She didn't know how she had ever been able to forget who he was and what he meant to her.

Tom smiled, pleased with himself, and busied himself with the children.

'So, who wants some cereal?'