Ed Grey was on the phone to a client in Paris, feet up on his desk, gazing out the window at the office block opposite. Tony Evangelou opened his door and looked in. Ed turned and shooed him away. Tony pointed to one of the screens on Ed’s wall. Ed looked. The sound was muted, but a headline on the screen told him all he needed to know.He stared.His client was talking, but Ed wasn’t listening. ‘Gilles,’ he said, ‘I’m going to have to call you back. Gilles, I’m sorry, I’ll get back to you.’The headline was still there at the bottom of the screen.FIDELIAN BANK FILES FOR BANKRUPTCY.Evangelou was watching him.Grey sat. He was numb. All he could think about was that he had closed out his short positions a week earlier. For a moment, the knowledge of what he had done completely froze his brain.He got up and left his office.A tense, eerie stillness hung over the funds desk. The managers and analysts were staring at a screen high up on the wall above the room. An interview was going on between an anchor and a reporter on a street somewhere in the financial district.
