‘His board aren’t going to buy that. Even his oversight people won’t allow that. That’s crazy. He doesn’t have to do anything. He can sit tight now and drip-feed the market.’

‘He won’t do that – there would be a run. There would be a fire sale to one of the banks who would cherry-pick our clients.’

Julian feels a surge in the blood.

‘OK. This is the deal. I am offering him one option only or I walk. He buys the bank with his private trusts, we sort out the finances, square the trusts and so on, and then he can take it into First Federal and the blinding light of disclosure, or keep it as his little hobby.’

‘That sounds like a good idea. Brilliant, actually. But as you said, time is not on our side and if he has the information he can make a call to the FSA or the US regulators and we are dead. So our deal is – am I right? – he buys at a billion plus from his own resources and we use some of the money to sort out the trusts so that they have no recourse. They won’t know anyway, but I think we have to do the deal now. Result, he gets the bank, clean as a whistle, and a going concern, working fine, clients happy – all for about a billion.’

‘OK, let’s give it a try. We have to believe he wants the bank a lot. I am sure that he doesn’t want to bring the whole thing down.’

They go back up to the thirty-eighth floor to see Cy who is watching a pre-season baseball game with a drink in hand. The Yankees are playing the Sox.

‘Right,’ he says taking a lingering glance at the television, ‘got your story straight?’

‘OK, we will take care of any commitments the bank may have after you have agreed the purchase at one point four billion, and when you make a deposit of five hundred million.’

‘So you want me to pay you to clean up your act? Why didn’t you do that before you came along with your offer to sell?’