Chapter 34 Wang Chen - 5

In 1956, Diana and David Setiniaz's third child was born.The first two were girls, and now they finally have a son (the third of six children) named David Michael. In the early summer of 1956, Reb Klimrod emerged from the Amazonian jungle.Setiniaz found that he had changed, not the same as before.At first glance, it doesn't look particularly great.He was as calm as ever, with an unbelievable, unnatural calmness that was almost inhuman, still courteous to anyone, almost too humble.Setiniaz later said: "I never heard him raise his voice, or lose his temper a little bit. He was not a saint. In fact, several of us often wished he was more... more like us. This self-control of his always Makes me uncomfortable. George Taalas thought it was a kind of paranoia, but I think it's going too far."

Leiber started from scratch with uncanny speed.His ability to remain completely out of business for thirteen months is a testament to the firmness of the organization he has established. "This time he came back," said Setiniaz, "even more different. He came back with a kind of cruelty and ruthlessness that he had never seen before. He is almost thirty. He has Mature. No matter what the situation, no matter what aspect, his actions are faster and more aggressive than ever before, and his expansion is in full swing.” On June 30, 1956, Klimrod came to Setiniaz's office.He said he had come to see "how things are going".Setiniaz reported to him that every detail has been recorded and filed one by one, and measures have been taken to ensure absolute secrecy.

"I'd like to spend three or four days going over your file, David. But that means giving your men a few days off. The Fourth of July is supposed to be a holiday in America, isn't it? Say, well, you're giving everyone an extra three days off." "Do you want me to stay with you?" Reber shook his head. "Thanks, David. But I don't want to deprive you of family fun. Your youngest son's name is Michael, isn't it?" His pale eyes gave David a friendly, amused glance. Setiniaz felt like a complete fool for naming his son Michael ), he had to have a fight with his wife, "Reb Semoniaz" sounded so out of place, Diana would have divorced him if he had suggested Reb.

Reber simply said, "Have a nice holiday, David." Setiniaz and his wife took their children to the villa for vacation.On July 2, he called the office, but no one answered.On the morning of the 5th, he came back from vacation and found that everything was in order.The keys are in the vault, along with a note: "David: Thank you, great job. One percent from now." Signed with a strong "R."He doubled his share of his profits to Setniaz, and that was tens of millions of dollars. Two months later, London's South Bay Gallery sent David Setiniaz by sea a masterpiece of Gauguin.The unsigned card read: "This is for Michael."

On the afternoon of July 5, 1956, Nick Petridis met Reb Klimrod.Six hours earlier, around nine-thirty that morning, Nick had received a call: a Major Baker wanted to speak to him.This is one of three code names.After dismissing the rest of the office, Petridis took the call. "Nick? Can you leave New York for a few days?" "Okay, as long as Tony stays and takes over from me." "I'll just get you one. Come and see me at three o'clock this afternoon, at the Algonquin Hotel, in the room under de Carvajal's name. Bring whatever you think you want to show me. .And send someone at 5:30 to pack up the files and take them back to your office. We can go to the airport together. The flight to Paris leaves at 7:50."

Within an hour, Petridis had the material together (he was always ready for such an emergency).The so-called "things you think you want to show me" are all the balance sheets of the shipping companies (with a total tonnage of more than three million tons) under his control for the past thirteen months. It took Leiber an hour to review this mass of files, and another hour to draw conclusions and make new instructions. Then, Petridis personally went to the lounge to hand over all the files to the two assistants for storage. He sat next to Reb again as they flew across the Atlantic.

"That was the way it was," Petridis recalled afterwards. "He suddenly told me about his past, at least some of it. He said he had been to Denmark twice right after the war. Jill also told me that he lived for a while in Cairo, France, Sicily and Italy. I was amazed: I had known him for seven years and we traveled a lot together and he never mentioned anything about his younger days .I thought he was Argentinian. In the past, when we got to a certain place, he never said whether he had been there before. He likes to keep it secret, not so much because of fear or any idiosyncrasy, but because he has a sense of the past. The past is of no interest. The only exceptions are business matters. In that respect, there is never the slightest ambiguity. By the way, for his anonymity—which I insist on to the end—I was paid far Far exceeded my expectations. At first, my brother and I were very puzzled that this man had more ships than Onassis and Niahos combined, and more than Ludwig, but besides Setinia Besides, as far as we two Petridis brothers know how rich he is. It's a strange feeling...  

"If anyone tries to fish in troubled waters, then this person must be crazy. Especially after the Harper incident..." "John Patrick Harper," said Reber very gently, "was recommended by your brother Tony." "I would recommend him too." "The investigations made at the time confirmed that the man was quite reliable. As much as one can usually be trusted with a man, so can be trusted with him." "Reb, he's just made a little mistake. I've corrected that." "But you didn't tell me that, Nick." It was night over the Atlantic, but Reber looked out the window for a long time.However, when he said the above sentence, he turned his head slowly, and his eyes fell on the lawyer of Greek descent, which made the latter shudder.The mist that usually clouded Klimrod's eyes was gone, and his eyes shone with a frightful, menacing light.

"Harper's totally dependable, just did a stupid thing," Nick said, feeling on pins and needles. "He stole $26,300." "Actually, this can't be regarded as private embezzlement, and he returned it all in two days. Leibo, what do you want me to do? Kill him?" "I've dealt with it this morning, Nick, and it's settled." Pete Diris stared at him, bewildered. "You mean, you..." "Harper is alive and will be alive as long as I want him to be. However, a safety device which has been devised to prevent this has been put into operation this morning. Of course, for the For you and me, as of today, Harper no longer exists. Unfortunately for him, it doesn't end there. His financial situation is going to be very difficult, and that's not his only problem. He You'll have a lot of trouble finding a decent job. Besides, it's going to cost him a lot to repay the $20,000 you lent him after the two of you had lunch at table 18 at the Seven Seas on May 26th. Not even if he had to sell that house outside Philadelphia. It's already mortgaged, and that's nerve-wracking enough for a man in his situation, so it creates other problems. But it's a good thing you paid for it. That lunch entitlement didn't spill over because, as far as I know, the Seven Seas restaurant and the whole building it's in is yours, albeit in the name of your relative. Nick, in the case of Harper, You did the right thing, and I don't want to blame you, except that you didn't think you should tell me about it. Well, that's not the case. We don't have to say anything more about Harper."

He smiled, and his eyes became blurred again. "Let's talk about something else, Nick. For example, the Frenchman who's going to be working with us and the other guy..." The Frenchman's name was Paul Soubis.He had been a student of George Taras for two years at Harvard, and Taras had ceased to coach.His name first appeared in the files sent to Setienaz in the autumn of 1953, when Soubise was already in a senior position at the headquarters of a large French shipping company.The process of his becoming a royal subject is a typical method adopted by Klimrod. Unless Klimrod directly intervened (which was extremely rare after 1955), a special procedure was required for all newcomers to the list of "senior cadres" (the annual income of A total of 3,400 male and female cadres earning more than 50,000 US dollars).Usually, on the day a person is added, sometimes two or three days later, an anonymous courier sends David Setiniaz a dossier marked "Top Secret. In person." .If Setiniaz was absent, the messenger would take the file away. "Top Secret" files are routinely linked to a name on the roster.The profile of the new members is recorded in great detail.

Black Dog also has such a file. These archives are constantly being supplemented with new content, such as what property Lierny or Abramovich added, or what happened to the personnel situation (such as divorce), and so on. The higher a person's status in the organization, the more exhaustive his file.A red "special" character will appear in the upper left corner of the first page of some files.This means that this person has become or is about to become a royal servant, that is to say, he will directly contact Klimrod and receive instructions directly from Klimrod.Take Tudor Angel as an example: a black dog file was established for him in 1951, and four years later, the red character "special" appeared on it, marking his promotion.There have never been more than eighteen files with the word "special". In Soubis' files, the words appeared on the first day, and the first investigative report pointed out that he not only held a series of prestigious diplomas, but also "very remarkable intellect" and "political ambition, good social and family relations, with which sooner or later he will occupy a prominent position in his country".The above view was put forward by Jethro's research organization in 1953, and it turned out to be a visionary prediction: in the sixties, Soubise became a cabinet member of the French government. Likewise, Soubice's biography shows a rather foolish venture (no doubt the result of inexperience) in 1950, a not-so-clean private life, and several methods of concealing income using two Swiss bank accounts. "Nick Petridis, Paul Subis," Reber introduced the two. On the afternoon of July 6, 1956, they met in a large hotel on the La Croisette in Cannes. This was the third meeting between Subis and Reb Klimrod.As far as he knew, Klimrod was an Argentinian, apparently very wealthy, who wanted to make a name for himself in the shipping industry, and was currently competing with those Greek shipping merchants, doing a good job. "I'm looking at making certain adjustments," Reber said. "But before we get down to business, I think I should let Soubis know the whole situation, Nick?" Nick followed Reber's instructions exactly, and began writing numbers on hotel paper (which was later burned). .As he brought up an unbelievably long list of company names and their respective gross tonnages, the Frenchman's face showed increasing surprise, and Petridis felt a kind of A triumphant, almost overwhelming pleasure. "That's all," he said at last. Soubis took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes.He laughed. "And Lloyd? Are you sure Lloyd isn't yours?" "Maybe I slipped," Reber said. "Is Lloyd mine, Nick?" "Not as far as I know," Nick said, "but that's beside the point. Maybe you bought it without telling me." He smiled at Soubis. "He can afford it." Su Bisi picked up those papers, read them from the beginning, and made an estimate. "Nearly 3.5 million tons." "Three million six hundred and twenty-eight thousand tons," Reber said calmly, "two million seven hundred and fifty-three thousand tons are tankers. Owned by seventy-four companies. It is about these tankers that I want to make some adjustments... ..." In his own words, it was "extremely simple."It's early July and they have six months to go... "Adjustments must be resolved within six months. Of course, if by...for example, November 15th, even if it is not fully completed, at least it has entered a stage of vigorous development. That is the most ideal. " The adjustment mentioned by Leiber is to redeploy all the tankers. The scale is extremely large, involving 74 companies.Leiber controls the shares of these companies through the entrustment agreement between himself and the Petridis brothers, Subis, and Taras, and then the Petridis brothers and others will control 74 indirect companies. Trustee, the nominal owner. "Nick, I want you to study each of the ships and make a definite decision which ships will be released from all charters on November 15th. This is the first step. I want you to list each The one-time shipping capacity of the ship.” "There is a significant portion of long-term contracts that are irrevocable." "I know that, Nick," said Reber, "so I want a ship-by-ship schedule. Even if it's not until November 15th." "So that as many ships as possible can be put into one-time shipping by November 15th?" "Exactly." "From November 15th, how long is the period?" "One year." Both Subis and Petridis couldn't help asking: What will happen on November 15th? But none of them asked. There are two reasons.First, they knew that if Klimrod had wanted to let them know the answer, he would have told them.Secondly, they knew that Klimrod would never say anything "in front of a third party".The way the two men finally recalled it suggests that they both—one New Yorker, one Frenchman—followed an interesting dualism and the exact same line of reasoning. "There's one more thing," said Reber, "that would be best done by Pavel: I need a report on all the tankers in operation, under construction and on order." "Including Japan?" "Including everything. Including the ships being built for our company and for others: for our ships, everything is to be done to hasten their completion; for..." "All measures must be taken to delay the completion of ships built for others." Reber laughed. "Paul, don't bring any pirate ships into this...you should include all oil tankers currently on the sea, no matter who owns them or what flag they fly. Find out if these ships are currently chartered, or when they will be accepted Charter, at what price. It's for next year. Can you do it, Paul?" "It's a massive undertaking." "Exactly sixteen months ago, on March 25, 1955, I asked you if you would be willing to work exclusively for me if the time came. You said yes. I asked you Think carefully about your decision. You reiterated this attitude to me when we met for the second time on April 11. Now is the time, Paul. Come with us." "Okay," Soubis said, feeling excited. "When will you want all this?" "The sooner the better," Reb said with a smile. "You can set up your own company today. We will handle the financial and legal procedures in a few days. From now on, you will discuss these matters with Nick and his brother Tony, who I absolutely trust. They will be in charge. Besides them you have another associate who is coming to us this evening... You had better not smoke, Pavel, unless you absolutely must." "I can restrain myself," said Soubis, putting the pipe he was about to light back into his pouch. "One more thing," said Reber, "from today to December 31 next year, please send me a list of all the oil tankers in the world that we can charter during this period. I Do I need to remind everyone that this needs to be kept strictly confidential. To make full use of all companies under our control, we can form more companies to use this if necessary.” "Until the charter party is signed?" "Yes. There are no restrictions other than secrecy. I don't want anyone to see the slightest sign." It was July, Soubis pointed out, and to charter now a vessel that would not be in service until November 15th would cost a staggering amount of investment, which would not pay off for a few months. "I have considered that, Pavel," replied Reber. "Each charter business should be studied separately to minimize the no-revenue period as much as possible. You know as well as I do that there are many options at our disposal. I am prepared to lose money if necessary." The operation cost approximately $50 million.The money flowing through many banking channels basically came from an insurance company, three banks (one of which was Hunter Manhattan and the other was a bank in Hong Kong) and an investment group led by Nessim Shah. In August 1951, at the beginning of the business, David Setiniaz and Reb Klimrod agreed with each other on a special procedure for making emergency calls.Klimrod had to leave often, sometimes for a long time, for example from May 1955 to June 1956, so it was absolutely necessary to have such a procedure.The first use of this procedure was in May 1956.The code word is "Brazil", followed by "Hawaii" and "San Francisco. , to be used in the same sentence. Setiniaz received a long-distance call from Rome, and he found that the other party spoke with a strong foreign accent. Setiniaz replied: "You must call Mr. Diego Haas in Rio de Janeiro, Haas, H, two a, s. The number is..." "I'm sorry," the other said, "I don't want to call myself, can you send me a message?" "of course can." "Just two words: Shenken Dov. I'll spell it for you..." "Is that all?" "That's all. Thanks." The other party hung up the phone.Setiniaz called Rio himself, and it was Diego Haas who answered.Setiniaz repeated the words to him.The little Argentine didn't react, he just sarcastically said that the weather in New York must be nasty, and then he invited Setiniaz to Ipanema.To live in his home for a week or two.Setiniaz had always disliked Hass so much that it was almost undisguised, so he just said that he would be happy to go, as long as the schedule allowed it.He hung up without mentioning Reber's name. The call from Rome was the only clue he had, leading him to believe that the informant was an Israeli named Joel Benish.Of course, he has no proof. But it also convinced him that Reber's reappearance in the early summer of 1956 was no coincidence. At five o'clock in the afternoon on October 29, 1956, Israel attacked the Sinai Peninsula.At 7:15 in the morning on November 5th, the French and British paratroopers opened their parachutes.Eight days later, Arab heads of state gathered in Beirut reiterated their desire to close the Suez Canal, which Egyptian President Nasser had ordered sunk to block oil shipments to France and Britain.The energy of these two countries mainly comes from the Middle East, and now the import volume has dropped by 80%, and the reserves are only enough for two or three months.After the dismal retreat of French and British troops was announced on November 27, an oil reinforcement plan was put in place, which involved the shipment of half a million barrels a day of oil from the United States, the Caribbean and Venezuela go to Europe. The canal remained closed for six months.Oil tankers had to detour around the Cape of Good Hope from the Persian Gulf to Europe.This voyage is 11,300 nautical miles, and only a large-tonnage ship can withstand it. Reb Klimrod and Gulandris first foresaw the emergence of so-called "supertankers".The events at Suez made most of the Greek shipowners—Rivanos, Kulukunlis, Emvirikos, Golandris, Vigotis, Onassis, Niahos—rich.They used to meet at the Café Royal in London, where they celebrated wildly one evening.Daniel Ludwig netted $100 million. And what about Reb Klimrod?Counting from November 20, 1956, he owned more than 4 million tons of oil tankers alone, and used the names of 81 different owners. This situation actually continued until 1966. eight years.His profit exceeded half a billion dollars in less than a year. Joel Banich later said he participated in the first phase of the operation, code-named "Kadesh," which had two purposes: to compress the Palestinian pocket in Gaza; Sharm El Sheikh at the southernmost point.Sixteen Dakota transport planes were called in to drop paratroopers into the Mitra Pass, just forty kilometers from the Suez Canal.Bernice persisted until he was allowed to board one of the planes.After landing smoothly, he walked for nearly two hours to the monument of Colonel Parker (Parker was the British governor in Sinai from 1910 to 1923).On the third day, on the night of October 30, he saw the 202nd Brigade cover the 300 kilometers from the official Israeli border to the Mitra Pass in twenty-eight hours. On November 6th he returned to Tel Aviv; his vacation was over. (He made the trip to Sinai during his annual vacation.) In 1956, he was thirty-one years old and had the rank of captain, but he was actually working for an Israeli government agency or espionage. In Tel Aviv, he learned of his next target: Adolf Eichmann, the former Jewish chief of the Nazi secret police. He lived in Rome until November 25th or 26th.The reunion with Leiber in the Italian capital at the beginning of December, according to him, is called "the long-term must be united".It is known that they met before Klimrod went to South America to execute Erich Steyr, and whether they met again between these two meetings, when, why, and in what way, Bernie did not mention it at all. Setiniaz knew nothing but the name Joel Bernisch, and nothing else about the man. Taras was different.He had traveled to the Middle East several times and met the Israeli twice.In the summer of 1978, while an Israeli government delegation was visiting the United States, Bernis also visited Talas and spent a weekend at his home in Maine.At that time, many years had passed since the Suez incident, and perhaps Bernice knew that Klimrod had a lot of trust in Taras.Anyway, he answered a few questions from Taras. He said he had been in "regular contact" with Leiber since 1950. "I like him very much, and I guess he also has a crush on me." Zenglas did not ask him questions about the events in Suez.Didn't ask Jethro about it either. Taras believed that Jethro's excellent secret organization was probably conceived by a veteran espionage expert.But he raised this question to Bernice: Did Leiber play any role in bringing Adolf Eichmann to justice? Bernice shook his head first.Then he said, "Not directly." Another person Reb Klimrod was to introduce to Nick Petridis and Paul Subis (but only to cooperate in this urgent tanker operation), was a twenty-nine-year-old A Lebanese named Nessim Shahadze.Soubis' intelligence was obvious, almost ostentatious, and he immediately impressed Petridis.In contrast, when it came to choosing another deputy, Nick believed that Klimrod had made a mistake, at least this time. Nessim Shah, on the other hand, was a young man with an expression of indifference that was almost artificial, a thin voice that was almost like a woman's, and it seemed that he was more interested in women and sweets than in business.A person of his type must be potbellied and bald by the age of fifty. There was another reason why Petridis was not so enthusiastic about the arrival of the Lebanese: he and his brother Tony were people trusted by Klimrod and had been in charge of shipping affairs from the beginning.They have every reason to think they are doing a good job.In an astonishingly short period of time, they have grown from one cargo ship to sixteen tankers and then to a fleet second in gross tonnage only to Daniel Ludwig, who started his business back in the thirties Xi, and one day they will surpass Ludwig.Nick and Tony felt they were partly to blame for the rapid expansion.Reber's thrusting Soubis in had already annoyed Petridis, and it wasn't until the Frenchman showed his talent that Nick's wounded pride was soothed. In addition, the ambitious plan disclosed by Xiaobo made it a matter of course to increase the number of personnel. "But we shouldn't have put a nasty Arab on us!" Nick said to Tony. Shah arrived in Cannes in the evening.It so happened that Su Bisi was standing at the window at this time.The four Rolls-Royces parked in a row had attracted his attention.A group of blond women with heavy make-up and beautiful figures alighted from the car leisurely like a commando landing in Port Said, which aroused Soubis' interest even more.He suddenly laughed and said, "Come and see!" Leib and Nick went to the window, just as Shah appeared, with an arrogant and indifferent expression, showing a little color.When he walked into the hotel, he looked as if he had just bought the building. Subis noticed the strange look in Klimro's pinched eyes, and asked, "Didn't you mention a Lebanese?" "Yes, that's him," Reber replied, obviously appreciating all this. "He'll be here soon." Twenty seconds passed, but finally someone knocked lightly on the door of the suite - Reber and the others had been meeting here since five o'clock.Subis went to answer the door.Nessim came in a short, fat man with a diamond ring of several carats on his left index finger.He greeted Soubis in non-foreign French, greeted Petridis in English with the over-the-top accent of a Harrow student who hadn't changed his voice, and finally addressed Ray in German. Greetings from Bob.Then he sat down, did not say a word for the next two hours, and closed his eyes from time to time, as if suddenly feeling sleepy, seeing the frequent surprised looks from the American and the Frenchman. Take it easy. Leiber continued to talk about his business as if nothing had happened.He talked about one of his important ideas about oil transportation, which is to refit as many ships as possible so that they can also carry goods other than oil, with the purpose of avoiding unprofitable return voyages.This was a new idea at the time. They proceeded to make horribly complicated calculations involving many aspects, including exchange rates.Subis, who has a degree in science and engineering, is ready to show his skills in computing. At this moment, Shah said in his shrill voice: "Don't waste your time. The exact number is..." So he reported a series of numbers calculated on the spot in detail. Among all the princes, Nesim Shah was undoubtedly the strangest one, but his rare listless appearance concealed a mind that even the devil would be willing to defeat him.He is the only person who uses a French nickname for Reb (except for Diego's familiar and informal attitude towards Reb, because he is not a royal subject, he is the shadow of Reb), and the only one who can be regarded as a better person than Reb. The faster guy, he's a total genius at that.He had other talents, as hidden as his calculus.In the oil field, two people tried to bypass the monopoly of big companies with high prices and deal directly with the Arab sheikhs who produced the oil fields.One of them was Ludwig.Although he achieved partial success, he also caused many problems, one of which was the boycott.It hurt him a lot.The other was Reber, and on his side everything was going on without difficulty; the band consisting of the Petridis brothers, Subis, and Nessim Shah was coordinated like a chamber orchestra, in which The cellist is a Swiss banker named Alois Knapp. Reb Klimrod would never have met Knapp had it not been for the strange and tragic incident in Zurich.