August 15/16, 1998.
On the fifteenth of August, Vasilich woke me up properly with a night call from Peru: trouble was brewing, get the senior staff back from vacation, Yuri Alexeyevich first of all, then Marina Igorevna and Konstantin Pavlovich. Have them book flights to Moscow right now, whatever it cost. I passed the order along to Yurik and the finance department. No doubt the old man was right.
A couple of days before the call, I’d been sitting at «Tsarskaya Okhota» with Vladlen Grigoryevich, who was moving his family out of Russia one-way and asked whether he could hole up in my house in Miami for a week or two… No long explanations needed. I dictated the house alarm code to Vladlen, handed over the keys to the house, to Zhorka’s Lambo, and to my own GMC Yukon, and passed him an American Motorola. Florida wasn’t ruled by good old GSM with roaming, but by the demonic CDMA.
We had a good sit-down as farewells go. Vladlen predicted that next week everyone who stayed behind would be in trouble, while Vasilich and his crowd would come out on top. The Yasenevo career men were about to have things looking up. It was clear that the moment Vladlen had described as «everyone who stayed behind will be in trouble» was arriving. I ought to have a quiet word with Vasilich, a genuine Yasenevo career man himself. The old man was in the know, but where to find him? He wasn’t answering his phone.
Yura, Kostya, and Marina flew in on Sunday, a few hours apart. We agreed to meet Monday at noon at the outdoor café by the Prosecutor General’s Office.
I got there early, planning to reread and touch up the press release for Proma’s fifth anniversary.
Yurik arrived at exactly 11:59. Sat down across from me, nodded at the waiter: «Gunpowder.» Glanced at the bottle of Jameson, made a face somewhere between a snort and a grunt, and laid out on the table a Motorola StarTAC, a Nokia «Banana» 8110, and a microscopic Ericsson. Tough life for Proma’s top managers – laying three mobiles out on the table for every conversation, just to position themselves correctly. A mandatory ritual that had become a habit. My Sagem in my back jeans pocket and my Nokia Communicator in my bag were considered gear for the broke.
I remembered Zhorka grumbling: «You could’ve changed that frock coat! Then again, it’ll do…» back when I’d shown up to a business meeting in a T-shirt and jeans. Mm, yes… There’d been a time when appearance meant nothing at all. Now Yurik dressed as a snowboarder in winter, a yachtsman and surfer in summer, wore whatever brands were current in the in-between seasons, and never missed a single high-profile event. That’s what status looked like!
Yura had learned Zhorka’s lessons perfectly. Good thing I wasn’t a hired manager obligated to position myself everywhere, all the time. I was flailing around in a different league: «Get rich or die trying.» Hadn’t died yet. Hadn’t made the cover of Forbes either…
Zhorka’s old prediction had come true: the smoke over the White House battles had cleared, and the winners had earned the right to plunder. No medal ribbons had been issued for the veterans. Figuring out «who’s who» now went by indirect signs. To get taken for a holding-company owner, I had to drive around with security in two Land Cruisers, trade in my Vacheron for a Roger Dubuis Hommage Condottieri, wear a prêt-à-porter suit, and casually drop into conversation: «The Riviera’s gotten trashy. Too many Russians. If anything, I hole up in Tunbridge Wells. Not a single Russian for miles, except for the kid from Lukoil. You’re welcome to visit!»
If you happen to be passing by – keep passing by!
Funny to admit – I’d never actually been to that English house. In fact, in my whole life I’d thoughtfully visited abroad exactly five times – cosmetic-surgery Los Angeles, the yacht tour, a New Year’s in New York, and three trips with Liza. The other fifty-odd trips didn’t count. A day’s routine: fly out of Sheremetyevo in the morning, check into a room, meet the necessary man, make the point that I wasn’t selling out for trinkets and could buy him outright for dollars, we’d discuss interests back in Moscow… and spend whatever time was left before the flight feeling the meaninglessness of existence, exactly like on Bayswater Road two years back: here I am, successful and handsome, and I have no idea why I’m here.
The near-term plan was to clear out to London, to finish moving Proma from the Kalmyk khanate under the British crown. And to settle in closer to Zhorik. It was rough without his advice.
I pushed the draft aside and took a swig of whiskey. Yura showed me his laptop screen:
– Just checked. We pissed away a million and a half on GKOs. Working capital will hold if we sit on payments this month. The real problem’s elsewhere, look at sales volume.
A grim trend. The bars along the timeline chart got smaller and smaller from January through August, and it was depressing to look at.
– Not impressive, – I looked up at Yurik. We understood each other without words, neither of us wanted to say it out loud. It was clear Proma wouldn’t survive another year.
– Where’d you go? – I asked, putting off the unpleasant conversation.
– Visited my mother-in-law in Carloforte, then hit Saint-Tropez. Took Vasilich and Svetka out for good measure too, before they took off for Peru five days ago.
– How was the sailing?
– It wasn’t anything. Would’ve been better off going to the Kama with the guys.
– I see. So what are we going to do?
– Downsize.
– How exactly?
Yura pulled out a sheet of paper and a pen and started sketching out numbers, crossing them out right away, drawing new ones below:
– Look. First thing, we cut the payroll fund in half. Roughly like that. Then rent payments…
– Stop. Are you sure?
– About what?
– About this – «we cut wages»? The line workers will stay, but the managers will scatter. Who’s going to run sales?
– Whoever stays.
– Nobody’s going to stay.
– Oh, please, Lyova.
– You sure?
– Damn right! The ballast will scatter, about half of them. Anyone smart will realize there’s nowhere to run, it’s the shits everywhere. The labor market’s about to collapse to zero. The smart ones will stay, the fools will run. And we don’t need the fools.
– Why didn’t you get rid of the fools earlier?
– Up until this year, volumes were growing, we hired dead weight just to plug holes. Now it’s time to part ways with the ballast. That’s what ballast is for, dumping it at the right moment.
– How are we firing them? By the book, or the nice way?
– The nice way. We’ll scare people with talk of layoffs. Whoever wants out can leave right away with a month’s severance up front. But I think this is temporary. Maybe we wait for September? Every single year, come August, it’s total shit, and then everything settles back to normal.
– Not ready to discuss this… let’s do it in a couple of days.
– Okay.
Yura fidgeted with the sheet of paper, asked:
– Are we sketching anything out for real right now?
– No. I’m telling you – not ready. If we’re doing this for real, prepare the numbers: what’s going to collapse, how to rebuild it, and how much money it’ll cost.
Yura nodded, asked one last thing:
– What do you think, will the ruble fall to ten?
That was our dream. It would’ve been pure happiness. At that exchange rate, production would take off, sky-high, past the sun. Not a single foreign competitor would be left standing in the market! By our estimates, nine rubles to the dollar would flip Proma from a shrinking business into a growing one.
– Hope so. Now let’s go work through with Marina and Kostya what we need to prepare for.
Yura slowly finished his tea, then vanished instantly. I was left alone with a bottle of Jameson two-thirds full, watching a happy man walk away.
