"What is it I can help you with?" I asked.
"Word among the investment community," Sparks said, speaking for the first time, "is that if you want to make some guaranteed money in the market, you go see Bill Stevens at Stevens Consulting."
I gave a small smile, "glad to know that my reputation proceeds me."
"Uh huh," Sparks continued. "We did a little checking on you Mr. Stevens. When we hear something like that it makes us a little curious. Guaranteed money? In the stock market? There is really no such thing. The stock market, as you surely know, is little more than a respectable form of gambling. Some have a flair for it, some do not. But nobody has the reputation that you have. Nobody."
He leaned forward, his gray eyes burning into mine. He was trying to intimidate me. "You charge nearly three times what other investment consultants do," he said. "There is no reason or justification for such an outrageous fee in a business such as this. None at all. But somehow you not only get away with it, you have more clients than you can handle. We sent one of our agents to try and sign up with you just to check you out and he was turned away, not because he's a fed but because you have no time to take on new clients, you're that booked."
"Is there something illegal about that?" I asked, starting to get a little angry.
Sparks ignored my question. "We've talked to many of your clients. It seems that you have quite the ability to spot and exploit trends in the market. An almost spooky ability. Time after time we were told how you advised them to put their money in this stock or that stock, usually something obscure that they'd never even heard of, and then low and behold, that stock begins to go up and up. Not one person we talked to complained about their stocks going down. Not a single one. Not one of them bitched about the fee you charged. Not a single one. Do you find that a little strange Mr. Stevens? Because I surely do."
"My clients TALKED to you?" I asked, appalled. I don't know why that surprised me but it did.
"Oh yes," Sparks smiled, perhaps sensing a little uplifted corner of my persona that he could pry at. "They were quite willing to talk to us once we implied to them that something illegal might be going on and that they might be implicated. Most of them happily showed us the records of their buys and sells. They sold you out in an instant at the mere suggestion that they themselves might be in danger."
"Figures," I muttered, seething at this knowledge. I recovered myself quickly. "But I'll ask you again gentlemen, have I done anything illegal?"
"I don't know Mr. Stevens," Sparks asked me, "have you? From everything we've learned it certainly looks like a fair amount of insider trading is going on here. Somebody is feeding you information, probably several somebodies inside of these corporations."
"Are you serious?" I asked, feeling myself on a little firmer ground. "You're suggesting that I have contacts inside of more than a hundred corporations that are feeding me inside info? Do you really believe that? It would have to be that many because that's how many companies I routinely advise my clients to invest in. I'm sure you know that if you've checked on me like you said. That's an awful lot of inside information, isn't it?"
"So you say you're doing nothing wrong?" Sparks asked, "that you're just very adept at picking the right stocks time and time again. So adept that you never guess wrong?"
"Basically, yes." I nodded.
"Would you mind if we took a look through your files?" Sparks asked next.
I laughed out loud, not able to help myself. "Let you look through my files?
Are you mad?"
He gave me a reasonable look. "If you have nothing to hide Mr. Stevens," he said, "then why should you mind letting us take a look?"
I shook my head at them. I'd had about enough of this. "Gentlemen," I asked, "this is the United States of America, is it not?"
"Yes Mr. Stevens," Sparks nodded.
"Good. Then I'm protected by a little document called the constitution am I not? A little addition to that document known as the fourth amendment? If you want to look through my files than you go get a judge to give you a warrant allowing you to do so. But you can't do that, can you? Because you don't have any probable cause that I've committed any crime. You're just here on a fishing expedition, hoping that I'll break down in front of you and bust open some international inside trading conspiracy. Well sorry to disappoint you gentlemen, but that's not going to happen. There is no conspiracy and you will not be looking at any of my files."
Talon took a deep, angry breath. "Mr. Stevens," he said, "I have some very good friends at the Internal Revenue Service. I can make a few phone calls and you would find yourself under very intense scrutiny every time you filed your taxes."
"You're threatening me?" I barked, laughing. "You've got to be shitting. You know damn well you've already had your buddies at the IRS look into my background. You could probably recite my net worth as well as I can. You want to have them audit me every year? Go ahead, bring it on. They'll find nothing. I pay every penny of capital gains tax and income tax that I'm responsible for. I take no questionable deductions. I'm sure my clients have told you that I'm somewhat of a weirdo in that regard. When they bitch about their capital gains tax I always tell them they should be proud to pay it, that there is not nearly enough distribution of wealth in this country. I tell them I think the tax should be greater than it is, that the rich should be hammered with taxes. Bring on the audits guys, you can't threaten me with that."
They both stared for a moment, feeling the balance of power shifting on its axis. "Mr. Stevens," Talon started again.
"Gentlemen," I said, standing up. "I'm a very busy man and I have work to do. I think the time has come to put an end to our discussion. If you wish to talk to me again, please call in advance and set up an appointment. I'll be sure to have a lawyer present. Good day."
Despite my bravado in the face of the feds, the encounter disturbed me greatly. They might not have known what they were dealing with but the fact remained that I had been noticed. I did not like to be noticed. I went home that night and found Nina in the bathtub, fragrant bubbles covering her body as she soaked after an exhausted sleep. She was due back at the hospital at six the next morning.
I leaned next to the tub and gave her a kiss. Somehow my hand just happened to drop into the water and land against her slippery thigh. The kiss deepened and two minutes later I was naked in the tub with her. A considerable amount of water splashed onto the carpet in the next fifteen minutes.
After, as we lay in our bed naked, staring at the ceiling fan going around and around I told her about my visit from Talon and Sparks. She was very alarmed by it.
"Feds?" she asked, looking at me. "You're not in any trouble are you Bill?"
"No," I shook my head. "They were just harassing me. They thought my record was a little suspicious and were trying to see if I was doing anything wrong."
"But you haven't been," she protested sternly. Nina was well aware of my prowess at picking stocks. She used to express doubt that I was committing so much of our net worth to a particular issue but she'd long since learned to trust my "instincts". How could she argue with constant success? If she had any suspicions about where my knowledge was coming from, if she ever thought it was more than just my own common sense and thorough study, she never mentioned it, either directly or indirectly.
"No," I said, "I've always gone out of my way to be on the up and up. I've never cheated so much as a penny on our taxes. We have nothing to worry about in that regards but at the same time I think it's time for a change."
"What kind of change?"
I told her. We talked into the wee hours of the morning. By the time she left for the hospital a decision had been made. I put it into motion the very next day.