The Heist

Pogue said.
    “It certainly is,” Nick Fox said, taking the seat beside Tom and directing his remark to Pogue. Nick was dressed in a navy blue blazer, an open-collared shirt, jeans, and loafers, and he seemed to have appeared out of thin air. “What Tom doesn’t realize is that you talked him out of making a down payment, making him ineligible for a more attractive interest rate, and steered him into a subprime loan back in 2006, even though he had a FICO score of 690 and a forty-five percent debt-to-loan ratio, because you personally earned a two percent higher commission from those loans over prime mortgages. You also got bonuses, and all-expenses-paid trips to Hawaii, from the bank based on how many subprime mortgages you moved.”
    “I don’t know what kind of crackpot activist you are, or what kind of stunt this is, but if you don’t leave right now, I’ll have security drag you out,” Pogue said.
    Nick calmly continued. “Not only that, you gouged him on fees. Shame on you, George. Or would you prefer I called you ‘Le Chiffre’?”
    Pogue went pale. “Who are you?”
    “I’m the man you’ve lost nearly forty-five thousand dollars toover the last few months playing online poker,” Nick said. His most recent win against Le Chiffre had come during his short stay in Bois-le-Roi.
    Pogue stared at Nick as if he had risen from the dead. “You’re Bret Maverick.”
    “At the online poker table, yes, that’s me. But right now, you can call me your conscience. Because here’s what else I know, George. You covered those gambling losses, and others totaling another twenty-three thousand dollars, by embezzling funds from this bank.”
    “What do you want?” George whispered, waving at Nick to keep his voice down.
    “You’re going to modify Tom’s loan to reflect the true market value of his home and offer him the lowest available interest rate with no refinancing charges whatsoever. You’re going to credit him for making all of his payments to date and you will erase any penalties. And you’re going to repair his credit rating, all by this time tomorrow when he comes back in to sign the papers, or I will turn you in to the authorities.”
    George glanced around again, and then whispered, “What about the other matter?”
    “It’ll be our little secret. My advice would be to put back what you took and hope nobody ever finds out what you did. If you’re thinking about making a run for it, that’s fine, but you’d better make things right for Tom before you go, because I will find you and I won’t be as understanding next time.” Nick turned to Tom, who was staring at him in shock. “Can I buy you a cup of coffee?”
    Tom was so dumbfounded by this unexpected turn of events that all he could do was nod. Nick ushered Tom out and led him to the Starbucks next door. They got their coffees and took a tableoutside. A number of the properties in the strip mall were vacant, and the parking lot was mostly empty, but Starbucks was busy. The sun was shining in a brilliant blue sky, and Tom was grateful for the warmth soaking into his shirt after the frigid air in Pogue’s office.
    When Tom Underhill was a kid, he’d lived in a place not unlike this, a seemingly ever-expanding suburban housing tract that gobbled up the walnut orchards that gave his hometown of Walnut Creek its name. He’d been fascinated by the construction, especially since nobody in his family worked with their hands. The family business was insurance. So each day Tom climbed the walnut tree in his backyard and spent hours watching the houses go up, making detailed drawings of every stage of construction. He salvaged scrap wood, borrowed some basic tools, and built a rambling multilevel treehouse in his backyard.
    Tom’s friends went on to college after high school, but Tom kept building treehouses. He moved to Southern California, and the treehouses turned profitable. He added playhouses to his repertoire and his business boomed. He was famous for his miniature Victorian houses and Swiss Family Robinson tree forts, and for his ability to replicate virtually anything in reduced size. Unfortunately the playhouses weren’t cheap, and the playhouse bubble burst when the housing bubble burst and the global economy took a nosedive. Now Tom scrounged up work as a handyman while his wife took care of their kids, ages two, eight, and ten. What Nick had just done for him was a miracle, but it didn’t solve all of his problems. And