After life on Fayerweather Street, I got a job writing newsletters at a commodities firm in downtown Boston. I didn’t know a single thing about commodities or futures but quickly became an “expert” in the eyes of the shady salesmen. In truth, my ignorance in finance wasn’t the only thing I was hiding back then. There was also my growing addiction to alcohol and the forbidden love affair with a fellow group therapy patient.

THIS IS PART 4 of a SIX-PART STORY

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6

The offices of the commodities firm I’d been hired to work for were situated on two floors with a wide carpeted staircase connecting them. Administrative -- people like me -- were on top, while the sales force worked down below. In the beginning I kept to my confines. Truthfully, I was overworked, having to write one report after the other, and didn’t have time to wander around the premises. 

But eventually curiosity got the better of me. I’d overhear Hank on the phone in his office next door talking about how the feds might be about to investigate the firm (these conversations were muffled; I’d maybe catch every third word, so I didn’t know whether to become actively worried or not). Occasionally I’d see Ron Schaeffer drifting down the hall like a ghost in his ill-fitting grey suit. But who were the rest of the people in this place? I started going downstairs to find out.

The sales guys were in a big open room, each with their own desk and phone, seated close to one another as if for inspiration. There were about twelve of them, all men, which seemed strange until I learned that people at the other end of a cold call seemed to have more faith in a male voice when it came to parting with their money. I’d go downstairs to visit and the guys would holler and cheer as if I were a visiting celebrity. “Let’s hear it for Nicole!” they’d shout, and my face would go beet red because I wasn’t used to that much attention. But to them I was indeed a Very Important Person, the one who gave them the information they needed to make their calls. Me, who knew nothing about finance! Suddenly, because of the trade journals I was constantly poring over, I was an expert who could advise them on how to pitch gold, copper, sugar, corn, soybeans, oil … what a joke!

But it wasn’t really a joke because my name was on the firm’s materials -- all the reports I’d written -- and if the company did actually get in trouble with the feds (as was rumored) I could go down the tubes right along with them.

It didn’t help that the methods the sales team used to close deals over the phone were highly dubious. Sometimes I’d go downstairs just to watch them in action. They’d sweet talk clients, put on accents because a German or British-sounding voice inspired more confidence than a regular American accent. “Hang on a little sec, Betty Sue,” one of them would croon. “We've just had a newsflash on sugar that’s amazing and I need to check with our experts. You could make a bundle on this one!” Then he’d cover the mouthpiece and start talking to the guy at the next desk about what his wife was making for dinner that night or where they should go for lunch. When he returned to Betty Sue on the phone, he’d say, “It’s just like I thought! This is the perfect time to buy! You stand to make a cool $200 just on this one deal.”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry at the audacity of it. 

Cover Image: Francesco Ungaro

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