The Black Path (11 page)

There are some girls living on the corridor; they hang out together and go to parties he never gets invited to. Anders, who lives opposite Mauri, wears trendy glasses and is studying law; you see him in the kitchen sometimes, but he’s nearly always at his girlfriend’s.

Håkan is tall and comes from Kramfors. Mattias is big and fat. And then there’s Mauri himself, who’s a skinny little midge. What a collection. None of them goes to parties. And there’s no point in organizing one themselves—who would they invite? They sit in front of the television in Håkan’s room in the evenings gazing mindlessly at porno films with cushions on their laps, like teenage boys.

That’s the way things have been, at any rate. But now Mauri has turned into a stock market nerd, and at least that means you’re somebody. And not because he hangs out with the others who stand around just inside Kopparporten beneath the monitor.

He’s become a real player, skipping lectures, sitting up at night with dry eyes reading
Dagens Industri
instead of studying.

It’s a fever, and he’s in love. The rush you get when you’ve got it right.

That first coup. He can remember how it felt, he’ll never forget, it’s like your first girl. He bought five hundred shares in Cura Nova before the merger with Artemis. Then the price shot up. First the leap, then a steady climb as others caught on and bought. They were a long way behind him; he was already thinking of selling. He didn’t say a word about how much he’d actually earned, not to anyone. Went outside. Stood under a street lamp with his face turned up to the falling snow. The certainty. The feeling.
I’m going to be rich. This is my thing.

And as a bonus he’s become friends with Diddi. Diddi, who stops beneath the monitor, checks the prices and chats a little, sometimes sits next to Mauri in lectures.

Sometimes they go out on the town. Mauri takes twenty-five percent of Diddi’s profits; he doesn’t do anything for nothing.

He’s no fool either. He knows it’s money that gives him his entry ticket into the Other World.

So what, he says. For him, money is the ticket. For another person it’s their face, for another their charm, for yet another it’s their name. You have to have a ticket of some kind, and any ticket can be lost. It’s a matter of holding on to what you’ve found.

There are rules. Unspoken rules. For example: it’s Diddi who gets in touch with Mauri, Diddi who rings and asks Mauri if he fancies going out. It isn’t acceptable to do things the other way round; it would never occur to Mauri to take the liberty of ringing Diddi.

So Mauri waits for Diddi to call. There are voices inside him. They talk about a different circle of acquaintances that Diddi has, a circle to which Mauri is not admitted. Beautiful people. Cool parties. Diddi calls Mauri when he has nothing else on. Something like jealousy stirs inside Mauri. He sometimes thinks he’ll stop trading for Diddi. The next minute he defends himself by telling himself that he’s making money out of Diddi, it’s a mutual exploitation.

He tries to study. And when he can’t manage either that or share dealing, he plays cards with Håkan and Mattias. Thinks that Diddi’s bound to call. Runs to his room when the phone rings, but it’s nearly always the room next door where one of the girls lives.

And when Diddi calls, Mauri says yes. Every time, he thinks he’s going to say no next time. Pretend to be busy.

Another rule is that Diddi chooses the company. It’s absolutely out of the question for Mauri to take somebody along, Håkan or Mattias for example. Not that he’d want to anyway. There’s no friendship there, no solidarity or whatever the hell it’s supposed to be. They’re outsiders, that’s all they have in common. But not any longer.

And Mauri and Diddi get completely pissed. Wide awake and high on cocaine. He sometimes wakes up in the morning without the slightest idea of how or when he got home. He’s got slips and tickets in his pockets, stamps on his hands, all clues as to how the journey went. From the pub to Caféet to a club to a late-night party to some girls.

And he’s allowed to screw the less attractive friends of the prettiest girls. And that’s absolutely fine, and so much more than Håkan and Mattias bloody get.

Six months pass. Mauri knows that Diddi has a sister, but he’s never met her.

Nobody can shrug their shoulders like Diddi. They fail an exam, both of them. Mauri turns his anger inward, it chafes and eats away at him inside. A voice tells him he’s worthless, that he’s just a fraud, that he’ll soon slip over the edge and fall down into the world that’s really meant for him.

Diddi swears too, but then he turns his failure outward, it’s the invigilator, the examiner, the guy who was sitting in front of him farting silently…it’s everybody’s fault except his. And he only broods about it for a little while. Then his usual insouciance returns.

It’s a while before Mauri realizes Diddi isn’t rich. He’s always thought that upper-class guys, especially those from the nobility, have plenty of money. But that’s not the case. When Diddi gets to know Mauri he’s managing on virtually nothing, just the contributory element of his student finances. He lives in an apartment in Östermalm, but it belongs to some relative. His shirts have come from his father’s wardrobe, they’re the ones his father grew out of long ago. He wears them casually buttoned over T-shirts. He owns one pair of jeans and one pair of shoes. He’s always cold in the winter, but he always looks good. Maybe he looks best of all when he’s freezing cold. When he hunches his shoulders with his arms pressed tightly against his body. You have to stop yourself throwing your arms around him.

Where Diddi got the money to invest in Mauri’s share dealing Mauri doesn’t know. He tells himself it’s not his concern. Later, when Mauri worked out how a pissed, slurring Diddi could go into the toilets in the bar and come out a short while later on top of the world, he wondered where Diddi got the money for his habits. He has his own ideas about that. Once when they were out, an older man came over and started chatting. He hadn’t got past hello when Diddi got up and just disappeared. Mauri sensed that it was absolutely taboo to ask who he was.

Diddi likes money. All his life he’s seen money, hung out with people who have money, but never had any himself. His hunger has grown. It doesn’t take long before he starts to take out more and more of his profits from the trading. Then it’s Mauri’s turn to shrug his shoulders. That isn’t his concern either. Diddi’s share in their simple company falls.

Diddi starts to disappear for long periods, traveling to the Riviera and to Paris. His pockets are full of money.

Everybody has to be crushed at some point. Soon it will be Diddi’s turn. And soon Mauri will get to meet Diddi’s sister.

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
: You call him master.

I
NNA
W
ATTRANG
: We are his curs, after all.

M
AURI
K
ALLIS
[
smiling and shaking his head slightly
]: They’ve stolen that from Jan Stenbeck, the financier. His employees used to call him master. I don’t know whether I should be flattered or insulted.

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
: Are they your curs?

M
AURI
K
ALLIS:
If we’re sticking with the animal theme, then of course I’d prefer to work with starving cats.

D
IDDI
W
ATTRANG
: And we’re fat…

I
NNA
W
ATTRANG
:…and lazy.

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
: So, tell me about it. A very unusual friendship seems to have developed between the three of you. Inna and Diddi Wattrang were born with a silver spoon in their mouths, and you’re what’s known as a “superkid,” succeeding against all the odds; is that a fair comment?

M
AURI
K
ALLIS:
Yes.

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
: So it must be you who’s the starving cat. What is it that makes the three of you such a good team?

M
AURI
K
ALLIS:
Diddi and Inna complement me. A major part of this enterprise involves finding people who are prepared to gamble, who are prepared to take a big risk for the chance of bringing off a big profit. And who can afford to do it. Who don’t have to sell a stock holding when it hits rock bottom, but who can afford to stay in a company that’s losing money until I’ve brought in a winning project. Because it always comes along. Sooner or later. But you have to be able to wait. That’s why we never float our companies on the stock exchange; we prefer private investments so you have some idea of who’s buying. It’s the same thing with, for example, mining in Uganda. Just at the moment, things are so unstable down there that we can’t actually do any business. But it’s a long-term project, and I believe in it. And the last thing I need is a gang of shareholders breathing down my neck and wanting to see profits within six months. Diddi and Inna find the right kind of investors for different projects. And they’re very good at selling. They find adventurous investors and gamblers for risky projects, and patient investors without liquidity problems for long-term projects. They’re much more socially adept than I am. They have that financial magnetism. And now we’re running a number of mines within the group, I’m delighted to have them working with the people on the ground and with colleagues. They can move in high or low circles, effectively and without falling out with anybody.

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
[
to Inna
]: So what’s Mauri’s strength, then?

I
NNA
W
ATTRANG
: Well, he’s got a real nose for a good business opportunity. An internal divining rod. And he’s an excellent negotiator.

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
: What’s he like as an employer?

I
NNA
W
ATTRANG
: He’s always calm. That’s the most fascinating thing about him. Things can get really rocky at times, like during the early years when he was buying concessions before he’d got the finance sorted. He never showed any hint of unease or stress. And that means that those of us who work around him feel enormously secure.

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
: But now you’ve been sounding off in the papers. Showing your feelings.

M
AURI
K
ALLIS:
You mean the mine in Ruwenzori? The AIDS business?

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
: You called Swedish AIDS a joke, among other things.

M
AURI
K
ALLIS:
That was a quote that was taken completely out of context. And I wasn’t sounding off in the press, a journalist came along to a lecture I was giving. But obviously I get annoyed eventually when I’m constantly pestered by Swedish journalists who haven’t done their homework. “Kallis Mining builds roads for militia troops.” And then they see me shaking hands with a general from the Lendu militia, and they write about what that particular group has done in the Congo, and all of a sudden my mining company in northwestern Uganda is the work of the devil himself. And so am I. It’s very easy to maintain your high moral values, simply by having nothing whatsoever to do with countries in crisis. Send in a contribution and keep your fingers out of it. But the population of these countries needs businesses, growth, employment. The government, on the other hand, wants budgetary assistance, with no form of control at all. You only have to look at the situation in Kampala to see where a great deal of the money goes. Incredibly luxurious houses all over the mountainsides. That’s where the members of the government live, and highly placed officials within the administration. And anybody who refuses to recognize that AIDS money is going to the military, who as well as terrorizing the civilian population spend their time plundering mines in northern Congo—well, they’re just being naive. Every year billions are pumped into Africa to combat AIDS, but if you ask any African woman in any African country you care to name, she’ll say: It doesn’t make any difference. Where does all that money go?

M
ALOU VON
S
IVERS
: Yes, where does it go?

M
AURI
K
ALLIS:
Into the pockets of members of the government, but that isn’t the worst of it. Better to build luxury houses than spend it on arms. But the AIDS workers have jobs they enjoy, and that’s fine. I’m only trying to say that if you’re going to run a company down there, you need to be prepared to interact with people who are dubious in one way or another. You’re going to get your own fingers a little bit dirty, but at least you’re doing something. And if I build a road from my mine, then it’s difficult for me to prevent opposing troops from using it.