"No, but that's not a bad idea."
"Well, what is it you want?"
"A small favor."
"You have got to be kidding."
"Not for me. It's the country I'm concerned about. That includes you. How about doing the U.S. a favor and leak a heavy rumor from the world of high finance. The American dollar, dear to us all, may be about to go the way of Confederate mustard plasters. I'll even dictate the statement for you."
"Matt, why don't you give this earth-shaking scoop to one of your big-shot connections down at The Wall Street Journal, assuming it's such hot news?"
Good question. The answer, sadly, was that nobody inside the system would want to even hear this kind of talk, let alone spread it. Everybody in the financial community was already whistling in the dark, terrified those Latin American debt dominos might start to tumble, taking a few of our flagship banks along with them. And now this? No way.
"Donna, I need somebody willing to go out on a limb."
"You shit." She gave a snort. "I let you mortify me once. And believe me that's the last—"
"Will you listen, for chrissake. I know it sounds crazy, but this is dead serious. I've taken on a foreign investment firm as a client. I can't tell you the name, but I'm absolutely sure the guy running it is about to screw this country somehow. He's been shorting the bond market, and now he's going to start dumping dollars. Billions and billions. I want to blow the whistle. Get something on the air that'll cause a few bankers and traders to look up from their computer terminals and—"