The Coffee Trader

“Of course you’re right,” Miguel said impatiently.

“Believe no pretended gestures of friendship,” Alferonda urged him.

“I understand.”

“Good. Then I wish you luck with your venture today.”

Miguel needed no luck. He had knowledge no one else possessed. And he had coffee.

As he passed through the great arch of the Exchange, he closed his eyes and muttered some half-recalled prayer in an effort to sustain his trading efforts that day. The Holy One, blessed be He, had not yet abandoned him. Miguel was sure of it. He was almost sure of it.

The business with Alferonda had only taken a few minutes, but already the tone of the Exchange had calmed since the riotous opening of the gates. On reckoning days, traders roamed the bourse, checking how their prices stood in order to hedge their accounts against unexpected changes. Within the first quarter hour, most had already learned what they needed to know.

Miguel hurried to the northwest corner of the Exchange and found a Dutch acquaintance in the Muscovy trade from whom to purchase whale oil. The current price was thirty-seven and a half guilders per quarter ton, and Miguel bought fifty quarters at just under nineteen hundred guilders-an amount he could ill afford to lose, particularly since it was all debt.

Miguel then took a turn around the Exchange, always keeping an eye on the clock and the far end of the plaza. He did a little business, buying some cheap lumber that a fellow needed to unload to raise capital, and then chatted with a few friends until he noticed five black-clad Dutchmen approaching the whale-oil corner. They were young, round-faced, and clean-shaven and had the confident expression of men who traded in large sums that were not their own. They were East India Company agents, and they wore their affiliation like a uniform. Men halted their conversations to watch them.

All five began at once. They cried out for whale oil, they slapped hands in agreement, and they moved on to the next deal. In almost an instant, Miguel heard someone calling out to buy at thirty-nine a quarter. The cries began in Dutch, Latin, and Portuguese: “Buying one hundred quarters at forty and a half.” Another voice returned, “Selling at forty.”

Miguel’s heart pounded in the thrill of trade. It was just as Geertruid had said-the coffee was like a spirit that had taken hold of his body. He heard each cry with clarity; he calculated each new price with instant precision. Nothing escaped his notice.

With his receipt clutched in one hand, he read the mood of the crowd more clearly than he had ever done before. He had seen dozens of these frenzies, but never before had he felt he could see its currents in the river of exchange. Each price sent the current in a new direction, and a man who paid close attention, whose wits were sharpened with this marvelous drink, could see everything unfold. Miguel now understood why he had failed in the past. He had always thought of the future, but he now understood that the future counted for nothing. Only this moment, this instant. The price would peak today in the excitement; tomorrow the price would plummet. Now was all that mattered.

Forty-two guilders per quarter ton. Forty-four guilders. It showed no sign of slowing. Forty-seven.

Always before he had wondered how to know when to make his move. It took skill and luck and clairvoyance to know when prices had peaked. It was better to sell just before the peak than just after, for prices fell much more quickly than they rose, and being off by an instant could mean the difference between profit and loss. Today, he would know the right instant.

Miguel stuck close, watching the faces of the merchants, looking for signs of panic. Then he noticed the five East India agents just begi

Now! the coffee screamed. Do it!

“Fifty quarters,” Miguel called out loudly, “for fifty-three and a half guilders.”

A fat little broker named Ricardo, a Jew of the Vlooyenburg, slapped Miguel’s hand to acknowledge the trade. And it was done.

His heart pounded. His breathing came in quick rasps as the prices fell around him: fifty guilders, then forty-eight, forty-five. He had sold at precisely the right moment. Seconds later would have cost him hundreds. The doubt that had been plaguing him, the sluggishness, the murky thinking, were all gone now. He had used coffee to banish them the way a great rabbi uses the Torah to banish demons.

Miguel felt as though he had just run all the way from Rotterdam. Everything had happened so quickly, it had all whirled around him in a murky coffee haze, but now it was done. The space of a few frantic moments had yielded a pure profit of eight hundred guilders.

He could barely keep himself from laughing out loud. It was like waking from a nightmare when he would tell himself that the terrors of the dream world were not his; he need not worry any longer. This debt that tormented him might as well disappear in the wind; that was how little it now mattered.

He hadn’t pla

By the clock on the tower, he could see that there was scant time left before the Exchange closed for the day. Why flitter about doing little things? It was time to celebrate. The most wretched time of his life had just come to an end. The indebted, struggling Lienzo was banished, and a new era of prosperity was upon him. He let loose a fresh burst of laughter, caring nothing for how the young broker hurried away as though Miguel might hurt him, caring nothing for the cluster of Dutchmen who now stared as though Miguel were a lunatic. They mattered not at all, but lest he forget the author of all good fortune, he called out his thanks to the Holy One, blessed be He, for sustaining him and allowing him to reach this season.

And then, as though in answer, the idea descended upon him all at once.

It came with unexpected force, and even at the time it seemed as though something had fallen from the heavens, for he did not pull it from himself. It came upon him from outside. It was a gift.

Miguel forgot about whale-oil profits. He forgot about his debts and Parido. In a glorious instant, he knew, with perfect clarity, how he would make his fortune from coffee.

The idea paralyzed him. He understood that if he could truly midwife this idea into the world he would have wealth on an order of which he had only dreamed. Not comfort money, not prosperity money: opulence money. He would be able to marry whomever he wished and at last fill the empty holes in his life; he would be able to bring forth Hebrew children and situate them as he liked; they would not be merchants toiling for their bread as he had been made to do. The descendants of Miguel Lienzo would be gentlemen, rentiers, anything they might choose, and with the leisure to devote their lives to the study of Torah-or, if they were daughters, to marry great scholars. His sons would be dedicated to the Law, they would give money to the charities, sit upon the Ma’amad and give wise rulings, and scatter petty men like Parido to the fringes of Jewish society.

He needed a moment to collect his thoughts, which were jumbled and sluggish. Standing still in the midst of the Exchange, merchants and brokers pushing past him like gusts of wind, he repeated his scheme back to himself to make sure he could fully articulate it in all its glory. He engaged in a silent dialogue, a session of interrogation as intense and merciless as any Ma’amad inquiry. If he were to be struck on the head and lose consciousness and sleep until the next day, he wanted to be certain that he would remember this idea as easily as he remembered his own name.