and the band played on
from the Book of Bonus Malus, Chapter 11.
1. And so it came to pass that the day arrived, when loud Rumour spoke with many tongues throughout the Bank;
2. And the Manager's Manager was seen walking in with a huge pile of envelopes.
3. Then those that had toiled all year in the trenches, and worked 5 weekends in an row, and recorded 100 hour work weeks, said unto one another:
4. Verily, the day of our reward hath arrived.
5. But how shall this be, knowing that the Evil One hath Madoff with several billion dollars worth of the Customer's money ?
6. And the Profits, although huge, are still down from last year.
7. And there was wailing and gnashing of teeth.
8. Thus it came to pass that one by one, the Permanent Employees were summoned into the Inner Room.
10. Where the manager read out to them from a script which he had been given:
11. The gist of which was that the guys at the top were very very sorry, especially because they had already sacked a third of the workforce, and everyone else was having to work twice as hard as before; but they were very very grateful for your efforts in the Toughest of Markets, and in Unprecedented Times.
12. And then they gave everybody the Letter of Bonus Malus.
13. And as they came out from the Inner Room, each person tried very hard to hide their feelings;
14. Even as do the farmers, who say the harvest is rotten every year, although we all know they are lying most of the time or they wouldn't still be farmers.
15. And the truth perhaps was that all got much less than they hoped, yet not as little as they feared.
16. But the one thing they could not do was discuss it with each other, because there is a gagging clause in everyone's work contract forbidding this on pain of death (or sacking, which is worse).
17. And the Prime Minister was made aware of all of this, and he waxed exceedingly wroth, although to be honest in our case it has nothing to do with him at all.
18. But he could not actually do Thing One about it.
19. And the band played on.
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