Table of Contents
List of Illustrations xiii
Acknowledgements xv
Introduction xvii
Preface xxi
1 The battle Royal 1
2 Mathewson to the rescue 14
3 Rebuilding the Royal 26
4 Hanging on the telephone 37
5 Financial engineering 41
6 Wings spread 48
7 George's big ambition 55
8 The Fred and Johnny show 69
9 Bagging NatWest 88
10 Anglo-Scottish blend 108
11 The wrong kind of growth 125
12 The fear culture 141
13 Wall of silence 151
14 Riding the Tiger 157
15 Royal Bank of Fred 171
16 Laird of Gogarburn 178
17 Enter the pharmacist 191
18 Fundamentally supine 194
19 Three pillars of ignorance 211
20 All-American boy 218
21 No more deals 233
22 Failed alchemists 245
23 Bad leveraged bets 261
24 I'm a-shattered, shattered! 266
25 That Border Collie feeling 285
26 Explosions at ABN 302
27 Drink the Kool-Aid 313
28 The crash 338
29 Death's Head 358
30 Fred found out 381
31 Defibrillation and despair 391
32 False dawn 403
33 Hester's ledger 416
34 Et tu, George? 444
35 McEwan's uncertain remedy 454
36 Normalisation of sorts 464
37 Komodo dragon 474
38 Largest theft anywhere, ever 484
39 The guilty men 492
Epilogue: Flight of fancy? 530
Glossary 539
Endnotes 543
Bibliography 607
Index 611
