General Cornwallis

On the bright November day, Mitch Curtis invited me to have lunch at the Bankers Club. I don’t rub elbows with bankers often — not often enough to put leather patches on my sleeves anyway.

The Bankers Club is 52 floors above the Bank of America. (Pick up a Sherpa guide at the 40th.) From the gleaming-clean windows you can see forever. You could hit the East Bay with a PingPong ball.

The walls are paneled brown oak. There are paintings of men in 18th century powdered wigs. Probably fellows who ran royal dampers and lent money to kings. Outside the men’s room there’s an antique French painting of a woman behind a cash drawer labeled “The Cashier.” She looks like one of the Madames who sit outside the johns in French railroad stations. If you don’t throw a franc in the basket as you leave, she gives you a dirty look.

The Bankers Club is a classy place.

Mitch Curtis is just back from Russia. He liked everything. “The people were friendly and one night I got into a restaurant where they had the best Chicken Kiev in the world.

“When you put a fork in it, the butter came out like an oil well.”

He was so overcome by the memory that he ordered Chicken Kiev, which happened to be on the menu. I ordered the vol-au-vent.

The November sun fell brightly on the table. All around us, bankers spoke softly of prime rates and prime ribs. There’s a touch of grace in the Bankers Club. I think my suit fits better there.

The Mitchell T. Curtis company helps people with a lot of money keep that money.

The company bought the best seller “The Year of the French.” It’s about the Irish rebellion of the 1790s and the help of a French fleet. There’s an old song:

“Oh, the French are on the sea and old Erin shall be free.”

He put together a hui of investors. They invested in the movie rights. The government is generous. You deduct this investment from your income tax. After awhile you sell the movie. You aren’t taxed as much on the profit as the tellers downstairs pay on their salaries.

Once Mitch brought a Chinese boy here. He told him: “All this land belongs to Louis Lurie. He was once a newsboy. That is the American way.”

They passed a room labeled: “Louis Lurie Foundation.” Mitch explained: “People who have money must have tax shelters. The government will take it away from them.”

The Chinese boy said: “Just like the Chinese way.”

The picture, “The Year of the French,” was made on the wild Atlantic side of Ireland.

When he saw it being made, Mitch got an urge to be an actor. Name in lights. Glamour. Hollywood.

“Actually, I just wanted a small part. The part of General Cornwallis who com- manded the English army.” (I read the book. I think Cornwallis — same fellow who surrendered to Washington at Yorktown — is a fat part.)

The director wouldn’t let Mitch play it. He was disappointed.

Mitch went on to Russia. “I didn’t like the drinks much — Georgian wine is OK. Then I found there was a foreign money bar in the basement of the hotel.

One for foreigners with foreign money. That improved things. I had a good in-tourist guide, a girl who spoke English. She must have a poor opinion of the United States.

“She asked me, ‘Are there many people in America who want to immigrate to Russia?’ ” Mitch said he didn’t know of any. They probably don’t come to the Bankers Club.

Mitch Curtis is just back from Russia. He liked everything. “The people were friendly and one night I got into a restaurant where they had the best Chicken Kiev in the world. When you put a fork in it, the butter came out like an oil well.”