Equestrians Afoot

B. White William

Description

During the conversion from communism to capitalism, the world perceived a huge consumer goods market in Russia. The reality of the situation was that the masses had very little money. Most of the wealth rested in the hands of a small groups of oligarchs. One of the oligarchs understood the problem and decided to try to help the people raise their standard of living to that of the western world. This oligarch was know as the Cowboy! The Cowboy put together a think tank of the best minds he could find. It was an eclectic bunch, including a Russian Jew, Hagar, Mynt Hswe and others. The team with the help of Cowboy's personal secretary, Maria and his right hand man, Estaban. The Cowboy knighted them all with immense personal wealth. These knights got off their horses and developed a powerful business model to help the economy grow. They started a consumer products company directed at the Russian market. They offered to teach the model to anyone interested. Just as they were enjoying some success life stepped in. An unnoticed death led to the assignation of the Cowboy! Set in the 1970's, in Belorussia, it is but a glimpse of Russia. Equestrians afoot is the prequel to Equestrians Abroad. A much more ambitious story. In a strange turn of events the team moves to America, where they attack an even greater problem....distribution of wealth. They are almost immediately set upon by big business, the financiers and Wall Street.

Sujets

• Historical fiction

Informations

• Publié par: First Edition Design Publishing
• Date de parution: 01 novembre 2015
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781622879847
• Langue: English

Extrait

Equestrians Afoot

By Bruce White
Equestrians Afoot
Copyright ©2015 Bruce White

ISBN 978-1622-879-84-7 EBOOK

July 2015

Published and Distributed by
First Edition Design Publishing, Inc.
P.O. Box 20217, Sarasota, FL 34276-3217
www.firsteditiondesignpublishing.com

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this book publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means ─ electronic, mechanical, photo-copy, recording, or any other ─ except brief quotation in reviews, without the prior permission of the author or publisher.
Chapter One

Ivars Kasarskis sat in his den. It was a room from an old Georgian palace. He had had the room carefully dismantled and rebuilt here in Minsk. It exuded the image of old money. lvars appreciated that. It was a large rectangular room with a fireplace at either end. It was paneled in ornate carvings of mahogany. It had a vaulted ceiling with bright paintings in each square. At one end were the billiards table and a small well-stocked bar. Ivars poison of choice was vodka It was what was expected of him. He seldom had any time for drink. A large oaken desk was at the other end. The computer seemed out of place there, but it was essential to Ivars import business. He was relaxing on the glove leather couch between the desk and the billiard table, watching the news on television. Olga, the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, brought him Vodka and water. She was in perky white shorts and a tee shirt. She knew her husband always needed a drink when he watched the news. She sat down beside him and started rubbing his shoulders.
"Things are not so bright for our homeland.'' lvars sighed.
"What can we do?" Olga was empathetic. She was growing concerned because this was becoming a recurring theme. She knew Ivars was dwelling on the future of the country, but why? At sixty-two, he should be planning retirement. He had anything and everything he wanted. She knew he could not rest with this obsession in his baggage.
He got up from the couch and took his drink to his desk. Olga got up and went into the kitchen to talk to the cook about breakfast for the next morning.
lvars loved his country. It had been very good to him. As a teenager at the end of world war two he discovered his talent. He became a famous dog robber for the wealthy and powerful. This of course set him up for the black-market. He had a reputation of being able to acquire anything his customer wanted, with no questions asked. This had brought him great wealth and power, as well as very influential friends. Although basically a criminal in Communistic Russia, he was a man of proven integrity. He had proven many times that he could be trusted to do anything he said he would do. He supplied muscle fora price. He never judged his customer. lf a customer wanted someone to suffer, lvars assumed that that someone had good reason to suffer. In his career, no customer had ever been compromised. He was trusted in every quarter.
He was excited when Andropov introduced Glastnost. The drive sputtered at Andropov's death until Gorbachev took up the reins. But lvars saw the Communist party torn down with no viable replacement. Ivars’ customer base was changing. It was becoming polluted by the Russian Mafia. The Mafia respected lvars. He respected the Mafia for its power and wealth, but he didn't like servicing them. They were too unstable.
Ivars real frustration was rooted in the comparative standard of living between what he considered to be the number one world power and the western world. A Russian citizen needed practically everything to catch up. They needed homes of their own. They needed cars, home appliances, computers, furniture, and a wider choice of foods and clothing. He looked out and saw the largest market since the baby boom of the west after the Second World War. He wanted to give them all of this to build their self-esteem, and enable them to reach their full potential. As the premiere marketer in all Russia, he could not ignore this fantastic market He established a legitimate import business. Quality goods from the west were too expensive for the common Russian. The business thrived on the patronage of the wealthy. How could he penetrate the real market? He was stymied. Olga called him up to bed. He responded with a deep sigh, no closer to a solution, he went to bed.
Oleg sat alone, amid piles of textbooks in the busy peevnaya. With the entire clamor of the people who stopped into the beer parlor after work going on around him, he was able to concentrate on his studies with ease. He leaned back, giving himself a chance to reflect. From the first time he had heard about transistors, he was fascinated by the world of electronics. By the time he arrived at the Technical Institute in Minsk, he was well versed in solid state physics, and very anxious to use this knowledge. His first real opportunity to use a computer was at the Technical Institute. Here he had access to the Internet. In his first year at the Institute, he had developed a process to build implanted Zener diodes with a less than one- percent tolerance and very high yields. This was a voluntary extra project. It had caused quite a stir. The process was documented and annotated by Oleg. He received top marks for his first year, and was considered a minor prodigy. His instructor had taken this work to industry for evaluation. Industry was so impressed that they implemented the process, which turned out to be very profitable. The courts were still trying to unravel the royalty issues. Of course Oleg had made no money on the project. But he was not concerned. He had verified his theories on annealing the silicon lattice structure, and several other key issues. He had also established a reputation in both the Institute and his chosen profession.
In his second year he developed an integrated power chip that solidified his theories on compartmentalization of silicon. Though the design was very promising, no one used it due to the legal hassle created by the Zener diodes.
In his third year He did a study on superconductors. It was not as impressive since no product was developed, just a body of work fully documented. This made the Institute happier. It was more conventional and no legal hassles would arise. Oleg felt this work would be very important, but even he didn't know where it fit.
This year, he did a paper on dinosaurs, to complete his humanities requirements.
Now all that was left were the final orals. The Institute had invited specialists from the University of Moscow to partake in the final orals, Oleg felt pressured for the first time. This pressure brought him suddenly back to reality. The other patrons of the beer parlor paid no attention to Oleg. They were used to him usually being there with his books. When Oleg first started stopping off at the peevnaya after class to clean up his paper work before going home, the regulars had been very interested in him.
As he reached for his notes he noticed a man entering the peevnaya. To Oleg the man looked like a cartoon of the nouveau riche. He was wearing western style blue jeans, Levis; no doubt, with a red silk western cut shirt and a string tie. On top of this he had a denim jacket, not a typical denim jacket, but a tailored western cut sports jacket. Oleg checked his boots, western of course. What a "waist" of money, Oleg smiled at his own brain bound pun. The fop sauntered about the peevnaya, as if very interested in what every customer was having, but not apparently searching for a table.
Ivars Kasarskis took a quick assessment of Oleg. He knew a lot about Oleg. He knew for instance that his parents had moved from Bobrusk to Minsk in 1957. They were both hvac engineers, Jewish, and moderately wealthy. They had been able to buy a modest home in Minsk. Oleg and his twin brother Leonide had been born there. His older brother and sister had been born in Bobrusk. Oleg's father had added an extra room when the twins came. He then added a second story, and a workshop which later became a garage for the family car. Oleg had been an excellent student. As the nation opened to Glastnost in the eighties, Oleg's father jumped at the chance to immigrate to America. He and his family were high profile Jews in a nation that despised Jews. Oleg however had married the beautiful Tonia who was not Jewish. The government had tried to block the marriage at every turn. Since the family home had much more than the required space, the marriage had proceeded. The government was more than happy to grant permission for the Russian Jews to immigrate, but balked at the immigration of a young Russian woman. Oleg and Tonia stayed behind, awaiting her release. They also had to dispose of the house and car. The family was allowed only one suitcase per person as they left their homeland.
Oleg and Tonia both had to finish their degrees as well. Things had darkened for the stranded couple. The house had been declared in the public domain. New roads were necessary to carry the increase in traffic, which would be required with the new economic plan. The couple was assigned a space in a state apartment building, with the amount of space required for every Russian couple without children. The space was not available yet. Oleg and Tonia were still in the home.
Oleg started regathering his thoughts. He became aware that the fop was now peering into his cup.
"So you are Oleg Kagan!" Without pause, and in a challenging tone, "I believe that the dinosaur is extinct."
Somewhat impatient, Oleg snapped back, "Of course!"
The stranger had taken a quick physical assessment of Oleg. Though Oleg was sitting down, the stranger knew him to be five feet eleven inches tall, with a strong build and a flat stomach. The clothes classified him as an upper middle class student. His eyes were intense, enhanced by a swarthy complexion and a black mustache. With this m