September 4, 2013.

Friction at Zurich Built Ahead of Suicide

The quacking voice from the next table, temporarily silenced during the Ministry's announcement, had started up again, as loud as ever. For some reason Winston suddenly found himself thinking of Mrs Parsons, with her wispy hair and the dust in the creases of her face. Within two years those children would be denouncing her to the Thought Police. Mrs Parsons would be vaporized. Syme would be vaporized. Winston would be vaporized. O'Brien would be vaporized. Parsons, on the other hand, would never be vaporized. The eyeless creature with the quacking voice would never be vaporized. The little beetle-like men who scuttle so nimbly through the labyrinthine corridors of Ministries they, too, would never be vaporized. And the girl with dark hair, the girl from the Fiction Department -- she would never be vaporized either. It seemed to him that he knew instinctively who would survive and who would perish: though just what it was that made for survival, it was not easy to say.

Long-simmering friction between the chairman and chief financial officer of Zurich Insurance Group AG ZURN. VX -0.73% escalated this summer as the two tussled over how to explain the company's disappointing progress toward meeting certain business targets, according to company officials familiar with the situation.

At this moment he was dragged out of his reverie with a violent jerk. The girl at the next table had turned partly round and was looking at him. It was the girl with dark hair. She was looking at him in a sidelong way, but with curious intensity. The instant she caught his eye she looked away again. 

The sometimes-heated exchanges between Josef Ackermann, who became chairman in 2012, and CFO Pierre Wauthier didn't strike Zurich officials as problematic. Then, last week, Mr. Wauthier committed suicide at his lakeside home outside Zurich.

The sweat started out on Winston's backbone. A horrible pang of terror went through him. It was gone almost at once, but it left a sort of nagging uneasiness behind. Why was she watching him? Why did she keep following him about? Unfortunately he could not remember whether she had already been at the table when he arrived, or had come there afterwards. But yesterday, at any rate, during the Two Minutes Hate, she had sat immediately behind him when there was no apparent need to do so. Quite likely her real object had been to listen to him and make sure whether he was shouting loudly enough. 

He left a typed note blaming Mr. Ackermann for creating an unbearable, pressure-cooker working environment, and for treating colleagues disrespectfully, according to people familiar with the note, which hasn't been released. Mr. Ackermann, a hard-charging former investment banker who became Zurich's chairman after a long career as the chief executive of Deutsche Bank AG, abruptly resigned.