“Yes, Mr. Hardeman.” The barman picked up a bottle of Canadian and placed it on the bar.
Number One turned to Donald. “You find my grandchildren and bring them here. All of them. Betsy too.”
Donald hesitated.
“Go on, do what I say!” Number One snapped.
Donald still hesitated. “You’re not going to drink, are you, sir?”
“No, goddamnit!” Number One roared. “What kind of a fool do you think I am? You fetch them here!”
“Yes, sir.”
Alicia was the first to enter the library. “I didn’t know you were still awake, Grandfather.”
“I couldn’t sleep,” he said. “Besides, I thought at least one time this evening we should all be together. Where’s Loren?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I haven’t seen him for several hours.”
“Donald will find him.”
Igor and Anne were the next to come in. “Grandfather,” Anne said, crossing the room to him.
He held up an interrupting hand. “I know,” he said. “You didn’t know I was still awake.”
“Are you all right?”
“I never felt better,” the old man said. He looked up as Elizabeth and Angelo appeared in the doorway. He gestured to her. “Come in, my child.”
Betsy ran across the room to him. “Great-Grandfather! I didn’t think we’d see you tonight!” There was a genuine pleasure in her voice.
He smiled at her. “I didn’t want to miss seeing you, especially tonight.”
“Great-Grandfather, you’re lovely!” She kissed his cheek.
He saw Angelo begin to walk away. “Angelo!” he called after him. “Please join us.”
Angelo hesitated.
“Please do, Angelo,” Betsy said quickly. “I know Great-Grandfather feels as if you’re one of the family.”
Number One glanced at her, then at Angelo. He smiled. “That’s an official invitation.”
Angelo came into the room. Donald appeared in the doorway behind him. “I can’t seem to find Mr. Loren anywhere, sir,” he said.
“He should be around somewhere,” Angelo said. “We arranged to meet here after the party. I’ll help you look for him.”
“No need to bother,” Loren’s voice came from the open terrace door. He came into the room. “You’re half an hour late, Angelo,” he said. “I told you we’d meet at three fifteen.”
“I’m sorry,” Angelo said. “I’m afraid I lost track of the time.”
Loren shot him a hard glance, then turned to his grandfather. “Now that we’re all here, Grandfather, what did you have in mind?”
Number One looked up at him. “I thought since this may be the last time we are all in this house together, it might be nice if we shared a final drink.”
Loren nodded. “That’s a nice sentimental gesture.” He turned to Alicia. “I’ll bet you never thought my grandfather was so fond of you that he would offer a farewell toast.”
Number One’s voice was suddenly icy. “Being my grandson doesn’t excuse bad manners. I think you owe Alicia an apology.”
“I owe her nothing!” Loren flashed. “She’s already gotten all she’s going to get from me.”
The old man’s voice became even colder. “I won’t allow Hardeman women to be spoken to like that.”
“In a few weeks she won’t be one,” Loren retorted.
“But right now she is still your wife,” Number One snapped. “And, by God, you will treat her with respect or—”
“Or what, Grandfather?” Loren asked sarcastically. “You’ll cut me out of your will?”
“No,” the old man said quietly. “I can do better than that. I’ll cut you out of my life.”
There was a long silence in the room as they stared into each other’s eyes. Loren’s eyes dropped. “I apologize,” he mumbled in a low voice.
“Barman.” Number One turned his chair. “Give everyone a drink.”
They were silent while the servant filled glasses and handed them around. Then they turned to Number One.
He held up his glass. “First—to the debutante. May she have many happy years.”
He touched the liquor to his lips while they all drank, then he raised his glass again. “There’s one other thing I have to tell you,” he said.
“This is the last party that will ever be held in Hardeman Manor. When your grandmother and I built this house we had dreams that it would be filled with the laughter and the sound of our family. But it didn’t quite work out that way. I guess neither of us ever thought that our children would go their own way and make their own lives. Maybe it was foolish of us to even dream of it, but now that the dreams are gone, I have no use for it.
“Tomorrow, Hardeman Manor will be closed. In the course of the next few weeks, certain personal things will be removed to Palm Beach and at the beginning of next month the State of Michigan will take it over to do with it what they will. That’s why I wanted this last party to be held here. To just once more feel this house alive with people.”
Number One looked around him. He held up his glass. “To Hardeman Manor, to my wife, to all my children, and to you.”
He touched the glass to his lips, hesitated a moment, then threw the liquor down his throat. He coughed once, the tears coming to his eyes, then smiled. “Don’t look so sad, children,” he said gruffly. “It just shows you how far an old man will go to find an excuse to drink a shot of whiskey!”
Chapter Thirteen
Dan Weyman’s voice was dry and flat. “What you’re doing, Angelo, is asking us to throw away our dirty water before we get clean. That doesn’t seem good business to me.”
“Then we go thirsty,” Angelo said. “But I’m sure that we’ll have what we need.”
“Sure?” Weyman’s voice was unchanged. “Between the new plant on the Coast and research, we have already invested over sixty million dollars and we haven’t even got an idea of what our new car will be.”
“Maybe,” Angelo replied. “But we do know what it will not be. And that’s a step in the right direction.”
“It’s a negative step,” Dan said. “What we have to take before the board is something positive.” He looked across the desk at Loren, who had been silent. “I, for one, can’t go along with Angelo’s idea to scrap the Sundancer for a car that nobody knows and may never be built. Half a loaf is better than none and in one year without a new car we may never get back into the market.”
“According to the figures you gave me,” Angelo said, “that half a loaf cost us almost forty-one million last year. If that’s true, dumping the car will in one year pay for the original capital investment in the new plant.”
“I pointed out that was an extraordinary loss,” Dan said. “Almost half of it was due to the failure of Sundancer Super Sport to sell.”
Angelo refrained from mentioning that he was the only member of the board who had been against the hot car, that he had correctly predicted the turning of the market.
“Let me just recap your recommendations so that I clearly understand them,” Loren said. He placed his palms together judicially on the desk in front of him and studied them. “It is your recommendation that the Sundancer line be converted to a production line for the engine and transmission of the new car so as to create greater space on the Coast for final assembly. Is that correct?”
Angelo nodded.
“Have you taken into account the cost of shipment to the Coast of those items and then the reshipment of the same parts in completed cars back East to market? Wouldn’t that be a wasteful additional cost?”
Angelo nodded again. “It might. Perhaps it would be better to ship shells for the eastern market back to Detroit for assembly here, if we can find room on the line for it. I don’t know yet and I won’t know until the car is designed and approved. Then we can refine manufacturing procedures.”
“I fail to see the rush to disavow the Sundancer,” Loren said.
Angelo looked at him. “Because
it’s yesterday’s automobile and I want to establish a brand-new outlook. A point of view that reflects today’s market in both attitudes and concerns.”
“Have you spoken to Number One about this?” Loren asked.
“Not yet,” Angelo said.
“Do you think he will like the idea of stopping production of the Sundancer?” Loren asked. “After all, it was the car that built this company.”
“I don’t think he will like it,” Angelo answered.
“Then why don’t you try to find a compromise, a middle ground, one that will be easier for him to accept?”
Angelo looked at him. “Because that’s not what he asked me to do. He asked me to build a new car that would get this company back into its former position in this industry. That’s what he asked me to do and that’s what I’m going to try to do. He didn’t ask me to make him like it.”
“I know my grandfather,” Loren said. “And I suggest you better talk it over with him before the board meeting.”
“I intend to do that.” Angelo rose to his feet. “Thank you, gentlemen. See you later this afternoon.”
They watched the door close behind him, then looked at each other.
“What do you think?” Dan asked. “Is he holding something back on us? Like maybe the design plans for the new car?”
“I don’t know,” Loren said thoughtfully. “I really don’t know.”
“He’s talking awfully positive for a man who doesn’t know what he’s doing.”
Loren looked at his friend. “Don’t you make the same mistake that I did once.”
“What do you mean?” Dan huffed.
“Once I thought he didn’t know what he was doing and you saw what happened. In his own quiet Machiavellian manner, he almost destroyed us.” He picked up a cigarette and lit it. “I’m not in the mood to give him another shot at me.”
“Then what do we do?” Dan asked.
“We sit tight and wait,” Loren said. “He’s the man in motion, he has to prove himself. We don’t have anything to prove. Our end of the business is paying the freight for all of us.”
There was a message to call John Duncan at the Coast lying on his desk when he returned to his office. He picked up the telephone and held on while the operator put the call through.
The old Scot’s voice came burring through the lines. “How was the party, laddie?”
“Fine,” Angelo replied shortly. “But that’s not what you called me about.”
Duncan laughed. “What’s happened to your sense of humor, Angelo?”
“Gone,” Angelo snapped. “Along with eight missing hours of sleep. What’s up?”
“I want your okay to do some work on my gas turbine engine.”
“You finish the tests on the Japanese Wankel?”
“Not yet. But we already know it’s good. Very good.”
“Then maybe we can make a deal.”
“Not a chance, laddie. One, they’re planning to come on strong in the States next year; two, Ford’s already wheeling and dealing for a share of Toyo Kogyo and they have the inside track. And with GM making their own deal with the Germans, we might as well forget it. They’ll royalty us right out of the market.”
Angelo was silent.
“I’ve been going over the turbine with Rourke,” Duncan said. “And we’d like to try some experiments with titanium and steel castings. We have a feeling that we can get it to take the heat and stress as well as the nickel and carbon alloys. If it can, we may have a way to bring down the cost.”
“Okay,” Angelo said. “Try it.” He reached for a cigarette. “Do you have the aerodynamics report on the designs yet?”
“No,” Duncan said. “We have the models sideways in the wind tunnel to see what will give first but nothing’s come through from them.”
“Keep me posted,” Angelo said.
“I will, laddie.” Duncan hesitated a moment. “Tell me, how does Number One look to you?”
“Good.”
“Have you spoken to him about the Sundancer yet?”
“No,” Angelo replied. “I’m going to try to get to him before the meeting.”
“Good luck, Angelo,” Duncan said.
“Thank you. You too.” Angelo put down the telephone. It rang again. He picked it up.
“Lady Ayres on the line,” his secretary said.
He switched over. “Hello, Bobbie.”
“You could have called me, Angelo.” Her voice was faintly reproachful.
He laughed. “Stop putting me on. Mere vice-presidents don’t call the boss’s intended.”
She laughed. “Now, you’re putting me on. I thought I might invite you to lunch.”
“I’d love to,” he said. “But I have a hectic afternoon coming up. I thought I’d grab a sandwich at my desk.”
“That’s funny,” she said. “That’s exactly what Loren told me. Is that common among American executives? A sign of diligence or something?”
“I don’t really know,” he answered.
“Then come upstairs,” she said. “I promise not to eat you.”
“Wrong promise,” he laughed.
“You come upstairs,” she said, “and I’ll promise to give you my latest American discovery for lunch.”
“What’s that?”
“A hero sandwich,” she answered.
He laughed aloud. “I’ll be right up. You certainly know the way to an Italian boy’s heart.”
“Take the last elevator on the bank,” she said. “I’ll clear the switch so that it comes up to the penthouse.”
She was waiting at the door when he came off the elevator. The doors closed behind him and they stood there silently for a moment, just looking at each other.
“I’m only a bird in a gilded cage,” she sang in a cracked voice. She tried to smile but she couldn’t make it. Then she came into his arms and they stood there very quietly for a long time.
After a while she stepped back and looked up at him. “You’ve lost weight.”
“A little.”
“I’ve missed you.”
He didn’t speak.
“I’ve really missed you,” she said.
He remained silent.
“You don’t know what it’s like, staying up here. There were times I thought I would go crazy.”
“You could have left any time,” he said. “You weren’t chained here.” He turned and pressed the call button for the elevator to return.
“Where are you going?”
“Back downstairs,” he answered. “I was stupid to come up in the first place.” The doors opened and he stepped into the elevator.
She placed a hand on the door to keep it from closing. “Stay.”
He shook his head. “If I do, I might blow it for you. Do you really want that?”
She stared at him.
“Do you?” he repeated.
She let her hand fall from the door. He saw her turn and walk away as the doors rushed shut. Slowly, the elevator began its descent.
Number One sat quietly at the foot of the long directors’ table. “Then we’re all agreed, gentlemen,” he said. “We’ll approve production of the Sundancer until April of ’71 and if Mr. Perino has completed satisfactory plans for the new car by that time, we will entertain a motion to convert.”
He looked at Angelo. “Is that acceptable to you?”
“No, sir,” Angelo said steadily. “But do I have a choice?”
“You don’t,” Number One said.
“Then there is just one further item I would like to call to the attention of the board,” Angelo said. “I had set as a target for production and sales of the new car, five hundred thousand units in the first year. What you are doing is making that goal impossible to achieve by half, simply because it will take that much time to break down the old assembly line.”
“We’ll make a note of that in the minutes,” Number One said. “In that case, with no further business to come before the board, I declare the meeting adjourn
ed.”
The door chimes finally made their way into his sleep. He opened his eyes and it took him a few moments to realize that he was in his suite at the Pontchartrain. He got out of bed and staggered through the living room to the door and opened it.
Betsy stood there. He couldn’t tell which of them was the more surprised. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t think you’d be asleep so early.”
“I was wiped out,” he said groggily. “I’ve only had about four hours sleep in the last three days.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize any more. You’ll make me feel guilty. Come on in.”
He led the way into the living room. “What time is it?” he asked.
“About ten thirty.”
He pointed to the bar. “Help yourself to a drink while I get my robe.” He padded off into the bedroom, his pajama trousers flapping around his legs.
When he came back she was drinking a Coke in a tall glass choked with ice cubes. He crossed to the bar and made himself a Canadian and water. He turned to look at her, taking a long sip of his drink. “Now, Miss Elizabeth,” he said heavily, “what can I do for you?”
She looked at him for a moment, then her eyes fell. “I need a favor,” she said. “A very important favor.”
He took another pull at his drink. “Like what?”
Her eyes came up and met his gaze. “You’ll think I’m being silly, or stoned, or something.”
“No, I won’t.”
“Angelo,” she said in a small voice.
“Yes?” he said, beginning to feel annoyed.
She hesitated a moment.
“Yes?” he repeated.
“My chart says it will work out okay.”
“What will?”
“You know,” she explained. “You, me. Taurus and Virgo.”
“Oh, sure,” he said, completely bewildered.
“Then it’s all settled,” she smiled. She put the glass down on the bar. “And we can go to bed.” She placed her arms around his neck.
“Wait a minute!” he protested. “Don’t I have anything to say about this?”
“Not really,” she said. “It’s all written in the stars.”
The Betsy (1971) Page 18