Vintage Love

by Clarissa Ross

  “Don’t say that, Mother!” Judith warned her. ‘I’ll see Miles whenever I like.”

  “Of course you will! You proved that tonight with your lies,” Millicent said, beginning to sob. “It could be your father, you sound so much like him!”

  “Mother!” Judith begged. And with a small moan of despair, she turned and ran down the hall to the refuge of her own room.

  The rain came on Sunday. It poured down and suited Judith’s mood. At breakfast she came to terms with her mother and tried to explain there was nothing to worry about in Miles Estey’s return. Her mother was in one of her quiet, apathetic moods and it was hard to know whether Judith had made the situation plain to her or not.

  Around noon she phoned Alan Fraser and was fortunate enough to get him on the line at the first try. He sounded glad to hear from her. “I called you last night,” he said. “But I guess I just missed you.”

  “I went out for a little while,” Judith said.

  “I wanted to tell you,” Alan continued, “that we have new troubles in the offing. A union organizer has just arrived in town.”

  “Oh!” she said, not wanting to commit herself.

  “It could mean trouble. Not that it may make too much difference, since we have all we can handle anyway.”

  “Perhaps it won’t turn out too badly,” she ventured.

  “I wouldn’t count on that,” he said, “especially since the union man happens to be someone who hasn’t too much good will toward Port Winter. His name is Miles Estey.”

  “Miles,” she repeated.

  “I don’t expect you to sound surprised,” Alan went on dryly. “Someone told me they saw you with him at the Ranch House last night.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Judith wasn’t surprised to hear that she and Miles had been seen. In spite of the fact they hadn’t noticed anyone they knew in their particular area of the restaurant, it was a big place and there had undoubtedly been people who had seen them coming in whom they hadn’t seen.

  Quickly recovering her poise, she said, “He got in touch with me as soon as he arrived in town.”

  “That’s logical,” Alan said, showing no sign of annoyance. “What kind of a mood is he in?”

  “He’s a lot different,” she warned him. “There were times when I felt I was talking to a stranger.”

  “I see,” Alan said quietly. “Did he mention his business here?”

  “Yes. He’s determined to get the workers a better deal.”

  “Does he know they may be facing a full lay-off?”

  “That didn’t seem to interest him.”

  There was a distinct sigh from the other end of the phone. “Well,” Alan said, “I guess that is that.”

  Judith said, “Perhaps you can get somewhere with him when you meet.”

  “I’m going to call his motel right away,” Alan said. “I hope I can arrange a meeting with him tonight; see him and get some idea what his demands are going to be.”

  “That could be a good idea,” Judith agreed. “I wish you luck.”

  “I can use some,” Alan said grimly. “I expect to get the final report on the shareholders of the plaza in the morning. I’m crossing my fingers that the Senator’s name will be among them.”

  “It would simplify things,” Judith said. “What about the housing project?”

  “I’ve been too busy tracing the shopping center setup to go into it yet.”

  “I’ll see you in the morning then,” she said.

  After she hung up, she went back to sit in the quiet of her own room and watch the rain beat down. She wondered if Alan would be successful in setting up a meeting with Miles and, if so, how the two would get along. It was odd that the two men who had figured in her life so prominently should now find themselves on opposing sides where the bridge was concerned.

  She tried to picture their meeting and the attitudes of each of the men. There was no doubt that Alan would try to be fair with the workers, but with his own authority in jeopardy at the moment, it was doubtful if he was in a very strong bargaining position. She was certain Miles would work for important gains for the union men he was representing, but she also felt he would be reasonable.

  Surely the differences between union and management could be settled favorably in this instance. As she saw it, the big danger looming from the bridge was the threat offered by Senator Lafferty and his backers. Alan would have to come up with something strong to defeat them.

  She believed that Alan would either prove himself in this crisis or go down to a personal defeat that might really blight his future. His father was to blame for many of Alan’s personality faults and would bear a heavy share of the guilt if Alan failed. The face of the elder Fraser still haunted her following her confrontation with him on the woodland path. Brandon Fraser was a cold, bigoted man and surely a very unhappy one.

  The day became evening without the rain letting up. And when she finally got into bed, it was still raining. It had been a dull, gray day filled with dark forebodings for the week ahead.

  Alan was already in his office when she arrived the next morning. It was still gray and unpleasant, but the rain had ended. He glanced up with a smile when she came in.

  “Ready for the big week?” he wanted to know.

  Judith slipped off her raincoat, hung it up and patted her hair. Then she asked, “How did you make out with Miles Estey?”

  “We had a meeting.”

  “With good results, I hope.”

  Alan shrugged. “You were right. He is in a tough mood. But I finally worked out a deal with him I think will be satisfactory to the bridge authority.”

  “You’ll be calling them together at once, I suppose.”

  “That will be your first job this morning,” Alan said briskly. “We’ll meet at the City Hall at eight-thirty tonight. Call everyone and tell them it’s urgent they be there.”

  She smiled. “Will Miles be meeting with them as well?”

  “You can mention he’ll be there,” Alan said, “and also some representative members of the union. We’ve still got to come to an agreement on safety measures. I hope we can reach a compromise on them.”

  Judith sat down at her desk and kept busy on the phone for more than an hour. As she was calling bridge authority members she heard Alan busy on the other line following up the shopping center information. And by the time she finished and went into his office again, he had sheets of written notes spread out before him.

  Glancing up at her, he asked, “Did you reach everyone?”

  “Yes. And they all promised to be there,” she said. “I think they’re curious to find out what you’re planning as a counter move to the Senator.”

  Alan looked grim. “Right this minute I wouldn’t like to say we have anything to fight him with. He’s clean as far as the shopping center is concerned.”

  Judith felt real disappointment. “Nothing to tie him in with it at all?”

  “Nothing!” He frowned at the scribbled notes. “I’ve exhausted every source of information.”

  “Then we’ll have to hope he may be connected with the housing development,” Judith said.

  “We’ll start on that now,” he promised. “It’s essential we get the information before tonight’s meeting if we can. I’ll give you some numbers and the facts I’m looking for.”

  The morning passed quickly, but not much headway was made. Judith talked to the company acting as agents for the housing development, and they seemed to have little to offer about the financial backing of the building company. Further calls to sub-contractors only brought the information that they had all dealt with one agent. She seemed to be getting nowhere.

  Alan had little better luck. The bank handling the mortgages for the firm supplied him with the incorporation information and the listed officers. Of course Senator Lafferty’s name was not included. Next, it was a matter of talking to these men and getting as much information as possible. Alan found them very tight-lipped. To all intents and
purposes, the owners of the development were a trio of Italian brothers who had previously built several other similar developments with modest success.

  The lunch hour came and went. Judith considered the fact that the senior Fraser had not made any appearance in his son’s office. She couldn’t help speculating on what his reaction had been to her lecture and wonder if it would make any change in his behavior toward Alan in the future. At least he had not made his usual bullying call.

  A few minutes after two, the door to Judith’s office opened and a smiling Councilman Fred Harvey came in. The little man beamed at her behind his heavy-framed glasses, looking his usual immaculately neat self in a brown suit.

  “How goes the battle?” he asked in his high-pitched voice.

  “Grim,” she said. “How was Washington?”

  The bright eyes twinkled. “Profitable! Only trouble is that the train trip takes too long.”

  Judith laughed. “That problem is easy to solve. Switch to using planes instead.”

  “I detest flying,” the little man said. “I’d rather suffer along with the ground transportation available.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t try to help.” She nodded toward the closed door to Alan’s office. “He’s on the phone. I’ll tell him you’re here as soon as he finishes. Why don’t you sit down?”

  Councilman Fred Harvey continued to stare at her in his shrewd fashion as he settled in a nearby chair. “I hear you have a friend visiting town.”

  “You soon get caught up on local gossip,” she told him.

  “I have my listening posts,” he said with a chuckle. “It’s only once in a long while they let me down.”

  Judith gave him a teasing glance. “I hear you’ve got both the Mayor’s office and Senator Lafferty’s bugged. Is that the truth?”

  This tickled the little man. He chortled with glee. “If I did have a microphone hidden in either of those places, you don’t think I’d tell you?”

  “I’m sure you wouldn’t,” she said. “I think this bugging thing is the most unethical practice I’ve ever heard of. Imagine having all the transactions in an office down on tape and cold-bloodedly playing it back to steal information.”

  Fred Harvey shrugged. “Some of the biggest firms are using those things.”

  “Then I say the biggest firms are proving themselves to be pretty small,” Judith told him.

  At this point in their conversation Alan emerged from the inner office. “I thought I heard you out here,” he said. “Smart of you to absent yourself from town while the Senator and his crowd had a Roman holiday taking pot shots at me.”

  The councilman smiled. “You look in pretty good shape in spite of it.”

  “I’m engaged in a last-ditch battle. Any ideas to help me?”

  The alert eyes behind the horn-rimmed glasses fixed on him. “I gave you my advice before I went to Washington. If you can’t beat them, why not join them?”

  “Because they wouldn’t have me, for one thing!” Alan said.

  Fred Harvey winked. “Don’t be too sure. I can still pull a few strings. I put you up for chairman; maybe I can keep you in the job.”

  “And maybe not! You don’t know how North’s newspaper has been tearing into me. They’ve accused me of everything but stealing and played up the overdue deliveries of steel just as you’d expect.”

  “They turn the water on, and they can turn it off,” the little councilman said calmly. “One word from North, and the newspaper will start saying nice things about you again.”

  “And the union is after me as well. Their man arrived while you were away,” Alan said.

  “Miles Estey,” Fred Harvey said with a chuckle. “I didn’t expect to see him in Port Winter again.”

  “He’s very much here,” Alan said. “And he means business.”

  “You can deal with him if you settle with the Senator,” Fred Harvey suggested.

  “I’ve been trying to do just that,” Alan told him. “Judith and I have been on the phone all morning. The Mayor tossed us the idea. He thinks if we could prove the Senator has some tie-in with the shopping plaza or the housing development behind it, we could turn the tables on him; let the public see that he’s trying to promote his own finances instead of their good.”

  The little man considered this. “Not a bad angle,” he agreed.

  “But not good enough,” Alan complained. “We’ve exhausted every source, and there’s nothing we can find to involve that bloated crook with either the shopping center or the development. We just can’t dig up any proof!”

  “I don’t believe you’ll ever get it,” was Fred Harvey’s opinion. “I tell you, Alan, my idea is the best. Let me see if I can’t fix up a deal with the Senator.”

  Alan frowned. “What kind of deal?”

  “He gets his North End spur, and you remain on as chairman of the bridge authority.”

  Alan was silent for a moment. “You don’t think there’s any honest way out of this?”

  “If there is, it’s escaped me,” Fred Harvey assured him. “And I have a reputation for being sharp.”

  “You’re asking me to stop battling North and sell out to him! How can you be so sure the Governor will go along with his idea?”

  Fred Harvey looked wise. “The Governor is worried about the coming election. He needs North’s support and campaign contribution.”

  Alan’s eyes narrowed. “I never expected to hear anything like this from you,” he said. “Never expected you’d throw anything North’s way.”

  “I don’t want to do it,” the little man said seriously. “Nor do I want to sacrifice you. I’m willing to compromise to bring you through this without a loss of reputation.”

  “What kind of a reputation will I have if I sell out?” Alan asked.

  Fred Harvey stood up. “I’d say North’s papers can do a pretty smart clean-up job on you, make you look so good you might be in line for some other important office when you’re through with the bridge.”

  Alan stared at him. “Is that your last word?”

  “It’s the best I can do,” Fred Harvey said, beaming happily again. “I know how you feel about this mess. But think it over, and I’m certain you won’t think my offer is too bad. Just don’t take too long to make up your mind. I’ll have to talk to the Senator soon if you’re to be salvaged.”

  Alan’s thin sensitive face was the color of milk as Councilman Fred Harvey wished them a jaunty good afternoon and left. He remained standing there staring at the door for several minutes and then turned slowly to Judith. She was shocked by his expression of defeat. And she thought to herself, This is it! The crisis has reached its peak! This is where he turns and runs!

  “You heard what he said?” Alan asked.

  “I couldn’t very well help it.”

  He shook his head. “And this is the man who backed me for the bridge job, the one who actively campaigned so that I got it!”

  “I don’t understand his attitude,” Judith confessed.

  Alan seemed not to have heard her. He was staring straight ahead. “All I have to do is shut up and buckle down to the Senator and North, and I get to remain the big man behind the bridge. It’s all so simple!”

  Judith said, “For once Fred Harvey must be on North’s team. He must have something to gain by this.”

  Alan gave her a grim smile. “You’re catching on! You’re beginning to get it! Just a little more time associating with the right people, and we’ll be old pros like the rest of them.” He paused. “I know now why I was picked for chairman. Dad was right!”

  Judith was becoming more alarmed every minute, sure that he was about to follow his usual pattern and retreat. “In what way?” she asked.

  “I’ll tell you,” he said, pacing up and down and talking at the same time. “Why do you think Harvey picked me out of all the more likely candidates to head the bridge authority?” Without waiting for her to reply, he went on, “Because they wanted a strong man? A leader!” He stopped and shook hi
s head. “No. They decided on me for the job because they wanted someone weak.”

  “You can’t be sure of that,” she protested.

  “I am sure of it,” he said. “They wanted a pushover, someone they could maneuver when the right time came.” He sighed. “And it seems the time has come.”

  She was shaken by his self-condemnation. Getting up, she went to him and touched his arm. “You can’t blame yourself! They’ve simply put you in an intolerable position. Harvey is the one most guilty.”

  “My own stupidity,” he said, “my ego, got me into this. No wonder Dad opposed it from the beginning.”

  “Your father wasn’t any more right than the rest of us,” she hurried to say.

  Alan shook his head. “Even Pauline had a little lecture prepared for me. Her father thought I should stay in line and mind my manners with Mr. S.C. North.”

  “North has been trying to get at you in every way possible.”

  “It seems he’s done an excellent job as usual,” Alan said with a bitter smile. “When I’m through with this, I won’t even have my self-respect left.”

  “There has to be some way,” Judith insisted. And as a last measure, she said, “Shouldn’t you let the Mayor know what’s been happening?”

  He nodded. “Call him and see if he can come over. And tell him if he has any other helpful suggestions, they’ll have to be better than the last ones.” And he went into his own office and closed the door.

  It took her quite a few minutes to locate the Mayor and then get him on the line. “It’s Judith,” she said. “We’re in pretty bad trouble here. I wish you could come by.”

  “Any luck with your digging?” Mayor Jim Devlin wanted to know.

  “None.”

  “That’s too bad.” The Mayor sounded concerned. “I’ll get there as soon as I can.”

  Alan was still shut up in his office when the Mayor arrived. The breezy Jim Devlin looked less assured and definitely worried. His stern face shadowed by fatigue, he glanced at the closed door to Alan’s office and asked her, “Is he about ready to quit?”

  “It doesn’t look good,” she said. Getting up, she knocked on the door and opened it to announce, “The Mayor is here.”