The Prodigal Daughter (35 page)

As nine o’clock
struck, Richard walked in the front door of Robert Frasei and Company on
Albermarle Street, only a few hundred yards from the Baron. A secretary ushered
him through to Sir Colin Emson’s office.

“Had a feeling
you’d be on time, old fellow, so I have everything prepared for you. I once
remember finding your father sitting on the doorstep with the milk bottles.
Everybody drank black (offee that day.”

Richard laughed.

“Your eight
hundred thousand dollars arrived before close of business yesterday, so all I
have to do is sign the share certificates over to you in the presence of a
witness.” Sir Colin flicked a switch.
“Can you come in,
Margaret?”
Sir Colin’s private secretary watched the chain-nan of one
bank sign the transfer certificates so that the recipient could become the
chairman of another bank.

Richard checked
over the documents, carefully signed his part of the agreement and was handed a
receipt for $800,000.

“Well, I hope
all the trouble you’ve taken in coming yourself will ensure that you become the
chairman of Lester’s, old chap.”

Richard stared
at the elderly man with the white walrus mustache, bdd head and military
bearing. I had no idea you realized that.”

“Wouldn’t want
you Americans to think we’re altogether asleep over here.

Now you bustle
off and catch the eleven o’clock from Heathrow and you’ll make your meeting
easily: not many of my customers pay as promptly as you do. By the way,
congratulations on that moon chappic.”

“What?” said
Richard.

“You’ve put a
man on the moon.”

“Good heavens,”
said Richard.

“No, not quite,”
said Sir Colin, “but I’m sure that’s what NASA has planned next.”

Richard laughed
and thanked Sir Colin again. He walked quickly back it) the Baron, literally
humming. He knew exactly what it felt like to be the man on the moon. He had left
his overnight bag with the porter so he was able to check out quickly and Sir
Colin’s chauffeur drove him back to Heathrow. Richard entered terminal 3 well
in time to check in for the eleven o’clock flight. He was going to be back in
New York with twenty-four hours to spare: if his father had had to make the
same transaction before he became chairman the process would have taken at
least two weeks.

Richard sat in
the Clipper Club lounge toying with a martini while reading in the Times about
Rod Laver’s chances of going on from his victory at Wimbledon to win The Grand
Slam. Outside, a heavy fog was descending. It wasn’t until thirty minutes later
that an announcement warned passengers that there would be a short delay on all
flights. An hour later, they called Richard’s flight, but as he walked across
the tarmac he could see the fog growing denser by the minute. He sat in his
seat, belt fastened, reading a copy of the previous week’s Time magazine,
willing himself not to look outside, waiting to feel the plane move.

Nixon, he read,
hitd named the first women generals, Colonel Elizabeth Hoisington and Colonel
Anne Mae Hays; no doubt the first innovation Nixon had made that Florentyna
would approve of, he thought.

“We are sorry to
announce that this flight has been delayed until further notice because of
fog.” A groan went up inside the first-class cabin.

“Passengers
should return to the terminal, where they will be issued with luncheon vouchers
and advised when to reboard the aircraft. Pan American apologizes for the delay
and hopes it will not cause any great inconvenience.” Richard had to smile,
despite himself. Back inside the terminal, he went around to every ticket
counter, checking on who had the first plane out. It turned out to be an Air
Canada flight to Montreal.

He reserved a
seat, after being told that his Pan Am flight to New York was now the
twenty-seventh in line for departure. He then checked the flights out of
Montreal to New York. There was one every two hours and the flying time was
just over an hour. He pestered Pan American and Air Canada every thirty
minutes, but the polite, bland reply remained unvaried: “I’m sorry, sir, we can
do nothing until the fog lifts.”

At two in the
afternoon, he called Florentyna to warn her about the dela.y.

“Not
impressive, Mr. Kane.
While you’re on the phone, did you manage to pick
up a red London bus for William?”

“Damn. I
completely forgot.”

“Not doing very
well today, Mr. Kane. Better try the dutyfree gift shop, hadn’t we?”

Richard found an
airport shop that sold several sizes of London buses.

He selected a
large plastic one and paid for it with the last of his English money. With the
bus safely under his arm, he decided to use his luncheon voucher. He sat down
to the worst airport lunch he had ever had: one thin piece of beef about an
inch square that the menu had misleadingly described as a minute steak, along
with three tired lettuce leaves posing as a side salad.
lie
checked his watch. It was already three o’clock. For two hours he tried to read
a copy of The French Lieutenant’s Wonian, but he was so anxious listening to
every radio announcement that he never got past page 4.

At seven
o’clock, after Richard had walked around terminal 3 several times, he began to
think it would soon be too late for a plane to take off whatever the weather.
The loudspeaker forebodingly warned of an important announcement to follow
shortly. He stood like a statue as the words came out. “We are sorry to
announce that all flights out of Heathrow have been canceled until tomorrow morning
with the exception of Iran Air Flight 006 to Jiddah and Air Canada flight 009
to Montreal.”

Richard had been
saved by his foresight: he knew the Air Canada flight would be completely sold
out within minutes. Once again he sat in a first-class lounge. Although the
flight was further delayed, it was eventually called a few minutes after eight.
Richard almost cheered when the 747 took off a little after nine o’clock.
Thereafter he found himself checking his watch every few minutes. The flight
was uneventful except for more appalling food and the plane eventually landed
at Montreal airport shortly before eleven.

Richard sprinted
to the American Airlines counter to discover that he had missed the last flight
to New York by a few minutes. He swore out loud.

“Don’t worry,
sit, there is a flight at ten twenty-five tomorrow morning.”

“What time does
it arrive in New York?”

“Eleven
-thirty.”

“Two hours and
thirty minutes to spare,” he said out loud. “I’ll have io hire a private
plane.”

“No plane is
allowed out of this airport after ten-thirty, sir.”

“Damn,” Richard
said, and reserved a seat and took a room in the Aiq~ort Baron and phoned
Florentyna.

“Where
am
you now?” she asked.

“The Airport
Baron, Montreal.”

“Curiouser
and curiouser.”

Richard
explained what had happened.

“Poor
darling.
Did you remember the red London bus?”

“Yes, I’m
clinging on to it, but my overnight bag is still on the Pan Ain flight to New
York.”

“And
the stock certificates?”

“They are in my
briefcase and have never left my side.”

“Well
don(
-, Mr. Kane. I’ll have a car waiting for you at the
airport, and Mr. Cohen and I will be at the stockholders’ meeting at Lester’s
clutching on to our forty-nine percent. So if you’re in possession of your two
percent, Jake Thomas will be on unemployment compensation by this time
tomorrow.”

“How can you be
so coot about it?”

“You’ve never
let me down yet. Sleep well.”

Richard did not
sleep well, and was back at the American Airlines terminal hours before the
plane was due to board. There was a slight delay, but the captain was still
anticipating that he could land at Kennedy by eleven-thirty. Richard had no
baggage and felt confident he could now make the meeting with at least half an
hour to spare. For the first time in over twenty-four hours he began to relax
and even made some notes for his first speech as Lester’s chairman.

When the 707
arrived at Kennedy it began to circle the airport. Richard looked out of his
little window and could clearly see the building in Wall Street that he had to
be at in two hours. He thumped his knee in anger. At last the plane descended a
few hundred feet, only to start circling again.

“This is Captain
James McEwen speaking. I am sorry for this delay, but we have been put into a
holding pattern because of traffic congestion.

It seems there
are some delayed flights from London now arriving into New York.” Richard
wondered if the Pan American flight from Heathrow would land before he did.

Five
minutes, ten minutes, fifteen minutes.
Richard checked the agenda.

Item
number one-a motion to reject the takeover bid by the Baron Group.

Item
number two-the issuing of new voting shares.
If they
couldn’t prove they had 51 percent, Jake Thomas would close the proceedings
within minutes after the meeting began. The plane began to descend and the
wheels touched the ground at twelve twenty-seven. Richard sprinted through the
terminal. He passed his chauffeur on the run,
who
quickly followed him to the parking lot, where Richard once again checked his
watch.
An hour and twenty minutes to spare.
He was
going to make the meeting comfortably.

“Step on it,”
said Richard.

“Yes, sir,” said
the chauffeur as he moved into the left-hand lane of the Van Wyck Expressway.
Richard heard the siren a few minutes later and a policeman on a motorcycle
overtook the car and waved them on to the hard shoulder. The policeman parked
and walked slowly toward Richard, who had already leaped out of the car.
Richard tried to explain that it was a matter of life and death.

“It always is,”
said the officer. “Either that or ‘My wife is having a baby.”‘ Richard left his
chauffeur to deal with the policeman while he tried to hail a passing cab, but
they were all full. Sixteen minutes later the policeman let them go. It was one
twenty-nine as they crossed the Brooklyn Bridge and turned onto FDR Drive.
Richard could see the skyscrapers of Wall Street in the distance, but the cars
were bumper to bumper all the way. It was six minutes to two before they
reached Wall Street, when Richard could bear it no longer and jumped out of the
car, briefcase under one
ann
, a red London bus under
the other, and sprinted the last three blocks, dodging slow pedestrians and
fast-honking cab drivers. He heard the clock at Trinity Church chime two as he
reached
Bowling Green
and prayed that it was fast as
he raced up the steps of the Lester’s building, suddenly realizing he didn’t
know where the meeting was being held.

“Fifty-first
floor, sir,” the doorman informed him.

The 30 to 60
elevator was full with the post-lunch-hour crowd and it stopped at 31-33-34-42-44-47-5051.
Richard jumped out of the elevator and ran down the corridor, following the red
arrow that indicated where the meeting was taking place. As he arrived in the
crowded room, one or two faces turned to look at him. There must have been over
five hundred people seated listening to the chairman, but he was the only
shareholder sweating from head to toe. He was greeted by the sight of a coot
Jake Thomas, who gave him a knowing smile from the platform. Richard realized
he was too late. Florentyna was sitting in the front row, her head bowed.

He took a seat
at the back of the room and listened to the chairman of Lester’s.

“All of us
believe that the decision that has been made today is in the best interests of
the bank. In the circumstances that The Present: 1968--1982223 your board of
directors faced, no one will have been surprised by my request, and Lester’s
will now continue its traditional role as one of America’s great financial
institutions. Item number two,” said Jake Thomas. Richard felt sick. “My final
task as chairman of Lester’s is to propose that the new chairman be Mr. Richard
Kane.”

Richard could
not believe his ears. A little old lady rose from her seat in the front row and
said that she would like to second the motion because she felt that Mr. Kane’s
father had been one of the finest chairmen the bank had ever had. There was a
round of applause as the old lady sat down.

“Thank you,”
said Jake Thomas.
“Those in favor of the resolution?”

Richard stated
into the body of the hall as hands shot into the air.

“Those against,”
Jake Thomas looked down from the platform. “Good, the resolution is carried
unanimously. I am now happy to invite your new chairman to address you.
Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Richard Kane.”
Richard walked
forward and everyone stood and applauded. As he passed Florentyna he handed her
the red bus.