The Moneychangers (31 page)

Heyward answered gruffly, 'T
hank you, young lady, but I doubt if I'll do that."

She seemed unperturbed. "And the other thing: On the way to the Bahamas we'll be landing in Washington briefly. The Vice-Pres
ident is joining us there." "A Vice-P
resident from Supranational?"

Her eyes were c
ocking. "No, silly. The Vi
ce-President of the United States
."

Some Sfteen minutes later, Big George Quartermain demanded of Roscoe Heyward, "For Chrissakesl Whatinhellzat
you're drinking? Mother's milk?

"It's lemonade." Heyward held up his glass, inspecting the insipid liquid. "I rather enjoy it.

The Supranational chairman shrugged his massive shoulders. "Every addict to his own poison. Girls taking care of you both?"

"No complaints from this quarter," the Honorable Harold Austin offered with a chuckle. Like the others, he was reclining comforta
bly in the 707's splendidly ap
pointed main lounge with the blonde, who had revealed her name as Rhetta, curled on the rug at his feet.

Avril said sweetly, "We're trying our best." She was standing behind Heyward's chair and let a hand travel lightly across his back. He felt her angers touch the base of his neck, linger momentarily, then move on.

Moments earlier, G. G. Quartermain had come into the lounge, resplendent in a crimson towel robe with white piping, the inevitable Q embroidered largely. Like a Roman senator, he was attended by acolytes a hardfaced, silent man in gym whites, presumably the masseur, and still another hostess in trim beige uniform, her features delicately Japanese. The masseur and the girl supervised Big George's entry into a broad, throne-like chair, clearly reserved for him Then a third figure the
original majordomo as if by magic produced a chilled martini and eased it into G. G. Quartermain's awaiting hand.

Even more than on previous occasions they had met, Heyward decided, the name "Big George" seemed apposite in every way. Physically their host was a mountain of a man at least six and a half feet in height, his chest, arms, and torso like a village blacksmith's. His head was half the size again of most other men's and his facial features matched prominent, large eyes, swift-moving and darkly shrewd, the mouth wide-lipped and strong, as accustomed to issuing commands as a Marine drill sergeant's, though on larger issues. Equally clearly, surface joviality could be banished instantly by powerful displeasure.

Yet he stopped short of coarseness, nor was there any sign of overweight or nab. Through the enfolding towel robe, muscles bulged. Heyward observed, too, that Big George's face betrayed no fat layers, his massive chin no jowls. His belly appeared flat and taut.

As to other bigness, his corporate reach and appetite were reported daily in the business press. And his living style aboard this twelve-million-dollar airplane was unabashedly royal.

The masseur and majordomo quietly disappeared. Replacing them, like one more character emerging on stage, was a chef a pale, worried pencil of a man, immaculate in kitchen whites with a high chef's hat which brushed the cabin ceiling. Heyward wondered just how big the onboard staff was. Later, he learned it totaled sixteen.

The chef stood stiffly beside Big George's chair, proffering an out-size black leather folder embossed with a golden Q. Big George ignored him.

"That trouble at your bank." Quartermain addressed Roscoe Heyward. "Demonstrations. All the rest. Is everything settled? Are you solid?"

"We were always solid," Heyward answered. 'That was never in question." "The market didn't think so."

"Since when was the
stock market an accurate barome
ter of anything?"

Big George smiled fleetingly, then swung to the petite Japanese hostess. "Moonbeam,
get me the latest quote on FMA.

"Yes, Mister
Q." the girl said. She went out by a forward door.

Big George nodded in t
he direction she had gone. "Still
can't get that tongue of hers around Qua
rtermain. Always calls me 'Mister
Q.' " He grinned at the others. "Manages nicely elsewhere, though."

Roscoe Heyward said quickly, "The reports you heard about our bank concerned a trifling incident, magnified beyond importance. It h
appened also at a time of manage
ment transition."

"But you people didn't stand firm," Big George insisted. "You let outside a
gitators have their way. You wen
t soft and surrendered."

"Yes, we did. And I'll be frank to say I didn't like the decision. In fact, I opposed it.

"Stand up to 'em!
Always clobber the bastards one
way or another! Never back down
" The Supranational chairman drained his martini and the majordomo appeared from nowhere, removed the original glass and placed a fresh one
in Big Ge
orge'
s hand. The drink's perfect chill
was apparent from its outside frosting.

The chef was
still standing, waiting. Quartermain continued to ignore him.

He rumbled reminiscently, "Had a sub-assembly manufacturing plant near Denver. Lots of labor
trouble. Wage demands beyond all
reason. Early this year, union called a strike, the last of many. I told our people the subsidiary which ran it war
n the sons of bitches we'll clos
e the plant down. Nobody believed us. So we made studies, planned ar
rangements. Shipped tools a
nd dies to one of our other companies. They took up the manufacturing slack. At Denver we closed. Suddenly no plant, no jobs, no payroll. Now, the lot of 'em employees, union, Denver city, state government, you name it are down on their
knees pleading with us to reopen." He considered his martini, then said magnanimously, "Well, we may. Doing other manufacturing, and on our terms. But we didn't back down."

"Good for you, George!
" the Honorable Harold said. "We need more people to take that kind of stand. The problem at our bank, though, has been somewhat different. In some ways we're still in an interim situation which began, as you know, with Ben Rosselli's death. But by spring next year a good many of us on the board hope to see Roscoe here firmly at the helm."

"Glad to hear it. Don't like dealing with people not at the top. Those I do business with must be able to decide, then make decisions stick."

"I assure you, George," Heyward said, "that any decisions you and I arrive at will be adhered to by the bank."

In an adroit way, Heyward realized, their host had maneuvered Harold Austin and himself into the stance of supplicants a reversal of a banker's usual role. But the fact was, any loan to Supranational would be worry-free, as well as prestigious for FMA. Equally important, it could be a precursor of other new industrial accounts
since Supranational Corporation
was a pacesetter whose example others followed.

Big George snapped abruptly at the chef. "Well, what is it?"

The figure in white was galvanized to action. He thrust forward the black leather folder he had been holding since his entry. "The luncheon menu, monsieur. For your approval."

Big George made no attempt to take the folder but scanned its contents held before him. He stabbed with a finger. "Change that
Waldorf salad to a Caesar." "Oui
, monsieur."

"And dessert. Not Glaze
d Martinique. A Souffle Grand Marnier." "Certainly, monsieur."

A nod of dismissal. Then, as the chef turned away, Big George glared. "And when I o
rder a steak, how do I like it….”

"Monsieur" the chef gestured imp
loringly with his free hand "I h
ave already apologize twice for the unfortunate last night." "Never mind that. The question was: How do I l
ike it..
'

With a Gallic shrug, repeating a lesson learned, the chef intoned, "On the slightly well-done side of mediu
m-rare." "Just remember that."
The chef asked despair
ingly, " 'Ow can I forget, mon
sieur?" Crestfallen, he went out.

"Something else that's important," Big George informed his guests, "is not to let people get away with things. I pay that frog a fortune to know exactly how I like my food. He slipped last night not much, but enough to ream him out so next time he'll remember. What's the quote?" Moonbeam had returned with a slip of paper.

She read out in accented English, "FMA trading now at forty-five and three quarters."

"There we are," Roscoe Heyward said, "we're up another point."

"But still not as high as before Rosselli bit the bullet," Big George said. He grinned. "Though when word gets out that you're helping finance Supranational, your stock'll soar."

It could happen, Heyward thought. In the tangled world of finance and stock prices, inexplicable things occurred. That someone would lend money to someone else might not seem to mean much yet the market would respond.

More importantly, though, Big George had now declared positively that some kind of business was to be transacted between First Mercantile American Bank and SuNatCo. No doubt they would thrash out details through the next two days. He felt his excitement rising.

Above their heads a chime sounded softly. Outside, the jet thrum changed to lower tempo.

"Washington
" Avril said. She and the other girls began fastening the men to their seats
.

Th
e time on the ground in Washington was even briefer than at the previous stop. With a 14-carat-VIP passenger,
it seemed, top priorities for landing, taxiing, and takeoff were axiomatic.

Thus, in less than twenty minutes they had returned to cruising altitude en route to the Bahamas.

The Vice-President was installed, with the brunette, Krista, taking care of him, an arrangement which he patently approved.

Secret Service men, guarding the Vice-President, had been accommodated somewhere at the rear.

Soon after, Big George Qua
rtermain, now attired in a striking cream silk one-piece suit, jovially led the way forward from the lounge into the airliner's dining room a richly decorated apartment, predominantly silver and royal blue. There, the four men, seated at a carved oak table beneath a crystal chandelier, and with Moonbeam, Avril, Rhetta, and Krista hovering deliciously behind, lunched in a style and on cuisine which any of the world's great restaurants would have found it hard to equal.

Roscoe Heyward, while relishing the meal, did not share in the several wines or a thirty-year-old Cognac brandy at the end. But he did observe that the heavy, gold-rimmed brandy goblets omitted the traditional decorative N of Napoleon in favor of a Q. Warm sunshine from an unbroken azure sky shone on the lush green fairway of the long pa
r-5 fifth hole at the Bahamas' L
ordly Cay Club golf course The course and its adjoining luxury club were among the half dozen most exclusive in the world.

Beyond the green, a white sand beech, palm-fringed, deserted, extended like a strip of Paradise into the distance. At the edge of the beach a pellucid turquoise sea lapped gently in tiny waveless. A half mile out from shore a line of breakers creamed on coral reefs.

Nearer to hand, beside the fairway, an exotic crazy
quilt of flowers hibiscus, bougainvillea, poinsettia, frangipani competed in belief-defying colors. The fresh, clear air, moved agreeably by a zephyr breeze, held a scent of jasmine. "I imagine," the Vice-President of the United States observed, "that this is as close to heaven as any politician gets."

"My idea of heaven," the Honorable Harold Austin told him, "would not include slicing." He grimaced and swung his four iron viciously. 'There must be some way to get better at this game." The four were playing a best-ball match Big George
and Roscoe Heyward against Harold Austin and the Vice President.

"What you should do, Harold," the Vice-President, Byron Stonebridge, said, "is get back into Congress, then work your way to the job I have. Once there, you'd have nothing else to do but golf; you could take all the time you wanted to improve your game. It's an accepted historical fact that almost every Vice-President in the past half century left office a better golfer than when he entered it."

As if to confirm his words, moments later he lofted his third shot a beautiful eight iron straight at the flagstick.

Stonebridge, lean and lithe, his movements fluid, was playing a spectacular game today. He had begun life as a farmer's son, working long hours on a family small holding, and across the years had kept his body sinewy. Now his homely plainsman's features beamed as his ball dropped, then rolled to within a foot of the cup.

"Not bad," Big George acknowledged as his cart drew even. "Washington not keeping you too busy, eh, By?"

"Oh, I suppose I shouldn't complain. I ran an inventory of Administration paper clip
s last month And there's been
a news leak from the White House it seems there's a chance I'll sharpen pencils over there quite soon."