Kane and Abel/Sons of Fortune Read online

  “Sixteen,” said Ted Leach instantly.

  “And with whom does their allegiance lie at this moment?” William asked.

  “Not the easiest question to answer, Mr. Kane,” Winthrop Davies chipped in. He took a crumbled envelope from his inside pocket and studied the back of it before he continued. “I think we can count on six sure votes, and Peter Parfitt can be certain of five. It came as a shock for me to discover this morning that Rupert Cork-Smith—he was Charles Lester’s closest friend—is unwilling to support you, Mr. Kane. Really strange, because I know he doesn’t care for Parfitt. I think that may make the voting six apiece.”

  “That gives us until Thursday,” added Ted Leach, “to find out how the other four board members are likely to vote.”

  “Why Thursday?” asked William.

  “Day of the next board meeting,” answered Leach, stroking his mustache, which William had noticed he did every time he started to speak. “And more important, Item One on the agenda is the election of a new chairman.”

  “I was told the next meeting would not take place until Monday,” said William in astonishment.

  “By whom?” Davies asked.

  “Peter Parfitt,” said William.

  “His tactics,” Ted Leach commented, “have not been altogether those of a gentleman.”

  “I’ve learned enough about that gentleman,” William said, placing an ironic stress on the word, “to make me realize I’ll have to take the battle to him.”

  “Easier said than done, Mr. Kane. He is very much in the driver’s seat at this moment,” said Winthrop Davies, “and I’m not sure how we go about removing him from it.”

  “Switch the traffic lights to red,” replied William. “Who has the authority to call a board meeting?”

  “While the board is without a chairman, either vice chairman,” said Ted Leach. “Which in reality means Peter Parfitt or myself.”

  “How many board members form a quorum?”

  “Nine,” said Davies.

  “And if you are one of the two vice chairmen, Mr. Leach, who is the Company Secretary?”

  “I am,” said Alfred Rodgers, who until then had hardly opened his mouth, the exact quality William always looked for in a company secretary.

  “How much notice do you have to give to call an emergency board meeting, Mr. Rodgers?”

  “Every director must be informed at least twenty-four hours beforehand, although that has never actually happened except during the crash of twenty-nine. Charles Lester always tried to give at least three days’ notice.”

  “But the bank’s rules do allow for an emergency meeting to be held on twenty-four hours’ notice?” asked William.

  “They do, Mr. Kane,” Alfred Rodgers affirmed, his monocle now firmly in place and focused on William.

  “Excellent, then let’s call our own board meeting.”

  The three bankers stared at William as if they had not quite heard him clearly.

  “Think about it, gentlemen,” William continued. “Mr. Leach, as vice chairman, calls the board meeting, and Mr. Rodgers, as company secretary, informs all the directors.”

  “When would you want this board meeting to take place?” asked Ted Leach.

  “Tomorrow afternoon.” William looked at his watch. “Three o’clock.”

  “Good God, that’s cutting it a bit fine,” said Alfred Rodgers. “I’m not sure——”

  “Cutting it very fine for Peter Parfitt, wouldn’t you say?” said William.

  “That’s true,” said Ted Leach, “if you know precisely what you have planned for the meeting?”

  “You leave the meeting to me. Just be sure that it’s correctly convened and that every director is properly informed.”

  “I wonder how Peter Parfitt is going to react,” said Ted Leach.

  “Don’t worry about Parfitt,” said William. “That’s the mistake we’ve made all along. Let him start worrying about us for a change. As long as he’s given the full twenty-four hours’ notice and he’s the last director informed, we have nothing to fear. We don’t want him to have any more time than necessary to stage a counterattack. And gentlemen, do not be surprised by anything I do or say tomorrow. Trust my judgment and be there to support me.”

  “You don’t feel we ought to know exactly what you have in mind?”

  “No, Mr. Leach. You must appear at the meeting as disinterested directors doing no more than carrying out your duty.”

  It was beginning to dawn on Ted Leach and his two colleagues why Charles Lester had chosen William Kane to be their next chairman. They left the Metropolitan Club a good deal more confident than when they had arrived, despite their being totally in the dark about what would actually happen at the board meeting they were about to instigate. William, on the other hand, having carried out the first part of Thomas Cohen’s instructions, was now looking forward to the harder second part.

  He spent most of the afternoon and evening in his room at the Yale Club, meticulously considering his tactics for the next day’s meeting and taking only a short break to call Kate.

  “Where are you, darling?” she said. “Stealing away in the middle of the night to I know not where.”

  “To my New York mistress,” said William.

  “Poor girl,” said Kate, “she probably doesn’t know the half of it. What’s her advice on the devious Mr. Parfitt?”

  “Haven’t had time to ask her, we’ve been so busy doing other things. While I have you on the phone, what’s your advice?”

  “Do nothing Charles Lester or your father wouldn’t have done in the same circumstances,” said Kate, suddenly serious.

  “They’re probably playing golf together on the eighteenth cloud and taking a side bet while watching us the whole time.”

  “Whatever you do, William, you won’t go far wrong if you do remember they are watching you.”

  When dawn broke, William was already awake, having managed to sleep only fitfully. He rose a little after six, had a cold shower, went for a long walk through Central Park to clear his head and returned to the Yale Club for a light breakfast. There was a message waiting for him in the front hail—from his wife. When he read it for a second time, William laughed at the line “If you’re not too busy could you remember to buy a baseball glove for Richard.” William picked up The Wall Street Journal, which was still running the story of trouble in Lester’s boardroom over the selection of a new chairman. It now had Peter Parfitt’s version of the story, hinting that his appointment as chairman would probably be confirmed at Thursday’s meeting. William wondered whose version would be reported in tomorrow’s paper. Oh, for a look at tomorrow’s Journal now. He spent the morning double-checking the articles of incorporation and bylaws of Lester’s Bank. He had no lunch but did find time to visit F.A.O. Schwarz and buy a baseball glove for his son.

  At two-thirty he took a cab to the bank in Wall Street and arrived a few minutes before three. The young doorman asked him if he had an appointment to see anyone.

  “I’m William Kane.”

  “Yes, sir, you’ll want the boardroom.”

  Good God, thought William, I can’t even remember where it is.

  The doorman observed his embarrassment. “You take the corridor on the left, sir, and then it’s the second door on the right.”

  “Thank you,” said William, and walked confidently as he could down the corridor. Until that moment, he had always thought the expression “a stomach full of butterflies” a stupid one. He felt that his heartbeat must be louder than the clock in the front hall; he would not have been surprised to hear himself chiming three o’clock.

  Ted Leach was standing alone at the entrance to the boardroom. “There’s going to be trouble” were his opening words.

  “Good,” said William. “That’s the way Charles Lester would have liked it and he would have faced the trouble head-on.”

  William strode into the impressive oak-paneled room and did not need to count heads to be sure that every direc