The Stallion (1996) (24 page)

“That’s the worst part. She wouldn’t say, but I’m just about certain I know.”

“So. Who?”

“Angelo Perino,” he muttered.

Roberta’s face stiffened and turned red. She stood, grabbed the whip, and it came down viciously on Loren’s backside. The blow cut him, and blood oozed from his welt.

“Oww!
Jesus, Roberta! Take it easy!”

She did it again, then a third time. Loren screamed.

They had to wonder if the person who rang the doorbell heard that scream. Roberta released Loren’s left wrist and left him to finish untying himself while she went to the door.

“Who the shit?” she muttered as she pulled on a robe.

She recognized the man who stood on the doorstep in the light from the lamp above the door. Burt Craddock. Number One’s factotum. Son of the nasty, officious secretary who had listened to the old man’s telephone calls.

Dressed in white tennis shoes, a blue turtleneck sweater, and khaki slacks, Burt carried himself like a dancer: lightly, on the tips of his toes. He was gray now, prematurely, and his flushed face suggested he had fortified himself with more than one drink before coming to the Hardeman residence.

“Do you remember me, Mrs. Hardeman?”

She nodded coolly. “What can I do for you?”

“I’ve come to talk to you about something. I know you’ll be interested.”

She hesitated for a moment, then stepped back and let him enter the house. She led him to the family room at the back of the house.

“Oh,” he said. “I’d
die
for a Steinway like that. Do you mind?” Without waiting to hear if she minded, he sat down
at the baby grand piano and struck a chord, then played a phrase of music.

“What is it you want to talk about?” she asked.

“Well … Mr. Hardeman should hear, too.”

Roberta lit a Chesterfield. “Want a drink?” she asked as she went to the bar and picked up a bottle of Black Label.

“Scotch? Yes. Thank you.”

Loren came into the room, wearing a robe and pajama pants and walking a little stiffly. “Craddock,” he said. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

Craddock remained seated on the piano bench. He sipped from the Scotch that Roberta had given him. “Well … your grandfather was a singular man, don’t you agree? Among the things he did, he had the house in Palm Beach wired—microphones hidden in many rooms, video cameras hidden in a few. That was part of my job: to install and maintain that equipment. To state the matter very, very succinctly, Mr. and Mrs. Hardeman, the late Mr. Hardeman asked me to tape
you
—in the intimacy of your bedroom. Which I did. The tape is very interesting.”

“Bullshit,” snapped Roberta.

Craddock raised his eyebrows, tipped his head, and smiled. “The late Mr. Hardeman was amused that he had a grandson who is a masochist married to a sadist. I can quote lines to you from your performance the night you were taped. Shall
IT

“Never mind,” said Loren rigidly. His face had reddened. “Are you saying you
have
this tape?”

Craddock nodded. “A copy. Mr. Hardeman owned three taping machines. It was simple to wire two of them together and dupe the tapes.”

“Tapes…,” said Roberta. “Other people besides us?”

Craddock grinned. “Mr. Hardeman, you have a daughter who is a sexual athlete.”

“With—?”

“Mr. Perino.”

Loren sighed. “I suppose you want money.” He poured himself half a glass of straight Scotch and gulped down half of it.

Craddock grimaced and shrugged. “Only what is fair, Mr. Hardeman. Your grandfather was miserly in his will. He left
a pittance to my mother, nothing to me, for years of faithful and confidential service.”

“For a fee you will deliver the tapes to me?”

“Yes.”

“How much?”

“Would two hundred thousand be unreasonable?”

“Totally unreasonable. But let’s suppose I pay it. Where are the tapes and when do I get them?”

“The tapes are in Florida, of course.”

“Are you going to bring them here?”

“If you wish

“All right.”

“Please understand that we were left poor people. Flying up here and renting a car…” He shrugged and held up his empty hands. Could you advance a bit of cash?”

“I suppose so. I’m not sure how much I have in the house. I’ll have to open a safe. I’ll be a minute or two.”

Roberta shook her head at Craddock. “Let me hear something my husband said on that tape.”

“He said, Oh, honey, that’s great! Do it again.’ Another time he said, ‘Hey, not quite so hard! Jesus, that hurts!’ Then you said, ‘Hurts good, though, huh?’ Shall I go on?”

“And Betsy? What did she and Perino do?”

“Well … maybe I shouldn’t say.”

Roberta crushed out her cigarette. “How do we know you won’t dupe the tapes again and come around for more money?”

Craddock smiled. “You’ll have to trust me.”

“Like shit,” said Loren. He stood in the doorway. In his right hand he held a .38 Smith & Wesson revolver.

Craddock jumped to his feet.
“Hey!”
he shrieked.

Loren fired. Craddock had turned to run for the back door, and Loren’s slug tore through his left buttock. Craddock screamed and jumped, struggling still to reach the door. Loren fired again. He missed the man entirely. This slug punched into the wall.

Loren trembled as he aimed the pistol again. His hands shook, and his jaw trembled.

Craddock screamed and screamed.

Roberta grabbed the pistol from Loren, took aim, and
fired. Her shot struck Craddock in the chest. He didn’t scream any more.

Loren stumbled to the bar.

“No!”
Roberta yelled. “We’ve got a mess to clean up. We’ve got a body to dump. And a car. Not another goddamned drop!”

“I had to do it,” Loren mumbled.

“You had to do it,” she agreed. “What you didn’t have to do was fuck it up.”

They didn’t fuck up the rest of it. When the body was discovered and identified, the police questioned them, since Burt Craddock had been employed by Number One. But the connection between Craddock and Mr. and Mrs. Loren Hardeman the third was so tenuous that the detectives did not pursue it.

They drew the same conclusion about the connection between Craddock and Angelo Perino. Over the phone Angelo confirmed that he had known Craddock but hadn’t seen the man since the last time he’d visited the Hardeman home in Palm Beach.

Mrs. Craddock wept loudly but insisted she had no idea why her son had gone to Detroit.

Tadashi Komatsu would not manufacture a Japanese XB 2000.

“You can sell this kind of car in the United States and in Europe,” he said; “nowhere else, I think. You make him, we make him, then we compete. Not enough market for that.”

“I was hoping we could be partners in it,” said Angelo.

Mr. Tadashi bowed but shook his head.

“Other companies besides yours are developing epoxy resin materials and the technology to manufacture it at reasonable cost. I am impressed with yours, though. Will you license us to use your technology?”

“Oh, yes. Oh, yes.”

“Will you lend me Keijo Shigeto? He and his family could live in the States for a year or two. I have much respect for his abilities as an engineer.”

“Oh, yes. If he is willing.”

Cindy was pregnant again, and she wanted to enjoy sailing on the Sound before she became awkwardly heavy. Bill Adams had taught her and Angelo the elements of sailing his thirty-five-foot yawl,
Eve,
and with Alicia they made a crew of four who did not have to struggle to manage the boat.

Bill liked to avoid weekend sailing, so it was on a Tuesday in August that they sailed west on Long Island Sound and anchored for lunch in Little Neck Bay. While Cindy and Alicia unpacked the lunch in the galley, Angelo and Bill sat in the stern and talked.

“I don’t usually talk business when I’m sailing,” said Bill, “but the word on the Street is that you’re committing XB to making a sports car.”

“I am. I want to expand the line. The Stallion is successful—”

“It saved the company,” Bill interrupted.

“I’ll accept that,” said Angelo, saluting with a martini.

“The word is that you’re going to build the body with an epoxy resin material.”

Angelo nodded. “It’s as strong as steel, with less than half the weight. We can get muscle-car performance from an engine that won’t guzzle gas.”

“I’m going to make you a suggestion. Do you mind if I make you a suggestion?”

“Not at all.”

“I told you a long time ago that a corporate raider in New Jersey has his eyes on XB. His name is Herbert Froelich, the president of Froelich & Green, Incorporated. They’ve masterminded half a dozen takeovers of medium-sized industrial corporations over the past eight or nine years. Not one of those companies still exists. They sell off their assets for a profit, then dissolve them. Now that XB looks far more
sound than it used to, they’re looking for the money to buy the stock.”

“A lot of it is family held,” said Angelo. “A lot of it is held by the Hardeman Foundation. I don’t think any of them will sell.”

“You never know,” said Bill. “Cash looks awfully good sometimes. Loren the Third is married to a woman who might want to get out of Detroit. They could go wherever they like and live like the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.”

Angelo shook his head. “I don’t know what I can do about it.”

“That’s what I want to suggest—what you can do about it. You want to license Shizoka’s epoxy resin technology. Buy the license yourself, manufacture it yourself, and sell it to XB.”

“I can see two problems,” said Angelo. “First is financing the license—”

“We can find the money. The Perinos and Morrises are not poor. You’ve got a record. So does Shizoka. If Tadashi Komatsu will license the technology, he’d probably give you better terms than he’d give the company.”

“The second problem is that there’s a conflict of interests,” said Angelo. “As an officer of XB, how can I—”

“Essentially, you be sure the company is completely informed of what you’re doing. Conflict of interests usually implies secrecy. Anyway, it might be arranged that Mr. Tadashi won’t license to XB.”

“Arranged…?”

“Let
me
arrange it. You don’t know about it.”

The board of directors assembled around the big table in the boardroom. As usual, Angelo Perino, vice president for research and development, sat in a chair set back against the wall, not at the table. Peter Beacon, vice president for engineering, sat in a chair that was similarly positioned.

Loren presided. Roberta sat to his right. James Randolph, Professor Mueller, and Alexander Briley sat along the two sides of the table. As usual, Princess Anne Alekhine had not
chosen to fly in from Europe for the meeting. If she had, she would have been the only vote Loren could not count on.

Angelo sensed renewed hostility from Loren. Well, why not? He’d lost his temper that night in Betsy’s suite and decked the man. That would cost him something, sooner or later. But Roberta? Why was she cold?

“The purpose of the meeting,” said Loren, “is to decide whether the company should continue with the XB 2000 project, in light of a serious recent setback. It seems that an essential element of Mr. Perino’s sports-racing car will not be available to us. Shizoka, the Japanese company that was to have supplied the technology for manufacturing the epoxy resin material that was to have formed the body of the car, will not license that technology to us. Without it, the car will weigh far too much to perform as promised. I can’t see any option but to drop the project.”

Everyone was staring at Angelo to see what he would say. “That’s a somewhat facile conclusion, Mr. President. There are other ways to acquire the technology.”

“What I’d like to know,” said Professor Mueller, “is why Shizoka won’t sell the technology to us.”

“Mr. Tadashi,” said Loren, “has some idea that our company is in danger of being acquired by a corporate raider. The raider has an unsavory reputation, in the view of Mr. Tadashi, and he does not want the technology to fall into the hands of people he doesn’t trust. In view of the fact that a majority of the shares is represented right here at this table, in my shares and those owned by the Hardeman Foundation, that’s obviously a fanciful notion.”

“He offered XB a license,” Angelo clarified, “on the condition that the company not fall under the control of new management.”

“Our lawyers say we can’t buy that,” said Loren. “It’s contrary to American corporation law to make it impossible for a corporation to change management.”

“And the new car can’t be built without this stuff?” asked Briley, the retired congressman.

“The whole cockamamie project depends on that and a few other things that are entirely uncertain,” said Loren sullenly.

“I can get us the material,” said Angelo.

“Oh? How?”

“Mr. Tadashi will not license the technology to the company. But he will license it to
me.
I can form a corporation that will manufacture it and sell it to XB Motors.”

“And how much money do we have to put up?” Loren asked.

“None, till I deliver the product,” said Angelo. “My company will manufacture the epoxy resin, form it into bodies for the XB 2000, and deliver it for a price that will probably be less than the cost of manufacturing it in an XB plant.”

“I fail to see,” said James Randolph, the director of the foundation, “how a corporate officer can lawfully and ethically sell to his own corporation.”

Angelo stood and handed a paper to Loren. “That’s my resignation as a vice president of XB Motors,” he said. “If XB is not going to build the 2000,1 have other things to do. If it is, I will sell you bodies. I will also continue to offer my services as a consultant, if you want them. My lawyers say there is nothing illegal about this arrangement. There is nothing unethical about it, either, because I have just put it all out on the table.”

“May I inquire as to how you are going to raise the money to do all of this?” Loren asked.