Never Leave Me (1953) Page 6

  His excitement began to run through me. The old pitch had crossed the plate after all. I was a fool to try to outguess the umpire. “I’ll get right out and get plane tickets.” I said.

  “I got ’em already,” he replied quickly. “They’re out at the airport in your name. Flight one-oh-four, leaving at eleven-fifteen. And your valise is out there too, in the checkroom.”

  I looked at my watch. It was almost ten o’clock, I would have to hurry. “Okay, Chris. I’ll get going.”

  A note of relief came into his voice. “Bring home the bacon, boss. Get that job and we’ll all eat high off the hog.”

  “Hog meat is for peasants,” I grinned. “Trot out the fatted calf.”

  I put down the phone and turned to Elaine. “You heard?” I asked.

  She nodded. “Better hurry,” she said. “There isn’t much time.”

  “You better hurry,” I smiled at her, “and throw some things in a bag. You’re coming with me.”

  She sat up, startled. “Brad, don’t be a fool. You can’t do that.”

  I was already gathering my things together. “Doll,” I said joking, “you don’t know me. I can do anything. You’re my good luck piece, and you’re not getting out of my sight until this deal is signed, sealed and delivered.”

  I called home while Elaine was packing her valise. “I’m grabbing the eleven-fifteen plane to Pittsburgh,” I said.

  “I was wondering why you didn’t call right back,” Marge replied.

  “I couldn’t,” I said hurriedly. “Chris’s line was busy and I just caught him. Brady wants to see me.”

  “Wonderful,” she laughed into the phone. “I’m so proud of you, Brad. I just know you’ll do good.”

  Chris had taken care of everything. There was a note attached to my bag informing me that I had a suite reserved in my name at the Brooke in Pittsburgh. I signed the register and we went up to our room at about two in the morning.

  She stood in the centre of the living room while the bellhop checked the suite. At last he came back to me, the key in his hand. I gave him a dollar and the door closed behind him.

  I turned to her and smiled. “Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Don’t be so grim, doll,” I said. “Pittsburgh can’t be that bad.”

  At last she answered. “I must have been crazy to let you do it. What if you run into someone you know?”

  “What if you do?” I countered.

  “I don’t have to explain anything to anybody,” she replied. “But you——”

  I didn’t let her finish. “I’ll do the worrying for me.”

  “Brad,” she protested, “You don’t know what people will say, how they are, what they do——”

  “And I don’t care,” I interrupted her again. “I don’t give a damn about people. All I care about is you. I want you near me, close to me. I don’t want to be away from you now that I’ve found you. I’ve spent too long a time waiting for you.”

  She came very close to me, her eyes searching my face. “Brad, you mean that, don’t you?”

  I nodded. “We’re here, ain’t we? That’s answer enough.”

  Her eyes were still on my face. I don’t know what she sought there, but she must have seen what she wanted. My voice stopped her before she got to the door. She turned to face me.

  “Wait a minute, Elaine,” I said. “We gotta do things right.” I scooped her up in my arms and carried her across the threshold.

  Chapter Ten

  THE administration building of Consolidated Steel was new and shining-white, just inside the steel wire grating that fenced their property. Behind the building lay the black, soot-covered foundries, their chimneys belching flame and smoke into the clear blue sky.

  A uniformed special officer stopped me as I came through the door. “Mr. Rowan to see Mr. Brady,” I said.

  “Do you have a pass?” he asked.

  I shook my head.

  “An appointment?”

  “Yes.”

  He picked up a telephone on a table near him and whispered into it, all the while watching me carefully. I lit a cigarette while waiting for him to pass me. I had time to take just one pull when he put the phone down. “This elevator, Mr. Rowan,” he said politely and pressed a button on the wall.

  The elevator door opened and there was a second uniformed special officer in the elevator. “Mr. Rowan to Mr. Brady’s office,” said the first officer as I went into the elevator.

  The doors closed behind me and the elevator began its ascent. I looked at the operator. “This is almost as bad as getting to see the President,” I smiled.

  “Mr. Brady is Chairman of the Board,” the special officer dead-panned.

  For a moment I fought an impulse to tell him that I was talking about the President of the United States but it would have been wasted so I kept my mouth shut. The elevator stopped and the doors opened. I stepped out.

  The special officer was right behind me. “This way, sir.”

  I followed him down a deserted marble corridor, past a series of pine-panelled doors. Between each door was an electric light in the form of a torch in the hand of a classic Greek figure. At almost any moment I expected one of the doors to open and an undertaker to come out to direct us to the remains.

  He paused in front of one of the doors, knocked lightly, then opened it and waved me in. I blinked my eyes at the light in the room after the gloomy corridor and heard the door close behind me.

  “Mr. Rowan?” The girl at the large semicircular desk in the centre of the room looked up at me inquiringly.

  I nodded and walked towards her.

  She got up and came around her desk. “Mr. Brady is tied up at the moment and extends his apologies. Would you care to wait in the reception room, please?”

  I let out a silent whistle. After this, nobody could tell me that the only thing Matt Brady had on his mind was steel. Not with a babe like this for a secretary. This kid was built for long-distance hauling and she had the equipment that went with endurance.

  “Must I?” I smiled.

  The smile was wasted, for she turned and led me to another door. I followed her slowly, enjoying the clock-work. This was a dame who knew what she had and made no bones about it. As a matter of fact I couldn’t see a bone anywhere. She held the door open for me.

  I stopped and looked at her. “How come you ain’t wearing one of them special cop uniforms?” I asked her.

  She didn’t smile. “Make yourself comfortable,” she said formally. “If there’s anything you’d like, please call me.”

  “Is that legit?” I grinned.

  For the first time an expression appeared on her face. She looked puzzled.

  I laughed aloud. “D’you mean that?” I translated.

  The puzzled frown vanished. “Of course,” she replied. “Cigars and cigarettes are in the humidor on the table. Magazines and papers on the rack beside it.” She closed the door before I had a chance to say anything else.

  I looked around the room. It was richly and quietly furnished. The walls were oak-panelled, the heavy furniture of comfortable leather. The carpets were thick and seemed to come up to your ankles. My eye was caught by a group of photographs neatly framed, hung in a cluster on the wall opposite the door.

  I walked over to them. Some very familiar faces looked down at me. Seven photographs all autographed to Matt Brady personally. All Presidents of the United States. Woodrow Wilson, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, F.D.R., Truman and Eisenhower.

  I ground out my cigarette in a tray. No wonder the operator hadn’t gone for my joke. Presidents come and go but Matt Brady went on forever. I sat down and stared up at the photographs. Tough little man, Matt Brady. Smart. He didn’t keep these pictures in his office like any other man would, where he could point to them or ignore them consciously to impress his visitors. He kept them in his waiting room as if to keep them in their place.

  I began to wonder what I
was doing here. Any guy who had as highly developed a sense of public psychology as Matt Brady seemed to have didn’t need a guy like me for anything. I looked at my watch. I had already been in the room about five minutes. If I had it figured right, it would be ten minutes before he would call for me. By then I would have had time to absorb the psychological effect of the waiting room.

  I grinned to myself. For a moment he almost had me. But two can play at that game. I got out of the chair and opened the door.

  The girl looked up at me, a startled expression in her eyes. I picked a magazine from the rack. “Where’s the washroom?” I asked.

  Silently she pointed to a door opposite mine. I crossed the office quickly. As I opened the washroom door her voice caught me. “But Mr. Brady will be free in a few minutes.”

  “Ask him to wait,” I said, quickly closing the door behind me.

  I had been in the can almost ten minutes when the door opened and someone came in. From under the tile booth door I could see a pair of men’s shoes stand hesitantly in front of the booth. They were cops’ shoes. I didn’t have to see the grey trouser cuffs to know that. I grinned and kept silent. A few seconds later the shoes went away and the door slammed again.

  It had taken a long time, but one of my father’s predictions had just come true. Years ago I remembered him saying to my mother that the only way they would ever get me out of the bathroom was to get the cops after me.

  I sat there and flipped the pages of the magazine. About five minutes later the door slammed again. I looked down under the booth. A pair of small shiny black shoes went past. I smiled grimly to myself. This round was mine.

  Quickly I dropped the magazine to the floor. A second later I came out of the booth and crossed over to the washstand.

  The little man standing there looked up at me questioningly. I grinned down at him in apparent surprise. Mr. Brady,” I said, “What nice offices you have here!”

  Matt Brady’s own office was big enough to serve as the lobby for Radio City Music Hall. It was on a corner of the building and two of its walls were large picture windows through which one could see building after building, all bearing the gleaming stainless steel signs reading Consolidated Steel. His desk occupied the large corner where the two windows came together. Around his desk were three bucket chairs facing him. On the opposite side of the office was a long conference table with ten chairs and a long sectional couch took up the closed corners of the room. In front of the couch was a marble-topped coffee table and two more chairs.

  He motioned me to a seat and went behind his desk. He sat down silently and looked at me. I waited for him to speak. His first question came from left field. “How old are you, Mr. Rowan?”

  I looked at him curiously. “Forty-three,” I answered.

  His next question also caught me off base. “How much do you earn a year?”

  “Thirty-five thousand,” I said quickly, before I had a chance to lie.

  He nodded silently and looked down at his desk. There were some typewritten sheets on it. He seemed to be studying them. I waited for him to continue to speak. After a moment he looked up at me. “Do you know why I sent for you?” he asked.

  “I thought I did,” I said honestly. “But now I’m not quite sure.”

  He smiled mirthlessly. “I believe in honest talk, young man,” he said. “So I won’t waste time in coming to the point. How would you like to make sixty thousand a year?”

  I laughed nervously. The way this guy threw numbers around, I was beginning to feel as if I was back in Washington. “I’d like it,” I said.

  He leaned towards me confidentially. “At yesterday’s meeting you presented a plan for the benefit of the industry. Remember?”

  I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. I also remembered that he didn’t think very much of it.

  “There were certain flaws in your presentation,” he continued. “But basically, it was sound.”

  I let my breath escape through my lips gently. The big one hadn’t got off the hook after all. A glow of triumph began to fill me. “I’m glad you think so, sir,” I said quickly.

  “When I left the meeting, I must admit I was slightly angry,” he said, still in a confidential tone of voice. His eyes held mine. “Because of your accusation.”

  “I regret it, sir,” I said quickly. “It was only because——”

  He held up a magnanimous hand, interrupting me. “Say no more. I admit I gave you sufficient provocation. But what you said impressed me. You were the only one there who had the nerve to call a spade a spade.” He smiled wryly. “It’s been too long a time since anyone spoke to me like that.”

  By now I was going around in circles. I didn’t know what the devil he wanted, so I kept quiet. They never hanged a man for keeping his mouth shut.

  He waved his hand at the windows behind him. “See that, Mr. Rowan?” he said. “That’s Consolidated Steel, and that’s not all of it, either. There are twenty other foundries like it in the United States. It’s one of the five largest corporations in the world—and I made it what it is to-day. Many people didn’t approve of my methods, but that didn’t matter. What did matter was that I made a dream come true. I’ve eaten, slept and drunk steel since I was a twelve-year-old water carrier in a foundry.”

  In spite of myself I was impressed by the little man. His tone had all the fervour of an evangelist. I kept silent.

  “So when you said that I was thinking selfishly you were absolutely right. I make no apologies for it. Too many years have gone by, and I’m too old to change now.”

  I still couldn’t see what he was driving at, so I waited. He leaned back in his chair and looked at me. I took a cigarette and lit it. He let me take a pull before he spoke. It was a good thing he did because what he said almost knocked me off my seat.

  “I like you, Mr. Rowan,” he said quietly. “Because you’re like me. You’re all the things you would say I was. Tough. Selfish. Ruthless. But I would call it practical. A recognition of the laws of survival.

  “That’s why I asked you to come and see me. I’m prepared to offer you a job here as Vice-President and Director of Public Relations at sixty thousand dollars a year. I need a man with your talents for organization to do for Consolidated Steel what you plan to do for the industry.”

  I held onto my chair. “But what of the industry campaign?” I asked.

  He laughed shortly. “Let them worry about their own campaign,” he said succinctly.

  I was silent. This was hitting it. All my life I had been waiting for a kick like this. Now that it had come I couldn’t believe it.

  Matt Brady spoke again. Apparently he had taken my stunned silence for an assent. The mirthless smile was back on his face. His fingers tapped the typwritten sheets of paper on his desk. “Mr. Rowan, these papers are as complete a dossier of your life as I could gather overnight. As you see I like to know as much as possible about my associates and I feel I only have to talk to you on one small point.”

  I looked at him questioningly. My head was still reeling. What was he talking about now?

  He looked down at the papers and spoke. “Your business record is a very good one, there is nothing there I have need to speak to you about. Your home life is also good. But there are portions of your personal life I think you must be cautioned about.”

  A chill began to settle down on me. “What, Mr. Brady?”

  “Last night you checked into the Brooke with a woman who is not your wife, Mr. Rowan. That’s very indiscreet. We at Consolidated must remember we are constantly under surveillance.”

  I began to get angry. How long had this guy been watching me? Maybe this was his payoff to get me away from Elaine. “By whom, Mr. Brady?” I asked coldly. “Who could be interested enough in me to know what I’ve been doing?”

  “Everyone who has anything to do with steel in Pittsburgh must expect to be watched, Mr. Rowan,” he said.

  I had to find out what was on those sheets of paper. “I suppose your spies also
gave you the name of the lady with me last night?” I asked.

  He looked up at me coldly. “I’m not interested in the names of your sleeping companions, Mr. Rowan. I’m only mentioning this because of our planned association.”

  I got out of my chair. “I’ve decided I’m not interested in your offer, Mr. Brady.”

  He got to his feet. “Don’t be foolish, young man,” he said quickly. “No woman is worth it.”

  I laughed shortly. I wondered what he would say if he knew it was his niece we were talking about. “That hasn’t anything to do with it, Mr. Brady,” I said coldly. I walked to the door and opened it.

  A special officer sitting just outside the door scrambled to to his feet. He looked at me expectantly.

  I looked back into the office at the little man standing behind his desk. “You’re overdoing this cop thing a bit, Mr. Brady,” I said. “Even the gestapo couldn’t help Hitler when the chips were down.”

  Chapter Eleven

  I HIT the street under a full head of steam. The bright sun tore at my eyes and I blinked. Down the street was Oscar’s bar. Its cool, dark interior looked good to me. I pushed my way through the revolving door.

  It was one of those cocktail lounges with restaurant attached. I headed for the bar and climbed up on a stool. The place was loaded with Con Steel people. I could tell from the badges on their clothing. This was a white-collar joint; the foundry workers apparently had their own stamping grounds.

  The bartender slid over in front of me. “Double Black Label over rocks,” I said. “Lemon twist.”

  He threw three ice cubes into a tumbler and put it down in front of me. Reaching behind him, he brought down a bottle of Black Label and filled the tumbler three-quarters full. Then he twisted a cut of lemon peel over the glass and dropped it in. “Buck and a half,” he said.

  Either the nut was nothing here or they cut the liquor big. I dropped a five on the bar and picked up my drink. “Ride it,” I said. I needed time to think.

  Those sheets of paper on Matt Brady’s desk bothered me. Whoever made that report might know Elaine was with me. That wouldn’t be good. Matt Brady might ignore my words, but I was sure he wouldn’t forgive me having her with me. I’d give an eyetooth to know who sent him that report.