Night Over Water

to stay there; and all because you were afraid to tell me you were taking the Clipper!”

He stared back at her, white-faced and silent.

She had not planned to make a speech but the words just came. “You slunk out of the hotel yesterday and rushed all the way to Southampton, hoping I wouldn’t find out!” She leaned on the table, and he shrank away from her. “What are you so scared of? I’m not going to bite you!” As she said the word bite he flinched, as if she might really do it.

She had not troubled to lower her voice. The people nearby had gone quiet. Peter looked around the room with an embarrassed expression. Nancy said: “I’m not surprised you feel foolish. After all I’ve done for you! All these years I’ve protected you, covered up for your stupid mistakes, and let you go on being chairman of the company even though you couldn’t organize a church bazaar! After all that, you tried to steal the business from me! How could you do it? Doesn’t it make you feel like a worm?”

He flushed crimson. “You’ve never protected me—you’ve always looked after yourself,” he protested. “You always wanted to be boss—but you didn’t get the job! I got it, and you’ve been scheming to take it away from me ever since.”

This was so unjust that Nancy did not know whether to laugh, cry or spit in his face. “You idiot, I’ve been scheming ever since to let you keep the chairmanship.”

He pulled some papers from his pocket with a flourish. “Like this?”

Nancy recognized her report. “You bet like that,” she said. “That plan is the only way for you to keep your job.”

“While you take control! I saw through it right away.” He looked defiant. “That’s why I came up with my own plan.”

“Which hasn’t worked,” Nancy said triumphantly. “I’ve got a seat on the plane and I’m coming back for the board meeting.” For the first time she turned to Nat Ridgeway and spoke to him. “I guess you still can’t take control of Black’s Boots, Nat.”

Peter said: “Don’t be so sure.”

She looked at him. He was petulantly aggressive. Surely he could not have something up his sleeve? He was not that smart. She said: “You and I own forty percent each, Peter. Aunt Tilly and Danny Riley hold the balance. They’ve always followed my lead. They know me and they know you. I make money and you lose it, and they understand that, even if they’re polite to you for Pa’s sake. They’ll vote the way I ask them to.”

“Riley will vote with me,” Peter said obstinately.

There was something in his mulishness that worried her. “Why would he vote with you, when you’ve practically run the company into the ground?” she said scornfully, but she was not as confident as she made herself sound.

He sensed her anxiety. “I’ve got you scared now, haven’t I?” he sneered.

Unfortunately, he was right. She was beginning to feel worried. He did not look as crushed as he should. She had to find out whether there was anything behind this bluster. “I guess you’re just talking through your hat,” she jeered.

“No, I’m not.”

If she kept taunting him he would feel compelled to prove her wrong, she knew. “You always pretend to have something up your sleeve but it generally amounts to nothing at all.”

“Riley has promised.”

“And Riley is as trustworthy as a rattlesnake,” she said dismissively.

Peter was stung. “Not if he gets ... an incentive.”

So that was it: Danny Riley had been bribed. That worried Nancy. Danny was nothing if not corruptible. What had Peter offered him? She had to know, so that she could either spoil the bribe or offer more. She said: “Well, if your plan hinges on Danny Riley’s reliability, I guess I don’t have anything to worry about!” and she laughed derisively.

“It hinges on Riley’s greed,” Peter said.

She turned to Nat and said: “If I were you I’d be very skeptical about all this.”

“Nat knows it’s true,” Peter said smugly.

Nat clearly would have preferred to remain silent, but when they both stared at him, he gave a reluctant nod of assent.

Peter said: “He’s giving Riley a big chunk of General Textiles’s work.”

That was a blow, and Nancy’s breath caught in her throat. There was nothing Riley would have liked better than to get a foot in the door of a major corporation such as General Textiles. To a small New York law firm it was the opportunity of a lifetime. For a bribe like that, Riley would sell his mother.

Peter’s shares plus Riley’s came to fifty percent. Nancy’s plus Aunt Tilly’s also amounted to fifty percent. With the votes divided equally, the issue would be decided by the casting vote of the chairman—Peter.

Peter could see he had trumped Nancy, and he allowed himself a smile of victory.

Nancy was not yet willing to concede defeat. She pulled out a chair and sat down. She turned her attention to Nat Ridgeway. She had sensed his disapproval all the way through the argument. She wondered if he knew that Peter had been working behind her back. She decided to put it to him. “I suppose you knew Peter was lying to me about this?”

He stared at her, tight-lipped; but she could do that too, and she simply waited, looking expectant. Finally she outstared him, and he said: “I didn’t ask. Your family quarrels are none of my concern. I’m not a social worker. I’m a businessman.”

But there was a time, she thought, when you held my hand in restaurants, and kissed me good night; and once you caressed my breasts. She said: “Are you an honest businessman?”

“You know I am,” he said stiffly.

“In that case, you won’t approve of dishonest methods being used on your behalf.”

He thought for a moment, then said: “This is a takeover, not a tea party.”

He was going to say more, but she jumped in. “If you’re willing to gain by my brother’s dishonesty, you’re dishonest yourself. You’ve changed since you worked for my father.” She turned back to Peter before Nat could reply. “Don’t you realize you could get twice the price for your shares if you let me implement my plan for a couple of years?”

“I don’t like your plan.”

“Even without restructuring, the company is going to be worth more because of the war. We’ve always supplied soldiers’ boots—think of the extra business if the U.S. gets into the war!”

“The U.S. won’t get into this war.”

“Even so, the war in Europe will be good for business.” She looked at Nat. “You know that, don’t you? That’s why you want to buy us out.”

Nat said nothing.

She turned back to Peter. “But we’d do better to wait. Listen to me. Have I ever been wrong about this sort of thing? Have you ever lost money by following my advice? Have you ever made money by disregarding it?”

“You just don’t understand, do you?” Peter said.

Now she could not imagine what was coming. “What don’t I understand?”

“Why I’m merging the company, why I’m doing this.”

“All right, why?”

He stared at her in silence, and she saw the answer in his eyes.

He hated her.

She was shocked rigid. She felt as if she had run headlong into an invisible brick wall. She wanted to disbelieve it, but the grotesque expression of malevolence on his distorted face could not be ignored. There had always been tension between them, natural sibling rivalry; but this, this was awful, weird, pathological. She had never suspected this. Her little brother, Peter, hated her.

This is what it must be like, she thought, when the man you have been married to for twenty years tells you he’s having an affair with his secretary and he doesn’t love you anymore.

She felt dizzy, as if she had banged her head. It was going to take a while to adjust to this.

Peter was not merely being foolish, or mean, or spiteful. He was actually doing himself harm in order to ruin his sister. That was pure hatred.