12. Mason Villiers
The limousine turned up Third Avenue from Forty-seventh Street and cruised slowly with the lights. Taxis darted past, jumping the traffic lights, and along the window-lit sidewalks male prostitutes cruised with brazen, casual arrogance. In the back seat of the limousine Villiers became irritated with the bedraggled whine of Tod Sanders’ complaining voice and said, “I’m sick of hearing about your mother. Shut up.”
Sanders didn’t say another word until he eased the big car in at the curb in front of Villiers’ hotel. Then, blank-faced, Sanders turned in his seat and said, “You want a girl? You want me to send for a girl?”
“No, to hell with it. You go on home and sit up with your sick mother.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” Tod Sanders was perpetually nodding, nervously pretending agreement before he could possibly know what he was going to be agreeing with; he was like a student-there was one in every classroom-whose head bobbed up and down the whole hour long.
“I’ll need you here at nine in the morning with the ear.”
“Yes, sir.”
The doorman had the limousine door open; Villiers stepped out and went into the hotel lobby. He glanced at the row of elevators but went on to the cocktail lounge. Drunk businessmen were crowded loud at the bar. As he moved past them, he saw a slim attractive woman sitting alone; her glance touched him, direct and interested. He sized her up as an easy lay.
She had a warm, slow smile.
He sat down and spoke: “Staying here in the hotel?”
“Yes.”
“In town long?”
“I live here.” She was still smiling.
“Work here?”
“Well, I’m sort of between jobs, you know. I do a little dancing, and I model a little. I’m just sort of-around, you know?”
He nodded. “Expensive?”
“Some gentlemen don’t think I am.”
“Go on,” he said.
“Two hundred.”
He laughed quietly and gave her his room number and walked out to the lobby.
At nine-thirty in the morning he entered the offices of Hackman and Greene and went back through the corridor without waiting for the English receptionist to announce him. He found Sidney Isher in Hackman’s office; the broker himself was nowhere in sight. Isher said, “George must be stuck in the traffic. It’s murder out there in this Goddamned heat. You want a cup of coffee?”
“No.” Villiers settled on a chair in the cool blast of the air-conditioner.
The red-haired lawyer coughed; his eye tic winked steadily. “I swear the pavements are starting to melt out there.”
Villiers said, “Take a pill or something-you’re nervous.”
“I guess I am. We’ve got a problem.”
“I’m listening.”
“It goes by the name of Arthur Rademacher. He’s James Melbard’s brother-in-law-this’ll take a minute to explain. You see, Melbard Chemical has about one and a half million shares of capital stock. As you know, there’s only about a hundred thousand shares outstanding on the open market-the rest belong to the Melbard family and a few insiders, and the twenty-three percent that NCI and Elliot Judd own together. The idea, as I understood it from you, was to tender an offer to Melbard to get a controlling interest from the Melbard family, in an exchange-of-stocks deal with Nuart Galleries. This was supposed to-”
“I’m losing interest,” Villiers snapped. “Get to the point.”
“I’m trying to.” Isher kept crossing and uncrossing his legs. “You want to buy a controlling interest in Melbard, right? The only way to do it is to buy eight hundred thousand shares of Melbard stock, right? And the only place you can buy that many shares is from Melbard’s family, because nobody else owns that much. But what I’m trying to tell you is, there’s a hitch we didn’t foresee. It seems this old bastard Rademacher owns a quarter of a million shares in his wife’s name-she’s James Melbard’s sister-and he’s also got options on another quarter of a million shares which James Melbard owns at the moment. You get the picture now? James Melbard can’t sell his stock to you unless Rademacher releases him from the options. For all practical purposes, Rademacher controls half a million shares of Melbard stock, which is better than thirty percent of the whole lot. Without that block of stock, you can’t get control of Melbard Chemical-not unless you can buy NCI’s block, and I doubt you could.”
“I don’t see the problem,” Villiers said. “If Rademacher owns it, then buy it from Rademacher. What’s so difficult about that?”
“Difficult? Nothing. It’s dead simple. Rademacher won’t sell.” Isher assumed a pained smile and made a vague gesture. “Just like that.”
“How do you know? Have you tried making him an offer?”
“Of course I have. What the hell do you think I’m talking from-pure guesswork? As soon as I got your call telling me Mrs. Hastings had agreed on the deal, I put my people to work on the Melbard group. I got a report from one of them this morning. Rademacher flatly turned us down. His half-million shares are too big a block for us to buck.”
“Maybe-if he isn’t bluffing. Who says he’s actually got control of that many shares?”
“Believe me. I checked it out.”
“Have you talked to him personally?”
“I put in a call. He wouldn’t talk to me.”
Villiers squinted at him. “People who refuse to talk usually have something to hide.”
“What’s that got to do with it? He’s got the stock, he refuses to sell it. That’s all there is to it.”
Villiers smiled gently and murmured, “Sidney, you haven’t got the balls of a Chihuahua. I’ve told you how high you could go, bidding for the stock-all you need to do is make Rademacher an offer he can’t turn down.”
“You told me to go as high as twelve dollars a share. That’s six million dollars-just for Rademacher’s stock. At that price you’d have to put eight or nine million dollars in to gain control. You haven’t got that kind of money.”
“Of course I’ve got that kind of money. What did you think this was, a penny-ante deal?”
“Don’t pull my leg. Where do you come up with nine million dollars?”
“Let me worry about that.”
“I will. I will-but you’re trying to grow too fast. You’ll get caught, or you’ll fall apart. I’ve watched you for years-can’t you ever take advice? You’ve only got two speeds in your engine-full speed ahead and full speed reverse. You’ve got to slow down on the corners.”
“All right, Sidney, you’ve exercised your mouth. Now I’ll put in my fifty-one percent worth. You’ll make Rademacher an offer he can’t refuse. If he won’t come to the phone, then don’t mail the offer, have it delivered to him by personal messenger, and put a little note in the envelope with it. Give it the friendly touch, and throw in a hint that you’re willing to grease him with options to buy a few blue chips below market price.”
Isher hawked, cleared his throat, and growled, “You give me a pain, Mace.”
“Take something for it.”
“Okay, so it’s an offer he can’t refuse. Suppose he refuses it?”
“Then use pressure. Everybody’s got something in his past he’s a little ashamed of-everybody’s scared of something. Find Rademacher’s soft spot.”
“I’m no detective.”
“You can hire them.”
Isher’s eyelid was winking rapidly with tension. “I don’t like it. You’re getting too ambitious too fast. You can’t just-”
“Don’t lean, Sidney. I’ve been leaned on by heavier men than you. Just do your job. Look at me when I’m talking to you.”
Isher flushed. He slid forward until he was sitting on the edge of his chair. “Hold it right there,” he said, his voice under stern control. “You’re not talking to a six-thousand-a-year lackey. Okay, so I’ve seen you order bigshot executives around as if you were a hung-over topkick yelling at recruits, and they let you do it because you’ve got enough clout to destroy them. You’ve never been bothered by leaving your cleat marks on people’s backs, and I suppose up to a point that’s good-it works, it’s helped you claw your way up to seven figures. But listen to me, Mace, you can’t treat these people the way you treat your boiler-room marks, with that world-is-my-ashtray attitude of yours. And you can’t treat me that way either. I know what you probably think of me, but-”