William received Alan Lloyd's letter at St. Paul's on the Thursday morning while having breakfast with Matthew.
Breakfast on Thursday morning at Beacon Hill was the usual eggs and bacon, hot toast, cold oatmeal, and a pot of steaming coffee. Henry was simultaneously tense and jaunty, snapping at the maid, joking with a junior city official who telephoned to say the name of the company who had been awarded the hospital contract would be posted on the notice board at City Hall around ten o'clock. Anne was almost looking forward to her last meeting with Glen Ricardo. She flicked through Vogue, trying not to notice that Henry's hands, clutching the Boston Globe, were trembling.
'What are you going to do this morning?' Henry asked, trying to make conversation.
'Oh, nothing much before we have our celebration lunch.
Will you be able to build the c1d1dren's wing in memory of Richard?'Anne asked.
'Not in memory of Richard, my darling. This will be my achievement, so let it be in your honour - 'qle Mrs. Henry Osborne Wing",'he added grandly.
'What a good idea,' Anne said, as she put her magazine down and snAled at him. 'But you mustn't let me drink too much champagne at lunch as I have a full check - up with Doctor MacKenzie this afternoon, and I don't think he would approve of me being drunk only nine weeks before the baby is due. When will you know for certain that the contract is yours?'
'I know now,' Henry said. 'The clerk I just spoke to was a hundred per cent confident, but it will be official at ten o'clock!
qbe first thing you must do then, Henry, is to phone Alan and tell him the good news. I'm beginning to feel quite guilty about the way I treated him last week.'
'No need for you to feel any guilt; he didn!t bother to keep you informed of William's actions!
'No, but he tried to explain later, Henry, and I didn't give him a chance to tell me his side of the story!
'All right, all right, anything you say. If it'll make you happy, I'll phone him at five past ten, and then you can tell William I've made him another million.'
He looked at his watch. 'I'd better be going. Wish me luck!
'I thought you didn't need any luck,' said Anne.
'I don't, I don't. It's only an expression. See. you at the Ritz at one,o'clock.' He kissed her on the forehead. 'By tonight, you'll be able to laugh about Alan, William, contracts, and treat them all as problems of the past, believe me. Goodbye, darling!
'I hope so, Henry!
An uneaten breakfast was laid out in front of Alan Lloyd. He was reading the financial pages of the Boston Globe, noting a small paragraph in the right hand column reporting that the city would be announcing at ten o'clock that morning which company had been awarded the five - million - dollar hospital contract.
Alan Lloyd had already decided what course of action he must take if Henry failed to secure the contract and everything that William had claimed turned out to be accurate. He would do exactly what Richard would have done faced with the same predicament, and act only in the best interests of the bank. The latest departmental reports on Henry's per - sonal finances disturbed Alan Lloyd greatly. Osborne was indeed a heavy gambler and no trace could be found of the trust's five hundred thousand dollars having gone into Henry's company. Alan Lloyd sipped his orange juice and left the rest of his breakfast untouched apologised to his housekeeper and walked to the bank. It ~as a pleasant day.
'William, are you up to a game of tennis this afternoon?'
Matthew Lester was standing over William as he read the letter from Alan Lloyd for a second time.
'What did you say?'
'Are you going deaf or just b ' ecorning a senile adolescent? Do you want me to beat you black and blue on the tennis court this afternoon?'
'No, I won't be here this afternoon, Matthew. I have more important things to attend to.'
'Naturally' old buddy, I forgot that you're off on another of your mysterious trips to the White House. I know President Harding is looking for someone to be his new fiscal advisor, and you're exactly the right man to take the place of that posturing fool, Charles G. Dawes. Tell him you'll accept, subject to his inviting Matthew Lester to be the Ad - ministration's next Attorney General!
There was still no response from William.
'I know the joke was pretty weak, but I thought it worthy of some comment,' said Matthew as he sat down beside William and looked more carefully at his friend. 'It's the eggs, isn't it? Taste as though they've come out of a Russian prisoner - of - war camp.'