We can't make them B-17's on the same production line.
You're going to have to decide which comes first."
I stared at him.
"You make the decision. You're president of the company."
"You own the goddamn company," he shouted back. "Which contract do you want to honor?"
"Both of them.
We're not in the business of turning away money."
"Then we'll have to get the Canadian plant in operation right away. We could handle prefabrication if the B-17's were put together up there."
"Then do it," I said.
"O.K. Get me Amos Winthrop to run it."
"I told you before – no Winthrop."
"No Winthrop, no Canadian plant.
I'm not going to send a lot of men to their death in planes put together by amateurs just because you're too damn stubborn to listen to reason."
"Still the fly-boy hero?" I sneered. "What's it to you who puts the planes together?
You're not flying them."
He crossed the room and stood over my chair, looking down at me. I could see his fists clench.
"While you were out whoring around London, trying to screw everything in sight, I was out at the airfields watching those poor bastards come in weary and beat from trying to keep the Jerry bombs off your fucking back.
Right then and there, I made up my mind that if we were lucky enough to get that contract, I'd personally see to it that every plane we shipped over was the kind of plane I wouldn't be afraid to take up myself."
"Hear, hear!" I said sarcastically.
"When did you decide you'd be satisfied to put your name on a plane that was second best?
When the money got big enough?"
I stared at him for a moment.
He was right.
My father said the same thing in another way once.
We'd been walking through the plant back in Nevada and Jake Platt, the plant supervisor, came up to him with a report on a poor batch of powder.
He suggested blending it in with a large order so the loss would be absorbed.
My father towered over him in rage.
"And who would absorb the loss of my reputation?" he shouted. "It's my name that's on every can of that powder.
Burn it!"
"All right, Roger," I said slowly. "You get Winthrop."
He looked into my eyes for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was quieter.
"You'll have to find him for us.
I'm sending Morrissey up to Canada to get the new plant started. I’ll go out to the Coast and start production."
"Where is he?"
"I don't know," he answered. "Last I heard, he was in New York, but when I checked around this morning, nobody seemed to know where he is.
He seems to have dropped out of sight."
4.
I slumped back into a corner of the big limousine as we came off the Queensboro Bridge.
Already, I regretted my decision to come out here.
There was something about Queens that depressed me.
I looked out the window while Robair expertly threaded the big car through the traffic.
Suddenly, I was annoyed with Monica for living out here.
I recognized the group of houses as the car rolled to a stop.
They hadn't changed, except that the lawn was dull and brown with winter now, where it had been bright summer-green the last time.
"Wait here," I said to Robair. I went up the three steps and pressed the doorbell. A chill wind whistled between the buildings and I pulled my light topcoat around me. I shifted the package uncomfortably under my arm.
The door opened and a small girl stood there, looking up at me.
Her eyes were dark violet and serious.
"Jo-Ann?" I asked tentatively.
She nodded silently.
I stared at her for a moment.