Chapter 29: What Winslow Earned

"I'll go," Winslow said.

We were standing at the foot of the Tower steps, where the crowd had melted away and the cooks were carrying their coffee trays inside.

"He asked for you alone."

"He asked for a man who holds half a vote."

Winslow looked at the street, not at me.

"Come with me. Sit at the next table."

"Why?"

"So you never have to wonder what I said."

"I don't wonder."

"I know." He finally looked at me. "That's why I'd like you there."

The restaurant sat on the river, with white cloths and a view of the bridges.

The maître d' looked at Winslow and then at me, and silently moved a potted palm to give me a clear line.

I took a table for one, two yards from theirs, with the menu held up and a glass of water.

The silver-maned man rose from a corner table in a charcoal suit.

He shook Winslow's hand and sat again.

He ordered a steak for each of them without asking, and glanced at me once with the faintest lift of one eyebrow.

"Ms. Sorrell," he said pleasantly, over the plant. "I did say my door was open. I didn't say I'd be knocking on yours."

"Pretend I'm not here," I said.

"I never could."

He turned back to Winslow.

"I'll be direct, Mr. Strathmore. The Tower is worth more to me than to the people who own it."

He cut his steak.

"I made an offer through channels. The answer was a speech about sixty employees."

"It was a good speech."

"It was an excellent speech. It's also a vote, and you hold one."

The man folded his hands.

"Larkspur's stake in the Tower needs both trustees to sell. One signature is a feeling. Two is a transaction."

"I know what the will says."

"Then you know I'm prepared to pay forty million dollars. To you. Personally."

He let that sit on the cloth.

"A consulting arrangement," he said. "A seat on my board."

He smiled.

"A great deal of money, for a man who has spent twenty years guarding other people's."

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