Jake Thomas nodded to the company secretary and voting slips were passed around to every board member. It looked to William as if everything had been decided before the meeting. He glanced around the crowded table at the twenty - nine men. Many of them he had chosen himself, but some of them he didn't know at all well. He had once heard that a small group of young directors openly supported the Democratic Party and John Kennedy. Some of them were looking at him; some were not. Surely they'd back him; they wouldn't let Rosnov - ski beat him. Not now. Please let me finish my term as chairman, he said to himself, then I'll go quietly and without any fuss - but not this way. He watched the members of the board as they passed their voting slips back to the secretary. He was opening them slowly. The room was silent and all eyes were turned towards the secxetary as he began opening the last few slips, noting down each aye and nay meticulously on a piece of paper placed in front of him that revealed two columns. William could see that one list of names was considerably longer than the other, but his failing eyesight did not permit him to decipher which was which. He could not accept that the day could have come when there would be a vote in his own board room between himself and Abel Rosnovski.

The secretary was saying something. William couldn't believe what he heard. By seventeen votes to twelve he had lost the confidence of the board. He managed to stand up. Abel Rosnovski had beaten him in the final battle. No one spoke as William left the board room. He returned to the Chairman's office and picked up his coat, stopping only to look at the portrait of Charles Lester for the last time, and then walked slowly down the long corridor and out of the front entrance.

The doorman said, 'Nice to have you back again, Mr. Chairman. See you tomorrow, sir.'

William realised he would never see him again. He turned around and shook hands with the man who had directed him to the board room twenty - three years before.

The rather surprised doon - nan said, 'Goodnight, sir,' as he watched William climb into the back of his car for the last time.

His chauffeur took him home and when he reached East Sixty - eighth Street, William collapsed on his front door step. The chauffeur and Kate helped him into the house~ Kate could see he was crying, and she put her arms round him.

'What is it, William? What's happened?'

'I've been thrown out of my own bank,' he wept. My own board no longer have confidence in me - When it mattered, they supported Abel Rosnovski.'

Kate managed to get him up to bed and sat with him through the night. He never spoke. Nor did he sleep.

The announcement in the Wall Street journal the following Monday morning said simply: 'William Lowell Kane, the president and chairman of Lester's Bank resigned after yesterday's board meeting!

No mention of illness or any explanation was given for his sudden departure, and there was no suggestion that his son would take his place on the board. William knew that rumour would sweep through Wall Street and that the worst would be assumed. He sat in bed alone, caring no longer for this world.

Abel read the announcement of William Kanes resignation in the Wall Street journal the same day. He picked up the phone, dialled Lester's Bank and asked to speak to the new chairman. A few seconds later Jake Thomas came on the line. 'Good morning, Mr. Rosnovski.'

'Good morning, Mr. Thomas. I'm just phoning to confirm that I shall release all my Interstate Airways shares to the bank at the market price this morning and my eight per cent holding in Lester's to you personally for two million dollars!

'Thank you, Mr. Rosnovski, that's most generous of you.'

'No need to thank me, Mr. Chairman, it's no more than we agreed on when you sold me your two per cent of Lester's,' said Abel RosnovskL

Book Seven

40

Abel was surprised to find how little satisfaction his final triumph had given him.

George tried to persuade him that he should go to Warsaw to look over sites for the new Baron but Abel didn't want to. As he grew older he became fearful of dying abroad and never seeing Florentyna again, and for months Abel showed no interest in the group's activities. When John F. Kennedy was assassinated on 22 November 1963, Abel became even more depressed and feared for America. Eventually George did convince him that a trip abroad could do no harm, and that things would perhaps seem a little easier for him when lie returned.

Abel travelled to Warsaw where he obtained a highly confidential agreement to build the first Baron in the communist world. His command of the language impressed Warsawians, and he was proud to beat Holiday Inns and Intercontinental behind the Iron Curtain. He couldn't help thinking ... and it didn't help when Lyndon Johnson appointed John (3 ronowski to be the first Polish - American ambassador to Warsaw. But now nothing seemed to give any satisfaction. He had defeated Kane and lost his own daughter, and he wondered if the man felt the same way about his son. After Warsaw, he roamed the world, staying in his hotels, watching the construction of new ones. He opened the first Baron in Cape Town, South Africa, and flew back to Germany to open one in Dilsseldorf.