“I agree, Miss Spencer. For those who position their heads above the parapet to get it lopped off.”
At the head of the table a straight-backed servant intoned, “The next course is roast saddle of mutton and spring chicken.”
Elizabeth nodded to the servant who placed her dish in front of her, and then pinned her gaze on Havemeyer. “Chicken. How appropriate.”
With his cheeks blazing from the innuendo, the sugar baron clamped his mouth shut. Elizabeth had axed the sugar baron off the matrimonial list. Clever girl.
With a conspiratorial gleam, she smiled at Zachary. It was the kind of smile that wove spells and caused men to run upon hot coals.
“I’d say that we should give Mr. Rourke a chance, don’t you agree, Father? Rawlins, will you finance him for me?”
Elizabeth Spencer had spoken for him? Zach couldn’t have been more surprised if she’d asked him how to breed archangels.
“I’ll give it some thought,” said Dyer, his tone belying the glimmer of warmth and yearning in his eyes as he studied her. Zachary gritted his teeth. His immediate contempt of Rawlins Dyer filled him with loathing.
Chapter Six
After dinner, the men left the ladies and withdrew to the retiring room. Cigar smoke, scotch, whiskey, and the smell of money. A servant lifted the Waterford crystal decanter and topped Zachary’s glass off. Top of the line. Kentucky bourbon. Aged in charred oak barrels.
Across from Zach, Dyer sat, the man clearly staking out his claim of importance in the room. The oil tycoon’s walrus mustache and his full head of graying hair caught what light there was around him. Few men planted themselves so indelibly in Zach’s memory.
Edward Spencer entered the room. Zachary felt something electric, an effect that said Spencer was king.
A throne room full of kings. Zachary smiled. It was, as Barnum would say, time for the show. He took a few steps to the middle of the room. “Gentlemen,” and once more, a bit louder, “Gentlemen, if you please.”
The room quieted, the only sound the tinkle of ice in glasses as sips of smooth whiskey soothed throats made dry in anticipation. Six pairs of eyes, all dark with avarice, looked toward him.
“I shall get straight to the point. As men with foresight, I believe you will concur that the engine I have designed, the engine of the future–”
Dyer harrumphed. “You are what my old tutor would have called a long pisser, Mr. Rourke. Prepared to aim your stream whether you’ve got anything to back it up. Big idea.”
Why the oil baron’s belligerence? Was it because Zachary had conspired with Elizabeth about Thrasybulus against the sugar baron–and one of his ilk. Zachary lifted one hand palm up. “I’m sorry to hear you say that.”
“Nobody has a monopoly on ideas. The engine you described is the Otto four-stroke combustion engine,” said Dyer whose pale thin lips radiated the word “virtue” more sweetly than greed or glory.
“Not so. I have developed a compressed charge, compression ignition engine. More robust in construction, it can be used to power locomotives, tractors, power mills, factories, and all sorts of heavy machinery. Comparatively, the Otto cycle compression ratio is approximately seven to one where my engine is high at twenty-two to one. Therefore, the efficiency for the Otto engine is a lot less than my engine.”
Dyer smiled, then sat back, looking not at Zach but at the cigar shoes end he was trimming with a gold cutter. “I don’t make deals for the sake of making a deal. Chances are, it will fall apart later with costs and headaches for everyone involved.”
Zachary eyeballed Dyer. “I should also mention that my engine requires a heavier oil that may be purchased from your refineries.” That might shut the man up.
Edward Spencer swirled the amber whiskey in his glass, his fierce prejudiced eyes insinuating the fanatical underpinnings of his will. “Everyone has a notion, but it’s taking those first few steps toward turning that notion into a reality that’s always the toughest.”
“I do have a working model to demonstrate, Mr. Spencer. I can arrange a time for those who’d like to take a view of what my invention can do,” Zachary had prepared himself for lack of enthusiasm. All part of a negotiation whether you were selling a sow or a potential million-dollar business.
“What is the time frame from start to finish to get your idea going?” asked the paper cut-out sugar baron. He tried to recover his loss at the stupid pool. He just dropped farther and raised his glass for the servant to refill. The seventh time, Zachary counted.
“Six months,” said Zachary.
Dyer lit his cigar and studied Zachary over a puff of circling smoke. “Why don’t you borrow from your family?”
“Shawn Fitzgerald, my sisters-in-law, Grace, and Rachel Rourke, have been most generous, but with the economic downturn can only offer so much. I need diverse investors.”
“What collateral do you have if you fail?” asked Spencer. The ice in his whiskey glass cracked against the side as he raised it for a servant to refill.
Zachary’s pulse jittered somewhere around the one hundred and sixty mark. Who presented more danger, these men, or the Comanche?
“What else?” prodded Dyer. “That’s hardly enough to substantiate the amount you require.”
