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knows what's coming." "And just what is my cousin's prediction, gentlemen? Biblical apocalypse?" The strong, faintly sarcastic male voice startled Michael and Payne. The editor's right hand, seeming to move with a life of its own, snatched the whiskey bottle from the desk top, jammed it in the drawer and slid the drawer shut with amazing speed. The man who'd spoken was Louis Kent Louis took the arm of the young woman at his side and guided her into the tiny office. Michael gave him the Washington copy. The Titans37 "Read it for yourself." He inclined his head to Louis' wife of two and a half years. "Good evening, Julia." "Good evening, Mi-heaven above! You're cut. And covered with dust!" "Nothing serious." Amanda's son, whom Michael had served as legal guardian until he reached his majority, let the dispatch droop in his hand. "You didn't get that pounding from the Stovall board, I hope." "Not this particular pounding." "Then where?" "It's not important, Louis." The younger man's eyes showed fleeting annoyance. People didn't refuse to answer questions put to them by Louis Kent. But he stayed calm: "How did the meeting go?" "Miserably." Louis scowled. He was slender and strongly built. And although he was only twenty-three, he already possessed a confidence and maturity that turned feminine heads. He looked superb in whatever he wore-tonight a conservative black frock coat, open to show a single- breasted waistcoat in a pattern of black and white checks that matched his trousers. His black satin cravat, tied in a bow, all but hid the round starched collar of his shirt. It was quite a proper costume for a young man of wealth. Yet its subdued blacks and grays represented a kind of negative but unmistakable ostentation. The tones of the clothing complemented Louis' dark eyes and swarthy skin-a heritage from the Mexican officer who had fathered him during the trouble in Texas in '36. His hair was jet black, worn thick at the back. The hair curled down behind his ears to neatly combed side whiskers reaching to a point just below his 38Prologue earlobes. He hadn't yet adopted the Dundreary look- or the latest male adornment, a flowing mustache. Louis laid his gray kid gloves alongside his stick on the editor's desk. "Summarize the meeting for me, Michael." The order irritated him. But perhaps he was just feeling tense because of the way the election was going. And the cut was throbbing again. "I began by telling the board we'd sent agents to Great Britain to investigate a radical new process for converting pig iron into wrought iron or steel. I told them the inventor, Mr. Bessemer, was making claims worth our attention. Saying the converting furnace he designed would one day produce five tons of steel in a quarter of an hour instead of the ten days it takes now. I went over the agents' report line by line. I covered every detail. Well, almost. Then I gave the board our recommendation, including the budget for funding an experimental installation in the Pittsburgh plant. I pleaded the case for more than three hours." Louis blinked. "I should think they'd have accepted the proposal out of sheer relief. Besides, the level of risk is acceptably low." "They almost agreed. Until Foley asked what Mr. Bessemer's fellow Englishmen thought about him." "And?" Michael shrugged. "I was forced to go back and comment on what I'd omitted from the report. That the other steelmakers say Bessemer and his process are crazy." "You told the truth?" Michael was nonplussed. "Of course." "And that's what defeated us?" "The proposal was turned down unanimously." "Why didn't you lie, for God's sake? That vote completely disrupts my plans to make the Stovall operation more competitive." The Titans39 "If you'd been there, would you have lied?" "You're damn right. And it's damned evident I should have been there!" His fingers were white as he forced himself to look at the dispatch from Jephtha. Disgusted, Michael walked out of the office. Louis' wife followed.