Titans

by Leila Meacham

  Another time, a member of Millicent’s sewing circle was visiting a sick neighbor and noticed a birthmark on the back of the woman’s leg in the same spot and identical in appearance as that of her baby sister, who had been adopted. Comparing notes, the two women discovered they were siblings. They had lived two blocks apart in Gainesville for over twenty years.

  So why should Leon Holloway doubt that a divine wind had not blown the twins together? Already there had been warnings that the chickens were coming home to roost when Neal Gordon and Trevor Waverling had unexpectedly turned up on his doorstep. Leon had been concerned that should Nathan and Samantha ever meet, there might be a romantic spark between them, and his blood would go cold at what could come of that. But no, thank goodness, Samantha Gordon was married, and it sounded like Nathan was smitten with Charlotte Weatherspoon, somebody who sounded right up Millicent’s alley.

  So what should he do now, if anything? He must think. He alone held the box lid showing the full picture of the puzzle of which each player held a piece. Neal Gordon had learned of Samantha’s parentage and believed Leon to be her father, a secret the rancher had apparently kept to himself. Somehow Trevor Waverling had come to suspect that Samantha was his daughter and twin sister to his son, but he had said nothing to Nathan or declared himself to Samantha, or the boy most certainly would have written of it in his letter. Nathan knew nothing about his birth other than he’d been begotten by another man than the one he’d thought was his father. Millicent, of course, knew she had a daughter born a twin but had no idea of who or where she was. Samantha had no knowledge of the father and twin brother living right under her nose, at least not yet.

  What a jumble!

  Leon would keep his counsel, allow the powers that be their sway with no interference from him. He slipped the letter in its envelope into his overalls’ pocket, mentally hearing Millicent chirp when he arrived with the mail: I see you’ve read Nathan’s letter, so let’s open Randolph’s. It was always the way. Nathan was forever last with his mother. Ah, Millie girl, Leon thought, heaven help you if you ever have to answer for what you did to your firstborns, but maybe the eye that had kept Nathan and Samantha in its sight was behind that, too. The twins were better off abandoned to the folks who’d taken them in, sure enough. Leon wished only that he could share in the lives they had made.

  Stretching to his full height, Sloan carefully pushed the skull in its burlap wrapping far back behind a box of painted wooden balls that annually adorned the Christmas tree. It was early Friday afternoon and hay-baling season. His foreman would be wondering where in blazes he was. His boss was needed to inspect and decide which areas of his hay fields to bale. A blight had wiped out at least half of his fodder crop, and it was essential that the rest be collected and baled before it became too dry or inclement weather set in and ruined the first cutting. Rain was expected on the coast and could move inland, but Sloan had had to hang around after lunch until Samantha left for Las Tres Lomas and Millie May had gone to exercise her mare. His older sister had come in from Houston for the weekend but would extend her stay now that Billie June was moving back—“for as long as Daniel’s services are needed at the drill site,” she’d informed them by telephone. Samantha had taken the message.

  The news that Billie June would be bringing Daniel Lane home with her on Sunday to occupy the best guest room had been as hard to swallow as a patch of cockleburs. The shock had been delivered at lunch, the women surprised that Sloan had not risen from the table like an enraged stallion to declare that he would absolutely forbid it, but he was in no position to protest the impudence of the man to push the proposal on Billie June. Daniel Lane’s threat—I want you to remember that I can destroy you with Miss Gordon, her father, and your sisters—still buzzed in his head like a swarm of gnats. Sloan had yet to figure out how to handle the threat and turn the table on the upstart.

  “And before you accuse Daniel of the idea,” Samantha had said at lunch as if reading his thoughts, “the notion was all Billie June’s.”

  “According to the dictates of Dad’s will, I’m afraid you can’t refuse her, Sloan,” Millie May had reminded him.

  “Dad’s dictates never included his daughter using a guest room for sexual trysts with a smithy’s helper!” he’d snapped.

  Samantha had inserted quietly, “A prince would be more suitable?”

  It was the first marital dispute between them. Sloan had felt a flush of shame. He was no snob. He respected all men who worked hard at their jobs. None stood more exalted in his estimation, and Daniel Lane had been known around Fort Worth as a hard and conscientious worker. Also, the solid fact was that Daniel no longer earned his living over a fire and anvil. To hear Billie June tell it, he had become indispensable to Waverling Tools. But what Samantha and his sisters did not know was that Daniel Lane was out to get him, and Billie June was his tool to do it.

  Makes my pursuit a whole lot easier with no regrets, the man had said.

  What pursuit?

  What I’ve determined is now my life’s mission.

  The memory of that cryptic exchange still raised his flesh a little, whatever it meant, but Sloan forced himself to close his mind to it. He had too much to do to worry about Daniel Lane’s “life’s mission.” He had thrown his napkin on the table and pushed back his chair. “You’re twisting my words, Samantha. Snobbery has nothing to do with it. Intentions do. Daniel Lane is up to no good with my younger sister.”

  “By now, don’t you think Billie June would have determined that for herself?” Millie May had asked.

  “She’s so besotted she can’t see she’s setting herself up for a waterfall of heartbreak,” Sloan had said. “I can’t prevent it in Dallas, but I can in my own house.”

  “It’s her heart, Sloan,” Samantha had said, again in that quiet, unflinching tone of reason.

  The long and short of it was that Daniel Lane was to plunk his bedroll in the main house of the Triple S Sunday, and that had forced Sloan to find another place to store the skull. With the women about, Sloan would have had a hard time explaining his reason for rummaging through the upstairs closet when he had supposedly stayed behind to write checks to pay the monthly bills. Their absence from the house was the first opportunity he’d had to sneak into the guest room where he’d hidden the relic. After his marriage, he’d moved it there from the master suite he’d taken over when his father died. Tomorrow, the maids would be cleaning the guest room Daniel was to occupy, airing out drawers and wardrobes, and Sloan had had little time to think of a place where the skull would be kept dry, safe from damage, and unlikely to be discovered. There had never been a need for locks inside the house at the Triple S, not even in the study. No building outside would do. Try as he might, despite the space available in his home, Sloan could think of no other place to hide the albatross around his neck but in a storage cabinet of Christmas items never opened until the holidays. It was across from the guest room, but even considering that liability, Sloan thought it the best hiding place temporarily available. A warped jamb made the door difficult to open, and when pried loose it grated like the lid of an ancient crypt. If Daniel went on the prowl to ferret out the skull—supposing he thought the owner of the Triple S dumb enough to keep it—Sloan could depend on the noise alone to alert the whole upper floor, but he must make sure not to sleep too soundly or ever to leave Daniel alone in the house.

  If only he could get rid of the damn thing, but his conscience shook a finger at him. The relic belonged to Sam. It could be an archeological treasure. If destroyed, the likes of it might never surface again.

  His wife and sister had pleaded with him to behave to Daniel. Samantha was already disturbed by her father’s refusal to allow Nathan Holloway and Todd Baker, pariah that he was, to stay in the house at Las Tres Lomas while they mapped out the drill site. The men would have to set up a tent and cook over a campfire. They would be arriving Monday by train, and at least Neal had agreed to send a wagon to pick them up at the station
.

  “I don’t understand how Daddy can be so unreasonable and inhospitable,” Samantha had complained. “With me gone from the house, you’d think he’d welcome those men’s company and be eager to hear all about the preliminary work they’re doing at Windy Bluff.” Sloan didn’t understand Neal’s stand, either. The Gordon house could accommodate any number of guests, and Daniel could have been shuffled off over there.

  Samantha had said, “If things get too tense, we can always move over to Las Tres Lomas for the week. Daddy would love it.”

  And leave Daniel Lane with the run of the house, Sloan had thought. Never! “I’m not about to allow a man I suspect of dishonorable intentions toward my sister to drive me out of my house, Samantha, so we’re staying put,” he’d said, closing the discussion.

  As he put a shoulder to the cabinet door to push it closed when his task was completed, Sloan realized an advantage of having his sister’s lover under his roof. Daniel Lane’s presence would give him the opportunity to size up the man who claimed him to be his life’s mission.

  “Nobody better light a match,” Jeanne announced as she took her designated place with notepad and pencil in hand at the conference table of Waverling Tools. “The excitement in here is ignitable.”

  “That’s one way of putting it,” Todd said, grinning widely. “I’d describe it as electric.” He gave the table a smack. “By God, we’re moving into the oil business, folks! Next to the day I married, this is the happiest day of my life.” He winked at Nathan. “Right, buddy?”

  “How would I know?” Nathan said, once again evading Todd’s attempt to give the impression they were as close as riders on a tandem bike.

  “I hope we’re not getting excited for nothing,” Jamie Foster said, shaking his head. An extremely competent and loyal carryover from the days of the company’s founding, the plant foreman was a taciturn fellow noted for resisting change. “Digging for oil is a whole lot riskier than digging for salt and water.”

  “We can always count on you to provide drag, can’t we?” his assistant said, good-humoredly clapping the foreman’s shoulder. He grinned around the table. “What would we do without our doubting Thomas?”

  “You’d be doin’ a whole hell of a lotta leapin’ without lookin’, that’s what, son,” Jamie said.

  “I like ignitable better,” Jeanne said, the defense of her choice of diction cast irritably at the company geologist.

  “I’d call it gaseous,” Daniel said, teasingly poking the ribs of the accountant next to him. “Did you eat beans for supper last night, Norman?”

  The accountant observed Daniel as if he were a roach found in his teacup. Spidery thin, his flesh as papery as the pages upon which he meticulously recorded the company’s expenses and manner as starched as his prim white shirts, the entrenched bachelor was often the secret butt of office jokes. “I never eat beans at any time, Mr. Lane. Whatever gas is floating around must surely be emitted from your own mouth. And may I remind you a lady is present.”

  “Yes, indeed,” Jeanne said huffily, feigning offense. “Thank you, Norman, for reminding that fact to the man sitting next to you who most certainly is not a gentleman.”

  Daniel grinned and blew her a kiss.

  At the head of the table, Trevor rapped a pen against his water glass to gain their attention. He’d been studying sheets of estimated drilling expenses and had barely listened to his employees’ banter. He was used to what an outsider might observe as squabbling among his department chiefs. It was nothing new to him that Todd Baker had become persona non grata to Nathan and an irritant to Jeanne. His accountant’s prissy fussiness about financial reports invited ribbing, Daniel Lane’s coarse humor grated, and even Trevor found his faithful foreman’s incorrigible naysaying beyond endurance at times. But despite their differences, they all worked exceptionally well together, even fondly, and were eager to head into the company’s new direction regardless of the risk to the employee profit-sharing plan Trevor had instated last year. Trevor had learned early in his business career that a company’s solvency went a long way to guaranteeing an employee’s output and loyalty, and to that end he made no secret of the robust financial health of Waverling Tools. Now he was about to reduce some of the fat from its bottom line.

  “Never had no such thing before. Don’t expect to have no such thing afterward,” his pessimistic foreman had grumbled in the meeting Trevor had called to apprise his team of the risky waters into which the company was headed, and all the others had nodded their approval. Trevor had explained that while Waverling Tools would be manufacturing much of the equipment used in the drilling process, there would be the major costs of labor, pipeline and road construction, storage tank rental, and wagon and rail transportation from the drill site to the refinery in Corsicana, not to mention ancillary expenses like feeding and sheltering the dozen or so men required to work a rig.

  And then there was no guarantee the well would come in.

  But all had hopped eagerly on board with faith in Todd’s analysis for this first sortie into deep waters and hope that come December there might be an extra bonus in their company Christmas stockings. Trevor hoped that none around the table had seen his gulp when he looked at the new table of expenses his accountant had prepared. Railroad transport fees had gone up. The Texas and Pacific was charging more for oil tankers, since they were in short supply. The teamster company Trevor had hired to haul the oil to its destination insisted on placing a clause in the contract calling for compensation for animal injury. The manufacturer of storage tubs had increased its prices. For the time being, these particular cost hikes were a moot point if no oil was discovered at Windy Bluff, but he, too, shared in his employees’ highly charged expectations for the company’s future. How much of it had to do with his daughter living on the land he was set to drill—the opportunity it would provide to see her again—he could not have said, but there was an extra note of optimism in his voice when he addressed the now-attentive group.

  “Gentlemen and lady,” he said, nodding at Jeanne, “I know it’s late to call a meeting on a Friday afternoon, but I believe today, September seventh, 1900, marks the end of Waverling Tools as we’ve known it, and Monday will begin the company as it will come to be known. As Todd says, we’re going into the oil business, not only to manufacture the tools and equipment essential to the industry, but to dig for the stuff ourselves. I believe we are on the eve of an unprecedented experience in Texas, one that will change our state as we know it, maybe even our lives. At the end of your reports, I will have Miss Beardsley haul out the champagne to toast our new beginnings. We have much to raise our glasses to.”

  Good to his promise, after the last item of business was concluded, Miss Beardsley appeared with a tray laden with tall flutes of champagne. Trevor lifted his glass, never again to drink the sparkling wine without remembering the prophecy he uttered that would soon come to pass.

  Chapter Sixty-Six

  On Saturday morning, September eighth, Nathan woke to a disquietude whose source eluded him. When he lived on the farm, he could blame this kind of disturbance on his farmer’s extra sense of perception. Something was coming. It was in the atmosphere. Hail, wind, flood? Locusts? Fire? An accident to human or animal? At such times, with his thumbs hooked in the straps of his overalls, he went outside to smell the air and listen to the wind, scrutinize the skies, and inspect the ground. His presentiments sometimes proved to be tricksters. They were not always true to him, but he never dismissed their warnings as unfounded. The calamities that failed to materialize did not mean they had not been of a mind to strike. They had simply diverted course, like the unseen rattlesnake that slithers off into the bush before an unsuspecting foot can feel its fangs.

  It’s a sort of sixth sense that comes from the farmer’s honed mistrust of Mother Nature, son, especially when the old girl has been exceptionally kind, Leon once explained. The wavin’ fields of wheat we see today might lie flattened by her hand tomorrow.

  Th
ere were no fields of wheat to rouse his instincts here in this house in the city with the sounds of Saturday traffic floating in through his open window, Nathan thought. To shake free of his uneasy mood, he thought of Charlotte—he’d see her at her party tomorrow night—and the sparring match he’d have later this morning with his father. Nathan chuckled. He didn’t know Charlotte well at all, but if she should be privy to his thoughts, he imagined her putting her pretty hands on her slim hips and saying in mock horror, Nathan Holloway! You mean to say you thought of me in the same category as smelly old boxing gloves? And he fantasized drawing her into his arms and saying, Only because you both connect with the same punch.

  Zak licked his face. Time to get up. Nathan let the dog outside through a hall door opening to an exterior set of stairs and heard the raucous cry of birds. Stepping out onto the landing, he looked up and saw a large formation of seagulls heading north. Benjy, in an undershirt, his suspenders down about his hips and his face lathered in shaving cream, had come out onto his apartment’s small balcony on top of the carriage house, apparently attracted by the noise. He saw Nathan and hollered, “They must have come from the coast. Wonder what’s up down there?”

  “I think a tropical storm must be headed that way,” Nathan hollered back. “Telegraph and telephone lines were down in Florida and Louisiana last week.”