The Glass Inferno

CHAPTER 19

Thelma and Jenny had shown up and Barton and Leroux, not wishing to talk business in front of them, had gone for a stroll on the promenade.

There were still ten minutes before their table would be ready.

Time enough to ask Leroux questions that Quantrell’s TV program had brought up-more than time, probably; considering how crowded the room was and that nobody was in a hurry to venture back outside. The table would undoubtedly be late anyway-and with less tension and hostility on Leroux’s part, Barton was beginning to enjoy himself. He was inside where it was warm and smelled pleasantly of food, and relaxed enough to admire the beauty of the soft snow drifting past the windows. It was almost a ghost snow-light, puffy flakes that clung to the glass for a moment before dissolving into tears of water that trickled down out of sight.

“Craig, you’ve been around architecture and construction long enough to realize there’s no such thing as a fireproof building, the best we can build is a fire-resistant one,” Leroux was saying. “Almost anything will burn; it all depends on how hot it gets. That’s your basic premise. After that, we get into time-how long will a piece of wood or a strip of rug resist charring, resist breaking into open flame? And at what temperature? Almost anything that goes into any building has a fire rating-it’s the law. And then there are building codes that every construction firm has to follow. We’re no different from the others.

We do our best to compete; we cut unnecessary corners and frills -that’s the name of the game. But we don’t break the law. The city has inspectors; the Fire Department has inspectors; the insurance companies have inspectors. If they don’t’ approve of the construction of one of our buildings, we can’t open it up for tenancy. It’s as simple as that.”

Barton swirled his drink for a moment and thought that it was anything but as simple as that. Leroux was pitching him and he wondered why the older man was making the effort.

“What about insurance trade offs? Quantrell implied that a builder could completely sprinkler his building, for example, and perhaps get a reduced rate from the insurance company that would help pay for the sprinkler system. True?”

Leroux laughed. “That’s almost a knee-slapper. He might actually find his insurance rates going up; there’s always the chance that something will set off the sprinklers accidentally and if they’re in a shop area with goods below, you’ve got one expensive, unholy mess on your hands. And few tenants would go for unsightly dropheads in their ceiling. What might happen is that you might get trade offs from the city in the form of relaxation of other parts of the fire code. For the majority of high rises, however, there’s not much chance of lower insurance rates.

Insurance is dirt cheap to begin with-there are something like four hundred companies out there bidding for your business. Frankly, the annual light-bulb bill for the Glass House will run to more than our annual insurance premiums.”

Barton drained his glass. Good, but they had included everything but ice cream in his Ramos fizz. He signaled for another. “How come it’s so cheap?”

Leroux looked angry. “Because, despite everything that Mr. Quantrell implies, fires in high-rise buildings are scarcer than tits on a boar hog. Sure, they happen-so do airplane crashes.

But, relatively speaking, the annual fatalities are so low as to be nonexistent. How much insurance can you buy for fifty cents at the local airport fifteen thousand dollars’ worth?” He calmed a little.

“All the public areas in the Glass House are sprinklered-they have to be. Install them throughout an entire building and the expense would be so high you’d no longer be competitive. Sears Roebuck did it in their headquarters building, as much for public image as for safety.

But we’re not Sears -at least not this year,” Maybe he was tired, maybe it was because Leroux was trying too hard, but Barton didn’t feel convinced.

“Craig, look out there. That building about two o’clock to your right, the one with the small red beacon on top.

The Penobscot Building. National Curtainwall was the developer there. And on your left, about the same relative position-the Hanson Building is ours, too. There are half a dozen more in town, all ours.”

For a moment he was lost in thought. “In a sense, Craig, we’re the original ecologists. Mankind can’t go on expanding his living space forever, cutting down forests and leveling the hills. Los Angeles houses a population two thirds that of Chicago in twice its space. We can’t afford suburbia forever; we have to get back to the city, the city that was invented as a trading center, as a manufacturing center, designed so the worker could be close to his job.” He flicked the ash off his cigar. “We build cities, Craig-it’s not a mean occupation.”

He wasn’t Caesar after all, Barton thought. He was Ramses; he was a pyramid builder.

“You mentioned earlier that you had seen Joe Moore’s project,” Leroux said. “Do you know what’s behind it?”

Barton suddenly felt stone sober. “No, but I’d like to.

For some strange reason, Wyn, I can’t see a country full of replicas of the Glass House.”

Leroux smiled. “You might see one or two, probably no more than that-local conditions vary too much from city to city. But I wouldn’t deny that you’ll see some that are remarkably similar, that might differ only in external detailing or such things as size of site, height-you could list the variables.

And you’ll see parts of it incorporated in buildings that might, to the untrained eye, seem radically different. I wish I could claim the original idea but a hotel chain beat me to it. Their flagship hotels are all designed after the same general model-a shell of rooms surrounding an enormous interior lobby, complete with ‘outside’ elevators running the height of the lobby, fountains,. plaza-type restaurants, the works. The lobbies may vary in size and shape but they’re still the same idea. For the most part, the basic problems of cantilevered floors and the like have all been figured out; you make the modifications you want and the building goes up in nothing flat.”

Leroux was leading up to, something, Barton thought uneasily. He had said earlier that he couldn’t do without him, which was ridiculous, but there had to be a reason why Leroux thought so.

“Construction is a hazardous occupation financially,” Leroux continued. “It’s one where time is-often the most critical factor. As a developer, we first have to arrange for interim financing, usually with a bank or a real estate investment trust, where the interest rates are high-banks don’t like to tie up their capital for long periods of time, for one thing. And the building itself represents a risk, it exists only on paper and a lot of things can go wrong between the rendering and the completed project. God help you if you run into trouble putting in your foundations, for example. When the building is finished, we arrange for permanent financing, usually with an insurance company.

The finished building is much less of a risk and the rates are lower.

One of your obvious expenses, of course, is how long you tie up the initial capital.”

“You taught me all of that in the first six months,” Barton said shortly. “You’ve been a good teacher.”

It was Leroux’s Turn to signal ‘for another drink.

“Developers and builders naturally try to beat the problem. The first thing was to junk the traditional method of acquiring the site, having the architectural firm prepare a complete set of working drawings, then calling for bids.

Unfortunately, there’s the time factor-the time to turn out the drawings, the time required for contractors to plow through all the drawings to make their. bids. You can lose six months, perhaps close to a year. So most high rises are ‘scope’ jobs or built by ‘fast-track’ methods. You usually don’t ask for bids. As soon as the initial shape is pinned down, we start construction of the basic building the foundation, frame, skin, basic mechanical, the core with the fire stairs, elevators, and the like. You work from the shell inward, essentially doing a lot of your designing at the same time you’re building, though granted that much of your basic designing may have been done before the rendering. You do an estimate of the quantity of materials you’d need, even though you may not have decided on a specific use for them at the time of the estimate. There’s an element of waste involved but you save on the most valuable commodity of all-time.”

“You’re leading up to something, Wyn; what is it?”

“The idea is to have a proven product, Craig, like the hotel chain I mentioned. Or the Glass House. It’s beautiful building; we’ll market it in various permutations and combinations-again, like the hotels.

But because there’s so little risk with a proven product, there’s no need for risk capital, for interim, financing, and the high interest rates. You eliminate the middle man financially. Which cuts the expense of the building to the eventual owner.”

“The only thing he doesn’t get is something that’s uniquely his own,” Barton said bitterly. “Something that’s an expression of his own corporation or business.”

Leroux waved his hand at the skyline. “There are a lot of buildings out there, Craig. How many of them strike you as beautiful?

One out of ten perhaps? Or is that a highly inflated figure?

What’s wrong with a Glass House here and a slightly different version of it in Milwaukee?

Nobody lives in two cities at the same time; the natives would hardly be offended.”

Leroux had sold Moore on the idea, Barton thought.

That’s what he had sensed and that’s what Moore hadn’t wanted to admit-that he had actually considered Leroux’s idea to be a good one.

“You’re telling me this for a reason, Wyn. I gather there’s some role you have in mind that I’m supposed to play?”

“That’s right.” Leroux suddenly looked troubled, unsure of himself because of Barton’s lack of enthusiastic response. “This isn’t something that’s going to happen several years from now; it’s in the works already. United Insurance has agreed to finance all National Curtainwall buildings-at permanent financing rates. We’ll be developer, designer, do the general contracting, decorate, and manage.

We’ll be hard to beat.”

“We’ll Turn out buildings like GM turns out cars, that it?

Complete with a five-year guarantee?”

“That’s one way of looking at it,” Leroux said coldly.

“It isn’t mine.”

“And me?”

“You were right earlier-I don’t need your talents as an architect …

I already bought those. I need managerial talent; I need somebody to help me run the show. I hand-picked you and I hand-trained you during the last two years. You’re the man I want-you’re the only man I’ve had time enough to teach. That was probably a mistake” Barton turned back to the window. Opportunity …

again. New title, new salary, success with a capital “S” because if Leroux had figured it right, in a few years National Curtainwall would be one of the largest developers in the country. But opportunity had come when he didn’t want it, when he had already made up his mind as to what he was going to do. Leroux kept opening doors for him that he didn’t want to walk through.

“The concept isn’t quite as narrow as you might think,” Leroux continued persuasively. “The Glass House is only one example; there’ll be other … models, if you like.”

The snowflakes were getting finer, Barton thought idly, and coming -down with greater force.. The wind must really be howling around the building.

“It’s a big job,” Leroux added, irritated. “Maybe you’re not a big enough man for it.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, Wyn, cut it out-I’m not twenty-one years old.

I didn’t say I wouldn’t take it. I want time to think it over.” Jenny would be delighted, he thought bitterly.

Suddenly Quinn was at their elbow, saying softly: “Your table’s ready now-would you follow me, please?”

She was pleasant but decidedly formal, probably because of the presence of Leroux, Barton thought.

They followed her into the dining room where Thelma and Jenny were already seated. Barton gave his drink order-black coffee and preferably immediately-and squeezed Jenny’s hand. She was unresponsive and distant, a slim, dark-haired girl in her middle twenties whose classic beauty was marred only by a too-thin nose. At one time, Barton thought morosely, she was full of life, relaxed and outgoing. That had been one of the things that had attracted him to her; in so many ways she had been like Quinn, only a younger version. Tonight, as usual lately, she was withdrawn and remote; she wouldn’t have ten words to say throughout the entire meal.

He turned his attention to Thelma Leroux. The enigma in Leroux’s life, he thought. A woman he would probably never quite understand, but one whom he instinctively respected. Younger than Leroux, though perhaps not by much. Like Wyndom, she was from North Carolina and still possessed a lingering trace of southern accent and charm. A naturally warm, self-confident woman who had somehow endowed matronhood with sensuality. She was slightly chubby-just enough to prevent the crepe from forming under her throat-with pale, smooth skin and frost-tinged hair. And despite her sophistication, there was still an earthiness about her. She could probably mingle with construction foremen as easily as with dowagers and still be herself, he thought.

“You know,” Thelma said, “as long as the building’s been open, I’ve never eaten here.”

“That’s Wyn’s fault,” Barton said. “He should have taken you here long before now. Curtainwall could even pick up the tab as a business expense.”

“Like hell it could,” Leroux interrupted. “The IRS watches us like a hawk.”

“It’s a beautiful place, Craig, and the service seems delightful, too.” Thelma’s eyes sparkled with a hint of mischief. “The hostess seemed to know you. Is she somebody out of your past?”

Barton smiled. “Quinn’s an old friend I once dated a long time ago-before I met Jenny.”

“How long before, Craig?” Jenny’s voice was small and stiff and there was sudden silence at the table.

“As a matter of fact,” Barton said curtly, “just before I met you.

You and she were much alike-I told you about Quinn.”

“She seems older than I had expected,” Jenny said coolly.

“More mature,” Barton corrected shortly. Irritated, he whipped his place napkin off the table, his elbow knocking over the carafe of water in the process. It shattered on the floor and he swore softly to himself, almost not hearing Thelma’s quiet “There’s no damage, Craig-the waitress shouldn’t have left it so near the edge.” Quinn was already sending over a bus boy with a small broom and several napkins to soak up the water.

Barton turned to the table behind him at which a middle-aged, rather stout woman and an elderly, dapper man were sitting. “I’m sorry if you were splashed, I’ll make good the cleaning….

“No, no, I wouldn’t think of it,” the woman said, smiling. “It’s only water. Mein lieber Gott-think how wet we would be if we were outside! Isn’t that right, Harlee?”

“Quite right, my dear. Don’t trouble yourself ‘ sir, it’s trilling, I assure you.” He was brushing at some spots on his suit and there was a tone in his voice that made Barton wonder if his response would have been the same if his wife hadn’t spoken up first.

He turned back to the table. It was going to be a long night, he thought, and Jenny had apparently made up her mind to make it even longer.

“It must have been rough flying weather today,” Thelma was saying, spreading a thin oil of conversation over the troubled waters. “Or does the weather bother you when you fly? I know it would me, particularly if I had to leave San Francisco to come here.”

Barton couldn’t help smiling. Thelma.into the breach, he thought.

He envied Leroux.