That had also been the day when Propulsion Research common stock dropped from 67½ to 9¼ in four hours on the New York Exchange. The government had dropped three big P-R contracts in favor of the O’Neil Drive. Devil’s Head never got off another run. Propulsion Research went: into receivership five months later. Enright had seen his beloved test stand equipment and machine tools auctioned off. It left him a broken man, his life shattered and sold to the highest bidder.
He turned off at the tracks and wailed while a fast freight passed, its turbine locomotive howling at him with a sound akin to that of his beloved rockets. Beating his way through strings of empty freight cars in the marshaling yards, he wound his way around a smoldering slag heap from a nearby smelter and started down the muddy flats of the Platte River.
There was a light glowing in his shack he noted as he reached it.
He didn’t remember having left it on, but he’d gone out in a hurry for that drink at Marlin’s. He realized he was getting forgetful lately. Have to watch it after this. Shrugging, he pushed open the door and went in.
A stocky, heavy-set man got up from a box in the corner. His pugnacious Irish features were set in a halfsmile. “Hello, Henry. I knew you’d come back if I waited long enough.”
Enright stopped dead, his hand still on the door. He shook his head violently, thinking the alcohol was making him see things again. But the man didn’t disappear. Throwing the door open again, Enright made a quick jerk of his head. “Get out! You’ve got no business here!” he snapped at Bill O’Neil.
“I’ve got something for you, Henry. I spent a week trying to find you to give it to you.” O’Neil’s manner was quiet. He didn’t move from where he was.
“I don’t want anything you’ve got! Get out!” Enright shouted.
O’Neil folded his arms and rocked back on his heels, making no move toward the open door. “Henry, stop thinking you’re the boss. You never were, and you’re not now. You’re just an ordinary Larimer Street bum full of booze.” O’Neil had changed in the last two years. His language had improved somewhat, and he had the assured manner that signifies one has matched wits with the most powerful men in the world on equal ground. “I didn’t come here to help you, because it seems you don’t want to be helped. But I came here to give you something, and I’m not leaving until you get it.”
“I said, get out!”