The Day the Rabbi Resigned Read Free Page B

where your people hold the majority of the stock. In a nonprofit institution like a college, the members of the board aren’t there because they own a certain number of shares. They’re there because they are presumed to be important people or to come from important families. Some of them even inherit their places on the board.”
    â€œCome, come, you mean their fathers will the seats to them?”
    â€œOf course not, but what frequently happens is that when John Whatsis the Second, the president of the Geewhiz Corporation dies, and John Whatsis the Third takes over, he’s apt to be offered his father’s place on the boards of the various charitable institutions that his father had held, at least the smaller ones. Right now, I have a majority, but it’s a bare majority.”
    â€œAnd with me, you’d have a comfortable majority?”
    â€œIt will be better, but not yet enough to give me full control. Because for certain things—and changing the name of the college is one of them—I need a two-thirds majority.”
    â€œYou realize, Don, you can’t count on me to make a financial contribution, not while you’re Windermere Christian. Every Jewish organization would be on my back for donations or to increase the sums I’ve already given.”
    â€œBelieve me, I understand.”
    â€œAll right, as long as you understand, I’ll come aboard. Will that give you your two-thirds majority?”
    â€œNo … It would have, but you see, sometimes you make a mistake. When we were expanding by buying up all the old brownstone front houses on Clark Street, I found a Cyrus Merton, a very knowledgeable realtor who proved to be extremely helpful. He had entrée to any number of banks for mortgage money, and he’s a genius at financing. So I asked him to serve on the board. He was very pleased and accepted.”
    â€œAnd he didn’t work out?”
    â€œOh, he became one of our most active members. He is semiretired and has plenty of time for us. He’s chairman of our Faculty Committee and spends a lot of time around the school.”
    â€œBut?”
    â€œHe backs me in almost everything, except the name change. He’s a very devout Catholic, fanatic, according to Charlie Dobson, another Catholic on our board. It is the Christian in our name that attracted him to the school. And from his point of view, the fact that we’re not denominational made it all the more important that we retain the name.”
    â€œAnd my coming on the board?”
    â€œWill probably please him,” said Macomber promptly. “To him it will signify that while all faiths are represented, the institution is essentially Christian.”
    â€œBut the two-thirds—”
    â€œWith you on the board, we’re close, but not there yet. He’s the leader of the opposition, and as long as he keeps his troops in line, he can stop us. But they’re not all as adamant as he, and if we can detach just one, we’ll be home free.”

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    At sixty-five Cyrus Merton was a wealthy man. Shortly after graduating from high school, he had got a job in a small real estate office in Dorchester, a suburb of Boston, where he had grown up, as a typist/file clerk, which included whatever else had to be done in the office, such as sweeping and dusting, running out for coffee and doughnuts, and delivering documents to banks and the Registry of Deeds. By the time he was twenty-two, however, he was showing properties to clients, and he even received a percentage of the commission when he occasionally succeeded in closing a deal. By the time he was twenty-five, he had a broker’s license and had opened his own office.
    He was not too successful, was struggling, in fact, until by chance he met a high school classmate who had gone on to a seminary and was now Father Joseph Tierney, a curate at St. Thomas’s in Barnard’s Crossing. It was through him that Cyrus